Hear my cry for mercy when I call to You for help, when I lift up my hands toward Your holy sanctuary. Sermons
I. HERE IS A TWOFOLD OUTLOOK. The writer of this psalm was the anointed of the Lord (ver. 8). He was Israel's king; and was withal encompassed by foes. Not only were there those who were the people of God, his inheritance (ver. 9), but there were also those who regarded not God, and who cared not for man (vers. 3, 5). And the time has not come when such a double outlook has ceased. The righteous, the wicked - tares and wheat - both are still on "the field of the world," growing together until the harvest. II. HERE IS A TWOFOLD YEARNING OF THE PSALMIST. 1. For the righteous. (Ver. 9.) "Save thy people, and bless thine inheritance." Put the emphasis on "thy,' "thine;" herein lies the force of the praying one's tender pleading with God "Feed them;" i.e. tend them, rule them; let them find thee all that thou art as their Shepherd. "Lift them up," equivalent to "bear them up," carry them in thine arms (Isaiah 63:9; Isaiah 40:11; Deuteronomy 1:31; Deuteronomy 32:11; see Perowne hereon). 2. Against the wicked. (Ver. 4.) It is here that so many have found a difficulty. We acknowledge that there would be a difficulty if these were the words of God to man; but as they are the words of man to God, why should there be any difficulty at all? Is any one bound to defend every word that any saint ever offered in prayer? Surely not. It is, however, only fair to the writer to bear in mind: (1) That he does not pray against the wicked with personal vindictiveness, but regards them as the enemies of God (ver. 5), and of society likewise (ver. 3). (2) No saint's prayers ever could go beyond the limits of the inspiration and revelation which were granted to him. No one even now can pray beyond the limits of his own knowledge. In the Old Testament times the all-conquering love of God had not been revealed as it has been to us, and so could not yield fuel for prayer. (3) That such a prayer as this is an historical representation of the petitions of saints in the psalmist's time, and is no absolute model for our time, with our larger and warmer light-beams from on high. At the same time, we are bound also to remember that we ought not to cherish the like feelings towards the wicked that we do towards the righteous. Yea, if we are righteous, we cannot. And while we plead with God to build up those who are pure and true, we ought to plead with him to frustrate the designs of unreasonable and wicked men, and to arise and vindicate the great cause of righteousness and truth. And this we may do, while leaving it absolutely with God to deal with wicked people as he sees fit. The Judge of all the earth will do right, and we surely can leave the matter there. "Vengeance is mine: I will repay, saith the Lord." Job's words are better than any prayers for vengeance: " I know that my Vindicator liveth." There let us rest. For we have to recognize - III. A TWOFOLD ACTION OF GOD'S PROVIDENCE. He builds up the righteous, but disconcerts the schemes of the wicked. So the experience of life shows us, and so this psalm indicates. 1. To the righteous. God is (1) their Strength; (2) their Shield; (3) the Stronghold of salvation for them and for their anointed king. This may be applied in the highest sense (cf. Romans 8:28; Hebrews 2:10). 2. To the wicked. (Ver. 5.) "He shall break them down, and not build them up" (cf. Psalm 18:25, 26; Psalm 37:35; Psalm 73:18-20). God will seem to men according to what they are. If they follow his commandments, peace will attend their steps. If they violate them, all nature will be full of detectives, whips, and stings. IV. A TWOFOLD ACT TOWARDS GOD. 1. Prayer. "Hear... when I lift up my hands toward thy holy oracle;" i.e. towards the "mercy-seat" (ver. 2). Although he was not selfish enough to cramp his desires within the limits of his own personal need, yet he was not unnatural enough to leave himself out. In fact, God was so much to him that his very life seemed bound up in God and his loving-kindness; the lack of a message from God to his spirit would almost drive him to despair (vers. 1, 2). But, as is so often the case, the very psalms which begin with the deepest sighing end with the most joyous shouting. Hence, following on prayer, there is: 2. Praise. (Ver. 6.) The lower God takes us down in the valley of humiliation, the higher will he take us up on the mount of exultation (Isaiah 41:16). And those who spend most time with God in weeping and supplication will have the loudest and sweetest strains to raise over the wonders of delivering grace. "They that sow in tears shall reap in joy." This is as true of prayer as it is of work. Note: Making all allowance for the difference of tone in the two dispensations, the Hebrew and the Christian, yet throughout both the same laws hold good. 1. That prayer is one of the forces by means of which God sways the world. 2. That his people have for thousands of years been praying to him to bring in righteousness and to put down wrong of every kind. 3. That it is more certain these prayers will be answered than that the sun will rise to-morrow. 4. And, consequently, it is for men to decide whether to their life there shall attach the privilege of being borne upon the hearts of all God's saints in prayer, or the peril of being surrounded with petitions that they may ultimately be put to shame. - C.
