EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS (3)

Verse 7.—“Remember not the sins of my youth;” let them not move thee to punish or be avenged on me for them; as men, when they remember injuries, seek to be avenged on those who have done them.—William Greenhill.

Verse 7.—“Remember not the sins of my youth.” It is not safe to be at odds with the “Ancient of days.”—John Trapp.

Verse 7.—“The sins of my youth.” Before we come to the principal point we must first clear the text from the incumbrance of a double objection. The first is this:—It may seem (may some say) very improbable that David should have any sins of his youth, if we consider the principals whereupon his youth was past. The first was poverty. We read that his father Jesse passed for an old man, we read not that he passed for a rich man; and probably his seven sons were the principal part of his wealth. Secondly, painfulness. David, though the youngest, was not made a darling, but a drudge; sent by his father to follow the ewes big with young; where he may seem to have learned innocence and simplicity from the sheep he kept. Thirdly, piety (Psalm lxxi. 5), “For thou art my hope, O Lord God; thou art my trust from my youth.” And again in the seventeenth verse of the same Psalm, “O God, thou hast taught me from my youth:” David began to be good betimes, a young saint, and yet crossed that pestilent proverb, was no old devil. And what is more still, he was constantly in the furnace of affliction. Psalm lxxxviii. 15. “Even from my youth up, thy terrors have I suffered with a troubled mind.” The question then will be this, How could that water be corrupted which was daily clarified? How could that steel gather rust which was daily filed? How could David’s soul in his youth be sooty with sin, which was constantly scoured with suffering? But the answer is easy; for though David for the main were a man after God’s own heart (the best transcript of the best copy), yet he, especially in his youth, had his faults and infirmities, yea, his sins and transgressions. Though the Scripture maketh mention of no eminent sin in his youth, the business with Bathsheba being justly to be referred to David’s reduced and elder age. I will not conclude that David was of a wanton constitution because of a ruddy complexion. It is as injurious an inference to conclude all bad which are beautiful, as it is a false and flattering consequence to say all are honest who are deformed. Rather we may collect David’s youth guilty of wantonness from his having so many wives and concubines. But what go I about to do? Expect not that I should tell you the particular sins, when he could not tell his own. Psalm xix. “Who can tell how oft he offendeth?” Or how can David’s sins be known to me, which he confesseth were unknown to himself, which made him say, “O Lord, cleanse me from secret sins”? But to silence our curiosity, that our conscience may speak:—If David’s youth, which was poor, painful, and pious, was guilty of sins, what shall we say, of such whose education hath been wealthy, wanton, and wicked? And I report the rest to be acted with shame, sorrow, and silence in every man’s conscience.—Thomas Fuller.

Verse 7.—“The sins of my youth.” Two aged disciples, one eighty-seven years old, one day met. “Well,” enquired the younger of his fellow pilgrim, “how long have you been interested in religion?” “Fifty years,” was the old man’s reply. “Well, have you ever regretted that you began when young to devote yourself to religion?” “Oh, no!” said he, and the tears trickled down his furrowed cheeks; “I weep when I think of the sins of my youth; it is this which makes me weep now.”—From K. Arvine’s “Cyclopædia of Moral and Religious Anecdotes,” 1859.

Verse 7.—“According to THY mercy,” not mine; for I have forsaken those mercies thou madest mine own (Jonah ii. 8; Psalm lix. 10, 17), in being cruel to myself by my sin, through distrust of thy promise, and upon presumption in thy mercy; yea, let it be, “for THY goodness’ sake,” not mine, for in me, that is, in my flesh, dwelleth no manner of thing that is good. Let thy goodness, then, be the motive, thy mercy the rule of all that grace, and of all those blessings thou vouchsafest unto my soul.—Robert Mossom.

