Psalm 25:7

Remember not the sins of my youth, nor my transgressions: according to thy mercy remember thou me for thy goodness' sake, O LORD.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

25:1-7 In worshipping God, we must lift up our souls to him. It is certain that none who, by a believing attendance, wait on God, and, by a believing hope, wait for him, shall be ashamed of it. The most advanced believer both needs and desires to be taught of God. If we sincerely desire to know our duty, with resolution to do it, we may be sure that God will direct us in it. The psalmist is earnest for the pardon of his sins. When God pardons sin, he is said to remember it no more, which denotes full remission. It is God's goodness, and not ours, his mercy, and not our merit, that must be our plea for the pardon of sin, and all the good we need. This plea we must rely upon, feeling our own unworthiness, and satisfied of the riches of God's mercy and grace. How boundless is that mercy which covers for ever the sins and follies of a youth spent without God and without hope! Blessed be the Lord, the blood of the great Sacrifice can wash away every stain.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Remember not the sins of my youth - In strong contrast with God, the psalmist brings forward his own conduct and life. He could ask of God Psalm 25:6 to remember His own acts - what "He himself" had done; but could not ask him to remember His conduct - His past life. He could only pray that this might be forgotten. He did not wish it to come into remembrance before God; he could not ask that God would deal with him according to that. He prays, therefore, that he might not be visited as he advanced in life with the fruits of his conduct in early years, but that all the offences of that period of his life might be forgiven and forgotten. Who is there that cannot with deep feeling join in this prayer? Who is there that has reached the period of middle or advanced life, who would be willing to have the follies of his youth, the plans, and thoughts, and wishes of his early years brought again to remembrance? Who would be willing to have recalled to his own mind, or made known to his friends, to society around him, or to assembled worlds, the thoughts, the purposes, the wishes, the "imaginings" of his youthful days? Who would dare to pray that he might be treated in advancing years as he treated God in his own early life? Nay, who would venture to pray that God would treat him in the day of judgment as he had treated the friends of his childhood, even the father who begat him, or the mother who bore him? Our hope in regard to the favor of God is that he will "not" summon up the thoughts and the purposes of our early years; that he will "not" treat us as if he remembered them; but that he will treat us as if they were forgotten.

Nor my transgressions - The sins of my early years.

According to thy mercy remember thou me - Deal with me, not according to strict justice, but according to mercy. Deal with me indeed according to thy nature and character; but let the attribute of mercy be that which will be the guide rather than the attribute of justice.

For thy goodness' sake - In order that thy goodness or benevolence may be displayed and honored - not primarily and mainly that I may be saved, but that thy character may be seen to be good and merciful.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

6, 7. Confessing past and present sins, he pleads for mercy, not on palliations of sin, but on God's well-known benevolence.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Remember not, so as to lay to my charge, the sins committed in my young and tender years, Ecclesiastes 11:9,10 which God frequently puntsbeth in riper age, Job 13:26 Jeremiah 3:25, and therefore he now prays that God would not deal so with him.

Nor my transgressions; my succeeding or other sins, which either have been acted by me, or may be imputed to me. Being a sinner, I have nothing to plead for myself but thy free mercy and goodness, which I now implore.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Remember not the sins of my youth,.... Original sin, in which he was born, and the breakings forth of corrupt nature in infancy, he brought into the world with him, together with all the youthful lusts and vanities to which that age is addicted; and sometimes the sins of youth are in some persons remembered by God, and punished in old age; and if not, they are brought to remembrance through the dispensations of Providence: and the people of God are chastised for them then, and are ready to fear it is in a way of wrath; see Job 13:26; which the psalmist here deprecates; for this is not said in order to extenuate his sins, they being but youthful follies, imprudencies, and inadvertencies, sins committed through ignorance, when he had not the knowledge of things he now had; nor as if he had lived so holy a life, that there were no sins of his to be taken notice of but what he had committed in his younger days; but rather this is to be considered as a confession of his having sinned from his youth upwards unto that time, as in Jeremiah 3:25; and therefore entreat, that God would not remember his sins, so as to correct him for them in wrath and hot displeasure; neither the sins he had formerly been guilty of, nor those of a later date; which he next mentions;

nor my transgressions; his more notorious and glaring ones; such as murder and adultery, in the case of Uriah and Bathsheba, and which now stared him in the face; and on account of these, and as a chastening for them, this unnatural rebellion of his son's, which was now raised against him, was suffered to befall him, as had been foretold to him, 2 Samuel 12:11;

according to thy mercy remember thou me, for thy goodness' sake, O Lord; he pleads no merit nor goodness of his own, but casts himself upon the mercy, grace, and goodness of God; in which he was certainly right; and on that account prayed and hoped for deliverance from his present troubles, and for discoveries of the pardon of his sins unto him, which is what he means by remembering him.

Geneva Study Bible

Remember not the {e} sins of my youth, nor my transgressions: according to thy mercy remember thou me for thy goodness' sake, O LORD.

(e) He confesses that his many sins were the reason that his enemies persecuted him, desiring that the cause of the evil may be taken away, so that the effect may cease.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

7. The word translated sins is derived from a root meaning to miss the mark or lose the way. It denotes primarily the failures, errors, lapses, of frailty; and so is naturally applied to the thoughtless offences of youth. The word for transgressions means literally rebellions, and denotes the deliberate offences of riper years.

according to thy mercy] According to thy lovingkindness, as in Psalm 25:6; Psalm 25:10.

for thy goodness’ sake] When Moses desired a revelation of God’s glory, he was granted a revelation of His goodness (Exodus 33:19). Cp. Psalm 27:13; Romans 2:4; Romans 11:22.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 7. - Remember not the sins of my youth, nor my transgressions. Job thought that God counted against him the "iniquities of his youth" (Job 13:26); David, with greater faith and a deeper insight into the true character of God, can ask with confidence that his may not be reckoned against him. An earthly father does not remember them against his son. How much less will our heavenly Father! According to thy mercy remember thou me, for thy goodness' sake, O Lord! Still, put me not from thy mind. "Remember thou me" always - but in the light of thy tender mercy, with the rays of thy love streaming over me and hiding the deformities of my transgressions. Do this "for thy goodness' sake," i.e. because thou art essential Goodness, perfect Tenderness, perfect Love. Psalm 25:7

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

May Jahve not remember the faults of his youth (חטּאות), into which lust and thoughtlessness have precipitated him, nor the transgressions (פּשׁעים), by which even in maturer and more thoughtful years he has turned the grace of God into licentiousness and broken off his fellowship with Him (פּשׁע בּ, of defection); but may He, on the contrary, turn His remembrance to him (זכר ל as in Psalm 136:23) in accordance with His grace or loving-kindness, which אתּה challenges as being the form of self-attestation most closely corresponding to the nature of God. Memor esto quidem mei, observes Augustine, non secundum iram, qua ego dignus sum, sed secundum misericordiam tuam, quae te digna est. For God is טּוב, which is really equivalent to saying, He is ἀγάπη. The next distich shows that טוּב is intended here of God's goodness, and not, as e.g., in Nehemiah 9:35, of His abundance of possessions.