Unto Thee will I cry, O Lord my Rock. I. HE PRAYS THAT GOD WOULD GRACIOUSLY HEAR AND ANSWER HIM NOW THAT, IN HIS DISTRESS, HE CALLED UPON HIM (vers. 1, 2). Observe —1. His faith in prayer. "O Lord, my rock." 2. His fervency in prayer. "Unto Thee will I cry" — as one in earnest, being ready to sink unless Thou come in with seasonable succour. 3. How solicitous he is to obtain an answer. "Be not silent to me." 4. His plea.(1) The sad despair he should be in if God slighted him. "If Thou be silent to me," etc. If God be not my friend, appear not to me, and appear not for me, my hope and my help is perished.(2) The good hopes he had that God would favour him. "I lift up my hands," etc. The most holy place, within the veil, is here called "the oracle." That was a type of Christ; and it is to Him that we must lift up our eyes and hands, for through Him all good comes from God to us. It was also a figure of heaven (Hebrews 9:24); and from God, as our Father in heaven, we are taught to expect answers to prayer. II. HE DEPRECATES THE DOOM OF WICKED PEOPLE (ver. 3). 1. Save me from being entangled in the snares they have laid for me. 2. Save me from being infected with their sins, and from doing as they do. 3. Save me from being involved in their doom. III. HE DEPRECATES THE JUST JUDGMENTS OF GOD UPON THE WORKERS OF INIQUITY (ver. 4). This is not the language of passion or revenge; nor is it inconsistent with the duty of praying for our enemies. But — 1. Thus he would show how far he was from complying with the workers of iniquity. 2. Thus he would express his zeal for the honour of God's justice in governing the world. 3. This prayer is a prophecy that God will, sooner or later, render to all impenitent sinners according to their deserts. Observe, he foretells that God will reward them, not only according to their deeds, but "according to the wickedness of their endeavours"; for sinners shall be reckoned with, not only for the mischief they have done, but for the mischief they would have done, which they designed, and did what they could to effect. And if God go by this rule in dealing with the wicked, sure He will do so in dealing with the righteous, and will reward them, not only for the good they have done, but for the good they endeavoured to do, though they could not compass it. IV. HE FORETELLS THEIR DESTRUCTION FOR THEIR CONTEMPT OF GOD AND HIS HAND (ver. 5). Why do men question the Being or attributes of God but because they do not duly regard His handi-works which declare His glory, and in which the invisible things of Him are clearly seen? Why do men forget God, and live without Him — nay, affront God, and live in rebellion against Him, but because they consider not the instances of that wrath of His which is "revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and Unrighteousness of men"? Why do the enemies of God's people hats and persecute them, and devise mischief against them, but because they "regard not the works" God has wrought for His Church, by which He has made it appear how dear it is to Him? (Isaiah 5:12). ( M. Henry, D. D.) 2. At the right time. 3. With the right motives. 4. In the right way. (J. E. Scott.) II. CRAVING FOR FELLOWSHIP WITH GOD. 1. God s silence deprecated as the greatest evil. 2. God's fellowship sought as the greatest good: (1) (2) (3) (4) III. CONFIDENCE IN THE ETERNAL JUSTICE OF GOD. 1. Deliverance sought from the doom of the wicked. 2. Retribution craved. IV. GRATITUDE FOE THE GOODNESS OF GOD. 1. For answered prayers. 2. For assistance in time of need. 3. For assurance of hope. V. EXULTING JOY IN THE SAVING STRENGTH OF GOD. VI. TRUST IN THE ULTIMATE TRIUMPH AND BLESSEDNESS OF GOD'S PEOPLE. (W. Forsyth, M. A.) 1. His nature. "Rock." What so immutable, abiding?(1) Deep in the nature of every man is the desire for some object on which to settle its confidence and its love.(2) The human spirit, without a fixed centre, is like the sea — never at rest.