GENERAL REMARKS. This Psalm begins and
ends with Hallelujah—"Praise ye the Lord." The space
between these two descriptions of praise is filled up with the
mournful details of Israel's sin, and the extraordinary patience
of God; and truly we do well to bless the Lord both at the
beginning and the end of our meditations when sin and grace are
the themes. This sacred song is occupied with the historical
part of the Old Testament, and is one of many which are thus
composed: surely this should be a sufficient rebuke to those who
speak slightingly of the historical Scriptures; it in becomes a
child of God to think lightly of that which the Holy Spirit so
frequently uses for our instruction. What other Scriptures had
David beside those very histories which are so depreciated, and
yet he esteemed them beyond his necessary food, and made them
his songs in the house of his pilgrimage?
Israel's history is here written with the view of showing
human sin, even as the preceding psalm was composed to magnify
divine goodness. It is, in fact, a national confession, and
includes an acknowledgment of the transgressions of Israel in
Egypt, in the wilderness, and in Canaan, with devout petitions
for forgiveness such as rendered the Psalm suitable for use in
all succeeding generations, and especially in times of national
captivity. It was probably written by David,—at any rate its
first and last two verses are to be found in that sacred song
which David delivered to Asaph when he brought up the ark of the
Lord (1Ch 16:34,35,36). While we are studying this holy Psalm,
let us all along see ourselves in the Lord's ancient people, and
bemoan our own provocations of the Most High, at the same time
admiring his infinite patience, and adoring him because of it.
May the Holy Spirit sanctify it to the promotion of humility and
gratitude.
DIVISION. Praise and prayer are
blended in the introduction (Ps 106:1-5). Then comes the story
of the nation's sins, which continues till the closing prayer
and praise of the last two verses. While making confession the
Psalmist acknowledges the sins committed in Egypt and at the Red
Sea (Ps 106:6-12), the lusting in the wilderness (Ps 106:13-15),
the envying of Moses and Aaron (Ps 106:16-18), the worship of
the golden calf (Ps 106:19-23) the despising of the promised
land (Ps 106:24-27), the iniquity of Baal Peor (Ps 106:28-30),
and the waters of Meribah (Ps 106:28-33). Then he owns the
failure of Israel when settled in Canaan, and mentions their
consequent chastisement (Ps 106:34-44), together with the quick
compassion which came to their relief when they were brought low
(Ps 106:44-46). The closing prayer and doxology fill up the
remaining verses.
EXPOSITION
Verse 1. Praise ye the Lord. Hallelujah. Praise
ye Jah. This song is for the assembled people, and they are all
exhorted to join in praise to Jehovah. It is not meet for a few
to praise and the rest to be silent; but all should join. If
David were present in churches where quartets and choirs carry
on all the singing, he would turn to the congregation and say,
"Praise ye the Lord." Our meditation dwells upon human
sin; but on all occasions and in all occupations it is
seasonable and profitable to praise the Lord. O give thanks unto
the Lord; for he is good. To us needy creatures the goodness of
God is the first attribute which excites praise, and that praise
takes the form of gratitude. We praise the Lord truly when we
give him thanks for what we have received from his goodness. Let
us never be slow to return unto the Lord our praise; to thank
him is the least we can do—let us not neglect it. For his
mercy endureth for ever. Goodness towards sinners assumes the
form of mercy, mercy should therefore be a leading note in our
song. Since man ceases not to be sinful, it is a great blessing
that Jehovah ceases not to be merciful. From age to age the Lord
deals graciously with his church, and to every individual in it
he is constant and faithful in his grace, even for evermore. In
a short space we have here two arguments for praise, "for
he is good: for his mercy endureth for ever, "and these two
arguments are themselves praises. The very best language of
adoration is that which adoringly in the plainest words sets
forth the simple truth with regard to our great Lord. No
rhetorical flourishes or poetical hyperboles are needed, the
bare facts are sublime poetry, and the narration of them with
reverence is the essence of adoration. This first verse is the
text of all that which follows; we are now to see how from
generation to generation the mercy of God endured to his chosen
people.
Verse 2. Who can utter the mighty acts of the LORD?
What tongue of men or angels can duly describe the great
displays of divine power? They are unutterable. Even those who
saw them could not fully tell them. Who can shew forth all his
praise? To declare his works is the same thing as to praise him,
for his own doings are his best commendation. We cannot say one
tenth so much for him as his own character and acts have already
done? Those who praise the Lord have an infinite subject, a
subject which will not be exhausted throughout eternity by the
most enlarged intellects, nay, nor by the whole multitude of the
redeemed, though no man can number them. The questions of this
verse never can be answered; their challenge can never be
accepted, except in that humble measure which can be reached by
a holy life and a grateful heart.
Verse 3. Since the Lord is so good and so worthy to be
praised, it must be for our happiness to obey him. Blessed are
they that keep judgment, and he that doeth righteousness at
all times. Multiplied are the blessings which must descend
upon the whole company of the keepers of the way of justice, and
especially upon that one rare man who at all times follows that
which is right. Holiness is happiness. The way of right is the
way of peace. Yet men leave this road, and prefer the paths of
the destroyer. Hence the story which follows is in sad contrast
with the happiness here depicted, because the way of Israel was
not that of judgment and righteousness, but that of folly and
iniquity. The Psalmist, while contemplating the perfections of
God, was impressed with the feeling that the servants of such a
being must be happy, and when he looked around and saw how the
tribes of old prospered when they obeyed, and suffered when they
sinned, he was still more fully assured of the truth of his
conclusion. O could we but be free of sin we should be rid of
sorrow! We would not only be just, but "keep
judgment"; we would not be content with occasionally acting
rightly, but would "do justice at all times."
Verse 4. Remember me, O Lord, with the favour which
thou bearest unto thy people. Insignificant as I am, do not
forget me. Think of me with kindness, even as thou thinkest of
thine own elect. I cannot ask more, nor would I seek less. Treat
me as the least of thy saints are treated and I am content. It
should be enough for us if we fare as the rest of the family. If
even Balaam desired no more than to die the death of the
righteous, we may be well content both to live as they live, and
die as they die. This feeling would prevent our wishing to
escape trial, persecution, and chastisement; these have fallen
to the lot of saints, and why should we escape them
"Must I be carried to the skies
On flowery beds of case?
While others fought to will the prize,
And sailed through bloody seas."
At the same time we pray to have their sweets as well as
their bitters. If the Lord smiled upon their souls we cannot
rest unless he smiles upon us also. We would dwell where they
dwell, rejoice as they rejoice, sorrow as they sorrow, and in
all things be for ever one with them in the favour of the Lord.
The sentence before us is a sweet prayer, at once humble and
aspiring, submissive and expansive; it might be used by a dying
thief or a living apostle; let us use it now. O visit me with
thy salvation. Bring it home to me. Come to my house and to my
heart, and give me the salvation which thou hast prepared, and
art alone able to bestow. We sometimes hear of a man's dying by
the visitation of God, but here is one who knows that he can
only live by the visitation of God. Jesus said of Zacchaeus,
"This day is salvation come to this house, "and that
was the case because he himself had come there. There is no
salvation apart from the Lord, and he must visit us with it or
we shall never obtain it. We are too sick to visit our Great
Physician, and therefore he visits us. O that our great Bishop
would hold a visitation of all the churches, and bestow his
benediction upon all his flock. Sometimes the second prayer of
this verse seems to be too great for us, for we feel that we are
not worthy that the Lord should come under our roof. Visit me,
Lord? Can it be? Dare I ask for it? And yet I must, for thou
alone cans: bring me salvation: therefore, Lord, I entreat thee
come unto me, and abide with me for ever.
Verse 5. That I may see the good of thy chosen.
His desire for the divine favour was excited by the hope that he
might participate in all the good things which flow to the
people of God through their election. The Father has blessed us
with all spiritual blessings in Christ Jesus, according as he
has chosen us in him, and in these precious gifts we desire to
share through the saving visitation of the Lord. No other good
do we wish to see, perceive, and apprehend, but that which is
the peculiar treasure of the saints. That I may rejoice in the
gladness of thy nation. The psalmist, having sought his portion
in the good of the chosen, now also begs to be a partaker in
their joy for of all the nations under heaven the Lord's true
people are the happiest. That I may glory with thine
inheritance. He would have a part and lot in their honour as
well as their joy. He was willing to find glory where saints
find it, namely, in being reproached for truth's sake. To serve
the Lord and endure shame for his sake is the glory of the
saints below: Lord, let me rejoice to bear my part therein. To
be with God above, for ever blessed in Christ Jesus, is the
glory of saints above: O Lord, be pleased to allot me a place
there also. These introductory thanksgivings and supplications,
though they occur first in the psalm, are doubtless the result
of the contemplations which succeed them, and may be viewed not
only as the preface, but also as the moral of the whole sacred
song.
Verse 6. We have sinned with our fathers. Here
begins a long and particular confession. Confession of sin is
the readiest way to secure an answer to the prayer of verse 4;
God visits with his salvation the soul which acknowledges its
need of a Saviour. Men may be said to have sinned with their
fathers when they imitate them, when they follow the same
objects, and make their own lives to be mere continuations of
the follies of their sires. Moreover, Israel was but one nation
in all time, and the confession which follows sets forth the
national rather than the personal sin of the Lord's people. They
enjoyed national privileges, and therefore they shared in
national guilt. We have committed iniquity, we have done
wickedly. Thus is the confession repeated three times, in token
of the sincerity and heartiness of it. Sins of omission,
commission, and rebellion we ought to acknowledge under distinct
heads, that we may show a due sense of the number and
heinousness of our offences.
Verse 7. Our fathers understood not thy wonders in
Egypt. The Israelites saw the miraculous plagues and
ignorantly wondered at them: their design of love, their deep
moral and spiritual lessons, and their revelation of the divine
power and justice they were unable to perceive. A long sojourn
among idolaters had blunted the perceptions of the chosen
family, and cruel slavery had ground them down into mental
sluggishness. Alas, how many of God's wonders are not
understood, or misunderstood by us still. We fear the sons are
no great improvement upon the sires. We inherit from our fathers
much sin and little wisdom; they could only leave us what they
themselves possessed. We see from this verse that a want of
understanding is no excuse for sin, but is itself one count in
the indictment against Israel. They remembered not the multitude
of thy mercies. The sin of the understanding leads on to the sin
of the memory. What is not understood will soon be forgotten.
Men feel little interest in preserving husks; if they know
nothing of the inner kernel they will take no care of the
shells. It was an aggravation of Israel's sin that when God's
mercies were so numerous they yet were able to forget them all.
Surely some out of such a multitude of benefits ought to have
remained engraven upon their hearts; but if grace does not give
us understanding, nature will soon east out the memory of God's
great goodness. But provoked him at the sea, even; at the Red
sea. To fall out at starting was a bad sign. Those who did not
begin well can hardly be expected to end well. Israel is not
quite out of Egypt, and yet she begins to provoke the Lord by
doubting his power to deliver, and questioning his faithfulness
to his promise. The sea was only called Red, but their sins were
scarlet in reality; it was known as the "sea of weeds,
"but far worse weeds grew in their hearts.
Verse 8. Nevertheless he saved them for his name's
sake, that he might make his mighty power to be known. When
he could find no other reason for his mercy he found it in his
own glory, and seized the opportunity to display his power. If
Israel does not deserve to be saved, yet Pharaoh's pride needs
to be crushed, and therefore Israel shall be delivered. The Lord
very jealously guards his own name and honour. It shall never be
said of him that he cannot or will not save his people, or that
he cannot abate the haughtiness of his defiant foes. This
respect unto his own honour ever leads him to deeds of mercy,
and hence we may well rejoice that he is a jealous God.
Verse 9. He rebuked the Red sea also, and it was
dried up. A word did it. The sea heard his voice and obeyed.
How many rebukes of God are lost upon us! Are we not more
unmanageable than the ocean? God did, as it were, chide the sea,
and say, "Wherefore dost thou stop the way of my people?
Their path to Canaan lies through thy channel, how dare you
hinder them?" The sea perceived its Master and his seed
royal, and made way at once. So he led them through the depths,
as through the wilderness. As if it had been the dry floor of
the desert the tribes passed over the bottom of the gulf; nor
was their passage venturesome, for HE bade them go;nor
dangerous, for He led them. We also have under divine protection
passed through many trials and afflictions, and with the Lord as
our guide we have experienced no fear and endured no perils. We
have been led through the deeps as through the wilderness.
Verse 10. And he saved them from the hand of them
that hated them. Pharaoh was drowned, and the power of Egypt
so crippled that throughout the forty years' wanderings of
Israel they were never threatened by their old masters. And
redeemed them from the hand of the enemy. This was a redemption
by power, and one of the most instructive types of the
redemption of the Lord's people from sin and hell by the power
which worketh in them.
Verse 11. And the waters covered their enemies:
there was not one of them left. The Lord does nothing by
halves. What he begins he carries through to the end. This,
again, made Israel's sin the greater, because they saw the
thoroughness of the divine justice, and the perfection of the
divine faithfulness. In the covering of their enemies we have a
type of the pardon of our sins; they are sunk as in the sea,
never to rise again; and, blessed be the Lord, there is
"not one of them left."—Not one sin of thought, or
word, or deed, the blood of Jesus has covered all. "I will
cast their iniquities into the depths of the sea."
Verse 12. Then believed they his words. That is
to say, they believed the promise when they saw it fulfilled,
but not till then. This is mentioned, not to their credit, but
to their shame. Those who do not believe the Lord's word till
they see it performed are not believers at all. Who would not
believe when the fact stares them in the face? The Egyptians
would have done as much as this. They sang his praise. How could
they do otherwise? Their song was very excellent, and is the
type of the song of heaven; but sweet as it was, it was quite as
short, and when it was ended they fell to murmuring. "They
sang his praise, "but "they soon forgat his
works." Between Israel singing and Israel sinning there was
scarce a step. Their song was good while it lasted, but it was
no sooner begun than over.
Verse 13. They soon forgat his works. They
seemed in a hurry to get the Lord's mercies out of their
memories; they hasted to be ungrateful. They waited not for his
counsel, neither waiting for the word of command or promise;
eager to have their own way, and prone to trust in themselves.
This is a common fault in the Lord's family to this day; we are
long in learning to wait for the Lord, and upon the Lord. With
him is counsel and strength, but we are vain enough to look for
these to ourselves, and therefore we grievously err.
Verse 14. But lusted exceedingly in the wilderness.
Though they would not wait God's will, they are hot to have
their own. When the most suitable and pleasant food was found
them in abundance, it did not please them long, but they grew
dainty and sniffed at angel's food, and must needs have flesh to
eat, which was unhealthy diet for that warm climate, and for
their easy life. This desire of theirs they dwelt upon till it
became a mania with them, and, like a wild horse, carried away
its rider. For a meal of meat they were ready to curse their God
and renounce the land which floweth with milk and honey. What a
wonder that the Lord did not take them at their word! It is
plain that they vexed him greatly, And tempted God in the
desert. In the place where they were absolutely dependent upon
him and were everyday fed by his direct provision, they had the
presumption to provoke their God. They would have him change the
plans of his wisdom, supply their sensual appetites, and work
miracles to meet their wicked unbelief: these things the Lord
would not do, but they went as far as they could in trying to
induce him to do so. They failed not in their wicked attempt
because of any goodness in themselves, but because God
"cannot be tempted, "—temptation has no power over
him, he yields not to man's threats or promises.
Verse 15. And he gave them their request.
Prayer may be answered in anger and denied in love. That God
gives a man his desire is no proof that he is the object of
divine favour, everything depends upon what that desire is. But
sent leanness into their soul. Ah, that "but!" It
embittered all. The meat was poison to them when it came without
a blessing; whatever it might do in fattening the body, it was
poor stuff when it made the soul lean. If we must know
scantiness, may God grant it may not be scantiness of soul: yet
this is a common attendant upon worldly prosperity. When wealth
grows with many a man his worldly estate is fatter, but his
soul's state is leaner. To gain silver and lose gold is a poor
increase; but to win for the body and lose for the soul is far
worse. How earnestly might Israel have unprayed her prayers had
she known what would come with their answer! The prayers of lust
will have to be wept over. We fret and fume till we have our
desire, and then we have to fret still note because the
attainment of it ends in bitter disappointment.
Verse 16. They envied Moses also in the camp.
