Ps. lxxxvi. 11. Teach vie thy way, 0 Lord! I will walk in thy truth : unite my heart to fear thy name.
IN mercy, no less than in judgment, does God see fit to afflict his people : he does it " for their profit, that they may in a more abundant measure be par- takers of his holiness3." And when we are brought nigh to him by means of our afflictions, then have they answered the great end for which they were sent.
David was a man who enjoyed much communion with God ; and probably it was to the extraordinary trials with which, for many years, he was visited, that he was indebted, under God, for that sublime
a Heb. xii. 10.
piety which shone so conspicuously in him. In the psalm before us, he pours out his soul before God under some great and heavy affliction, probably under the persecutions of Saul : but it had produced the most beneficial effect upon his mind ; seeing that it stirred up within him more ardent desires after God, and determined him, through grace, to walk more diligently in the ways of God : " Teach me thy way, O Lord ! I will walk in thy truth : unite my heart to fear thy name."
In these words we see the two great requisites for an acceptable walk with God ; which are,
I. An illumination of mind, that we may know His ways —
[We know nothing of God or his ways, any farther than
he has seen fit to reveal himself to us (How little our
unassisted reason can teach us, has abundantly appeared in all the philosophers of Greece and Rome.) Least of all can we know any thing of the way which he has appointed for our reconciliation with him through the blood of his Son : respect- ing that no finite intelligence could have formed any con- ception, if it had no^ been made known to us by a special
communication from heaven But we need also, yet
further, a special revelation of it to our own souls. The mere report, as contained in the written word, is not of itself suffi- cient to bring us to a saving knowledge of these sublime truths : Christ must be revealed in us b, as well as to us, or we shall never " know him as we ought." These great things are, in- deed, " freely given to us of God :" yet must we " receive the Spirit of God, in order that we may know them " aright c : He must, as "a Spirit of wisdom and revelation," open the eyes of our understanding, before we can comprehend d this great mystery, so as really to acquiesce in it, and cordially to come
to Christ as "the way, the truth, and the lifee" If the
Apostles themselves, after above three years' attendance on the public and private instructions of our Lord, yet needed to have " their understandings opened, in order that they might understand the Scriptures f," there can be no doubt but that the same is necessary for us all ; and that we all need to cry with David, " Open thou mine eyes, that I may see wondrous things out of thy law g ;" or, as he speaks more fully in another psalm, " Shew me thy ways, O Lord ; teach me thy paths ;
b Gal. i. 16. c 1 Cor. ii. 12. d Eph. i. 17, 18.
e John xiv. G. f Luke xxiv. 45. s Ps. cxix. 18.