Homilist Psalm 39:1-13 I said, I will take heed to my ways, that I sin not with my tongue: I will keep my mouth with a bridle, while the wicked is before me.… I. THOUGHT UNDER TRIAL. 1. Its utterance repressed. "I said, I will take heed to my ways."(1) This effort as repression was pious. Why did he essay to "muzzle" his tongue? "That I sin not." He felt in all probability that the circumstances which brought on his sufferings had awakened within him such sceptical ideas concerning the rectitude or benevolence of the Divine procedure, the utterance of which, in the ears of the wicked, while they were "before him," would be highly sinful. (2) This effort at repression was painful. Imprisoned thoughts, like pent-up floods, increase in turbulent force; the more they are suppressed, the more they heave, swell, and battle. (3) This effort at repression was temporary. His thoughts became at last irrepressible. "I spake with my tongue." To whom? Not to ungodly men — this he resolved not to do because it was sinful — but to the great Jehovah. 2. Its attention arrested. The character of life. Its terminableness. Its frailty. Its brevity. Its vanity. Its emptiness. Its disquietudes. Its worthless labours. (Homilist.) Parallel Verses KJV: {To the chief Musician, even to Jeduthun, A Psalm of David.} I said, I will take heed to my ways, that I sin not with my tongue: I will keep my mouth with a bridle, while the wicked is before me. |
    |