Bible Heaven/Bible Heaven.iso/spurgeon/ps6.4

Text File | 1993-03-17 | 4KB | 71 lines

                           EXPOSITION.

        "_Return, O Lord; deliver my soul_." As God's absence was
the main cause of his misery, so his return would be enough to
deliver him from his trouble. "_Oh save me for thy mercies'
sake_." He knows where to look, and what arm to lay hold upon. He
does not lay hold on God's left hand of justice, but on his right
hand of mercy. He knew his iniquity too well to think of merit,
or appeal to anything but the grace of God.

        "_For thy mercies' sake_." What a plea that is! How
prevalent it is with God! If we turn to justice, what plea can we
urge? but if we turn to mercy we may still cry, notwithstanding
the greatness of our guilt, "Save me for thy mercies' sake."

        Observe how frequently David here pleads the name of
Jehovah, which is always intended where the word LORD is given in
capitals. Five times in four verses we here meet with it. Is not
this a proof that the glorious name is full of consolation to the
tempted saint? Eternity, Infinity, Immutability, Self-existence,
are all in the name Jehovah, and all are full of comfort.

              EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS.

        Verse 4.--"Return, O Lord, deliver my soul_," etc. In
this his besieging of God, he brings up his works from afar off,
closer; he begins in this Psalm, at a deprecatory prayer; he asks
nothing, but that God would do nothing, that he would forbear
him--_rebuke me not, correct me not_. Now, it costs the king less
to give a pardon than to give a pension, and less to give a
reprieve than to give a pardon, and less to connive, not to call
in question, than either reprieve, pardon, or pension; to forbear
is not much. But then as the mathematician said, that he could
make an engine, a screw, that should move the whole frame of the
world, if he could have a place assigned him to fix that engine,
that screw upon, so that it might work upon the world; so prayer,
when one petition hath taken hold upon God, works upon God, moves
God, prevails with God, entirely for all. David then having got
this ground, this footing in God, he brings his works closer; he
comes from the deprecatory to a postulatory prayer; not only that
God would do nothing against him, but that he would do something
for him. God hath suffered man to see _Arcana imperii_, the
secrets of his state, how he governs--he governs by precedent; by
precedents of his predecessors, he cannot, he hath none; by
precedents of other gods he cannot, there are none; and yet he
proceeds by precedents, by his own precedents, he does as he did
before, _habenti dat_, to him that hath received he gives more,
and is willing to be wrought and prevailed upon, and pressed with
his own example. And, as though his doing good were but to learn
how to do good better, still he writes after his own copy, and
_nulla dies sine linea_. He writes something to us, that is, he
doth something for us every day. And then, that which is not
often seen in other masters, his copies are better than the
originals; his latter mercies larger than his former; and in this
postulatory prayer, larger than the deprecatory, enters our text,
"_Return, O Lord; deliver my soul: O save me_," etc.--^John
Donne.

                       HINTS TO PREACHERS.

        Verse 4.--"_Return, O Lord_." A prayer suggested by a
sense of the Lord's absence, excited by grace, attended with
heart searching and repentance, backed by pressing danger,
guaranteed as to its answer, and containing a request for all
mercies.

        Verse 4.--The prayer of the deserted saint. 1. _His
state_: his soul is evidently in bondage and danger: 2. _His
hope_: it is in the Lord's return. 3. _His plea_: mercy only.