From it, he will fully understand the weakness and wretchedness of man, and the power and loving-kindness of God, not for our merit, but for his mercy's sake. A truly wise person will treasure in his heart this delightful psalm. It is our wisdom to mind our duty, and to refer our comfort to him. It is of great use to us to be fully assured of God's goodness, and duly affected with it. When sinners see how justly God takes away the gifts they have abused, they will not have a word to say.
It shall fully convince all those who deny the Divine Providence. Worldly wealth is uncertain often those who are filled with it, ere they are aware, lose it again. We see many who have thus suddenly risen, as suddenly brought to nothing. If we look abroad in the world, we see many greatly increase, whose beginning was small. Verses 33-43 What surprising changes are often made in the affairs of men! Let the present desolate state of Judea, and of other countries, explain this. Yet, in answer to their cries, the Lord turns their storm into a calm, and causes their trials to end in gladness. How seasonable it is at such a time to pray! This may remind us of the terrors and distress of conscience many experience, and of those deep scenes of trouble which many pass through, in their Christian course. Mariners have their business upon the tempestuous ocean, and there witness deliverances of which others cannot form an idea. Verses 23-32 Let those who go to sea, consider and adore the Lord. Even in common cases of recovery from sickness, God in his providence speaks, and it is done by his word and Spirit the soul is restored to health and holiness. He sends his word, and heals souls convinces, converts them, makes them holy, and all by the word. It is also to be applied to the spiritual cures which the Spirit of grace works. All Christ's miraculous cures were emblems of his healing diseases of the soul. It is by the power and mercy of God that we are recovered from sickness, and it is our duty to be thankful. The weakness of the body is the effect of sickness. They hurt their bodily health by intemperance, and endanger their lives by indulging their appetites. Verses 17-22 If we knew no sin, we should know no sickness. His sin is forgiven by a merciful God, and his pardon is accompanied by deliverance from the power of sin and Satan, and by the sanctifying and comforting influences of God the Holy Spirit. Having struggled in vain for deliverance, he finds there is no help for him but in the mercy and grace of God. The awakened sinner discovers his guilt and misery. This is a shadow of the sinner's deliverance from a far worse confinement. Afflicting providences must be improved as humbling providences and we lose the benefit, if our hearts are unhumbled and unbroken under them. In the eastern prisons the captives were and are treated with much severity. Verses 10-16 This description of prisoners and captives intimates that they are desolate and sorrowful. Those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, after God, and communion with him, shall be filled with the goodness of his house, both in grace and glory. The words describe their case whom the Lord has redeemed from the bondage of Satan who pass through the world as a dangerous and dreary wilderness, often ready to faint through troubles, fears, and temptations. It is scarcely possible to conceive the horrors suffered by the hapless traveller, when crossing the trackless sands, exposed to the burning rays of the sum.
Verses 1-9 In these verses there is reference to the deliverance from Egypt, and perhaps that from Babylon: but the circumstances of travellers in those countries are also noted. (23-32) God's hand is to be seen by his own people. God's providential care of the children of men in distresses, in banishment, and dispersion.
0 kommentar(er)