Though to him as the Lord's chosen instrument they owed
everything, they grudged him the authority which it was needful
that he should exercise for their good. Some were more openly
rebellious than others, and became leaders of the mutiny, but a
spirit of dissatisfaction was general, and therefore the whole
nation is charged with it. Who can hope to escape envy when the
meekest of men was subject to it? How unreasonable was this
envy, for Moses was the one man in all the camp who laboured
hardest and had most to bear. They should have sympathised with
him; to envy him was ridiculous. And Aaron the saint of the
Lord. By divine choice Aaron was set apart to be holiness unto
the Lord, and instead of thanking God that he had favoured them
with a high priest by whose intercession their prayers would be
presented, they cavilled at the divine election, and quarrelled
with the man who was to offer sacrifice for them. Thus neither
church nor state was ordered aright for them; they would snatch
from Moses his sceptre, and from Aaron his mitre. It is the mark
of bad men that they are envious of the good, and spiteful
against their best benefactors.
Verse 17. The earth opened and swallowed up Dathan,
and covered the company of Abiram. Korah is not mentioned,
for mercy was extended to his household, though he himself
perished. The earth could no longer bear up under the weight of
these rebels and ingrates: God's patience was exhausted when
they began to assail his servants, for his children are very
dear to him, and he that toucheth them touches the apple of his
eye. Moses had opened the sea for their deliverance, and now
that they provoke him, the earth opens for their destruction. It
was time that the nakedness of their sins was covered, and that
the earth should open her mouth to devour those who opened their
mouths against the Lord and his servants.
Verse 18. And a fire was kindled in their company;
the flame burned up the wicked. The Levites who were with
Korah perished by fire, which was a most fitting death for those
who intruded into the priesthood, and so offered strange fire.
God has more than one arrow in his quiver, the fire can consume
those whom the earthquake spares. These terrible things in
righteousness are mentioned here to show the obstinacy of the
people in continuing to rebel against the Lord. Terrors were as
much lost upon them as mercies had been; they could neither be
drawn nor driven.
Verse 19. They made a calf in Horeb. In the
very place where they had solemnly pledged themselves to obey
the Lord they broke the second, if not the first, of his
commandments, and set up the Egyptian symbol of the ox, and
bowed before it. The ox image is here sarcastically called
"a calf"; idols are worthy of no respect, scorn is
never more legitimately used than when it is poured upon all
attempts to set forth the Invisible God. The Israelites were
foolish indeed when they thought they saw the slightest divine
glory in a bull, nay, in the mere image of a bull. To believe
that the image of a bull could be the image of God must need
great credulity. And worshipped the molten image. Before it they
paid divine honours, and said, "These be thy gods, O
Israel." This was sheer madness. After the same fashion the
Ritualists must needs set up their symbols and multiply them
exceedingly. Spiritual worship they seem unable to apprehend;
their worship is sensuous to the highest degree, and appeals to
eye, and ear, and nose. O the folly of men to block up their own
way to acceptable worship, and to make the path of spiritual
religion, which is hard to our nature, harder still through the
stumblingblocks which they cast into it. We have heard the
richness of Popish paraphernalia much extolled, but an
idolatrous image when made of gold is not one jot the less
abominable than it would have been had it been made of dross and
dung: the beauty of art cannot conceal the deformity of sin. We
are told also of the suggestiveness of their symbols, but what
of that, when God forbids the use of them? Vain also is it to
plead that such worship is hearty. So much the worse. Heartiness
in forbidden actions is only an increase of transgression.
Verse 20. Thus they changed their glory into the
similitude of an ox that eateth grass. They said that they
only meant to worship the one God under a fitting and suggestive
similitude by which his great power would be set forth to the
multitude; they pleaded the great Catholic revival which
followed upon this return to a more ornate ceremonial, for the
people thronged around Aaron, and danced before the calf with
all their might. But in very deed they had given up the true
God, whom it had been their glory to adore, and had set up a
rival to him, not a representation of him; for how should he be
likened to a bullock? The psalmist is very contemptuous, and
justly so: irreverence towards idols is an indirect reverence to
God. False gods, attempts to represent the true God, and indeed,
all material things which are worshipped, are so much filth upon
the face of the earth, whether they be crosses, crucifixes,
virgins, wafers, relics, or even the Pope himself. We are by far
too mealy mouthed about these infamous abominations: God abhors
them, and so should we. To renounce the glory of spiritual
worship for outward pomp and show is the height of folly, and
deserves to be treated as such.
Verse 21. They forgat God their saviour.
Remembering the calf involved forgetting God. He had commanded
them to make no image, and in daring to disobey they forgot his
commands. Moreover, it is clear that they must altogether have
forgotten the nature and character of Jehovah, or they could
never have likened him to a grass eating animal. Some men hope
to keep their sins and their God too—the fact being that he
who sins is already so far departed from the Lord that he has
actually forgotten him. Which had done great things in Egypt.
God in Egypt had overcome all the idols, and yet they so far
forgot him as to liken him to them. Could an ox work miracles?
Could a golden calf cast plagues upon Israel's enemies? They
were brutish to set up such a wretched mockery of deity, after
having seen what the true God could really achieve.
"Wondrous works in the land of Ham, and terrible things by
the Red sea". They saw several ranges of miracles, the Lord
did not stint them as to the evidences of his eternal power and
godhead, and yet they could not rest content with worshipping
him in his own appointed way, but must needs have a Directory of
their own invention, an elaborate ritual after the old Egyptian
fashion, and a manifest object of worship to assist them in
adoring Jehovah. This was enough to provoke the Lord, and it did
so; how much he is angered every day in our own land no tongue
can tell.
Verse 23. Therefore he said that he would destroy
them. The threatening of destruction came at last. For the
first wilderness sin he chastened them, sending leanness into
their soul; for the second he weeded out the offenders, the
flame burned up the wicked; for the third he threatened to
destroy them; for the fourth he lifted up his hand and almost
came to blows (Ps 106:26); for the fifth he actually smote them,
"and the plague brake in among them"; and so the
punishment increased with their perseverance in sin. This is
worth noting, and it should serve as a warning to the man who
goeth on in his iniquities. God tries words before he comes to
blows, "he said that he would destroy them": but his
words are not to be trifled with, for he means them, and has
power to make them good. Had not Moses his chosen stood before
him in the breach. Like a bold warrior who defends the wall when
there is an opening for the adversary and destruction is rushing
in upon the city, Moses stopped the way of avenging justice with
his prayers. Moses had great power with God. He was an eminent
type of our Lord, who is called, as Moses here is styled,
"mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth." As the Elect
Redeemer interposed between the Lord and a sinful world, so did
Moses stand between the Lord and his offending people. The story
as told by Moses himself is full of interest and instruction,
and tends greatly to magnify the goodness of the Lord, who thus
suffered himself to be turned from the fierceness of his anger.
With disinterested affection, and generous renunciation of
privileges offered to himself and his family, the great Lawgiver
interceded with the Lord to turn away his wrath, lest he should
destroy them. Behold the power of a righteous man's
intercession. Mighty as was the sin of Israel to provoke
vengeance, prayer was mightier in turning it away. How
diligently ought we to plead with the Lord for this guilty
world, and especially for his own backsliding people! Who would
not employ an agency so powerful for an end so gracious! The
Lord still harkens to the voice of a man, shall not our voices
be often exercised in supplicating for a guilty people? Verse
24. Yea, they despised the pleasant land. They spoke
lightly of it, though it was the joy of all lands: they did not
think it worth the trouble of seeking and conquering; they even
spoke of Egypt, the land of their iron bondage, as though they
preferred it to Canaan, the land which floweth with milk and
honey. It is an ill sign with a Christian when he begins to
think lightly of heaven and heavenly things; it indicates a
perverted mind, and it is, moreover, a high offence to the Lord
to despise that which he esteems so highly that he in infinite
love reserves it for his own chosen. To prefer earthly things to
heavenly blessings is to prefer Egypt to Canaan, the house of
bondage to the land of promise. They believed not his word. This
is the root sin. If we do not believe the Lord's word, we shall
think lightly of his promised gifts. "They could not enter
in because of unbelief"—this was the key which turned the
lock against them. When pilgrims to the Celestial City begin to
doubt the Lord of the way, they soon come to think little of the
rest at the journey's end, and this is the surest way to make
them bad travellers. Israel's unbelief demanded spies to see the
land; the report of those spies was of a mingled character, and
so a fresh crop of unbelief sprang up, with consequences most
deplorable.
Verse 25. But murmured in their tents. From
unbelief to murmuring is a short and natural step; they even
fell to weeping when they had the best ground for rejoicing.
Murmuring is a great sin and not a mere weakness; it contains
within itself unbelief, pride, rebellion, and a whole host of
sins. It is a home sin, and is generally practised by
complainers "in their tents, "but it is just as evil
there as in the streets, and will be quite as grievous to the
Lord. And hearkened not unto the voice of the Lord. Making a din
with their own voices, they refused attention to their best
Friend. Murmurers are bad hearers.
Verse 26. Therefore he lifted up his hand against
them, to overthrow them in the wilderness. He swore in his
wrath that they should not enter into his rest; he commenced his
work of judgment upon them, and they began to die. Only let God
lift his hand against a man and his day has come; he falls
terribly whom Jehovah overthrows. To overthrow their seed also
among the nations, and to scatter them in the lands.
Foreseeing that their descendants would reproduce their sins, he
solemnly declared that he would give them over to captivity and
the sword. Those whose carcases fell in the wilderness were, in
a sense, exiles from the land of promise, and, being surrounded
by many hostile tribes, they were virtually in a foreign land:
to die far off from their father's inheritance was a just and
weighty doom, which their rebellions had richly deserved. Our
own loss of fellowship with God, and the divisions in our
churches, doubtless often come to us as punishments for the sins
out of which they grow. If we will not honour the Lord we cannot
expect him to honour us. Our captains shall soon become
captives, and our princes shall be prisoners if we forget the
Lord and despise his mercies. Our singing shall be turned into
sighing, and our mirth into misery if we walk contrary to the
mind of the Lord.
Verse 28. They joined themselves also unto Baalpeor.
Ritualism led on to the adoration of false gods. If we choose a
false way of worship we shall, ere long, choose to worship a
false god. This abomination of the Moabites was an idol in whose
worship women gave up their bodies to the most shameless lust.
Think of the people of a holy God coming down to this. And ate
the sacrifices of the dead. In the orgies with which the
Baalites celebrated their detestable worship Israel joined,
partaking even in their sacrifices as earnest inner court
worshippers, though the gods were but dead idols. Perhaps they
assisted in necromantic rites which were intended to open a
correspondence with departed spirits, thus endeavouring to break
the seal of God's providence, and burst into the secret chambers
which God has shut up. Those who are weary of seeking the living
God have often shown a hankering after dark sciences, and have
sought after fellowship with demons and spirits. To what strong
delusions those are often given up who cast off the fear of God!
This remark is as much needed now as in days gone by.
Verse 29. Thus they provoked him to anger with
their inventions: and the plague brake in upon them. Open
licentiousness and avowed idolatry were too gross to be winked
at. This time the offences clamoured for judgment, and the
judgment came at once. Twenty-four thousand persons fell before
a sudden and deadly disease which threatened to run through the
whole camp. Their new sins brought on them a disease new to
their tribes. When men invent sins God will not be slow to
invent punishments. Their vices were a moral pest, and they were
visited with a bodily pest: so the Lord meets like with its
like.
Verse 30. Then stood up Phinehas, and executed
judgment: and so the plague was stayed. God has his
champions left in the worst times, and they will stand up when
the time comes for them to come forth to battle. This righteous
indignation moved him to a quick execution of two open
offenders. His honest spirit could not endure that lewdness
should be publicly practised at a time when a fast had been
proclaimed. Such daring defiance of God and of all law he could
not brook, and so with his sharp javelin he transfixed the two
guilty ones in the very act. It was a holy passion which
inflamed him, and no enmity to either of the persons whom he
slew. The circumstances were so remarkable and the sin so
flagrant that it would have involved great sin in a public man
to have stood still and seen God thus defied, and Israel thus
polluted. Phinehas was not of this mind, he was no trimmer, or
palliator of sin, his heart was sound in God's statutes, and his
whole nature was ablaze with zeal for God's glory, and
therefore, though a priest, and therefore not obliged to be an
executioner, he undertook the unwelcome task, and though both
transgressors were of princely stock he had no respect of
persons, but dealt justice upon them as if they had been the
lowest of the people. This brave and decided deed was so
acceptable to God as a proof that there were some sincere souls
in Israel that the deadly visitation went no further. Two deaths
had sufficed to save the lives of the multitude.
Verse 31. And that was counted unto him for
righteousness unto all generations for evermore. Down to the
moment when this psalm was penned the house of Phinehas was
honoured in Israel. His faith had performed a valorous deed, and
his righteousness was testified of the Lord, and honoured by the
continuance of his family in the priesthood. He was impelled by
motives that what would otherwise have been a deed of blood was
justified in the sight of God; nay, more, was made the evidence
that Phinehas was righteous. No personal ambition, or private
revenge, or selfish passion, or even fanatical bigotry, inspired
the man of God, but zeal for God, indignation at open
filthiness, and true patriotism urged him on. Once again we have
cause to note the mercy of God that even when his warrant was
out, and actual execution was proceeding, he stayed his hand at
the suit of one man: finding, as it were, an apology for his
grace when justice seemed to demand immediate vengeance.
Verse 32. They angered him also at the waters of
strife. Will they never have done? The scene changes, but
the sin continues. Aforetime they had mutinied about water when
prayer would soon have turned the desert into a standing pool,
but now they do it again after their former experience of the
divine goodness. This made the sin a double, yea a sevenfold
offence, and caused the anger of the Lord to be the more
intense. So that it went in with Moses for their sakes. Moses
was at last wearied out, and began to grow angry with them and
utterly hopeless of their ever improving; can we wonder at it,
for he was man and not God? After forty years bearing with them
the meek man's temper gave way, and he called them rebels, and
showed unhallowed anger; and therefore he was not permitted to
enter the land which he desired to inherit. Truly, he had a
sight of the goodly country from the top of Pisgah, but entrance
was denied him, and thus it went ill with him. It was their sin
which angered him, but he had to bear the consequences; however
clear it may be that others are more guilty than ourselves, we
should always remember that this will not screen us, but every
man must bear his own burden.
Verse 33. Because they provoked his spirit, so that
he spake unadvisedly with his lips. Which seems a small sin
compared with that of others, but then it was the sin of Moses,
the Lord's chosen servant, who had seen and known so much of the
Lord, and therefore it could not be passed by. He did not speak
blasphemously, or falsely, but only hastily and without care;
but this is a serious fault in a lawgiver, and especially in one
who speaks for God. This passage is to our mind one of the most
terrible in the Bible. Truly we serve a jealous God. Yet he is
not a hard master, or austere; we must not think so, but we must
then rather be jealous of ourselves, and watch that we live the
more carefully, and speak the more advisedly, because we serve
such a Lord. We ought also to be very careful how we treat the
ministers of the gospel, lest by provoking their spirit we
should drive them into any unseemly behaviour which should bring
upon them the chastisement of the Lord. Little do a murmuring,
quarrelsome people dream of the perils in which they involve
their pastors by their untoward behaviour.
Verse 34. They did not destroy the nations,
concerning whom the LORD commanded them. They were
commissioned to act as executioners upon races condemned for
their unnatural crimes, and through sloth, cowardice, or Sinful
complacency they sheathed the sword too soon, very much to their
own danger and disquietude. It is a great evil with professors
that they are not zealous for the total destruction of all sin
within and without. We make alliances of peace where we ought to
proclaim war to the knife; we plead our constitutional
temperament, our previous habits, the necessity of our
circumstances, or some other evil excuse as an apology for being
content with a very partial sanctification, if indeed it be
sanctification at all. We are slow also to rebuke sin in others,
and are ready to spare respectable sins, which like Agag walk
with mincing steps. The measure of our destruction of sin is not
to be our inclination, or the habit of others, but the Lord's
command. We have no warrant for dealing leniently with any sin,
be it what it may.
Verse 35. But were mingled among the heathen, and
learned their works. It was not the wilderness which caused
Israel's sins; they were just as disobedient when settled in the
land of promise. They found evil company, and delighted in it.
Those whom they should have destroyed they made their friends.
Having enough faults of their own, they were yet ready to go to
school to the filthy Canaanites, and educate themselves still
more in the arts of iniquity. It was certain that they could
learn no good from men whom the Lord had condemned to utter
destruction. Few would wish to go to the condemned cell for
learning, yet Israel sat at the feet of accursed Canaan, and
rose up proficient in every abomination. This, too, is a
grievous but common error among professors: they court worldly
company and copy worldly fashions, and yet it is their calling
to bear witness against these things. None can tell what evil
has come of the folly of worldly conformity.