Verse 7.—“According to thy mercy.” Moses was the first that brought up this happy expression, “According to thy mercy” (I know not where it is used by any other man), that is, according to the infinite mercy that is in thy heart and nature. David did next use it (Psalm xxv.), and in the great case of his sin and adultery (Psalm li. 1), “that he would be merciful to him, according to the multitude of his mercies,” And as he needed all the mercies in God, so he confessed the sin of his nature, and hath recourse to the mercies in God’s nature. But it is Psalm xxv. 7, I pitch on; there he doth not content himself only with this expression, “According to thy mercy,” but he adds another phrase, “For thy mercy’s sake,” and “goodness’ sake.” Muis observes in this coherence, “Good and upright is the Lord” (verse 8), that he centres in his nature. Thou hast a merciful nature; deal with me according to that, and for the sake of that, “according to thy mercy,” “for thy goodness’ sake.” The meditation of that attribute was the foundation of his faith and prayer herein. When he hath done, he referreth himself to Moses, verse 11, “For thy name’s sake, O Lord, pardon mine iniquity; for it is great.” He refers to that name proclaimed before Moses. Exodus xxxiv. 6, 7. But you will say, How do these expressions, “for thy name’s sake,” “for thy goodness’ sake,” “for thy mercy’s sake,” imply the same as “for himself,” “for his own sake”? how do they involve the Godhead? Look to Isaiah xliii. 25, “I, even I, am he that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine own sake,” that is, for myself. Isaiah xlviii. 11. “For mine own sake, even for mine own sake, will I do it.” You have it twice in one verse; and that which is “for mercy’s sake” in one place, is “for mine own sake” in another, and behold it is I, I am he, as I am God, who doth it. What is this, but “Jehovah, Jehovah, God merciful”?—Thomas Goodwin.

Verse 8.—“Good and upright is the Lord: therefore will he teach sinners in the way.” As election is the effect of God’s sovereignty, our pardon the fruit of his mercy, our knowledge a stream from his wisdom, our strength an impression of his power; so our purity is a beam from his holiness. As the rectitude of the creature at the first creation was the effect of his holiness, so the purity of the creature by a new creation, is a draught of the same perfection. He is called the Holy One of Israel more in Isaiah, that evangelical prophet, in erecting Zion, and forming a people for himself, than in the whole Scripture besides.—Stephen Charnock.

Verse 8.—“Good and upright is the Lord: therefore will he teach sinners in the way.” Will not the Lord, who is good, be as gracious to his enemies as he requires us to be to ours? It is his own law, “If thou meet thine enemy’s ox or his ass going astray, thou shalt surely bring it back to him again.” Exodus xxiii. 4. Now God meets us sinners, and all sinners as such are his enemies; he meets us straying like the beast without understanding; and what? will he not bring us again unto himself, the sole proprietary, by that first right of creation, and that more firm right of redemption?—Robert Mossom.

Verse 9.—“The meek will he guide in judgment;” or, the poor (namely, in spirit), will he make to tread in judgment, to foot it aright, to walk judiciously, to behave themselves wisely, as David did (1 Sam. xxiv.), so that Saul feared him. Natural conscience cannot but stoop to the image of God, shining in the hearts and lives of the really religious.—John Trapp.

Verse 9.—“The meek will he guide in judgment.” They have been made meek, i.e., desirous of being taught, and praying to be so; but, being now sensible of unworthiness, they are afraid that God will not teach them. This may be done to other sinners but not to them. Therefore they are told who may expect teaching, even they who desire and pray for teaching.—John Berridge, 1716-1793.

Verse 9.—“He will guide the poor in judgment.” Never will this docility be found in any man, until the heart, which is naturally elated and filled with pride, has been humbled and subdued. As the Hebrew word denotes the poor or afflicted, and is employed in a metaphorical sense, to denote the meek and humble, it is probable that David, under this term, includes the afflictions which serve to restrain and subdue the frowardness of the flesh, as well as the grace of humility itself; as if he had said, When God has first humbled them, then he kindly stretches forth his hand to them, and leads and guides them throughout the whole course of their life.—John Calvin.

Verse 9.—“The meek,” etc. Pride and anger have no place in the school of Christ. The Master himself is “meek and lowly of heart;” much more, surely, ought the scholars to be so. He who hath no sense of his ignorance, can have no desire, or capability of knowledge, human or divine.—George Horne.

Verse 9 (last clause).—The Lord will teach the humble his secrets, he will not teach proud scholars.—Thomas Goodwin.

