1. It is a good thing to give thanks unto the Lord, or
Jehovah. It is good ethically, for
it is the Lord’s right; it is good emotionally, for it is pleasant to the
heart; it is good practically, for it leads others to render the same homage.
To give thanks to God is but a small return for the great benefits wherewith he
daily loads us; yet as he by his Spirit calls it a good thing, we must not
despise it, or neglect it. We thank people when they oblige us; how much more
ought we to bless the Lord when he benefits us. Devout praise is always good;
it is never out of season, never superfluous, but it is especially suitable to
the Sabbath; a Sabbath without thanksgiving is a Sabbath profaned. And to
sing praises unto thy name, O most High. It is good to give thanks in the
form of vocal song. Nature itself teaches us thus to express our gratitude to
God; do not the birds sing, and the brooks warble as they flow? To give our
gratitude a tongue is wise. Silent worship is sweet, but vocal worship is
sweeter.
2. To show forth thy lovingkindness in the morning. The day should begin with praise: no hour is too early for
holy song. We leave unpleasant tasks as long as we can, but our hearts are so
engrossed with the adoration of God that we would rise early to attend to it. And
thy faithfulness every night. No hour is too late for praise; the end of
the day must not be the end of gratitude. Evening is the time for retrospect,
memory is busy with the experience of the day; hence the appropriate theme for
song is the divine faithfulness, of which another day has furnished
fresh evidences. Every night, clouded or clear, moonlit or dark, calm or
tempestuous, is alike suitable for a song upon the faithfulness of God, since
in all seasons, and under all circumstances, it abides the same, and is the
mainstay of the believer’s consolation.
3. Upon an instrument of ten strings. With the fullest range of music, uttering before God with
the full compass of melody the richest emotions of his soul. And upon the
psaltery, thus giving variety to praise: the psalmist felt that every
sweet-sounding instrument should be consecrated to God. George Herbert and
Martin Luther aided their private devotions by instrumental music; and whatever
may have been the differences of opinion in the Christian church, as to the
performance of instrumental music in public, we have met with no objection to
its personal and private use. Upon the harp with a solemn sound, or upon
“meditation with a harp”; as much as to say, my meditative soul is, after
all, the best instrument, and the harp’s dulcet tones come in to aid my
thoughts. It is, however, much to be feared that attention to the mere
mechanism of music, noting keys and strings, measures and quarter notes, has
carried many away from the spiritual harmony which is the soul and essence of
praise. Fine music without devotion is but a splendid garment upon a corpse.
4. For thou, Lord, hast made me glad through thy work. It was natural for the psalmist to sing, because he was
glad, and to sing unto the Lord, because his gladness was caused by a
contemplation of the divine work. If we consider either creation or providence,
we shall find overflowing reasons for joy; but when we come to review the work
of redemption, gladness knows no bounds. I will triumph in the works of thy
hands. I cannot help it, I must rejoice in the Lord, even as one who has
won the victory and has divided great spoil. In the first sentence of this
verse he expresses the unity of God’s work, and in the second the
variety of his works; in both there is reason for gladness and triumph.
5. O Lord, how
great are thy works! He is lost in wonder. Great for
number, extent, and glory and design are all the creations of the Infinite One.
And thy thoughts are very deep. The Lord’s plans are as profound as his
doings are vast. Some people think but cannot work, and others are mere drudges
working without thought; in the Eternal the conception and the execution go
together. Providence is inexhaustible, and the divine decrees which originate
it are inscrutable. Redemption is grand beyond conception, and the thoughts of
love which planned it are infinite. Human beings are superficial, God is deep.
We stand by the fathomless sea of divine wisdom, and exclaim with holy awe,
“Oh the depth!”
6. In this
and the following verses the effect of the psalm is heightened by contrast.
Alas, the character described here is no uncommon one. The boorish or boarish
man, for such is almost the very Hebrew word, sees nothing in nature, and if it
be pointed out to him, his foolish mind will not comprehend it. The unbelieving
heart does not know; and with all its parade of intellect, it does not
understand. O God, how sorrowful a thing it is that people whom thou hast so
largely gifted, and made in thine own image, should so brutify themselves that
they will neither see nor understand what thou hast made so clear.