Verse 36. And they served their idols: which were a
snare unto them. They were fascinated by the charms of
idolatry, though it brings misery upon its votaries. A man
cannot serve sin without being ensnared by it. It is like
birdlime, and to touch it is to be taken by it. Samson laid his
head in the Philistine woman's lap, but ere long he woke up
shorn of his strength. Dalliance with sin is fatal to spiritual
liberty.
Verse 37. Yea, they sacrificed their sons and their
daughters unto devils. This was being snared indeed; they
were spell bound by the cruel superstition, and were carried so
far as even to become murderers of their own children, in honour
of the most detestable deities, which were rather devils than
gods. "And shed innocent blood." The poor little ones
whom they put to death in sacrifice had not been partakers of
their sin, and God looked with the utmost indignation upon the
murder of the innocent. "Even the blood of their sons and
of their daughters, whom they sacrificed unto the idols of
Canaan." Who knows how far evil will go? It drove men to be
unnatural as well as ungodly. Had they but thought for a moment,
they must have seen that a deity who could be pleased with the
blood of babes spilt by their own sires could not be a deity at
all, but must be a demon, worthy to be detested and not adored.
How could they prefer such service to that of Jehovah? Did he
tear their babes from their bosoms and smile at their death
throes? Men will sooner wear the iron yoke of Satan than carry
the pleasant burden of the Lord; does not this prove to a
demonstration the deep depravity of their hearts? If man be not
totally depraved, what worse would he do if he were? Does not
this verse describe the ne plus ultra of iniquity? And the land
was polluted with blood. The promised land, the holy land, which
was the glory of all lands, for God was there, was defiled with
the reeking gore of innocent babes, and by the blood red hands
of their parents, who slew them in order to pay homage to
devils. Alas! alas! What vexation was this to the spirit of the
Lord.
Verse 39. Thus were they defiled with their own
works, and went a whoring with their own inventions. Not
only the land but the inhabitants of it were polluted. They
broke the marriage bond between them and the Lord, and fell into
spiritual adultery. The language is strong, but the offence
could not be fitly described in less forcible words. As a
husband is deeply dishonoured and sorely wounded should his wife
become unchaste and run riot with many paramours in his own
house, so was the Lord incensed at his people for setting up
gods many and lords many in his own land. They made and invented
new gods, and then worshipped what they had made. What a folly!
Their novel deities were loathsome monsters and cruel demons,
and yet they paid them homage. What wickedness! And to commit
this folly and wickedness they cast off the true God, whose
miracles they had seen, and whose people they were. This was
provocation of the severest sort.
Verses 40. Therefore was the wrath of the LORD kindled
against his people, in so much that he abhorred his own
inheritance. Not that even then he broke his covenant or
utterly cast off his offending people, but he felt the deepest
indignation, and even looked upon them with abhorrence. The
feeling described is like to that of a husband who still loves
his guilty wife, and yet when he thinks of her lewdness feels
his whole nature rising in righteous anger at her, so that the
very sight of her afflicts his soul. How far the divine wrath
can burn against those whom he yet loves in his heart it were
hard to say, but certainly Israel pushed the experiment to the
extreme. And he gave them into the hand of the heathen. This was
the manifestation of his abhorrence. He gave them a taste of the
result of sin; they spared the heathen, mixed with them and
imitated them, and soon they had to smart from them, for hordes
of invaders were let loose upon them to spoil them at their
pleasure. Men make rods for their own backs. Their own
inventions become their punishments. And they that hated them
ruled over them. And who could wonder? Sin never creates true
love. They joined the heathen in their wickedness, and they did
not win their hearts, but rather provoked their contempt. If we
mix with men of the world they will soon become our masters and
our tyrants, and we cannot want worse.
Verse 42. Their enemies also oppressed them.
This was according to their nature; an Israelite always fares
ill at the hands of the heathen. Leniency to Canaan turned out
to be cruelty to themselves. And they were brought into
subjection under their hand. They were bowed down by laborious
bondage, and made to lie low under tyranny. In their God they
had found a kind master, but in those with whom they had
perversely sought fellowship they found despots of the most
barbarous sort. He who leaves his God leaves happiness for
misery. God can make our enemies to be rods in his hands to flog
us back to our best Friend.
Verse 43. Many times did he deliver them. By
reading the book of Judges we shall see how truthful is this
sentence: again and again their foes were routed, and they were
set free again, only to return with rigour to their former evil
ways. But they provoked him with their counsel. With
deliberation they agreed to transgress anew; self will was their
counsellor, and they followed it to their own destruction. And
were brought low for their iniquity. Worse and worse were the
evils brought upon them, lower and lower they fell in sin, and
consequently in sorrow. In dens and caves of the earth they hid
themselves; they were deprived of all warlike weapons, and were
utterly despised by their conquerors; they were rather a race of
serfs than of free men until the Lord in mercy raised them up
again. Could we but fully know the horrors of the wars which
desolated Palestine, and the ravages which caused famine and
starvation, we should shudder at the sins which were thus
rebuked. Deeply engrained in their nature must the sin of
idolatry have been, or they would not have returned to it with
such persistence in the teeth of such penalties; we need not
marvel at this, there is a still greater wonder, man prefers sin
and hell to heaven and God. The lesson to ourselves, as God's
people, is to walk humbly and carefully before the Lord and
above all to keep ourselves from idols. Woe unto those who
become partakers of Rome's idolatries, for they will be joined
with her in her plagues. May grace be given to us to keep the
separated path, and remain undefiled with the fornication of the
scarlet harlot of Babylon.
Verse 44. Nevertheless he regarded their
affliction, when he heard their cry. Notwithstanding all
these provoking rebellions and detestable enormities the Lord
still heard their prayer and pitied them. This is very
wonderful, very godlike. One would have thought that the Lord
would have shut out their prayer, seeing they had shut their
ears against his admonitions; but no, he had a father's heart,
and a sight of their sorrows touched his soul, the sound of
their cries overcame his heart, and he looked upon them with
compassion. His fiercest wrath towards his own people is only a
temporary flame, but his love burns on for ever like the light
of his own immortality.
Verse 45. And he remembered for them his covenant.
The covenant is the sure foundation of mercy, and when the whole
fabric of outward grace manifested in the saints lies in ruins
this is the fundamental basis of love which is never moved, and
upon it the Lord proceeds to build again a new structure of
grace. Covenant mercy is sure as the throne of God. And repented
according to the multitude of his mercies. He did not carry out
the destruction which he had commenced. Speaking after the
manner of men he changed his mind, and did not leave them to
their enemies to be utterly cut off, because he saw that his
covenant would in such a case have been broken. The Lord is so
full of grace that he has not only mercy but mercies, yea a
multitude of them, and these hive in the covenant and treasure
up good for the erring sons of men.
Verse 46. He made them also to be pitied of all
those that carried them captives. Having the hearts of all
men in his hands he produced compassion even in heathen bosoms.
Even as he found Joseph friends in Egypt, so did he raise up
sympathizers for his captive servants. In our very worst
condition our God has ways and means for allaying the severity
of our sorrows: he can find us helpers among those who have been
our oppressors, and he will do so if we be indeed his people.
Verse 47. This is the closing prayer, arranged by
prophecy for those who would in future time be captives, and
suitable for all who before David's days had been driven from
home by the tyranny of the various scatterings by famine and
distress which had happened in the iron age of the judges. Save
us, O Lord our God. The mention of the covenant encouraged the
afflicted to call the Lord their God, and this enabled them with
greater boldness to entreat him to interpose on their behalf and
rescue them. And gather us from among the Heathen. Weary now of
the ungodly and their ways, they long to be brought into their
own separated country, where they might again enjoy the means of
grace, enter into holy fellowship with their brethren, escape
from contaminating examples, and be free to wait upon the Lord.
How often do true believers now a days long to be removed from
ungodly households, where their souls are vexed with the
conversation of the wicked. To give thanks unto thy holy name,
and to triumph in thy praise. Weaned from idols, they desire to
make mention of Jehovah's name alone, and to ascribe their
mercies to his ever abiding faithfulness and love. The Lord had
often saved them for his holy name's sake, and therefore they
feel that when again restored they would render all their
gratitude to that saving name, yea, it should be their glory to
praise Jehovah and none else.
Verse 48. Blessed be the LORD God of Israel from
everlasting to everlasting. Has not his mercy endured for
ever, and should not his praise be of like duration? Jehovah,
the God of Israel, has blessed his people, should they not also
bless him? And let all the people say, Amen. They have all seen
spared by his grace, let them all join in the adoration with
loud unanimous voice. What a thunder of praise would thus be
caused! Yet should a nation thus magnify him, yea, should all
the nations past and present unite in the solemn acclaim, it
mould fall far short of his deserts. O for the happy day when
all flesh shall see the glory of God, and all shall aloud
proclaim his praise.
Praise ye the LORD, or "Hallelujah."
Reader, praise thou the Lord, as he who writes this feeble
exposition now does with his whole heart.
"Now blest, for ever blest, be He,
The same throughout eternity,
Our Israel's God adored!
Let all the people join the lay,
And loudly, `Hallelujah', say,
`Praise ye the living Lord!'"
EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS
Verse 1. For he is good; essentially, solely
and originally; is communicative and diffusive of his goodness;
is the author of all good and no evil; and is gracious and
merciful and ready to forgive. John Gill.
Verse 1. For he is good: for his goodness endureth
for ever. Observe here what is a true and perfect confession
of the divine goodness. Whenever God so blesses his own people
that his goodness is perceived by carnal sense, in bestowing
riches, honours, peace, health and things of that kind, then it
is easy to acknowledge that God is good, and that acknowledgment
can be made by the most carnal men. The case stands otherwise
when he visits offenders with the rod of correction and scourges
them with the grace of chastisement. Then the flesh hardly bears
to confess what by its own sense it does not perceive. It fails
to discern the goodness of God unto salvation in the severity of
the rod and the scourging, and therefore refuses to acknowledge
that goodness in strokes and sufferings. The prophet, however,
throughout this Psalm celebrates in many instances the way
wherein the sinning people were arrested and smitten. And when
he proposed that this Psalm should be sung in the church of God,
Israel was under the cross and afflictions. Yet he demands that
Israel should acknowledge that the Lord is good, that his mercy
endureth for ever, even in the act of smiting the offender. That
therefore alone is a true and full confession of the divine
goodness which is made not only in prosperity but also in
adversity. Musculus.
Verse 1. There is,
1. The doxology;
2. Invitation;
3. The reason that we should, and why we should, give thanks
always;
4. The greatness of the work. But "who can utter the
mighty acts of the LORD? who can shew forth all his
praise?" That is, it is impossible for any man in the world
to do this great duty aright, as he should.
5. The best mode and method of giving thanks. "Blessed
are they that keep judgment, and he that doeth righteousness at
all times." As if he had said, "This is indeed a vast
duty; but yet he makes the best essay towards it that sets
himself constantly to serve God and keep his
commandments."—William Cooper, in the "Morning
Exercises."
Verse 1. The first and two last verses of this psalm
form a part of that psalm which David delivered into the hand of
Asaph and his brethren, to be sung before the ark of the
covenant, after it was brought from the house of Obededom to
Mount Zion. See 1Ch 16:34-36. Hence it has been ascribed to the
pen of David. Many of the ancients thought, and they are
followed by Horsley and Mudge, that it was written during the
captivity; resting their opinion chiefly on verse 47; but as
that verse occurs in the Psalm of David recorded in 1Ch 16:35,
this argument is clearly without force. James Anderson's Note
to Calvin in loc.
Verse 2. Who can utter? etc. This verse is
susceptible of two interpretations; for if you read it in
connection with the one immediately following, the sense will
be, that all men are not alike equal to the task of praising
God, because the ungodly and the wicked do nothing else than
profane his holy name with their unclean lips; as it is said in
the fiftieth psalm: "But unto the wicked God saith, What
hast thou to do to declare my statutes, or that thou shouldest
take my covenant in thy mouth?" And hence to this sentence
the following clause should have been annexed, in the form of a
reply, "Blessed are they that keep judgment." I am of
opinion, however, that the prophet had another design, namely,
that there is no man who has ever endeavoured to concentrate all
his energies, both physical and mental, in the praising of God,
but will find himself inadequate for so lofty a subject, the
transcendant grandeur of which overpowers all our senses. Not
that he exalts the power of God designedly to deter us from
celebrating its praises, but rather as the means of stirring us
up to do so to the utmost of our power. Is it any reason for
ceasing our exertions, that with whatever alacrity we pursue our
course, we yet come far short of perfection? But the thing which
ought to inspire us with the greatest encouragement is the
knowledge that, though ability may fail us, the praises which
from the heart we offer to God are pleasing to him; only let us
beware of callousness; for it would certainly be very absurd for
those who cannot attain to a tithe of perfection, to make that
the occasion of their not reaching to the hundredth part of it. John
Calvin.
Verse 2. Who can utter the mighty acts of the LORD?
etc. Our sight fails us when we look upon the sun, overpowered
by the splendour of his ways; and the mind's eye suffers the
like in every meditation on God, and the more attention is
bestowed in thinking of God, the more is the mental vision
blinded by the very light of its own thoughts. For what canst
thou say of him, what, I repeat, canst thou adequately say of
him, who is more sublime than all loftiness, and more exalted
than all height, and deeper than all depth, and clearer than all
light, and brighter than all brightness, and more splendid than
all splendour, stronger than all strength, more vigorous than
all vigour, fairer than all beauty, truer than all truth, and
more puissant than puissance, and greater than all majesty, and
mightier than all might, richer than all riches, wiser than all
wisdom, gentler than all gentleness, more just than all justice,
more merciful than all mercy?—Tertullian, quoted by
Neale and Littledale.
Verse 2. Who can utter the mighty acts of the LORD?
etc. This may be resolved either into a negation or restriction.
Few or none can "utter the mighty acts of the LORD,
"can "show forth all his praise"; few can do it
in an acceptable manner, and none can do it in a perfect manner.
And indeed it is not unusual in Scripture for such kind of
interrogations to amount unto either a negation, or at least an
expression of the rareness and difficulty of the thing spoken
of: 1Co 2:16 Ps 92:1 Isa 53:1. Without a full confession of
mercies it is not possible to make either a due valuation of
them, or a just requital of them. And how impossible a thing it
is fully to recount mercies, you may see by Ps 40:5; "Many,
O Lord my God, are thy wonderful works which thou hast done, and
thy thoughts which are toward us: they cannot be reckoned up in
order unto thee: if I would declare and speak of them, they are
more than can be numbered."—Henry Jeanes, in "The
Works of Heaven upon Earth," 1649.
Verse 2. Mighty acts of the Lord. Or powers, to
which answers the Greek word for the miracles of Christ (Mt
11:20,21), and Kimchi here restrains them to the wonders wrought
in Egypt and at the Red Sea; but they may as well be extended to
the mighty acts of God, and the effects of his power, in the
creation of all things out of nothing; in the sustentation and
government of the world; in the redemption of his people by
Christ; in the conversion of sinners, and in the final
perseverance of the saints; in all which there are such displays
of the power of God as cannot be uttered and declared by mortal
tongues. John Gill.
Verse 3. Blessed are they that keep judgment,
etc. That are of right principles and upright practices; this is
real and substantial praising of God. Thanks doing is the proof
of thanksgiving; and the good life of the thankful is the life
of thankfulness. Those that thank God only, and no more, are not
only contumelious, but injurious. John Trapp.
Verse 3. Keep judgment; doeth righteousness. I
doubt not that there is some difference; viz. that he is said to
keep judgment who judgeth rightly, but he to do righteousness
who acts righteously. Augustine.
Verse 3. I have read of Louis, king of France, that
when he had through inadvertency granted an unjust suit, as soon
as ever he had read those words of the Psalmist, "Blessed
is he that doeth righteousness at all times, "he presently
recollected himself, and upon better thoughts gave his judgment
quite contrary. Thomas Brooks.
Verse 4. O visit me. This is a beautiful
figure. The prayer is not, "Give me a more intense desire,
increased energy of action, that I may please thee, that I may
serve thee, that I may go step by step up to thee, every step
bringing with it is fresh sense of meritorious claim upon
thee". No such thing. It is "Visit me";
"descend down upon me" daily from thine own lofty
throne, for the fulfilment of thine own purposes. "Visit
me". George Fisk, 1851.