Verse 9 (last clause).—Such as lie at his feet and say, “Speak, Lord, for thy servant heareth,” such whose hearts are supple and soluble, tractable, and teachable, so that a little child may lead them. (Isaiah xi. 6.) Austin was such an one. Saith he, “I am here an old man ready to learn of a young man, my coadjutor in the ministry, who hath scarce been one year in the service.”—John Trapp.

Verse 10.—“All the paths of the Lord,” אָדְהוֹה orchoth signifies the tracks or ruts made by the wheels of wagons by often passing over the same ground. Mercy and truth are the paths in which God constantly walks in reference to the children of men; and so frequently does he show them mercy, and so frequently does he fulfil his truth, that his paths are easily discerned. How frequent, how deeply indented, and how multiplied are those tracks to every family and individual! Wherever we go, we see that God’s mercy and truth have been there by the deep tracks they have left behind them. But he is more abundantly merciful to those who keep his covenant and his testimonies; i.e., those who are conformed, not only to the letter, but to the spirit of his pure religion.—Adam Clarke.

Verse 10.—“All the paths of the Lord are mercy and truth.”—As his nature is love and truth, so all his ways are mercy and truth. They are “mercy” in respect of aiming at our good, and “truth” in respect of fulfilling his promises and faithful carriage to us; therefore whatsoever befalls thee, though it be clean contrary to thy expectation, interpret it in love. Many actions of men are such as a good interpretation cannot be put upon them, nor a good construction made of them; therefore interpreters restrain those sayings of love, that it believes all, etc.; that is, credibilia, all things believable, otherwise to put all upon charity, will eat out charity. But none of God’s ways are such, but love and faith may pick a good meaning out of these. A bono Deo nil nisi bonum, from a good God there comes nothing but what is good; and therefore says Job, “Though he kill me, I will trust in him.” Endeavour to spy out some end of his for good at the present, and if none ariseth to thy conjecture, resolve it into faith, and make the best of it.—Thomas Goodwin.

Verse 10.—“Unto such as keep,” etc.: he is never out of the road of mercy unto them.—Thomas Goodwin.

Verse 11.—“For thy name’s sake, O Lord, pardon mine iniquity; for it is great.” I cannot do better than quote one of those beautiful passages of the great Vieyra, which gave him the character of the first preacher of his age:—“I confess, my God, that it is so; that we are all sinners in the highest degree.” He is preaching on a fast on occasion of the threatened destruction of the Portuguese dominion in Brazil by the Dutch. “But so far am I from considering this any reason why I should cease from my petition, that I behold in it a new and convincing argument which may influence thy goodness. All that I have said before is based on no other foundation than the glory and honour of thy most holy Name. Propter nomen tuum. And what motive can I offer more glorious to that same Name, than that our sins are many and great? For thy name’s sake, O Lord, be merciful unto my sin, for it is great. I ask thee, saith David, to pardon, not every-day sins, but numerous sins, but great sins: multum est enim. O motive worthy of the breast of God! Oh, consequence which can have force only when it bears on supreme goodness! So that in order to obtain remission of his sins, the sinner alleges to God that they are many and great. Verily so; and that not for love of the sinner nor for the love of sin, but for the love of the honour and glory of God; which glory, by how much the sins he forgives are greater and more numerous, by so much the more ennobles and exalts itself. The same David distinguishes in the mercy of God greatness and multitude: greatness, secundum magnam misericordiam tuam; multitude, et secundum multitudinem miserationum tuarum. And as the greatness of the divine mercy is immense, and the multitude of his lovingkindnesses infinite; and forasmuch as the immense cannot be measured, nor the infinite counted, in order that the one and the other may in a certain manner have a proportionate material of glory, it is necessary to the very greatness of mercy that the sins to be pardoned should be great and necessary to the very multitude of lovingkindnesses that they should be many. Multum est enim. Reason have I then, O Lord, not to be dismayed because our sins are many and great. Reason have I also to demand the reason from thee, why thou dost not make haste to pardon them?”—Vieyra, quoted by J. M. Neale.