7. When the wicked spring as the grass, in abundance, and apparent strength, hastening on their
progress like verdant plants, which come to perfection in a day, and when
all the workers of iniquity do flourish, flowering in their prime and
pride, their pomp and their prosperity; it is that they shall be destroyed
for ever. They flower for a short space to wither without end. Greatness
and glory are to them but the prelude of their overthrow. Little does their
opposition matter; the Lord reigns on as if they had never blasphemed him. The
Most High is unaffected by the fleeting mortals who dare oppose him: they will
soon vanish forever from among the living. But as for the wicked—how can our
minds endure the contemplation of their doom for ever? Destruction for
ever is a portion far too terrible for the mind to realize. Eye hath not
seen, nor ear heard, the full terror of the wrath to come!
8. This is
the middle verse of the psalm, and the great fact which this Sabbath song is meant
to illustrate. God is at once the highest and most enduring of all beings.
Others rise to fall, but he is the Most High to eternity. The ungodly are
destroyed forever, and God is most high forever; evil is cast down, and the
Holy One reigns supreme eternally.
9. For, lo, thine enemies, O Lord. It is a
wonder full of instruction and warning, observe it; for, lo, thine enemies
shall perish, they shall be known no more. In that the thing is spoken
twice it is confirmed by the Lord; it shall surely be, and that speedily. All
the workers of iniquity shall be scattered. Their forces will be dispersed,
their hopes broken and themselves driven hither and thither like chaff before
the tempest. They will not have the courage to remain in arms, nor the unity to
abide in confederacy. Terrible as this fact is, no true-hearted person would
wish to have it otherwise. Treason against the great Monarch of the universe
ought not to go unpunished; such wanton wickedness richly merits the severest
doom.
10. But my horn shalt thou exalt like the horn of an
unicorn. The believer rejoices that he will
not be allowed to perish, but will be strengthened and enabled to triumph over
his enemies, by the divine aid. The unicorn may have been some gigantic ox or
buffalo now unknown, and perhaps extinct—among the ancients it was the favorite
symbol of unconquerable power; the psalmist adopts it as his emblem. Faith
takes delight in foreseeing the mercy of the Lord, and sings of what he will do
as well as of what he has done. I shall be anointed with fresh oil.
Strengthening will be attended with refreshment and honor. As guests were
anointed at feasts with perfumed unguents, so shall the saints be cheered and
delighted by fresh outpourings of divine grace; and for this reason they will
not pass away like the wicked. Observe the contrast between the happiness of
the brutish people and the joy of the righteous: the brutish grow with a sort
of vegetable vigor of their own, but the righteous are dealt with by the Lord
himself, and all the good which they receive comes directly from his own right
hand, and so is doubly precious in their esteem. The psalmist speaks in the
first person, and it should be a matter of prayer with the reader that he may
be enabled to do the same.
11. Mine eye also shall see my desire on mine enemies. The words my desire, inserted by the translators,
had far better have been left out. He does not say what he should see
concerning his enemies; he leaves that blank, and we have no right to fill in
the vacant space with words which look vindictive. He would see that which
would be for God’s glory, and that which would be eminently right and just. And
mine ears shall hear my desire of the wicked that rise up against me. Here,
again, the words my desire are not inspired, and are a needless and
perhaps a false interpretation. The good man is quite silent as to what he
expected to hear; he knew that what he heard would vindicate his faith in his
God, and he was content to leave his cruel foes in God’s hands, without an expression
concerning his own desire one way or the other. It is always best to leave
Scripture as we find it. The broken sense of inspiration is better let alone
than pieced out with additions of a translator’s own invention; it is like
repairing pure gold with tinsel, or a mosaic of gems with painted wood. The
holy psalmist had seen the beginning of the ungodly, and expected to see their
end; he felt sure that God would right all wrongs, and clear his Providence
from the charge of favoring the unjust; this confidence he here expresses, and
sits down contentedly to wait the issues of the future.
