113:1-9 An exhortation to praise God. - God has praise from his own people. They have most reason to praise him; for those who attend him as his servants, know him best, and receive most of his favours, and it is easy, pleasant work to speak well of their Master. God's name ought to be praised in every place, from east to west. Within this wide space the Lord's name is to be praised; it ought to be so, though it is not. Ere long it will be, when all nations shall come and worship before him. God is exalted above all blessing and praise. We must therefore say, with holy admiration, Who is like unto the Lord our God? How condescending in him to behold the things in the earth! And what amazing condescension was it for the Son of God to come from heaven to earth, and take our nature upon him, that he might seek and save those that were lost! How vast his love in taking upon him the nature of man, to ransom guilty souls! God sometimes makes glorious his own wisdom and power, when, having some great work to do, he employs those least likely, and least thought of for it by themselves or others. The apostles were sent from fishing to be fishers of men. And this is God's constant method in his kingdom of grace. He takes men, by nature beggars, and even traitors, to be his favourites, his children, kings and priests unto him; and numbers them with the princes of his chosen people. He gives us all our comforts, which are generally the more welcome when long delayed, and no longer expected. Let us pray that those lands which are yet barren, may speedily become fruitful, and produce many converts to join in praising the Lord.

Verse 2. - Blessed be the Name of the Lord from this time forth and for evermore. The prayer here is that God may be praised through all time, as in the next verse it is that he may be praised through all space. In connection with the praise of God, limits of time and place are unsuitable (comp. Psalm 115:18; Psalm 121:8; 125:8; 131:3; Isaiah 59:21; Micah 4:7).

Blessed be the name of the Lord,.... Some prefix the word "saying", as directing to the matter and manner of praising the Lord, and to express themselves thus; "let the name of the Lord be blessed"; honoured, glorified, spoken well of.

From this time forth and for evermore; from the beginning of time, or as soon as time began, the Lord's name was to be praised, and was praised by the holy angels, who were present at laying the foundation of the earth, Job 38:4, and all the works of the Lord, in their way, have praised him ever since. Here it may respect the time of penning this psalm, or the time when the persons called upon commenced the servants of the Lord, the time of their conversion; a time of love, life, light, and deliverance, and therefore a time to begin to praise the Lord: or the whole time of the Gospel dispensation, to which this psalm refers; the accepted time and day of salvation, and of the Gentiles glorifying God for his mercy; in which the Lord is to be and is praised, as he will be to all eternity, by angels and glorified saints.

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