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Christ and His Church are the subject of this noble psalm.

I. THE CALL TO HIGHER HOLINESS, to higher attainments in faith, love and purity. And the figure employed suggests what is needed — the entire renunciation of the world which lieth in the wicked one, as in marriage the bride is well content to leave her old home, and all its intimacies, for the higher love that awaits her. See the call of Abraham, and what is written of the tribe of Levi. "Who said unto his father and to his mother, I have not seen him," etc.; and our Lord's words, "He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is," etc.

II. THE ENFORCEMENT OF THIS EXHORTATION. "So shall the king greatly desire thy beauty." That beauty is a spiritual one — the beauty of holiness, the spiritual lovelines of a soul on which the King has begun to stamp the impress of His own beauty. Many will mournfully say that no such beauty is theirs. But remember that word of the Lord, "I have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning himself thus." "I have surely heard;" it means that it is as sweetest music in my ears. The lowly self-estimate, the deep humility of heart which such sorrow reveals is part of the very beauty which made the Lord answer to the bride who had just said, "Look not upon me, for I am black," "Behold, thou art all fair, my love; there is not a spot in thee." For the mantle of Christ's perfect righteousness is cast over every believer, and in that they are "all fair."

III. THE FURTHER ENFORCEMENT AND EXHORTATION. "For He is thy Lord, and worship thou Him." We are never to forget His Divine dignity and the unutterable disparity of rank between the parties in this marriage. "Thy Maker is thy husband." Our love, therefore, must be worship, adoration.

(C. J. Brown, D. D.)

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KJV: Hearken, O daughter, and consider, and incline thine ear; forget also thine own people, and thy father's house;

WEB: Listen, daughter, consider, and turn your ear. Forget your own people, and also your father's house.