12. The song
now contrasts the condition of the righteous with that of the graceless. The
wicked “spring as the grass,” but the righteous shall flourish like the palm
tree, whose growth may not be so rapid, but whose endurance for centuries
is in fine contrast with the transitory verdure of the meadow. When we see a
noble palm standing erect, sending all its strength upward in one bold column,
and growing amid the dearth and drought of the desert, we have a fine picture
of the godly person, who in uprightness aims alone at the glory of God, and,
independent of outward circumstances, is made by divine grace to live and
thrive where all things else perish. The text tells us not only what the
righteous is, but what he will be; come what may, the good person will
flourish, and flourish after the noblest manner. He shall grow like a cedar
in Lebanon. This is another noble and long-lived tree. On the summit of the
mountain, unsheltered from the blast, the cedar waves its mighty branches in
perpetual verdure, and so the truly godly person under all adversities retains
joy of soul, and continues to make progress in the divine life. Grass, which
makes hay for oxen, is a good enough emblem of the unregenerate; but cedars,
which build the temple of the Lord, are none too excellent to set forth the
heirs of heaven.
13. Those that be planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of our
God. In the courtyards of oriental
houses trees were planted, and being thoroughly screened, they would be likely
to bring forth their fruit to perfection in trying seasons; in the same way,
those who by grace are brought into communion with the Lord will be likened to
trees planted in the Lord’s house, and will find it food to their souls. No
heart has so much joy as that which abides in the Lord Jesus. If someone abides
in Christ, he brings forth much fruit. Those who are rooted to the world do not
flourish; those who send forth their roots into the marshes of frivolous
pleasure cannot be in a vigorous condition; but those who dwell in habitual
fellowship with God will come to full growth, rich in grace, happy in
experience, mighty in influence, honored and honorable. No tree grows in God’s
garden self-sown; once planted of the Lord, we shall never be rooted up, but in
his courts we shall take root downward, and bring forth fruit upward to his
glory forever.
14. They shall still bring forth fruit in old age. Nature decays but grace thrives. Fruit, as far as nature is
concerned, belongs to days of vigor; but in the garden of grace, when plants
are weak in themselves, they become strong in the Lord, and abound in fruit
acceptable with God. Happy are they who can sing this Sabbath psalm, enjoying
the rest which breathes through every verse of it; no fear as to the future can
distress them, for their evil days, when the strong man faileth, are the
subject of a gracious promise, and therefore they await them with quiet
expectancy. Aged believers possess a ripe experience, and by their mellow
tempers and sweet testimonies they feed many. Even if bedridden, they bear the
fruit of patience; if poor and obscure, their lowly and contented spirit
becomes the admiration of those who know how to appreciate modest worth. Grace
does not leave the saint when the keepers of the house do tremble; the promise
is still sure though the eyes can no longer read it; the bread of heaven is fed
upon when the grinders fail; and the voice of the Spirit in the soul is still
melodious when the daughters of music are brought low. Blessed be the Lord for
this! Because even to hoary hairs he is the I AM, who made his people; he
therefore bears and carries them.
They shall be fat and flourishing. God does not pinch his poor servants, and diminish their
consolations when their infirmities grow upon them; rather does he see to it
that they renew their strength, for their mouths will be satisfied with his own
good things.
15. This
mercy to the aged proves the faithfulness of their God, and leads them to
show that the Lord is upright,
by their cheerful testimony to his ceaseless goodness. We do not serve a Master
who will run back from his promise. Every aged Christian is a letter of
commendation to the immutable fidelity of Jehovah. He is my rock, and there
is no unrighteousness in him. Here is the psalmist’s own seal and sign
manual: still was he building upon his God, and still was the Lord a firm
foundation for his trust. He has tried us, but he has never allowed us to be
tempted above what we are able to bear; he has delayed our reward, but he has
never been unrighteous to forget our work of faith and labor of love. He is a
friend without fault, a helper without fail. Whatever he may do with us, he is
always in the right.
Excerpt from:
The Treasury of David
By Charles H Spurgeon
