Gleanings in the Psalms

This Psalm has much sadness in it, but we may be sure it will end well, for it begins with prayer, and prayer never has an ill issue. The psalmist did not run to man but to the Lord, and to him he went, not with studies, stately, stilted words, but with a cry – the natural, unaffected, unfeigned expression of pain.

Verse 1. “I cried unto God with my voice, even unto God with my voice; and he gave ear unto me.” At the second knock - “even unto God with my voice” - the door of grace flew open - “he gave ear unto me”.

Verse 2. “In the day of trouble I sought the Lord ...” Days of trouble must be days of prayer; in days of inward trouble, we must seek him, and seek till we find him. The psalmist, in the day of his trouble, did not seek for the diversions of business or recreation to shake off his trouble that way, but he sought God and his favour and grace. Those that are under trouble of mind must not think to drink it away, or laugh it away, but pray it away.

Verse 2. “... my sore ran in the night, and ceased not ...” Mr Flavel, in reckoning up those things wherein the sorrow of believers is distinguished from the sorrow of hypocrites when it comes to the question of sins, says - “The believers' troubles for sin are more private and silent – their 'sore' runs 'in the night'”.

Verse 4. “... I am so troubled that I cannot speak.” Words are only the body, the garment, the outside of prayer; sighs are nearer the heart work. A dumb beggar gets an alms at Christ's gate, even by making signs, when his tongue cannot plead for him – yes rather, because he is dumb. Objection: I have not so much as a voice to utter unto God, and Christ saith, “Cause me to hear thy voice.” Answer: Yes, but some other things have a voice besides the tongue; “the Lord has heard the voice of my weeping.” (Psalm 6 verse 8) Tears have a tongue, and grammar, and language that our Father knoweth. Babes have no words for the breast, apart from weeping; but the mother can read hunger in the weeping.

Verse 6. “I call to remembrance my song in the night ...” The Songs in the night is as a favourite a word in the Old Testament as “Glory in tribulation” is in the New, and it is one of those words which prove that both Testaments have the self-same root and spirit.

Verse 6. “... I commune with mine own heart: and my spirit made diligent search.” This duty requires diligence. External acts of religion are facile: to lift up the eyes to heaven, to bow the knee, to read a prayer – this requires no more labour than a papist to tell over his beads. But to examine a man's self, to take the heart all to pieces like a watch and see what is defective, this is not easy. Reflective acts are hardest. The eye can see everything but itself.

Verse 8. “Is his mercy clean gone for ever? Doth his promise fail for evermore?” Let not apparent impossibilities make you question God's accomplishment of any of his gracious words. Though you cannot see how a thing will be done, it is enough that God has said that it will be done. Cast not away your confidence because God defers his performances. Though providences run at cross-purposes, though they move backwards and forwards, you have a sure and faithful word to rely upon. Promises, though they seem for a time to be delayed, cannot be finally frustrated. Dare not to harbour such a thought within yourselves. The being of God may as well fail as the promise of God. That which does not come in your time will be hastened in His time, which is always the more convenient season.

Verse 9. “hath God forgotten to be gracious ...” In what pangs couldst thou be, O Psalmist, that so woeful a word should fall from thy lips? “Hath God forgotten to be gracious?” Surely, thy temptation has gone so high, that the next step would have been blasphemy.

Verse 9 “Selah.” Thus was he going on with his dark and dismal apprehensions, when all of a sudden, he checked himself with that word. “Selah;” - stop there; go no further; let us hear no more of these unbelieving surmises. And then, he chides himself in verse 10, “this is mine infirmity.”

(concluded next edition).