1. Bow down thine ear, O Lord,
hear me. When our prayers are lowly by
reason of our humility, or feeble by reason of our sickness, or without wing by
reason of our despondency, the Lord will bow down to them. Faith, when she has
the loftiest name of God on her tongue, and calls him Jehovah, yet dares to ask
from him the most tender and condescending acts of love. Great as he is he
loves his children to be bold with him. For I am poor and needy. Our
distress is a forcible reason for our being heard by the Lord God, merciful,
and gracious, for misery is ever the master argument with mercy. Such reasoning
as this would never be adopted by a proud man. Of all despicable sinners those
are the worst who use the language of spiritual poverty while they think
themselves to be rich and increased in goods.
2. Preserve my soul.
Let my life be safe from my enemies, and my spiritual nature be secure from
their temptations. For I am holy. I am set apart for holy uses;
therefore do not let thine enemies commit a sacrilege by injuring or defiling
me: I am clear of the crimes laid to my charge, and in that sense innocent;
therefore, I beseech thee, do not allow me to suffer from unjust charges; and I
am gentle towards others, therefore deal mercifully with me as I have dealt
with my fellow-men. Any of these renderings may explain the text; perhaps all
together will expound it best. It is not self-righteous in good people to plead
their innocence as a reason for escaping from the results of sins wrongfully
ascribed to them; penitents do not bedaub themselves with mire for the love of
it, or make themselves out to be worse than they are. To plead guilty to
offenses we have never committed is as great a lie as the denial of our real
faults. O thou my God, save thy servant that trusteth in thee. Lest
anyone should suppose that David trusted in his own holiness he immediately
declared his trust in the Lord, and begged to be saved as one who was not holy
in the sense of being perfect, but was even yet in need of the very elements of
salvation. How sweet is the title my God when joined to the other, thy
servant; and how sweet is the hope that on this ground we shall be saved.
Note how David’s poor I am (or rather the I repeated without the)
appeals to the great I AM with sacred boldness engendered by necessity, aided
by the faith which removes mountains.
3. Be merciful to me, O Lord. The best people need mercy, and appeal to mercy. For I
cry unto thee daily. Is there not a promise that importunity will prevail?
He who prays every day, and all the day, for so the word may mean, may rest
assured that the Lord will hear him. If we cried sometimes to man, or other
false confidences, we might expect to be referred to them in the hour of our
calamity, but if in all former times we have looked to the Lord alone, we may
be sure that he will not desert us now.
4. Rejoice the soul of thy servant. Make my heart glad, for I count it my honor to call myself
thy servant, and I reckon thy favor to be all the wages I could desire. I look
for all my happiness in thee only, and therefore unto thee, O Lord, do I
lift up my soul. Thou art as the brazen serpent to my sick nature, and I
lift up my soul’s eye to thee that I may live. I know that the nearer I am to
thee the greater is my joy; therefore be pleased to draw me nearer while I am
laboring to draw near. It needs a strong shoulder at the wheel when a heart
sticks in the miry clay of despondency; but the Lord will take the will for the
deed, and come in with a hand of almighty grace to raise his poor servant out
of the earth and up to heaven.
5. For thou, Lord, art good, and ready to forgive. Good at giving and forgiving; supplying us with his
good, and removing our evil. Some men who would be considered good are
so self-exaltingly indignant at the injuries done them by others that they
cannot forgive; but the better a being is, the more willing he is to forgive,
and the best and highest of all is ever ready to blot out the transgressions of
his creatures. And plenteous in mercy unto all them that call upon thee.
God does not dispense his mercy from a store so impoverished as to give out
altogether, but his goodness flows abundantly. In two places in this psalm
David almost quotes word for word the passage in Exodus 34:6.
6. Give ear, O Lord,
unto my prayer. Even the glory which his spirit had
beheld did not withdraw him from his prayer, but rather urged him to be more
fervent in it; hence he implores the Lord to hear his requests. Note the
expression the voice of my supplications, as if they were not all voice
but were partly inarticulate noise, yet amid much that was superfluous there
really was an inner meaning which was the heart’s intention. This he would have
the Lord sift out from the chaff, and hear amid the mingled din. May our soul’s
intent always give our prayers a live core of meaning.
7. A pious
resolve backed by a judicious reason. It is useless to cry to those who cannot
or will not hear. Our experience confirms us in the belief that Jehovah the
living God really does aid those who call upon him, and therefore we pray
because we really find it to be a practical and effectual means of obtaining
help from God in the hour of need. There can be no reason for praying if there
be no expectation of the Lord’s answering.
8. Among the gods there is none like unto thee, O Lord. There are gods by delegated office, such as kings and
magistrates, but they are as nothing in the presence of Jehovah; there are also
gods by the nomination of superstition, but these are vanity itself, and cannot
be compared with the living and true God. Neither are there any works like
unto thy works. What have the false gods ever made or unmade? What miracles
have they wrought?