(3) All outside the soul is unsettled and shifting as the clouds. "Riches take to themselves wings and flee away;" friends drop into the grave. The soul wants a Rock amidst this surging sea. 2. His attitude. "Silent." Even Christ on the cross exclaimed, "My God," etc. Does not this prove man's intuitive belief in the fact that fellowship with the Great Father is happiness? Whatever may be man's theoretical credenda concerning the Eternal, his primitive faith is, that happiness is attained only by close communion with Him. 3. His salvation. "Lest I be like them who go down into the pit." From what a pit does the great God deliver His people — (1) (2) (3) II. The NATURE of the prayer is here given in metaphor. 1. Prayer has respect to a special manifestation of God. "Toward Thy holy oracle." What the "Mercy Seat" was to the Jew, Christ is to humanity in these last times — the Temple in which God is to be met, and where the Shekinah radiates — Emmanuel — God with us. Man in prayer requires that his Deity should appear as a local personality. 2. Prayer is the elevation of the soul to God. "I lift up my hands." The lifting up of the hands symbolizes the lifting up of the heart. (Homilist.) I. Is GOD SILENT TO OUR PRAYERS? We pray expecting His answer. Prayer is not the mere utterance of surcharged hearts, like Lear's raving to the winds. There is moral benefit in simple desire, and that desire grows by utterance. The Rock may not speak to us, but we can lean against it and find shelter under it. But the idea of God speaking to us is as essential for prayer as our speaking to Him. We ask for response, not merely that He would listen. In what sense may God be silent to a praying man? It is a possibility, and as such it is deprecated. Perhaps David was impatient because the answer did not at once come. Sometimes the answer may follow at once, as the thunder-clap the lightning. "I will, be thou clean," was the instant answer to the leper's cry. But the answer to the Syro-Phoenician, to the centurion, to the disciples in the storm, to the sisters of Lazarus, were purposely delayed. The long winter is not a capricious delay of spring; it prepares for a fuller, a more luxuriant life. Surely was not the Father, in this sense, silent to the well-beloved Son Himself when He prayed in His agony, thrice, "Father, if it be possible." His cup might not pass, but "He was heard in that He feared." Our hasty desires are often not wise. The thing demanded might send "leanness into our souls." II. THERE ARE OTHER SILENCES THAT PERPLEX us. What is the meaning of many of God's laws — the economy of violence, of death, of death as the condition of life? Why are the secrets of Nature so hidden? Why did not God tell at the first what powerful generations have just discovered? Wherefore do the wicked prosper? Why is God silent when His people are wronged with impunity and success? No doubt, much that we call God's silence is speech that is unheard. It is not His silence, but only our deafness. Christianity has taught us how to regard suffering itself as a gospel. III. CONCERNING HIS KINGDOM WE ARE PERPLEXED. "Lord, are there few that be saved'?" He is silent to our curiosity even when prompted by benevolence. IV. IN SPIRITUAL THINGS, again, we often think, in our obtuseness, that God is silent. We do not always hear God's voice in our own souls. The Babel voices of passion drown it. He that will do the will of God shall know of the doctrine. Some men see and hear God everywhere; others never see or hear Him at all. To the spiritual soul God's world is a whispering gallery — dead stones speak. V. TO SUCH A SOUL THE THOUGHT THAT GOD MAY BE SILENT TO HIM IS INTOLERABLE. He would be as those who perish. Every delay was painful. The Divine Fatherhood has such meaning to us that we cannot bear "the hiding .of God's face." This is the meaning of all the great yearnings after God with which the Psalms are full. To be thrown upon the mystery and sin and trouble of life, "all the burden and the mystery of this unintelligible world," without God is, to a religious soul, intolerable. How terrible to think of men to whom God is always silent, who are spiritually so deaf that they cannot hear, and to whom, if they could hear, God has no words that He could speak but of rebuke. There are men who all their lives have been saying prayers but have never prayed, and to whom God has never spoken. What if the silence should