EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS (2)

Verse 3.—“A new song.” That is to say, a new and recent composition on account of recent benefits; or constantly new songs, song succeeding song as daily new material for divine praise offers itself to the attentive student of the works of God. Or new, that is, always fresh and full of life, and renewed as new occasions offer themselves: as Job says, “My glory was fresh in me, and my bow was renewed in my hand.” Or new, i.e., not common but rare and exquisite; as the new name in Rev. ii. 17; the new commandment, John xiii. 34. Or this respects the gospel state, wherein is a new covenant (Heb. viii. 8), a new Jerusalem (Rev. xxi. 2), a new man (Eph. ii. 15), and all things new. 2 Cor. v. 17. New, on account of its matter being unknown of men: as in Rev. xiv. 3, “They sung a new song, and no man could learn that song but the hundred and forty and four thousand, which were redeemed from the earth.” New may be used in opposition to old. The song of Moses is old, and of the Lamb is new.—Martin Geier (1614-1681), in “Poli Synopsis Criticorum.”

Verse 3.—“Sing unto him a new song.” Put off oldness: ye know the new song. A new man, a New Testament, a new song. A new song belongeth not to men that are old; none learn that but new men, renewed through grace from oldness, and belonging now to the New Testament, which is the kingdom of heaven.—Augustine.

Verse 3.—“A new song;” namely, sung with such fervency of affections as novelties usually bring with them; or, always new, seeing God’s graces never wax old; or, sung by the motion of this new spirit of grace, which doth not so much look after the old benefits of the creation as after the new benefit of the redemption in Christ, which reneweth all things. Ps. xl. 3, and xcvi. 1; Rev. v. 9, and xiv. 3.—John Diodati.

Verse 3.—“Sing unto him a new song.” It is a melancholy proof of the decline of the church, when the exhortation to sing a new song is no longer attended to: in such a case, there is need of the greatest care to prevent the old ones falling into oblivion.—E. W. Hengstenberg.

Verse 3.—“Play skilfully.” It is not an easy matter to praise God aright; it must be done corde, ore, opere, with the very best of the best.—John Trapp.

Verse 4.—“The word of the Lord is right.” His word of promise given to the church. The divine revelation to all setting forth what is to be believed, hoped for, and done. The decrees of God and his penal judgments. The whole counsel and determination of God in the creation and government of the world. “Is right,” without defect or error. The word right is opposed to tortuous; it means true or certain.—John de Pineda (1577-1637); D. H. Mollerus (1639), and others, in Synopsis.

Verse 4.—“All his works are done in truth.”

Verse 5.—“The earth is full of the goodness of the Lord.” If we reflect on the prodigious number of human beings who constantly receive their food, raiment, and every pleasure they enjoy, from their mother earth, we shall be convinced of the great liberality with which nature dispenses her gifts; and not only human beings, but an innumerable quantity of living creatures besides—inhabitants of the air, the waters, and the earth—are daily indebted to nature for their support. Those animals which are under our care are still indebted to the earth for their subsistence; for the grass, which nature spontaneously produces, is their chief food. The whole race of fishes, except those which men feed for their amusement, subsist without any of their aid. The species of birds which is perhaps the most despised and most numerous, is the sparrow. What they require for their support is incredible, but nature takes care to feed them; they are however but the smallest part of her children. So great is the quantity of insects, that ages may pass before even their species and classes can be known. How many and how diversified the sorts of flies that play in the air! The blood taken from us by the gnat is very accidental food for them; and we may suppose that where there is one gnat that lives upon it, there are millions that have never tasted human blood, or that of any other animal. On what can all these creatures subsist? Perhaps every handful of earth contains living insects; they are discovered in every drop of water; their multiplying and means of support are incomprehensible. While nature is thus prolific in children, she is also fruitful in means for their subsistence; or, rather, it is the God of nature who has poured into her bosom this inexhaustible store of riches. He provides each creature with its food and dwelling. For them he causes the grass and other herbs to grow, leaving each to select its proper food. And, however mean many creatures may appear to us, he feeds and assists them all.

O Almighty God, how manifest is thy greatness! Thou dost what the united efforts of all mankind would fail to accomplish. Thou hast given life, and breath, and being to all creatures that live in the air, the waters, or the earth. Surely thou wilt do for thy believing people what thou dost for animals and insects! When we are filled with doubts and fears, let us consider the ravens whom the Lord feeds when they cry. Let them and all creatures beside, which man takes no care of, teach us the art of contentment. The great Author of nature knows all our wants. Let us cast our every care on him, for he careth for us; and may we come boldly to the throne of grace in faith and sincerity that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help us in every time of need.—Christopher Christian Sturm.

Verse 5.—“The earth is full of the goodness of the Lord.” To hear its worthless inhabitants complain, one would think that God dispensed evil, not good. To examine the operation of his hand, everything is marked with mercy, and there is no place where his goodness does not appear. The overflowing kindness of God fills the earth. Even the iniquities of men are rarely a bar to his goodness: he causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends his rain upon the just and the unjust.—Adam Clarke.

