For thy judgments are good. Behold, I have longed after thy precepts: Some people, whom I know, long after the promises, and others long after the doctrines. I hope that they will all get an equal longing for the precepts, for true believers love the precepts as much as they love the promises or the doctrines: “Behold, I have longed after thy...
Behold, I have longed after thy precepts,.... After a greater degree of knowledge of them, and an opportunity of hearing them explained and enforced, and of yielding obedience to them; see Psalms 119:7; quicken me in thy righteousness: in the way of righteousness, according to the word of righteousness, the Gospel, and with the righteousness of...
Behold, I have longed after thy precepts: That is a sure sign of a true child of God. Hypocrites may long after the promises, but only the true-born child of God longs after the precepts. If your chief desire is to be holy, that is a desire which comes of the Spirit of God. A bad man may desire to go to heaven; a desperately wicked man may wish to...
w, VAU.--The Sixth Part. Ver. 41. VAU. Let thy mercies come also unto me, O Lord,.... Meaning not his providential mercies, but his special mercies and favours; his mercies of old, which were upon his heart and thoughts from everlasting; the sure mercies of David, or the blessings of the everlasting covenant; the spiritual blessings, wherewith the...
So shall I have wherewith to answer him that reproacheth me,.... Saying there is no help and salvation for him in God; asking where is his God, in whom he trusted? and where is the promise of salvation, on which he depended? To which an easy and ready answer might be given, when the mercies and salvation of God came unto him, and he clearly...
And take not the word of truth utterly out of my mouth,.... The Scriptures, which are by divine inspiration, come from the God of truth, contain nothing but truth in them, and are called "the Scriptures of truth", Daniel 10:21. Or the Gospel, which is often so called, Ephesians 1:13; This comes from God, who cannot lie, and is a declaration of his...
So shall I keep thy law continually,.... Which denotes not the perfection of keeping the law, but the constancy of it: the psalmist was persuaded, that so long as he had the word of truth in his mouth, and the judgments of God in his view, he should be diligent and constant in the discharge of his duty, which these directed and encouraged him...
And I will walk at liberty,.... Not in licentious way, but in Gospel liberty, under the influence of the free spirit; where is liberty, in the exercise of grace and discharge of duty. Or, "I will walk at large" (g); or, "in a broad way", as Aben Ezra and Kimchi supply it: not in the broad road that leads to destruction, but in the law of God,...
I will speak of thy testimonies also before kings,.... As very likely he did before Saul and his courtiers, before the king of Achish and the princes of the Philistines, when as yet he was not a king himself; and when he was come to the throne, such kings as came to visit him, instead of talking with them about affairs of state, he spoke of the...
And I will delight myself in thy commandments,.... In perusing and practising them; which I have loved; a good man loves the law of God, and the commandments of Christ, and delights in them after the inward man.
My hands also will I lift up unto thy commandments, which I have loved,.... Showing by such a gesture his great esteem of them, and affection for them; stretching out his hands, and embracing them with both arms, as it were: and this being a praying gesture, 2 Timothy 2:8, may signify his earnest desire and request that he might have grace and...
z, ZAIN.--The Seventh Part. Ver. 49. ZAIN. Remember the word unto thy servant,.... The word of promise made unto him, concerning establishing his house and kingdom for ever; which he desires God would show himself mindful of in fulfilling it, and renew and confirm his faith in it, and give him some fresh assurance of the performance of it, 2...
This [is] my comfort in my affliction,.... David had his afflictions, and so has every good man; none are without; it is the will and pleasure of God that so it should be; and many are their afflictions, inward and outward: the word of God is often their comfort under them, the written word, heard or read; and especially a word of promise,...
The proud have had me greatly in derision,.... Profane sinners, proud and haughty scorners, that make a jest of religion, and scoff at everything serious and good: these derided the psalmist for his piety and religion, his principles and practices; in which he was a type of Christ, who was both the song of the drunkards, and was derided by the...
I remembered thy judgments of old, O Lord,.... Either the judgments of God executed on wicked men; as the bringing a flood on the world of the ungodly; the burning of Sodom and Gomorrah; the destruction of Pharaoh and his host in the Red sea; the cutting off of the Canaanites, and dispossessing them of their land: or the providential dispensations...
Horror hath taken hold upon me,.... Trembling, sorrow, and distress, to a great degree, like a storm, or a blustering, scorching, burning wind, as the word (h) signifies, which is very terrible; because of the wicked that forsake thy law: not only transgress the law of the Lord, as every man does, more or less; but wilfully and obstinately despise...
Thy statutes have been my songs in the house of my pilgrimage. Meaning either his unsettled state, fleeing from place to place before Saul; or, literally, his house of cedar, his court and palace, which he considered no other than as an inn he had put into upon his travels homeward; or rather the earthly house of his tabernacle, in which, as long...
I have remembered thy name, O Lord, in the night,.... In the night of distress and affliction, as Jarchi; or rather literally, in the night season, when on his bed and awake: while others were asleep, he revolved in his mind the greatness of the divine Being; the perfections of his nature; his wonderful works of creation, providence, and grace;...