never be broken? (H. Allen, D. D.) I. WHILE COMPLAINING OF GOD'S SILENCE, ARE YOU REALLY SO CERTAIN THAT HE IS SILENT? What if God has been speaking distinctly and repeatedly, while from faults of your own you have not heard Him? There are two pre-requisites to the catching of God's voice! Listen for it in the proper quarter. Many miss the Divine message because they fail to realize how often it comes to us in the ordinary and the commonplace. "Where is the Christ?" do you ask? — "the Christ that I need to save me, to guide me?" Why, in the weekly sermons you hear, in the daily Scriptures you read, in the temporal experiences that befall you, in the spiritual aspirations that stir in you. Lay your ear to the things that are close to you: customary ordinances, customary providences, as well as your yearnings and anxieties for a better life. Christ is speaking in these. 2. Listen for it with the necessary sympathy. Otherwise, though close to the sphere where God speaks, with His messages ringing all round about you, you may miss or mistake their meaning; they will be no real messages to you. Who are those that appreciate the poet's message? Only such as have a portion of the poet's soul. Who are those that appreciate the musician's message? Only such as have a portion of the musician's taste. And who are those that appreciate the Divine message? Only such as have an element of the Divine character, that raises you to the knowledge of the Divine, instals you into fellowship with the Divine. II. IN COMPLAINING OF GOD'S SILENCE, ARE YOU SURE THAT HIS SILENCE WILL CONTINUE? Remember the Syro-Phoenician woman. If your prayer be a prayer for simple relief, cud if you are careful to ask for it in the right spirit, willing to wait for it till the right time, you need not lose heart, though Christ at the outset be silent. The speaking will surely follow. And meanwhile through the very silence Christ may work by blessing as well as by speech. He may keep you waiting for a time that faith may be strengthened, that hope may be fanned, that love may be refined, that patience may be perfected, that desire may be purified. III. IN COMPLAINING OF GOD'S SILENCE, ARE YOU SURE IT WOULD BE GOOD FOR YOU IF HE SPOKE? (John 16:12). He meets many a question that goes up to Him about concealed things in life and doctrine with a shake of the head, the attitude of reticence and of reserve. And the reason is this — the knowledge of such matters is meanwhile unsafe. A modern religious writer has beautifully said that the key to God's silence on many points is to be found in the simple words, "We shall be changed," and the fact that God waits till the change takes place. IV. IN COMPLAINING OF GOD'S SILENCE, ARE YOU SURE YOU ARE NOT PROVOKING HIM TO KEEP SILENCE? HOW? By sin that is wilfully indulged in, or sin that is insufficiently repented of-inadequately realized and confessed (Psalm 66:18). "But," you say, "I have grieved over my iniquity." Yes, but there is grieving and grieving. Have you renounced it? Have you renounced the fruits of it? Have you gone to God with such an absence of self-justification and self-excuse as to say, "I and not another have done this thing, and against Thee and not another has this thing been done"? For if not, grieve as you may, plead as you may, be prepared for God's silence. V. IN COMPLAINING OF GOD'S SILENCE, ARE YOU SURE YOU ARE GIVING HIM THE OPPORTUNITY TO SPEAK? "Truly," says the psalmist, "my soul waiteth upon God." It ought rather to read, "is silent to God." A friend told me some time ago that a Christian lady startled him with a question worth the repeating. She first asked, "Do you pray? Yes." "And how long do you remain on your knees, after you have prayed, waiting for an answer? Well," he said, "it is strange; I never thought of doing that at all." We forget the duty of stillness, of quietness. We forget the duty of now and again being silent to God in the attitude of expectancy and recipiency. (W. A. Gray.) (A. Warr, M. A.) (J. Hunter, D. D.) 5230 beggars Christ is All The Great Privilege of those that are Born of God Religion Pleasant to the Religious. Psalms |
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