Verse 5.—“The goodness of the Lord.” In discoursing on the glorious perfections of God, his goodness must by no means be omitted; for though all his perfections are his glory, yet this is particularly so called, for when Moses, the man of God, earnestly desired to behold a grand display of the glory of Jehovah, the Lord said, in answer to his petition, “I will make all my goodness pass before thee;” thus intimating that he himself accounted his goodness to be his glory (Exod. xxxiii. 19; xxxiv. 7); and it includes that mercy, grace, longsuffering, and truth, which are afterwards mentioned. When it relieves the miserable, it is mercy; when it bestows favours on the worthless, it is grace; when it bears with provoking rebels, it is longsuffering; when it confers promised blessings, it is truth; when it supplies indigent beings, it is bounty. The goodness of God is a very comprehensive term; it includes all the forms of his kindness shown to men; whether considered as creatures, as sinners, or as believers.—George Burder, 1838.

Verse 5.—“The goodness of the Lord.” He might, if he had pleased, have made everything we tasted bitter, everything we saw loathsome, everything we touched a sting, every smell a stench, every sound a discord.—William Paley, D.D., 1743-1805.

Verse 6.—“By the word of the Lord were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth.” That the רוּחַ is not spirit, but breath, is evident from the words “of his mouth” (compare Isaiah xi. 4), and from the parallelism with “word.” Simple word is simple breath; both together, they stand in contrast to that exercise of strength, that labour, that use of means and instruments without which feeble man can bring nothing to perfection. Then there are the parallel passages, “All the while my breath is in me, and the Spirit of God is in my nostrils,” Job xxvii. 3. “The Spirit of God hath made me, and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life.” Job xxxiii. 4. “Thou takest away their breath, they die, and return to their dust, thou sendest forth thy breath, they are created.” Psalm civ. 29, 30. On the other hand, however, the exposition which would interpret רוּחַ פִיו, without reference to the Spirit of God, cannot be a correct one. In the history of the creation, to which the verse before us, as well as verses seven and nine, generally refer, the creation is described as the work of the Spirit of God, and his Word. First, the Spirit of God moved upon the face of waters, then God said. We may also suppose that the Spirit and the power of God are here represented by the figure of breath, because that in man is the first sign of life.—E. W. Hengstenberg.

Verse 6.—“By the word of the Lord.” May be understood of the hypostatic Word, as John teaches us. John i. 1. (John Cocceius, 1603-1669). This is an illustration of the old saying, that while Grotius finds Christ nowhere, Cocceius finds Christ everywhere.—C. H. S.

Verse 6.—Let any make a world, and he shall be a God, saith Augustine; hence is it that the church maketh it the very first article of her Creed to believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth.—John Weemse.

Verses 6, 9.—It is all one with God to do as to say, to perform as to promise; it is as easy, he is as willing, as able, to do the one as the other. There is no such distance betwixt God’s saying and doing, as amongst men. His saying is doing. “He spake, and it was done; he commanded, and it stood fast.” “By the word of the Lord were the heavens made.” “The worlds were framed by the word of God.” Heb. xi. 3. There is omnipotency in his word, both of command and promise; therefore called, “The word of his power.” Heb. i. 3. One word of his can do more in an instant than the united powers of heaven and earth can do to eternity. This consideration removes at once the chief discouragements that hinder the lively actings of faith; for what is it that weakens our confidence of the promises’ performance, but because we look upon the accomplishment as uncertain or difficult, or future and afar off! Now from hence faith may conclude the performance is certain, easy, and present.—David Clarkson.

Verse 7.—“He gathereth the waters of the sea together as an heap,” etc. “God called the gathering together of the waters, seas.” Gen. i. 10. This unstable element must, like all other elements, be put under law, and confined within bounds, that there might be a habitable earth for man and all the creatures around him. Thus the Psalmist sings, “He gathereth the waters of the sea together as an heap: he layeth up the depth in storehouses.” The boundary was such as to cause his servants to wonder. They looked from the shore, as we do, and under the influence of a well-known law, the billows in their heaving swells, seemed as if they would, as if they did, touch the sky itself; and as if they were so much higher than the shore, that they were in danger of leaving their basin and stretching over the land. Just such an impression, we, with all our science, popularly hold. The prophets thus looked as we do, and under the same kind of feeling. How wonderful, they thought, is all this! A low barrier of sand is made Jehovah’s agent for bounding the deep. “The Lord hath placed the sand for the bound of the sea by a perpetual decree, that it cannot pass it: and though the waves thereof toss themselves, yet can they not prevail; though they roar, yet can they not pass over it.” Jer. v. 22.—John Duns, D.D., in “Science and Christian Thought,” 1868.

Verse 7.—“The waters of the sea.” Of all objects that I have ever seen, there is none which affects my imagination so much as the sea or ocean. I cannot see the heavings of this prodigious bulk of waters, even in a calm, without a very pleasing astonishment; but when it is worked up in a tempest, so that the horizon on every side is nothing but foaming billows and floating mountains, it is impossible to describe the agreeable horror that rises from such a prospect. A troubled ocean, to a man who sails upon it, is, I think, the biggest object that he can see in motion, and consequently gives his imagination one of the highest kinds of pleasure that can arise from greatness. I must confess it is impossible for me to survey this world of fluid matter without thinking on the hand that first poured it out, and made a proper channel for its reception. Such an object naturally raises in my thoughts the idea of an Almighty Being, and convinces me of his existence as much as a metaphysical demonstration. The imagination prompts the understanding, and by the greatness of the sensible object, produces in it the idea of a Being who is neither circumscribed by time nor space.—Spectator.