Verse 4. O visit me with thy salvation. Hugo
takes the visit of God as that of a physician of whom healing of
the eyes is sought, because it is immediately added, "That
I may see", etc. Lorinus.
Verse 4. There is an ancient Jewish gloss which is
noteworthy, that the petition is for a share in the resurrection
in the days of Messiah in order to see his wonderful restoration
of his suffering people. Neale and Littledale.
Verse 5. We may note that the threefold nature of man
prompts the union of the three petitions of this verse in one.
"That I may see, " is the prayer of the body, desiring
the open vision of God; "and rejoice, "is the wish of
the soul or mind, that the affections may likewise be gratified;
and vice thanks, as the spirit needs to pour itself out in
worship. Further, there are three names here given to the
saints, each for a reason of its own. They are God's
"chosen, " because of his predestinating grace,
"according as he hath chosen us in him before the
foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without
blame before him in love" (Eph 1:4); they are his
"nation, "having one law and one worship under him as
sole king, "And what nation is there so great, that hath
statutes and judgments so righteous as all this law?" (De
4:8) they are his "inheritance, "for it is written,
"I shall give the heathen for thine inheritance" (Ps
2:8). Hugo Cardinalis and Albertus Magnus, in Neale
and Littledale.
Verse 5. That I may see the good of thy chosen.
That, having been predestined, and justified, we may come to see
the good of thy chosen, which means that the very face of the
Lord may be made conspicuous to us. (1Jo 3:2). By the "good
of thy chosen" we are not to understand their own probity
or goodness, but the supreme happiness that is their lot.
"That I may rejoice in the gladness of thy nation."
That we may partake in that unspeakable joy which arises from
the beatific vision, which is the peculiar property of the
chosen people, of which strangers cannot taste, of which the
gospel says, "Enter into the joy of thy Lord."—Robert
Bellarmine, 1542-1621.
Verse 6. We have sinned with our fathers. Let
us look a little further back, to find the age of sin; even as
far as the original, from whence comes all the copy of
imitation. Be they never so new in act, they are old in example:
"We have sinned with our fathers." God tells them they
had rebelled of old; "As your fathers did, so do ye"
(Ac 8:51). Antiquity is no infallible argument of goodness:
though Tertullian says the first things were the best things;
and the less they distanced from the beginning, the poorer they
were; but he must be understood only of holy customs. For
iniquity can plead antiquity: he that commits a new act of
murder finds it old in the example of Cain; drunkenness may be
fetched from Noah; contempt of parents from Ham; women's
lightness from the daughters of Lot. There is no sin but hath
white hairs upon it, and is exceeding old. But let us look
further back yet, even to Adam; there is the age of sin. This is
that St. Paul calls the old man; it is almost as old as the
root, but older than all the branches. Therefore our restitution
by Christ to grace is called the new man. Thomas Adams.
Verse 6. We have sinned with our fathers. It
enhances the sin considerably by adding "with our
fathers." He would have seemed to extenuate, not
exaggerate, if he had said, We have sinned with other mortals.
But by saying, We have sinned with our fathers, he by no means
lessens but aggravates their offences, while he thereby extols
the goodness of God who blessed not only those who acted
sinfully and impiously, but also the children and descendants of
the sinful and impious, even those whom he could with the
highest justice have cut off as doubly detestable. Musculus.
Verse 6. Sinned; committed iniquity; done wickedly.
The Rabbins tell us that there are three kinds and degrees of
sin here set down in an ascending scale; against one's self,
against one's neighbour, against God; sins of ignorance, sins of
conscious deliberation, sins of pride and wickedness. R. Levi
and Genebrardus, in Neale and Littledale.
Verse 6. Though the writers of the Scriptures were by
divine inspiration infallibly preserved from extravagance, yet
they use every appropriate variety of strong and condemnatory
language against sin (Ps 106:6). Surely moral evil cannot be a
trifle. Yet it breaks forth on all occasions and on all hands.
Sometimes it is in the form of forgetfulness of God (Ps
106:13,21), sometimes of rash impetuosity towards evil (Ps
106:13), sometimes of strong, imperious lusts (Ps 106:14),
sometimes of vile unbelief (Ps 106:12,24), and so of the whole
catalogue of offences against God and man. O how vile we are!—William
S. Plumer.
Verse 7. Our fathers understood not thy wonders in
Egypt. Though the elders went along with Moses, and heard
him shew his commission to Pharaoh, and make his demands in the
name of the Lord to let Israel go, (Ex 3:16); yea, and they saw
the judgments of God on Egypt; yet "they did not
understand" that these wonders would do the work of their
deliverance. At first they thought it was worse with them. Much
less did they understand, that their deliverance should be a
type of eternal deliverance, that God would be their God, as
after is explained in the preface to the ten commandments. And
because they "understood not his wonders, "therefore
they "remembered not his mercies." A shallow
understanding causeth a short memory. Nathaniel Homes,
1652.
Verse 7. Our fathers understood not thy wonders in
Egypt. It is more than probable, that many of the Israelites
ascribed most of these wonders to the skill of Moses
transcending that of the Egyptian magicians or to his working by
the assistance of a higher and more potent spirit than that
which assisted them. Or, in case they did believe them to have
been the effects of a Divine Power, yet they did not inure their
minds seriously to consider it, so as to have a standing awe of
that power imprinted upon their hearts by such a consideration:
and he that considers great and important matters superficially,
in the language of the Scripture, does not understand them. Robert
South.
Verse 7. Understood not...remembered not. He
reproveth both their understanding and memory. Understanding
there was need of; that they might meditate unto what eternal
blessings God was calling them through these temporal ones; and
of memory, that at least they might not forget the temporal
wonders which had been wrought, and might faithfully believe,
that by the same power which they had already experienced, God
would free them from the persecution of their enemies; whereas
they forgot the aid which he had given them in Egypt, by means
of such wonders, to crush their enemies. Augustine.
Verse 7. One sin is a step to another more heinous;
for not observing, is followed with not remembering, and
forgetfulness of duty draweth on disobedience and rebellion. David
Dickson.
Verse 7. They provoked him. To provoke, is an
expression setting forth a peculiar and more than ordinary
degree of misbehaviour, and seems to import an insolent daring
resolution to offend. A resolution not contented with one single
stroke of disobedience, but such a one as multiplies and repeats
the action, till the offence greatens, and rises into an
affront; and as it relates to God, so I conceive it as aimed at
him in a threefold respect. First, of his power. Secondly, of
his goodness. Thirdly, of his patience.
First. And first it rises up against the power and
prerogative of God. It is, as it were, an assault upon God
sitting upon his throne, a snatching at his sceptre, and a
defiance of his very royalty and supremacy. He that provokes God
does in a manner dare him to strike, and to revenge the injury
and invasion upon his honour. He considers not the weight of
God's almighty arm, and the edge of his sword, the swiftness and
poison of his arrows, but puffs at all, and looks the terrors of
sin revenging justice in the face. The Israelites could not sin
against God, after those miracles in Egypt, without a signal
provocation of that power that they had so late, and so
convincing an experience of: a power that could have crushed an
Israelite as easily as an Egyptian; and given as terrible an
instance of its consuming force upon false friends, as upon
professed enemies; in the sight of God, perhaps, the less sort
of offenders of the two.
Secondly. Provoking God imports an abuse of his goodness.
God, as he is clothed with power, is the proper object of our
fear; but as he displays his goodness, of our love. By one he
would command, by the other he would win and (as it were) court
our obedience. And an affront to his goodness, his tenderness,
and his mercy, as much exceeds an affront of his power as a
wound at the heart transcends a blow on the hand. For when God
shall show miracles of mercy, step out of the common road of
providence, commanding the host of heaven, the globe of the
earth, and the whole system of nature out of its course, to
serve a design of goodness upon a people, as he did upon the
Israelites; was not a provocation, after such obliging passages,
infinitely base and insufferable, and a degree of ingratitude,
higher than the heavens struck at, and deeper than the sea that
they passed through?
Thirdly. Provoking God imports an affront upon his
longsuffering, and his patience. The movings of nature in the
breasts of mankind, tell us how keenly, how regretfully, every
man resents the abuse of his love; how hardly any prince, but
one, can put up an offence against his acts of mercy; and how
much more affrontive it is to despise majesty ruling by the
golden sceptre of pardon, than by the iron rod of penal law. But
now patience is a further and an higher advance of mercy; it is
mercy drawn out at length; mercy wrestling with baseness, and
striving, if possible, even to weary and outdo ingratitude; and
therefore a sin against this is the highest pitch, the utmost
improvement, and, as I may so speak, the ne plus ultra of
provocation. For when patience shall come to be tired, and even
out of breath with pardoning, let all the invention of mankind
find something further, either upon which an offender may cast
his hope, or against which he can commit a sin. But it was God's
patience the ungrateful Israelites sinned against; for they even
plied and pursued him with sin upon sin, one offence following
and thronging upon the neck of another, the last account still
rising highest, and swelling bigger, till the treasures of grace
and pardon were so far drained and exhausted, that they provoked
God to swear, and what is more, to swear in his wrath and with a
full purpose of revenge, that they should never enter into his
rest. Robert South.
Verse 7. They provoked him. Wherein lay their
provocation? They remembered not the multitude of his mercies:the
former mercies of the Lord did not strengthen their trust in
present troubles; that was one provocation. And as former
mercies did not strengthen their trust, so the present troubles
drew out their distrust, as another Scripture assures, reporting
their behaviour in it (Ex 14:11): "And they said unto
Moses, Because there were no graves in Egypt, hast thou taken us
away to die in the wilderness? wherefore hast thou dealt thus
with us, to carry us forth out of Egypt? "What were these
fearful forecasts, these amazing bodements of an unavoidable (as
they apprehended) ruin, but the overflowing of unbelief, or
distrust in God; and this was another provocation. Former
mercies are forgotten, yea, eaten up by unbelief, as the seven
lean kine in Pharaoh's dream, eat up the fat ones, and present
difficulties are aggravated by unbelief, as if all the power of
God could not remove and overcome them. And will not the Lord
(think you) visit in anger such a sin as this?—Joseph Caryl.
Verse 7. At the Red Sea. That is to say, at the
Arabian Gulf: literally, at the Sea of Suph, which, if Suph be
not here a proper name, (as it seems to be in De 1:1, and, with
a slight variation, in Nu 31:14) means the sea of weeds, and
that sea is still called by a similar name, in modern Egypt. Its
designation, throughout the books of the Old Testament, is in
the Syriac version, and the Chaldee Paraphrased, likewise
rendered the sea of weeds; which name may have been derived from
the reeds growing near its shore: or from the weeds, or
coralline productions, seen through its waters, and the corals
seen at its bottom...Pliny states, that it is called the Red Sea
from King Erythras, or from the reflection of a red colour by
the sun, or from its sand and its ground, or form the nature of
its water. Daniel Cresswell.
Verses 7-8. This psalm is a psalm of thanksgiving, as
the first and last verses declare. Now because a man is most fit
to praise God when he is most sensible of his own sin and
unworthiness; the psalmist doth throughout this psalm lay
Israel's sin and God's mercy together. Ps 106:7. Our Fathers
(says he) understood not thy wonders in Egypt. They saw
them with their eyes, but they did not understand them with
their heart: they did not apprehend the design and scope and end
of God in those wonders: and therefore, "they remembered
not (says the text) thy mercies; for a man remembers no
more than he understands."
But it may be these mercies were very few, and so their sin
in forgetfulness the less? Nay, not so, Ps 106:7, They
remembered not the multitude of thy mercies.
But it may be this was their infirmity or weakness, and so
they were rather to be borne withal? Not so, but they
rebelled against him; so Montanus reads it better.
But it may be this sin was committed whilst they were in
Egypt, or among the Egyptians, being put on by them? Not so
neither, but when they were come out of Egypt, and only had to
deal with God, and saw his glorious power at the Red Sea, then
they rebelled against him, at the sea, even at the Red Sea.
What, then, did not the Lord destroy them? No says the text, Notwithstanding,
all their grievance, unthankfulness, and their rebellion, he
saved them for his name's sake. William Bridge, in a Sermon
preached before the House of Commons, Nov. 5, 1647.
Verse 8. Nevertheless he saved them. If God
should not shew mercy to his people with a nevertheless,
how should the glory of his mercy appear? If a physician should
only cure a man that hath the headache or the toothache; one
that hath taken cold, or some small disease; it would not argue
any great skill and excellency in the physician. But when a man
is nigh unto death, hath one foot in the grave, or is, in the
eye of reason, past all recovery; if then the physician cure
him, it argues much the skill and excellency of that physician.
So now, if God should only cure, and save a people that were
less evil and wicked; or that were good indeed, where should the
excellence of mercy appear? But when a people shall be drawing
near to death, lying bed ridden, as it were, and the Lord out of
his free love, for his own name's sake, shall rise, and cure
such an unworthy people, this sets out the glory of his mercy.
It is said in the verse precedent, "They rebelled at the
sea, even at the Red Sea", or, as in the Hebrew, "even
in the Red Sea; "when the waters stood like walls on
both sides of them; when they saw those walls of waters that
never people saw before, and saw the power, the infinite power
of God leading them through on dry land; then did they
rebel, at the sea, even in the sea; and yet for all this
the Lord saved them with a notwithstanding all this. And
I say, shall the Lord put forth so much of grace upon a people,
that were under the law; and not put forth much more of his
grace upon those that are under the gospel?—William Bridge.
Verse 8. For his name's sake. Improve his name
in every case; for he hath a name suiting every want, every
need. Do you need wonders to be wrought for you? His name is
Wonderful; look to him so to do, for his name's sake. Do you
need counsel and direction? His name is the Counsellor: cast
yourself on him and his name for this. Have you mighty enemies
to debate with? His name is the Mighty God; seek that he may
exert his power for his name's sake. Do you need his fatherly
pity? His name is the everlasting Father; "As a Father
pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear
him." Plead his pity, for his name's sake. Do you need
peace external, internal, or eternal? His name is the Prince of
Peace; seek for his name's sake, that he may create peace. O
sirs, his name is JEHOVAH ROPHI, the Lord, the healer and
physician; seek, for his name's sake, that he may heal all your
diseases. Do you need pardon? His name is JEHOVAH TSlDKENU, the
Lord our righteousness: seek, for his name's sake, that he may
be merciful to your unrighteousness. Do you need defence and
protection? His name is JEHOVAH NISSI, the Lord your banner;
seek, for his name's sake, that his banner of love and grace may
be spread over you. Do you need provision in extreme want? His
name is JEHOVAH JIREH, in the mount of the Lord it shall be
seen, the Lord will provide. Do you need his presence? His name
is JEHOVAH SHAMMAH, the Lord is there: IMMANUEL, God with us:
look to him to be with you, for his name's sake. Do you need
audience of prayer? His name is the Hearer of prayer. Do you
need strength? His name is the Strength of Israel. Do you need
comfort? His name is the Consolation of Israel. Do you need
shelter? His name is the City of Refuge. Have you nothing and
need all His name is All in all. Sit down and devise names to
your wants and needs, and you will find he hath a name suitable
thereunto; for your supply, he hath wisdom to guide you; and
power to keep you; mercy to pity you; truth to shield you;
holiness to sanctify you; righteousness to justify you; grace to
adorn you; and glory to crown you. Trust in his name, who saves
for his name's sake. Ralph Erskine, 1685-1752.
Verse 9. He rebuked the Red sea also, and it was
dried up. A poetical expression, signifying that the Red Sea
retired at God's command, just as a slave would fly from his
master's presence on being severely rebuked. Robert
Bellarmine.
Verse 9. He rebuked. We do not read that any
voice was sent forth from heaven to rebuke the sea; but he hath
called the Divine Power by which this was effected, a rebuke,
unless indeed any one may choose to say, that the sea was
secretly rebuked, so that the waters might hear, and yet men
could not. The power by which God acts is very abstruse and
mysterious, a power by which he causeth that even things devoid
of sense instantly obey at his will. Augustine.
Verse 9. Wilderness. Midbar; a broad expanse of
poor dry land, suited for sheep walks (like our South Downs, or
Salisbury Plain). Compare Isa 43:13. William Kay.
Verse 11. There was not one of them left. An
emblem this of the utter destruction of all our spiritual
enemies by Christ, who has not only saved us from them, but has
entirely destroyed them; he has made an end of sin, even of all
the sins of his people; he has spoiled Satan, and his
principalities and powers; he has abolished death, the last
enemy, and made his saints more than conquerors over all.