9. All nations whom thou hast made, and these include all mankind, since they all come of the
first Adam, thy creature, and their lives are all distinct creations of thine
omnipotence. All these shall come with penitent hearts, in thine own
way, to thine own self, and worship before thee, O Lord. Because thou
art thus above all gods, people will at last discover thy greatness, and will
render thee the worship which is thy due. This was David’s reason for resorting
to the Lord in trouble. It makes us content to be in the minority today, when
we are sure that the majority will be with us tomorrow. David was not a
believer in the theory that the world will grow worse and worse, and that the
dispensation will wind up with general darkness and idolatry. We look for a day
when the dwellers in all lands worship thee alone, O God, and shall glorify
thy name.
10. For thou art great.
It is only in the Divine Being that either greatness or goodness exists
absolutely, and essentially. To be great and not good might lead to tyranny in
the King, and for him to be good and not great might involve countless
calamities. And doest wondrous things. Being good, he is said to be
ready to forgive; being great, he works wonders; we may blend the two, for
there is no wonder so wonderful as the pardon of our transgressions. Even the
commonest daisy is a marvel, and a pebble enshrines wisdom. Only to fools is
anything which God has made uninteresting. Note that the verb doest is
in the present: the Lord is doing wondrous things, they are transpiring before
our eyes. Look upon the bursting buds of spring or the maturing fruits of
autumn, gaze on the sky or skim the sea, mark the results of providence and the
victories of grace. Thou art God alone. Our God is not to be worshiped
as one among many good and true beings, but as God alone; his gospel is not to
be preached as one of several saving systems, but as the sole way of salvation.
11. Teach me thy way, O Lord. Instruct me thus at all times, but teach me now especially
since I am in trouble and perplexity. Show me the way which thy wisdom and
mercy have prepared for my escape. Not my way give me, but thy
way teach me; I would follow thee and not be willfull. I will walk in thy
truth. When taught I will practice what I know; truth will not be a mere
doctrine or sentiment to me, but a matter of daily life.
Unite my heart to fear thy name. Having taught me one way, give me one heart to walk
therein, for too often I feel two natures contending. God who created the bands
of our nature can draw them together, tighten, strengthen, and fasten them, and
so we shall be powerful for good, but not otherwise.
12. I will praise thee, O Lord my God, with all my heart. Praise should never be rendered with less than all our
heart, and soul, and strength, or it will be both unreal and unacceptable. This
is the second time in the psalm that David calls the Lord my God; the
first time he was in an agony of prayer (verse 2), and now he is in an ecstasy
of praise. If anything can make a man pray and praise, it is the knowledge that
the Lord is his God. And I will glorify thy name for evermore. God has
never done blessing us; let us never have done blessing him.
13. For great is thy mercy toward me. Personal experience is ever the master singer. Whatever
thou art to others, to me thy mercy is most notable. And thou hast delivered
my soul from the lowest hell. David had been kept by God, for his enemies
would have done more than send him to hell had they been able. His sense of sin
also made him feel as if the most overwhelming destruction would have been his
portion had not grace prevented. There are some alive now who can use this
language unfeignedly, and he who pens these lines most humbly confesses that he
is one. Left to myself to indulge my passions, to rush onward with my natural
vehemence, what a candidate for the lowest abyss should I have made myself by
this time.
The psalmist here again touches a bold and joyful note, but
soon he exchanges it for the mournful song.
14. O God, the proud are risen against me. His walk with God was as smoke to their eyes, and therefore
they determined to destroy him. And the assemblies of violent men have
sought after my soul. They hunted in packs, with keen scent, and eager
foot. And have not set thee before them. They would not have molested
the servant if they had cared for the Master. Those who fear not God are not
afraid to commit violent and cruel acts.
15. But thou, O Lord.
What a contrast! We get away from the blusterings of proud but puny people to
the glory and goodness of the Lord. Art a God full of compassion, and
gracious, long-suffering, and plenteous in mercy and truth. A truly
glorious doxology, mainly from Exodus 34:6. Here is compassion for the weak
and sorrowing, grace for the undeserving, long-suffering for the provoking,
mercy for the guilty, and truth for the tried. Are we sorrowful? We find the
Lord full of compassion. Are we contending with temptation? His grace comes to
our aid. Do we err? He is patient with us. Have we sinned? He is plenteous in
mercy. Are we resting on his promise? He will fulfill it with abundant truth.
16. O turn unto me.
One turn of God’s face will turn all our darkness into day. And have mercy
upon me. That is all he asks, for he is lowly in heart; that is all he
wants, for mercy answers all a sinner’s needs. Give thy strength unto thy
servant. Gird me with it that I may serve thee; guard me with it that I may
not be overcome. When the Lord gives us his own strength we are sufficient for
all emergencies, and have no cause to fear any adversaries. And save the son
of thine handmaid. As the sons of slaves were their master’s property by
their birth, so he gloried in being the son of a woman who herself belonged to
the Lord. What others might think a degrading illustration he uses with
delight, to show how intensely he loved the Lord’s service.
17. Show me a token for good. Let me be assured of thy mercy by being delivered out of
trouble. That they which hate me may see it, and be ashamed. What bodes
good to me will make them quail and blush. Disappointed and defeated, the foes
of the good man would feel ashamed of what they had designed. Because thou, Lord, hast helped me, and comforted me.
God does nothing by halves; those whom he helps he also consoles, and so makes
them not merely safe but joyful. Lord, deal thus with us evermore; so shall we
glorify thee.
Excerpt from:
The Treasury of David
By Charles H Spurgeon