Likewise it may be a representation of the destruction of the
wicked at the last day, who will all be burnt up at the general
conflagration, root and branch, not one will be left. See Mal
4:1. John Gill.
Verse 12. Then believed they his words. There
is a temporary faith, as Mark calls it in (Mr 4:17), which is
not so much a fruit of the Spirit of regeneration, as of a
certain mutable affection, and so it soon passeth away. It is
not a voluntary faith which is here extolled by the prophet, but
rather that which is the result of compulsion, namely, because
men, whether they will or not, by a sense which they have of the
power of God, are constrained to show some reverence for him.
This passage ought to be well considered, that men, when once
they have yielded submission to God, may not deceive themselves,
but may know that the touchstone of faith is when they
spontaneously receive the word of God, and constantly continue
firm in their obedience to it. John Calvin.
Verse 12. Natural affections raised high in a
profession of religion will withstand temptations for a fit, but
wait till the stream runs lower, and you will see. What a fit of
affection had the Israelites when their eyes had seen that
miraculous deliverance at the Red Sea! What songs of rejoicing
had they! what resolves never to distrust him again! Then
believed they his words; they sang his praise. Satan doth
not presently urge them to murmuring and unbelief, though that
was his design, but he staid till the fit was over, and then he
could soon tempt them to forget his works. Richard Gilpin in
"A Treatise of Satan's Temptations," 1677.
Verse 12. In the very brevity of this verse, the only
one of its kind in the narrative portion of the psalm, we may
well see how short lived were their gratitude, belief, and
worship of God; as it follows at once, They soon forgat,
etc. Neale and Littledale.
Verses 12-13. They sang his praise. They soon forgat
his works. This was said of that generation of the Israelites,
which came out of Egypt. The chapter which contains the portion
of their history here alluded to, begins with rapturous
expressions of gratitude, and ends with the murmurs of
discontent; both uttered by the same lips, within the short
space of three days. Their expressions of gratitude were called
forth by that wonderful display of the divine perfections, which
delivered them from the host of Pharaoh, and destroyed their
enemies. Their murmurs were excited by a comparatively trifling
inconvenience, which in a few hours was removed. Of persons
whose thanksgivings were so quickly, and so easily changed to
murmurings, it might well be said,—though they sang God's
praises, "they soon forgat his works." Unhappily,
the Israelites are by no means the only persons of whom this
may, in truth, be said. Their conduct, as here described,
affords a striking exemplification of that spurious gratitude,
which often bursts forth in a sudden flash, when dreaded evils
are averted, or unexpected favours bestowed; but expires with
the occasion that gave it birth; a gratitude resembling the joy
excited in an infant's breast by the gift of some glittering
toy, which is received with rapture, and pleases for an hour;
but when the charm of novelty vanishes, is thrown aside with
indifference; and the hand that bestowed it is forgotten.
Springing from no higher principle than gratified self love, it
is neither acceptable to God, nor productive of obedience to his
laws; nor does it in any respect really resemble that holy,
heaven born affection, whose language it often borrows, and
whose name it assumes. It may be called, distinctively, the
gratitude of sinners; who, as they love those that love them,
will of course be grateful to those that are kind to them;
grateful even to God when they view him as kind.
Of these instances, the first which I shall notice is
furnished by the works of creation; or, as they are
often, though not very properly, called, the works of nature. In
so impressive a manner do these works present themselves to our
senses; so much of variety, and beauty, and sublimity do they
exhibit; such power, and wisdom, and goodness do they display;
that perhaps no man, certainly no man who possesses the smallest
share of sensibility, taste, or mental cultivation, can, at all
times, view them without emotion; without feelings of awe, or
wonder, or admiration, or delight. But, alas, how transient, how
unproductive of salutary effects, have all these emotions
proved? Appetite and passion, though hushed for a moment, soon
renewed their importunities; the glitter of wealth and
distinction, and power, eclipsed, in our view, the glories of
Jehovah; we sunk from that heaven toward which we seemed rising,
to plunge afresh into the vortex of earthly pleasures and
pursuits; we neglected and disobeyed him, whom we had been ready
to adore; and continued to live without God, in a world which we
had just seen to be full of his glory. A second instance of a
similar nature is afforded by the manner in which men are often
affected by God's works of providence. In these works his
perfections are so constantly, and often so clearly displayed;
our dependence on them is at all times so real, and sometimes so
apparent; and they bear, in many eases, so directly and
evidently upon our dearest temporal interests, that even the
most insensible cannot, always, regard them with indifference.
But the feeling is usually transient; and the acknowledgment
is forgotten almost as soon as it is made. In a similar manner
are men often affected by God's works of grace; or those
works whose design and tendency it is, to promote the spiritual
and eternal interests of man. These works most clearly display,
not only the natural, but the moral perfections of Jehovah. Here
his character shines, full-orbed and complete. That an
exhibition of these wonders should make, at least, a temporary
impression upon our minds, is no more than might naturally be
expected. For a moment our hearts seem to be melted. We feel,
and are ready to acknowledge, that God is good; that the Saviour
is kind; that his love ought to be returned; that heaven is
desirable! Like a class of hearers described by one great
Teacher, we receive the word with joy; a joy not unmingled with
something which resembles gratitude; and we sing, or feel as if
we could with pleasure sing, God's praises. But we leave his
house; the emotions there excited subside; like the earth, when
partially softened by a wintry sun, our hearts soon regain their
icy hardness; the wonders of divine grace are forgotten; and God
has reason to say in sorrow and displeasure,—Your goodness is
as the morning cloud; and as the early dew it goeth away. Condensed
from a Sermon by Edward Payson, 1783-1827.
Verse 13. They soon forgat his works. They
forgat, yea, "soon"; they made haste to forget,
so the original is: "They made haste, they forgat."
Like men that in sleep shake Death by the hand, but when they
are awake they will not know him. Thomas Adams.
Verse 13. How may we know that we are rightly
thankful? When we are careful to register God's mercy, 1Ch 16:4:
"David appointed certain of the Levites, to record, and to
thank and praise the Lord God of Israel." Physicians say
the memory is the first thing that decays; it is true in
spirituals: "They soon forgat his works."—Thomas
Watson.
Verse 13. They soon forgat. As it is with a
sieve or boulter, the good corn and fine flour goes through, but
the light chaff and coarse bran remains behind; or as a
strainer, that the sweet liquor is strained out, but the dregs
are left behind: or as a grate, that lets the pure water run
away, but if there be any straws, sticks, mud, or filth, that it
holds. Thus it is with most men's memories; by nature they are
but, as it were, pertusa dolia, mere river tubs,
especially in good things very treacherous, so that the vain
conceits of men are apt to be held in, when divine instructions
and gracious promises run through; trifles and toys, and worldly
things, they are apt to remember, tenacious enough; but for
spiritual things they leak out; like Israel, they soon forget
them. William Gouge.
Verse 13. They soon forgat his works. Three
days afterwards, at the waters of Marah (Ex 15:24). Adam
Clarke.
Verse 13. They waited not. The insatiable
nature of our desires is astonishing, in that scarcely a single
day is allowed to God to gratify them. For should he not
immediately satisfy them, we at once become impatient, and are
in danger of eventually falling into despair. This, then, was
the fault of the people, that they did not cast all their cares
upon God, did not calmly call upon him, nor wait patiently until
he was pleased to answer their requests, but rushed forward with
reckless precipitation, as if they would dictate to God what he
was to do. And, therefore, to heighten the criminality of their
rash course, he employs the term counsel; because men
will neither allow God to be possessed of wisdom, nor do they
deem it proper to depend upon his counsel, but are more
provident than becomes them, and would rather rule God than
allow themselves to be ruled by him according to his pleasure.
That we may be preserved from provoking God, let us ever retain
this principle, That it is our duty to let him provide for us
such things as he knows will be for our advantage. And verily,
faith divesting us of our own wisdom, enables us hopefully and
quietly to wait until God accomplishes his own work; whereas, on
the contrary, our carnal desire always goes before the counsel
of God, by its too great haste. John Calvin.
Verse 13. They waited not. They ought to have
thought, that so great works of God towards themselves were not
without a purpose, but that they invited them to some endless
happiness, which was to be waited for with patience; but they
hastened to make themselves happy with temporal things, which
give no man true happiness, because they do not quench
insatiable longing: "for whosoever", saith our Lord,
"shall drink of this water, shall thirst again." Joh
4:13. Augustine.
Verse 13. They waited not for his counsel.
Which neglect of theirs may be understood two ways. First, that
they waited not for his open or declared counsel, to direct them
what to do, but without asking his advice would needs venture
and run on upon their own heads, to do what seemed good in their
own eyes. Secondly, that they waited not for the accomplishment
of his hidden and secret counsel concerning them; they would not
tarry God's time for the bringing forth and bringing about his
counsels. Not to wait upon God either way is very sinful. Not to
wait for his counsel to direct us what to do, and not to wait
for his doing or fulfilling his own counsel, argues at once a
proud and an impatient spirit; in the one, men so even slight
the wisdom of God, and in the other vainly presume and attempt
to prevent his providence. Joseph Caryl.
Verse 13. They waited not for his counsel. A
believer acting his faith, hath great advantage of an
unbeliever. An unbeliever is froward and passionate, and heady
and hasty, when he is put to plunge; he waits not for the
counsel of God. He leaps before he looks, before he hath
eyes to see his way; but a believer is quiet and confident, and
silent and patient, and prayerful, and standing upon his watch
tower, to see what God will answer at such a time. Matthew
Lawrence, in "The Use and Practice of Faith,"
1657.
Verse 14. In the wilderness. When God by
circumstances of time and place doth call for moderation of
carnal appetite, the transgression is more heinous and offensive
unto God: "They lusted exceedingly in the wilderness",
where they should have contented themselves with any sort of
provision. David Dickson.
Verse 14. In the wilderness. There, where
they had bread enough and to spare, yet nothing would serve
them but they must have flesh to eat. They were now purely at
God's finding; so that this was a reflection upon the wisdom
and goodness of their Creator. They were now, in all
probability, within a step of Canaan, yet had not
patience to stay for dainties till they came thither. They
had flocks and herds of their own, but they will not kill
them; God must give them flesh as he gave them bread, or they
will never give him credit or their good word: they did not only
wish for flesh, "but" they "lusted
exceedingly" after it. A desire even of lawful things, when
it is inordinate and violent, becomes sinful; and therefore this
is called "lusting after evil things", (1Co 10:6),
though the quails as God's gift, were good things, and were so
spoken of, Ps 105:40. Yet this was not all, "they tempted
God in the desert", where they had had such experience
of his goodness and power, and questioned whether he could
and would gratify them therein. See Ps 78:19-20. Matthew
Henry.
Verse 15. And he gave them their request, etc.
The throat's pleasure did shut up paradise, sold the birthright,
beheaded the Baptist, and it was the chief of the cooks,
Nebuzaradan, that first set fire to the temple, and razed the
city. These effects are,
1. Grossness; which takes away agility to any good work;
which makes a man more like a tun upon two pottle pots. Caesar
said he mistrusted not Antony and Dolabella for any practices,
because they were fat; but Casca and Cassius, lean, hollow
fellows, who did think too much. The other are the devil's
crammed fowls, too fat to lay. Indeed, what need they travel
far, whose felicity is at home; placing paradise in their
throats, and heaven in their food?
2. Macilency of grace; for as it puts fatness into their
bodies, so leanness into their souls. God fatted the Israelites
with quails, but withal sent leanness into their soul.
The flesh is blown up, the spirit doth languish. They are worse
than man eaters, for they are self eaters: they put a pleurisy
into their bloods, and an apoplexy into their souls. Thomas
Adams.
Verse 15. Sent leanness into their soul. God affords
us as great means for our increase in these Gospel times as ever
he did; he puts us into fat pastures, and well watered, Ps
23:1-6; therefore it is a shame for God's people not to grow,
not to "bring forth twins", as So 6:6. They should
grow twice as fast, bring forth twice as fast, bring forth twice
as many lambs, twice as much wool, twice as much milk, as those
that go upon bare commons. All the world may cry shame on such a
man that is high fed, and often fed with fat and sweet
ordinances, if he be still like Pharaoh's lean kine, as lean and
ill favoured as ever he was before. Certainly, fat ordinances
and lean souls do not well agree. We are to look upon it as the
greatest of judgments to have leanness sent into our souls
while we are fed with manna. We look on it as an
affliction to have an over lean body; but it's a far sadder
condition to have a lean soul. Of the two, it were far better to
have a well thriving body and a lean soul: it is a great mercy
when both prosper, 3Jo 1:2: "I wish above all things that
thou mayest prosper and be in health, even as thy soul
prospereth." Oh it is a sweet thing, especially to have a
prospering soul, and still upon the growing hand: and God
expects it should be so, where he affords good diet, great means
of grace; as Da 1:10: "The prince of the eunuchs said unto
Daniel, I fear my lord the king, who hath appointed your meat
and your drink." If you should look ill, who fare so well,
I should be sure to bear the blame; it were so much as my head
is worth. So certainly, where God affords precious food for
precious souls, if these souls be lean under fat ordinances,
either those that are fed, or those that feed them; either the
stewards or the household; either minister, or people, or both,
are sure to bear the blame. It is but equal and just that such
should grow. We do not wonder to see lean sheep upon bare
commons, but when we see sheep continue lean in fat pastures, we
think their meat is ill bestowed on them; and therefore let us
strive to be on the growing hand. Matthew Lawrence.
Verse 15. Leanness is rendered
"loathing" by Bishop Horsley, which accords with the
literal state of the case; but I think leanness, as
applied to the soul is exceedingly descriptive of its spiritual
barrenness and emptiness of aught like Divine tastes or
enjoyments. Thomas Chalmers.
Verse 17. The earth opened, etc. This element
was not used to such morsels. It devours the carcases of men;
but bodies informed with living souls, never before. To have
seen them struck dead upon the earth had been fearful; but to
see the earth at once their executioner and grave, was more
horrible. Neither the sea nor the earth are fit to give passage;
the sea is moist and flowing, and will not be divided, for the
continuity of it; the earth is dry and massy, and will neither
yield naturally, nor meet again when it hath yielded: yet the
waters did cleave to give way unto Israel for their
preservation; the earth did cleave to give way to the
conspirators in judgment; both sea and earth did shut their jaws
again upon the adversaries of God. There was more wonder in this
latter. It was a marvel that the waters opened; it was no wonder
that they shut again; for the retiring and flowing was natural.
It was no less marvel that the earth opened; but more marvel
that it shut again; because it had no natural disposition to
meet when it was divided. Now might Israel see they had to do
with a God that could revenge with ease. There are two sorts of
traitors: the earth swallowed up the one, the fire the other.
All the elements agree to serve the vengeance of their Maker.
Nadab and Abihu brought fit persons, but unfit fire, to God;
these Levites bring the right fire, but unwarranted persons,
before him: fire from God consumes both. It is a dangerous thing
to usurp sacred functions. The ministry will not grace the man;
the man may disgrace the ministry. Joseph Hall.
Verse 17. Dathan and Abiram only are mentioned, and
this in strict agreement with Nu 26:11, where it is said, "the
children of Korah died not." And the same thing is at
least implied in Nu 16:27, where it is said, that, just
before the catastrophe took place, "Dathan and Abiram"
(there is no mention of Korah) "came out and stood in the
door of their tents." See this noticed and accounted for in
Blunt's Veracity of the Books of Moses, Part 1, 20
pounds, 86. J.J. Stewart Perowne.
Verse 19. They made a calf. And why a calf?
Could they find no fitter resemblance of God amongst all the
creatures? Why not rather the lordly lion, to show the
sovereignty; vast elephant, the immensity; subtle serpent, the
wisdom; long-lived hart, the eternity; swift eagle, the ubiquity
of God, rather than the silly senseless calf, that eateth hay?
But the shape matters not much, for if God be made like
anything, he may be made like anything, it being as unlawful to
fashion him an angel as a worm, seeing the commandment forbids
as well the likeness of things in heaven above as ill earth
beneath (Ex 20:4). But probably a calf was preferred before
other forms because they had learned it from the Egyptians'
worshipping their ox Apis. Thus the Israelites borrowed (Ex
12:35) not all gold and silver but some dross from the
Egyptians, whence they fetch the idolatrous forms of their
worship.
Verse 19. The modern Jews are of opinion that all the
afflictions which ever since have, do, or shall befall their
nation, are still the just punishments on them for this their
first act of idolatry. And the rabbins have a saying that God
never inflicts any judgment upon them, but there is an ounce of
his anger on them for their ancestors' making the golden calf. A
reverend friend of mine, conversing at Amsterdam with a Jewish
youth (very capable and ingenious for one of that nation)
endeavoured to make him sensible of God's anger upon them for
rejecting and crucifying of Christ, for which foul act he showed
how the Jews have lived many hundred years in miserable
banishment. But the youth would in no wise acknowledge in their
sufferings any effect or punishment of their murdering of
Christ, but taking his Bible turned to God's threatening
immediately after their making of the calf (Ex 33:34);
"Nevertheless in the day when I visit, I will visit their
sin upon them", so interpreting and applying all the
numerous calamities which since have befallen them to relate to
no other cause than that their first idolatry. Whereas, indeed,
the arrears of their idolatry long ago were satisfied, and this
is a new debt of later date contracted on themselves by their
infidelity. Thomas Fuller, 1608-1661, in "A
Pisgah Sight of Palestine."
Verse 19. They made a calf, etc. This people
had seen this idolatrous service in Egypt; and now they did not
more long after Egyptian food, than after this Egyptian god...It
is an easy matter for men to be drawn to the practice of that
idolatry that they have been accustomed to see practised in
those places that they have a long time lived in. He that would
take heed of idolatry, let him take heed of Egypt; the very air
of Egypt (as I may so say) is infectious in this kind. See here,
they had seen the worship of a young bullock in Egypt, and they
must have a bullock. . . . The local seat of Antichrist (and
what seat can that be but Rome?) is called in the
Revelation by three names: it is called Egypt, Re 2:8. It
is called Sodom in the same verse. It is called Babylon
in many places of the Revelation. It is called Babylon,
in regard of her cruelty. It is called Sodom, in regard
to her filthiness; and Egypt, in regard of her idolatry.
It is a hard matter for a man to live in Egypt, and not to taste
and savour somewhat of the idolatry of Egypt. We had sometime,
in England, a proverb about going to Rome. They said, a man that
went the first time to Rome, he went to see a wicked man there;
he that went the second rime to Rome, went to be acquainted with
that wicked man there; he that went the third time, brought him
home with him. How many have we seen (and it is pity to see so
many) of our nobility and gentry go to those Egyptian, parts,
and return home again; but few of them bring home the same
manners, the same religion, nor the same souls they carried out
with them. Thomas Westfield, Bishop of Brigtow, in
"England's Face in Israel's Glasse," 1658.
Verse 19. In Horeb. There is a peculiar stress
on the words "in Horeb", as denoting the very place
where the great manifestation of God's power and presence has
been made, and where the law had been given, whose very first
words were a prohibition of the sin of idolatry. Agellius, in
Neale and Littledale.
Verse 19-20. Apis, or Serapis, was a true living black
bull, with a white list or streak along the back, a white mark
in fashion of an half moon on his right shoulder, only two hairs
growing on his tail (why just so many and no more, the devil
knows), with a fair square blaze on his forehead, and a great
bunch called cantharus under his tongue. What art their priests
did use to keep up the breed and preserve succession of cattle
with such gwrismata, or privy marks, I list not to
inquire...Besides this natural and living bull, kept in one
place, they also worshipped boun diacruson, a golden or gilded
ox, the image or portraiture of the former. Some conceive this
Apis to have been the symbol and emblem of Joseph the patriarch,
so called from ba, ab, a father, seeing he is said to be
made by God a father to Pharaoh (Ge 45:8), that is, preserver of
him and his country; and therefore the Egyptians, in after ages,
gratified his memory with statues of an ox, a creature so useful
in ploughing, sowing, bringing home, and treading out of corn,
to perpetuate that gift of grain he had conferred upon them.
They strengthen their conjecture because Serapis (which one will
have to be nothing else but Apis with addition of rv, sar,
that is, a prince, whence perchance our English Sir) was
pictured with a bushel over his head, and Joseph (we know) was
corn meter general in Egypt. Though others, on good ground,
conceive ox worship in Egypt of far greater antiquity. However,
hence Aaron (Ex 32:4), and hence afterwards Jeroboam (who flying
from Solomon, lived some years with Shishak, king of Egypt, 1Ki
11:40) had the pattern of their calves, which they made for the
children of Israel to worship. If any object the Egyptians'
idols were bulls or oxen, the Israelites' but calves, the
difference is not considerable; for (besides the objector never
looked into the mouths of the latter to know their age) gradus
non variat speciem, a less character is not another letter.
Yea, Herodotus calls Apis himself moscov, a calf, and Vitulus is
of as large acceptation among the Latins. Such an old calf the
poet describes—
Ego hanc vitalam (ne forte recuses
Bis venit ad mulctram binos alit ubere faetus)
Depono.
My calf I lay (lest you mistake both tides
She comes to the pail and suckles twain besides).
But to put all out of doubt, what in Exodus is termed a calf,
the psalmist calleth an ox (Ps 106:20).
—Thomas Fuller.
Verses 19-22. It is to be hoped, we shall never live
to see a time, when the miracles of our redemption shall be
forgotten; when the return of Jesus Christ from heaven shall be
despaired of; and when the people shall solicit their teachers
to fabricate a new philosophical deity, for them to worship,
instead of the God of their ancestors, to whom glory hath been
ascribed from generation to generation. George Horne.
Verse 20. An ox that eateth grass. The
Egyptians, when they consulted Apis, presented a bottle of hay
or of grass, and if the ox received it, they expected good
success. Daniel Cresswell.
Verse 20. Although some of the Rabbins would excuse
this gross idolatry of their forefathers, yet others more wise
bewail them, and say that there is an ounce of this golden calf
in all their present sufferings. John Trapp.
Verse 21. They forgat God. To devise images and
pictures to put, us in the mind of God, is a very forgetting
both of God's nature and of his authority, which prohibits such
devices, for so doth the Lord expound it: "They forgat
God their saviour."—David Dickson.
Verse 21. Let us observe in this place that Israel is
now for the third time accused of forgetting God; above in Ps
106:7, afterwards in Ps 106:13, and now in Ps 106:21. And that
he might shew the greatness of this forgetfulness he does not
simply say they forgat God, but adds, their Saviour: not
the Saviour of their fathers in former times, but their own
Saviour. Musculus.
Verse 22. Land of Ham. Egypt is called the land
of Ham, or rather Cham, Mx, because it was peopled
by Mizraim, the son of Ham, and grandson of Noah. Plutarch (De
Iside and Osiride) informs us, that the Egyptians called their
country Chmia, Chemia; and the Copts give it the name of
Chmi, Chemi, to the present day. Comprehensive Bible.
Verse 23. Moses his chosen stood before him in the
breach. Moses stood in the gap, and diverted the wrath of
God; the hedge of religion and worship was broken down by a
golden calf, and he made it up: Nu 16:41-42, the people
murmured, rose up against Moses and Aaron, trod down the hedge
of authority, whereupon the plague brake in upon them; presently
Aaron steps That into the gap, makes up the hedge, and stops the
plague, Nu 16:47-48 which they did was honourable; and they were
repairers of breaches. We, through infinite mercy, have had some
like Moses and Aaron, to make up our hedges, raise up our
foundations, and stop some gaps; but all our gaps are not yet
stopped. Are there not gaps in the hedge of doctrine? If it were
not so, how came in such erroneous, blasphemous, and wild
opinions amongst us? Are there not gaps in the hedges of civil
and ecclesiastical authority? Do not multitudes trample upon
magistracy and ministry, all powers, both human and divine? Are
there not gaps in the worship of God? Do not too many tread down
all churches, all ordinances, yea, the very Scriptures? Are
there not gaps in the hedge of justice, through which the bulls
of Bashan enter, which oppress the poor, and crush the needy? Am
4:1: Are there not gaps in the hedge of love; is not that bond
of perfection broken? Are there not bitter envyings and strife
amongst us; do we not bite and devour one another? Are there not
gaps in the hedge of conscience? Is not the peace broken between
God and your souls? Doth not Satan come in oft at the gap, and
disturb you? Are there not gaps also in your several relations,
whereby he gets advantage? Surely, if our eyes be in our heads,
we may see gaps enough. William Greenhill.
Verse 23. The breach. This is a metaphor taken
from a city which is besieged, and in the walls of which the
enemy having made a "breach" is just entering
in, to destroy it, unless he be driven back by some valiant
warrior. Thus Moses stood, as it were "in the
breach", and averted the wrath of God, when he was just
going to destroy the Israelites. See Ex 32:1-35. Thomas
Fenton.
Verse 23. If Christians could be brought to entertain
a just sense of the value and power of intercessory prayer,
surely it would abound. It is a terrible reproof against the
lying prophets of Ezekiel's time: "Ye have not gone up into
the gaps, neither made up the hedge for the house of Israel to
stand in the battle in the day of the Lord" (Eze 13:5).
Compare Ex 32:9-14. William S. Plumer.
Verse 24. Yea, they despised. When the promised
inheritance of heaven (which was figured by the pleasant land
of promise), is not counted worthy of all the pains and
difficulties which can be sustained and met with in the way of
going toward it; the promised inheritance is but little esteemed
of, as appeareth in the Israelites, who for love of ease, and
fear of the Canaanites, were ready to turn back to Egypt: They
despised the pleasant land. David Dickson.
Verse 24. They despised the pleasant land. This
was a type of heaven, the good land afar off; the better
country, the land of promise and rest; in which is fulness of
provisions, and where there will be no hunger and thirst; where
flows the river of the water of life, and stands the tree of
life, bearing all manner of fruits; where there is fulness of
joy and pleasures for evermore; the most delightful company of
Father, Son, and Spirit, angels and glorified saints, and
nothing to disturb their peace and pleasure neither from within
nor from without. And yet this pleasant land may be said to be
despised by such who do not care to go through any difficulty to
it; to perform the duties of religion; to bear reproach for
God's sake; to go through tribulation; to walk in the narrow and
afflicted way which leads unto it; and by all such who do not
care to part with their sinful lusts and pleasures; but prefer
them and the things of this world to the heavenly state. John
Gill.
Verse 24. One great bar to salvation is spiritual
sloth. It is said of Israel, They despised the pleasant land.
What should be the reason? Canaan was a paradise of delight, a
type of heaven; aye, but they thought it would cost them a great
deal of trouble and hazard in the getting, and they would rather
go without it, they despised the pleasant land. Are there not
millions of us who would rather go sleeping to hell, than
sweating to heaven? I have read of certain Spaniards that live
near where there is great store of fish, yet are so lazy that
they will not be at the pains to catch them, but buy of their
neighbours: such a sinful stupidity and sloth is upon the most,
that though Christ be near them, though salvation is offered in
the Gospel, yet they will not work out salvation. Thomas
Watson.
Verse 24-25. Murmuring hath in it much unbelief and
distrust of God. They believed not his word; but murmured in
their tents. They could not believe that the wilderness was
the way to Canaan, that God would provide and furnish a table
for them there, and relieve them in all their straits. So it is
with us in trouble. We quarrel with God's providence, because we
do not believe his promises; we do not believe that this can be
consistent with love, or can work for good in the end. John
Willison, 1680-1750.
Verse 25. But murmured. Murmuring! It must have
been a malady characteristic of the Hebrew people, or a disease
peculiar to that desert. As we proceed with this narrative we
are constantly meeting it, creaking along in discord harsh and
chronic, or amazing earth and heaven by its shrill ear piercing
paroxysms. They lift up their eyes, and as the Egyptians pursue,
the people murmur. They come to a fountain, the water is bitter,
and once more they murmur. Then no bread; murmurings redoubled.
Moses is no longer in the Mount; murmurs. He takes too much upon
him; more murmurs. When shall we reach that promised
land?—murmurs extraordinary, loud murmurs. We are close to the
land, but its inhabitants are giants, and their towns walled up
to heaven. Oh, what a take in! and the last breath of the last
survivors of that querulous race goes forth in a hurricane of
reproach and remonstrance—a perfect storm of murmurs. James
Hamilton (1814-1867) in "Moses the man of God."
Verse 25. The murmuring on this occasion seems to have
been a social evil, they murmured in their tents. So do
men in social life promote among each other prejudice and
aversion to true religion. W. Wilson.
Verse 28. They joined themselves also unto Baalpeor,—rather
"bound themselves with his badge": for it was the
custom in ancient times, as it is now, in all Pagan countries,
for every idol to have some specific badge, or ensign, by which
his votaries are known. John Kitto, in "Daily Bible
Illustrations."
Verse 28. They joined themselves also unto Baalpeor.
The narrative (Nu 25:1-18) seems clearly to show that this form
of Baal worship was connected with licentious rites. Without
laying too much stress on the Rabbinical derivation of the word
rwep, hiatus, i.e., "aperire hymenem virgineum",
we seem to have reason to conclude that this was the nature of
the worship. Baal Peor was identified by the Rabbins and early
fathers with Priapus (see the authorities quoted by Selden, De
Diis Syris, 1., 4, p. 302, sq., who, however, dissents from
this view.) This is, moreover, the view of Creuzer (2., 411),
Winer, Gesenius, Furst, and almost all critics. The reader is
referred for more detailed information particularly to Creuzer's
Symbolik and Movers' Phönizier. William Gotch, in
"Smith's Dictionary of the Bible."
Verse 28. Ate the sacrifices. It was usual for
the officers to eat the chief part of the sacrifice. Hence the
remarks of Paul on this subject, 1Co 8:1-13. Benjamin
Boothroyd.
Verse 28. The dead. The word Mytm, maithim,
signifies dead men; for the idols of the heathen were
generally men,—warriors, kings, or lawgivers,—who had been
deified after their death; though many of them had been
execrated during their life. Comprehensive Bible.
Verse 28. And they ate the sacrifices of the dead.
His obsequies to Polydorus paying
A tomb we raise, and altars to the dead
With dark blue fillets and black cypress bind
Our dames with hair dishevelled stand to mourn;
Warm frothy bowls of milk and sacred blood
We offer, in his grave the spirit lay,
Call him aloud, and bid our last farewell. Virgil.
Verse 29. They provoked him to anger with their
inventions. Note, that it is not said, with their deeds,
but with their pursuits (studies). It is one thing simply
to do a thing; it is quite another to pursue it earnestly night
and day. The first may take place by chance, or through
ignorance, or on account of some temptation, or violence, and
that without the consent and against the inclination of the
mind. But the latter is brought about in pursuance of a fixed
purpose and design and by effort and forethought. We see,
therefore, in this passage that the patience of God was at
length provoked to anger and fury when the people sinned not
merely once and again, but when the pursuit of sin grew and
strengthened. Musculus.
Verse 29. Their inventions. Their sins are here
called by the name of "their inventions." And
so, sure, they are; as no ways taught us by God, but of our own
imagining or finding out. For, indeed, our inventions are the
cause of all sins. And if we look well into it we shall find our
inventions are so. By God's injunction we should all live, and
his injunction is, "You shall not do every man what seems
good in his own eyes" (or finds out in his own brains), but
"whatsoever I command you, that shall you do." De
12:8. But we, setting light by that charge of his, out of the
old disease of our father Adam ("ye shall be as gods,
knowing good and evil"), think it a goodly matter to be
witty, and to find out things ourselves to make to ourselves, to
be authors, and inventors of somewhat, that so we may seem to be
as wise as God, if not wiser; and to know what is for our
turns, as well as he, if not better. It was Saul's fault. God
bade him destroy Amalek altogether, and he would invent a better
way, to save some (forsooth) for sacrifice, which God could not
think of. And it was St. Peter's fault, when he persuaded Christ
from his passion, and found out a better way (as he thought)
than Christ could devise. Lancelot Andrewes.
Verse 29. Brake in upon them. The image is that
of a river which has burst its barriers; see Ex 19:24. The
plague is the slaughter inflicted upon the people by command of
Moses; Nu 25:4-5,8-9,18. "The Speaker's
Commentary."
Verse 30. Then stood up Phinehas. All Israel
saw the bold lewdness of Zimri, but their hearts and eyes were
so full of grief, that they had not room enough for indignation.
Phinehas looked on with the rest, but with other affections.
When he saw this defiance bidden to God, and this insult upon
the sorrow of his people (that while they were wringing their
hands, a proud miscreant durst outface their humiliation with
his wicked dalliance), his heart boils with a desire of a holy
revenge; and now that hand, which was used to a censer and
sacrificing knife, takes tip his javelin, and, with one stroke,
joins these two bodies in their death, which were joined in
their sin, and in the very flagrance of their lust, makes a new
way for their souls to their own place. O noble and heroical
courage of Phinehas! Which, as it was rewarded of God, so is
worthy to be admired of men. He doth not stand casting of
scruples: Who am I to do this? The son of the high priest. My
place is all for peace and mercy: it is for me to sacrifice, and
pray for the sin of the people, not to sacrifice any of the
people for their sin. My duty calls me to appease the anger of
God what I may, not to revenge the sins of men; to pray for
their conversion, not to work the confusion of any sinner. And
who are these? Is not the one a great prince in Israel, the
other a princess of Midian? Can the death of two so famous
personages go unrevenged? Or, if it be safe and fit, why doth my
uncle Moses rather shed his own tears than their blood? I will
mourn with the rest; let them revenge whom it concerneth. But
the zeal of God hath barred out all weak deliberations; and he
holds it now both his duty and his glory, to be an executioner
of so shameless a pair of offenders. . . . Now the sin is
punished, the plague ceaseth. The revenge of God sets out ever
after the sin; but if the revenge of men (which commonly comes
later) can overtake it, God gives over the chase. How oft hath
the infliction of a less punishment avoided a greater! There are
none so good friends to the state, as courageous and impartial
ministers of justice: these are the reconcilers of God and the
people, more than the prayers of them that sit still and do
nothing. Joseph Hall.
Verse 30. Then stood up Phinehas, etc. Mark the
mighty principle, which rolled like a torrent in the heart of
Phinehas. The Spirit leaves it not obscure. The praise is this,
"He was zealous for his God", Nu 25:13. He could not
fold his arms, and see God's law insulted, his rule defied, his
majesty and empire scorned. The servant's heart blazed in one
blaze of godly indignation. He must be up to vindicate his Lord.
His fervent love, his bold resolve, fear nothing in a righteous
cause. The offending Zimri was a potent prince: nevertheless he
spared him not. Believer, can you read this and feel no shame?
Do your bold efforts testify your zeal? Sinners blaspheme God's
name. Do you rebuke? His Sabbaths are profaned. Do you protest?
False principles are current? Do you expose the counterfeits?
Vice stalks in virtue's garb. Do you tear down the mask? Satan
enthrals the world. Do you resist? Nay, rather are you not
dozing unconcerned? Whether Christ's cause succeeds, or be cast
down, you little care. If righteous zeal girded your loins, and
braced your nerves, and moved the rudder of your heart, and
swelled your sails of action, would God be so unknown, and
blasphemy so daring? Mark, next, the zeal of Phinehas is sound
minded. It is not as a courser without rein, a torrent
unembanked, a hurricane let loose. Its steps are set in order's
path. It executes God's own will in God's own way. The mandate
says, let the offenders die. He aims a death blow, then, with
obedient hand. The zeal, which heaven kindles, is always a
submissive grace. Henry Law, in "Christ is All",
1858.
Verse 30. Stood up, as valiantly to do his work
of zeal, as Moses had done to discharge the office of
intercessor, and because he alone rose to set the example of
resistance to the foul rites of Baal Peor. Cassiodorus,
quoted by Neale and Littledale.
Verse 30. So the plague was stayed. God himself
puts this peculiar honour of staying the plague (when he was
about to destroy the whole camp) upon this fact of Phinehas,
saying, "He hath turned away my wrath", Nu 25:10-11,
because he was acted with the same zeal for God's glory and
Israel's good, as God himself is acted with for them, and feared
not to lose his life in God's cause, by putting to death a
prince and a princess in the very flagrancy of their lust at one
blow. There is such an accent and such an emphasis put by the
Lord on this act, (as the Jewish Rabbis observe), that here they
begin the forty-first section or lecture of the Law, or (as
Vatablus saith) the seventh section of the book, which they call
Phinehas. Moreover, it teacheth us, that zeal of justice in the
cause of God is an hopeful means to remove God's wrath from, and
to procure his mercy to, man. Thus David also made an atonement
by doing justice on Saul's house, 2Sa 21:3, etc. . . . Phinehas
by virtue of this promise of the priesthood (Nu 25:12-13) lived
himself to a great old age, even (as some say) to three hundred
years, as appeareth by Jud 20:28, where he then is found alive,
for his zeal at this time. He lived so long that some of the
Rabbis are of opinion that he died not at all, but is still
alive, whom they suppose to be the Elias that is to come before
the coming of Christ; but this notion is confuted by others of
their Rabbis, and by the mention of his seed succeeding him in
sacred Scripture. However, though few after the Flood did near
attain to any such age, yet must Phinehas be very old in that
time of Israel's warring with Benjamin...Phinehas's priesthood
is called "everlasting", not in his person, but in his
posterity, whose sons were successively high priests till the
captivity of Babylon, 1Ch 6:4-16; and at the return out of
captivity, Ezra, the great priest and scribe, was of his line,
Ezr 7:1-6; and so it continued in that line until, or very near,
the approach of our evangelical High Priest (as Christ is
called, Heb 5:6), who was of the order of Melchizedek. Christopher
Ness.
Verse 30. Why is the pacifying of God's wrath, and the
staying of the plague ascribed to Phinehas, having a blush of
irregularity in it, rather than to the acts of Moses and the
judges, which were by express command from God and very regular?
For answer, the acts of Moses and the judges slaked the fire
of God's wrath, that of Phinehas quenched it; again, the
acts of Moses and the judges had a rise from a spark,
that of Phinehas from a flame of zeal and holy
indignation in him; hence the Lord, who is exceedingly taken
with the springs and roots of actions, sets the crown upon the
head of Phinehas. Edmund Staunton, in a Sermon preached
before the House of Lords, 1644.
Verse 30. So the plague was stayed. A man doth
not so live by his own faith, but in temporal respects
the faith of another man may do him good. Masters by their faith
obtained healing for their servants, parents for their children,
Mt 15:28. "Oh, man, great is thy faith!" "Jesus
seeing their faith", healed the sick of the palsy. God's
people for the town or place where they live: "The
innocent" (i.e., the faithful doer) "shall
deliver the island", Job 22:30. Ge 18:32, "If ten
righteous persons shall be found there, I will not destroy it
for ten's sake." Especially in Magistrates, Moses,
Nu 14:1-45; Hezekiah, Isa 37:1-38, put up prayers, and
God saved the people and places, they prayed for: Then
Phinehas executed judgment (appeased God by faith) and so
the plague was stayed. Matthew Lawrence.
Verse 30. Elevation of mind and sweetness of spirit
are pearls of great price, and if we wish to preserve them we
had better intrust them to God's own keeping. If Moses lost his
faith, it was by first losing self command: and if a man lose
this, it is hard to say what next he may lose: like the mad
warrior who makes a missile of his shield and hurls it at the
head of all enemy, he is henceforward open to every fiery dart,
to the cut and thrust of every assailant. But, as John Newton
remarks, "The grace of God is as necessary to create a
right temper in a Christian on the breaking of a china plate as
on the death of an only son"; and as no man can tell on any
dawning day but what that may be the most trying day in all his
life, how wise to pray without ceasing, "uphold me
according unto thy word. Hold thou me up, and I shall be
safe." "Set a watch, O Lord, before my mouth: keep the
door of my lips." "Who can understand his errors?
Cleanse thou me from secret faults. Keep back thy servant also
from presumptuous sins; let them not have dominion over me: then
shall I be upright, and I shall be innocent from the great
transgression."—James Hamilton.
Verse 32. It went ill with Moses. This judgment
of God on that sin did not imply that he had blotted Moses out
of the book of life, or the number of the saints, or otherwise
than forgive his sin. For he continued still to talk with him,
and advise with him of the governing of his people, and spake to
Joshua that he should be faithful to him as his servant Moses.
That was not the true Canaan from which he was shut out, but
only the figure and shadow; and that he was allowed to see; a
vision well worthy of all his labours, for the more excellent
things signified by it. Isaac Williams, in "The
Characters of the Old Testament," 1873.
Verse 33. They provoked his spirit. As Abraham
was distinguished for his faith, so was Moses for his meekness;
for Scripture has declared that he was "very meek, above
all the men which were on the face of the earth", Nu 12:3.
Yet, judging from facts recorded of him, we should be inclined
to suppose that he was by nature remarkable for sensitiveness
and hastiness of temper—that was his one besetting infirmity.
Such appears to have been evinced when he slew the Egyptian;
when he twice smote the rock in the wilderness; and on that
occasion when he was "punished", as the psalmist says,
"because they provoked his spirit, so that he spake
unadvisedly with his lips", and when he broke the two
tables of stone. Something of the same kind appears to have been
the case with our own Hooker, whose biographer attributes to him
such singular meekness, while his private writings indicate a
temper keenly alive and sensitive to the sense of wrong. Isaac
Williams.
Verse 33. They provoked his spirit. In a
dispensation itself mainly gracious, and foreshadowing one which
would be grace altogether, it was of prime importance that the
mediating men should be merciful and gracious, long suffering,
and slow to anger. And sure they were in marvellous manner. . .
. Brimming, over with instruction as is this passage, we must
leave it with a few remarks.
1. How careful preachers of the gospel and expounders of
Scripture should be not to give an erroneous impression of God's
mind or message. The mental acumen is rare, but the right spirit
is rarer. But what is the right spirit?—A loving spirit, a
gentle spirit, a faithful spirit, a meek and weaned spirit, a
spirit which says, "Speak, Lord, for thy servant heareth",
and a spirit which adds, "All that the Lord giveth me, that
will I speak", that excellent spirit which is only imparted
by the good Spirit of God. For if He withdraw, even a Moses
ceases to be meek, and ceasing to be meek, even a Moses becomes
a bad divine and an erroneous teacher, striking the rock that
has been already stricken once for all, and preaching glad
tidings gruffly. He who gives the living water does not grudge
it; but sometimes, instead of "Ho! every one that thirsteth",
the preacher says, "Hear now, ye rebels; must we fetch you
water out of this rock?" and makes the very invitation
repulsive.
2. When any one has run long and run well, how sad it is to
stumble within a few steps of the goal! If Moses had an earthly
wish, it was to see Israel safe in their inheritance, and his
wish was all but consummated. Faith and patience had held out
well nigh forty years, and in a few months more the Jordan would
be crossed and the work would be finished. And who can tell but
this very nearness of the prize helped to create something of a
presumptuous confidence? The blood of Moses was hot to begin
with, and he was not the meekest of men when he smote the
Egyptian and hid him in the sand. But he had got a good lesson
in ruling his spirit, and betwixt the long sojourn with Jethro
and the self discipline needful in the charge of this multitude,
he might fancy that he had now his foot on the neck of this
enemy: when lo! the sin revives and Moses dies.
Blessed is the man that feareth alway! Blessed is the man
who, although years have passed without an attempt at burglary,
still bars his doors and sees his windows fastened! Blessed is
the man who, although a generation has gone since the last
eruption, forbears to build on the volcanic soil and dreads
fires which have smouldered for fourscore years! Blessed is the
man who, even when the high seas are crossed and the land is
made, still keeps an outlook! Blessed is the man who, even on
the confines of Canaan, takes heed of the evil heart, lest, with
a promise of entering in, he should come short through unbelief!
Verse 33. They provoked his spirit, etc. Angry
he certainly was; and when, reverting to a former miracle, the
Most High directed him to take the wonder staff—his rod of
many miracles and at the head of the congregation "speak to
the rock", and it would "give forth its water",
in the heat and agitation of his spirit he failed to implement
implicitly the Divine command. Instead of speaking to the rock
he spoke to the people, and his harangue was no longer in the
language calm and dignified of the lawgiver, but had a certain
tone of petulance and egotism. "Hear now, ye rebels, must
we—must I and Aaron, not must Jehovah—fetch you water out of
this rock?" And instead of simply speaking to it, he raised
the rod and dealt it two successive strokes, just as if the rock
were sharing the general perversity, and would no more than the
people obey its Creator's bidding. He was angry, and he sinned.
He sinned and was severely punished. Water flowed sufficient for
the whole camp and the cattle, clear, cool, and eagerly gushing,
enough for all the million; but at the same moment that its
unmerited bounty burst on you, ye rebels, "a cup of wrath
was put into the hand of Moses." (Van Oosterzee.) To you,
ye murmurers, there came forth living water; to your venerable
leaders the cup of God's anger. "The Lord spoke unto Moses
and Aaron, Because ye believed me not, to sanctify me in the
eyes of the children of Israel, therefore ye shall not bring
this congregation into the land which I have given them."
Nu 20:12. James Hamilton.
Verse 33. He spake unadvisedly with his lips.
The Lord desires him to address the rock, but Moses speaks to
Israel. God wishes him to speak a word to the inanimate stone,
and Moses strikes it twice. God still is willing that the people
shall remain as his inheritance, but Moses evidently treats them
with ill will and much offensiveness. God wishes to relieve, and
give refreshing to the people in their thirst, and Moses is
selected to cooperate with him in all such joy; but mark how, on
this very day, a deep discord between God's inclination and the
mind of Moses shows itself. God is inclined to grant
forgiveness,—Moses inclines to punishment; before, the very
opposite seemed to prevail. God is forbearing,—Moses, filled
with bitterness; God seeks to glorify his grace,—with Moses,
self, not God, comes into prominence. "Must
we",—not, "must the Lord",—but "must we
fetch you water out of this rock?" We see now, in this
prophet, strong at other times, the first plain indications of
decay and weariness. He has grown tired (and truly it should not
seem strange, for which of us could have sustained a struggle
such as his for half the time?) of carrying these stubborn
children any longer now. This man, so truly great, has never for
an instant hitherto forgotten his own dignity in presence of all
Israel; but now, he is no longer master of himself. J.J. Van
Oosterzee.
Verse 33. He spake unadvisedly. A gracious
person may be surprised and fall suddenly among thieves that
lurk behind the bushes. Nay, very holy men, unless wonderful
wary, may be quickly tripped up by sudden questions and
unexpected emergencies. Who knows the subtilty of sin, and the
deceitfulness of his own heart? Take heed of answering quickly,
and send up sudden ejaculations to heaven before you reply to a
weighty and doubtful motion. Samuel Lee.
Verse 34-38. The miracles and mercies which settled
them in Canaan made no more deep and durable impressions upon
them than those that fetched them out of Egypt; for by that time
they were well warm in Canaan, they corrupted themselves, and
forsook God. Observe the steps of their apostasy.
1. They spared the nations which God had doomed to
destruction (Ps 106:34). When they had got the good land God had
promised them, they had no zeal against the wicked inhabitants,
whom the Lord commanded them to extirpate, pretending pity; but
so merciful is God, that no man needs to be in any case more
compassionate than he.
2. When they spared them, they promised themselves, that for
all this, they would not join in any dangerous affinity with
them; but the way of sin is down hill; omissions make way for
commissions; when they neglect to destroy the heathen, the next
news we hear is, they were mingled among the heathen,
made leagues with them, and contracted an intimacy with them, so
that they learned their works (Ps 106:35). That which is
rotten will sooner corrupt that which is sound, than be cured or
made sound by it.
3. When they mingled with them, and learned some of their
works that seemed innocent diversions and entertainments, yet
they thought they would never join with them in their worship;
but by degrees they learned that too (Ps 106:36). They served
their idols in the same manner, and with the same rites that
they served them; and they became a snare unto them, that sin
drew on many more, and brought the judgments of God upon them,
which they themselves could not but be sensible of, and yet knew
not how to recover themselves.
4. When they joined with them in some of their idolatrous
services, which they thought had least harm in them, they little
thought that ever they should be guilty of that barbarous and
inhuman piece of idolatry, the sacrificing of their living
children to their dead gods: but they came to that at last (Ps
106:37-38) in which Satan triumphed over his worshippers, and
regaled himself in blood and slaughter. They sacrificed their
sons and daughters, pieces of themselves to devils;
and added murder, the most unnatural murder, to their idolatry;
one cannot think of it without horror; they "shed innocent
blood", the most innocent, for it was infant blood, nay, it
was the "blood of their sons and their daughters." See
the power of the spirit that works in the children of
disobedience, and see his malice. The beginning of idolatry and
superstition, like that of strife, is as the letting forth of
water, and there is no villainy which they that venture upon it
can be sure they shall stop short of, for God justly "gives
them up to a reprobate mind" (Ro 1:28). Matthew Henry.
Verse 37. Yea, they sacrificed their sons and their
daughters unto devils. We need no better argument to
discover the nature of these gods than this very service in my
text accepted of them: for both by the record of sacred writ,
and relation of heathen authors and other writers, we know that
nothing was so usually commanded nor gratefully accepted by
these heathenish gods, as was the shedding of man's blood, and
the sacrificing of men, maids, and children unto them, as
appears by the usual practice of men in former times. From the
testimonies of Scripture, I give only the example of the king of
Moab, mentioned in 2Ki 3:27, where it is said, that, being in
some straits, "He took his eldest son that should have
reigned in his stead, and offered him for a burnt offering upon
the wall."
The stories likewise of the heathen are full of like
examples. When the oracle of Apollo was asked by the Athenians
how they might make amends for their killing of Androgens, it
willed them to send yearly to king Minos seven bodies of each
sex to appease the wrath of god. Now this kind of yearly
sacrifice continued still in Athens in the time of Socrates.
Thus the Carthaginians, being vanquished by Agathocles, king of
Sicily, and supposing their god to be displeased, to appease him
did sacrifice two hundred noble men's children. This custom was
ancient even before the Trojan war, for then was Iphigenia
sacrificed. Thus we read that the Latins sacrificed the tenth of
their children to Jupiter; that men and children were usually
sacrificed to Saturn in many places in Candia, Rhodomene,
Phoenice, Africa, and those commonly the choice and dearest of
their children and most nobly descended. The manner of
sacrificing their children to Saturn, Diodorus relates to be
this: bringing their children to the statue or image of Saturn,
which was of huge greatness, they gave them into his hands,
which were made so hollow and winding that the children offered
slipped and fell down through into a cave and furnace of fire.
These sacrifices continued in use till the birth and death of
our Saviour Christ, who came to destroy the work of the devil;
for such sacrifices were first forbidden by Augustus Caesar;
after more generally by Tiberius (in whose reign our Saviour
suffered) who, as Tertullian writes, so straitly forbade them,
that he crucified the priests who offered them: howbeit, even in
Tertullian's time, and after in Eusebius' and Lactantius' times,
such sacrifices were offered (but closely) to Jupiter Latialis.
Who can now doubt, seeing such exceeding superstitious
cruelty, but that the gods commanding such sacrifices were very
devils and enemies to mankind? God commands no such thing, but
forbids it, and threatens plagues to his people, because they
had forsaken him and "built also the high places of Baal,
to burn their sons with fire for burnt offerings unto Baal,
which I commanded not, not spake it, neither came it into my
mind" (Jer 19:5). Most infallibly then we may conclude that
none but Satan, that arch devil, with his angels, were the
commanders of such service, for this agrees right well with his
nature, who hath been a murderer from the beginning. Robert
Jenison, in "The Height of Israel's Heathenish Idolatrie,
in Sacrificing their Children to the Devil," 1621.
Verse 37. Yea, they sacrificed their sons, etc.
From this we learn that inconsiderate zeal is a flimsy pretext
in favour of any act of devotion. For by how much the Jews were
under the influence of burning zeal, by so much does the prophet
convict them of being guilty of greater wickedness; because
their madness carried them away to such a pitch of enthusiasm,
that they did not spare even their own offspring. Were good
intentions meritorious, as idolaters suppose, then indeed the
laying aside of all natural affection in sacrificing their own
children was a deed deserving the highest praise. But when men
act under the impulse of their own capricious humour, the more
they occupy themselves with acts of external worship, the more
do they increase their guilt. For what difference was there
between Abraham and those persons of whom the prophet makes
mention, but that the former, under the influence of faith was
ready to offer up his son, while the latter, carried away by the
impulse of intemperate zeal, cast off all natural affection, and
imbrued their hands in the blood of their own offspring. John
Calvin.
Verse 37. Devils, Mydv, Shedim. It
appears that children were sacrificed to the deities thus named;
that they were considered to be of an angry nature, and inimical
to the human race, and thus the object of the homage rendered to
them was to avert calamities. The name Mydv may signify either lord
or master, or anything that is black, it being
derived from an Arabic Ain Vav verb—viz., to be
black, or to be master. John Jahn, in "Biblical
Antiquities."
Verse 37-38. We stand astonished, doubtless, at this
horrid, barbarous, and unnatural impiety, of offering children
by fire to a Moloch: but how little is it considered, that
children, brought up in the ways of ignorance, error, vanity,
folly, and vice, are more effectually sacrificed to the great
adversary of man kind!—George Horne.
Verse 39. And went a whoring with their own
inventions. As harlotry is one of the most abominable of
sins that can be committed by a daughter or a wife; so often in
the Scriptures turning from God and especially the practice of
idolatry is called whoredom and fornication, Ps 73:27 Ex
34:15-16. William S. Plumer.
Verse 40. He abhorred his own inheritance.
Whenever great love sinks into great hate it is termed abhorrence.
Lorinus.
Verse 43. They were brought low for their iniquity.
Sin is of a weakening and impoverishing nature; it has weakened
all mankind, and taken from them their moral strength to do
good; and has brought them to poverty and want; to be beggars on
the dunghill; to a pit wherein is no water; and left them in a
hopeless and helpless condition; yea, it brings the people of
God often times after conversion into a low estate, when God
hides his face because of it, temptations are strong, grace is
weak, and they become lukewarm and indifferent to spiritual
things. John Gill.
Verse 46. He made them also to be pitied of all
them that carried them captives. This improved feeling
towards the Jews through God's influence appears in Da 1:9; as
Joseph similarly had his captivity improved by God's favour (Ge
39:21). So Evil merodach, King of Babylon, treated kindly
Jehoiachin, king of Judah (2Ki 25:27). A.R. Fausset.
Verse 47. Gather us. Bishop Patrick says that,
in his opinion, this verse refers to those, who, in the days of
Saul, or before, were taken prisoners by the Philistines, or
other nations; whom David prays God to gather to their own land
again; that they might worship him in that place which he had
prepared for the ark of his presence. Thomas Fenton.
Verse 48. Amen. Martin Luther said once of the
Lord's Prayer that "it was the greatest martyr on earth
because it was used so frequently without thought and feeling,
without reverence and faith." This quaint remark, as true
as it is sad, applies perhaps with still greater force to the
word "Amen." Familiar to us from our infancy is
the sound of this word, which has found a home wherever the
natives have learnt to adore Israel's God and Saviour. It has
been adopted, and without translation retained, in all languages
in which the gospel of Jesus the Son of David is preached. The
literal signification, "So be it", is known to all;
yet few consider the deep meaning, the great solemnity, and the
abundant consolation treasured up in this word, which has formed
for centuries the conclusion of the prayers and praises of God's
people. A word which is frequently used without due
thoughtfulness, and unaccompanied with the feeling which it is
intended to call forth, loses its power from this very
familiarity, and though constantly on our lips, lies bedridden
in the dormitory of our soul. But it is a great word this word "Amen";
and Luther has truly said, "As your Amen is, so has been
your prayer." It is a word of venerable history in Israel
and in the church. The word dates as far back as the law of
Moses. When a solemn oath was pronounced by the priest, the
response of the person who was adjured consisted simply of the
word "Amen." In like manner the people
responded "Amen" when, from the heights of Ebal and
Gerizim, the blessings and the curses of the divine law were
pronounced. Again, at the great festival which David made when
the ark of God was brought from Obed Edom, the psalm of praise
which Asaph and his brethren sang concluded with the words,
"Blessed be the Lord. God of Israel for ever and ever. And
all the people said, Amen" (1Ch 16:36). Thus we find in the
Psalms, not merely that David concludes his psalm of praise with
the word Amen, but he says, And let all the people
say, Amen. Adolph Saphir, in "The Lord's
Prayer," 1870.
HINTS TO THE VILLAGE PREACHER
Verse 1. Take this verse as the theme of the Psalm,
and we shall then see that its exhortation to praise,
1. Is directed to a special people: chosen, redeemed, but
sinful, borne with, and forgiven.
2. Is supported by abundant arguments. Man not to be praised,
for he sins. God gives in his goodness, and forgives in his
mercy, and is therefore to be thanked.
3. Is as applicable now as ever: for our story is a
transcript of Israel's.
Verse 2.
1. A challenge.
2. A suggestion: at least let us do what we can.
3. An ambition: in the ages to come we will make known with
the church to angels, and all intelligent beings, the mighty
acts of divine grace.
4. A question—shall I be there?
Verse 3. The blessedness of a godly life.
Verse 4.
1. The language of Humility: "Remember me, O Lord."
Let me not escape thy notice amongst the many millions of
creatures under thy care.
2. The language of Faith.
(a) That God has a people to whom he shows special favour.
(b) That he himself has provided salvation for them.
3. The language of prayer.
(a) For the free gift of salvation.
(b) For the common salvation—not wishing to be peculiar,
but to be as "Thy people", taking them for all in all,
both here and hereafter. Walking in the footsteps of the flock.
"Be this my glory, Lord, to be
Joined to thy saints, and near to thee."—G.R.
Verses 4, 7, 45. In Ps 106:4, a remembrance desired.
In Ps 106:7, a failure of remembrance deplored. In Ps 106:45, a
divine remembrance extolled.
Verse 5.
1. The Persons: "Thy chosen"; "Thy
nation"; "Thine inheritance."
2. The Privileges: "The good of thy chosen";
"The gladness of thy nation"; "The glory of thine
inheritance."
3. The Pleas: "That I may see", etc. They were once
as I am: make me what they are now.
(a) My salvation is everything to me. "That I may
see," etc. "That I may rejoice", etc. They are
many, I am but one. "That I may glory", etc.—G.R.
Verse 6. In what respects men may be partakers in the
sins of their ancestors.
Verses 7-8.
1. On man's part a darkened understanding, ungrateful
forgetfulness, and provocation.
2. On God's part: understanding discovering a reason for
mercy; memory mindful of the covenant; patience revealing its
power.
Verses 7-8.
1. A special provocation; they murmured at the Red Sea.
2. A special deliverance; "Nevertheless", etc.
3. A special Design; "For his own sake"; "That
he might make his power known."—G.R.
Verse 8. Salvation by grace a grand display of power.
Verse 8.
"Why are men saved?" See "Spurgeon's
Sermons", No. 115.
1. The glorious Saviour, "He."
2. The favoured persons, who are they?
(a) They were a stupid people: "Our fathers understood
not", etc., Ps 106:7.
(b) An ungrateful people: "They remembered not",
etc., Ps 106:7,13,24, etc.
(c) A provoking people.
3. The reason of salvation: "He saved them for his
name's sake." The name of God is his person, his
attributes, and his nature. We might, perhaps, include this
also: "My name is in him"—that is, in Christ; he
saves us for the sake of Christ, who is the name of God. He
saved them that he might manifest his nature: "God is
love." He saved them to vindicate his name.
4. The obstacles removed: "Nevertheless."
Verse 9. Israel at the Red Sea. See
"Spurgeon's Sermons", No. 72.
1. Israel's three difficulties.
(a) The Red Sea in front of them. This was not put there by
an enemy; but by God himself. The Red Sea represents some great
and trying providence placed in the path of every newborn child
of God, to try his faith, and the sincerity of his trust in God.
b) The Egyptians behind them,—the representatives of the
sins which we thought were dead and gone. (c) The third
difficulty was faint hearts within them.
2. Israel's three helps.
(a) Providence.
(b) Their knowledge that they were the covenant people of
God.
(c) The man,—Moses. So the believer's hope and help is in
the God man Christ Jesus.
3. God's grand design in it. To give them a thorough baptism
into his service, consecrating them for ever to himself (1Co
1-2).
Verse 9. (second clause). Dangerous and
difficult paths rendered safe and easy by God's leadership.
Verse 11. (second clause). Song over sins
forgiven.
Verses 12-14. The faith of nature, based on sight,
causes transient joy, soon evaporates, dies in utter unbelief,
and conducts to greater sin.
Verses 13-15.
1. Mercies are sooner forgotten than trials: "They soon
forgat", etc. We write our afflictions on marble, our
mercies upon sand.
2. We should wait for God, as well as upon God: "They
waited not," etc.
3. Immoderate desire for what we have not of worldly goods,
tempts God to deprive us of what we have: Ps 106:14.
4. Prayer may be answered for evil as well as for good:
"He gave them their request", then smote them with a
plague.
5. Carnal indulgence is inimical to spiritual mindedness: Ps
106:15. Better have a lean body and healthy soul, than a healthy
body and leanness of soul. "Poor in this world, rich in
faith." There are few of whom it can be said, "I wish
thou mayest prosper and be in health," etc. (3Jo 2). G.R.
Verse 14. The wickedness of inordinate desires.
1. They are out of place—"in the wilderness."
2. They are assaults upon God—"and tempted God."
3. They are despisers of former mercies—see preceding verses.
4. They involve solemn danger—see following verse.
Verse 16. The sin of envy. Its base nature, its cruel
actions its unscrupulous ingratitude, its daring assaults, its
abomination before God.
Verse 19. The sinner as an inventor.
Verses 19-22.
1. The Sin remembered.
(a) Idolatry: not forgetting God merely, or disowning him,
but setting up an idol in his place.
(b) Idolatry of the worst kind: changing be glory of God into
the similitude of an ox, etc.
(c) The idolatry of Egypt under which they had suffered, and
from which they had been delivered.
(d) Idolatry after many wonderful interpositions of the true
God in their behalf.
2. The Remembrance of Sin.
(a) For Humiliation. It was the sin of their fathers.
(b) For self condemnation. "We have sinned with our
fathers." It was our nature in them, and it is their nature
in us that has committed this great sin.
Verse 23. Moses, the intercessor, a type of our Lord.
Carefully study his pleading as recorded in Ex 32:1-35.
Verse 23.
1. Mediation required: "He said that he would destroy
them," etc.
2. Mediation offered: "Moses stood before him in the
breach."
3. Mediation accepted: "To turn away his wrath",
etc. Ex 32:1-35. G.R.
Verse 24-26. Murmuring.
1. Arises from despising our mercies.
2. Is fostered by unbelief.
3. Is indulged in all sorts of places.
4. Makes men deaf to the Lord's voice.
5. Provokes great judgments from the Lord.
Verse 24-27.
1. The Rest promised: "The pleasant land."
2. The Refusal of the Rest: "They despised", etc.
3. The Reason of the Refusal: unbelief. "They could not
enter in because of unbelief."—G.R.
Verse 30-31. The effects of one decisive act for God;
immediate, personal, and for posterity.
Verses 32-33.
1. The afflictions of God's people are for the trial of their
faith.
2. The trial of their faith is to bring them from dependence
upon circumstances to depend upon God himself.
3. The forbearance of God with his people is greater than
that of the best of men. G.R.
Verse 33.
1. What it is so to speak unadvisedly.
2. What is the great cause of it—"they provoked his
spirit."
3. What the results may be.
Verse 34-42.
1. What Israel did not do. They began well, but did not
complete the conquest of their foes: Ps 106:34.
2. What they did do: Ps 106:35-39.
(a) They became friendly with them.
(b) They adopted their habits: "learned their
works."
(c) They embraced their religion: "served their
idols."
(d) They imitated their cruelties; Ps 106:37-38.
(e) They did worse than the heathen (Ps 106:39), they added
wicked inventions of their own.
3. What God did to them: Ps 106:40-42. He gave them into the
hands of their enemies, and suffered them to be severely
oppressed by them. We must either conquer all our foes or be
conquered by them. Bring your shield from the battle or be
brought home upon it.—G.R.
Verse 37. Moloch worship in modern times. Children
sacrificed to fashion, wealth, and loveless marriage among the
higher classes. Bad example, drinking customs, etc., among the
poorer sort. A needful subject.
Verse 44-45. Sin in God's people.
1. Is very provoking to God.
2. Ensures chastisement.
3. Is to be sincerely mourned—"their cry."
4. Will be graciously forgiven, and its effect removed. So
the covenant promises.
Verse 47.
1. An earnest Prayer: "Save us, O Lord", etc.
2. A Believing Prayer: "O Lord our God."
3. A humble Prayer: "Gather us from among the
heathen."
4. A sincere Prayer: "To give thanks unto thy holy
name"; to own thy justice and holiness in all thy ways.
5. A confident Prayer: "To triumph in thy praise."
None but bruised spices give forth such odours.—G.R.
Verse 48.
1. God is to be praised as the "God of Israel."
(a) Of typical Israel.
(b) Of the true Israel.
2. He is to be praised as the God of Israel under all
circumstances: for his judgments as well as for his mercies.
3. At all times: "From everlasting to everlasting."
4. By all people: "Let all the people say, Amen."
5. As the beginning and end of every song: "Praise ye
the Lord."—G.R.
Verse 48. Let all the people say, Amen. The
exhortation to universal praise. All men are indebted to the
Lord, all have sinned, all hear the gospel, all his people are
saved. Unanimity in praise is pleasant, and promotes unity in
other matters.