But it may be that our souls are in a pardoned state ; and that God has " taken a live coal from off the altar, and applied it to our lips, saying, Thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin is purged e." If so, what acknowledgments should we make? Verily there can be no circumstances whatever in which such persons should not bless God from their very inmost soulsf.]
2. His eyes from tears —
[David often found occasion to weep, either on his own account or on account of others g. Indeed his whole life was tempestuous and full of trouble. What the particular affliction was from which he had now been delivered, we do not exactly know. If it was sickness and death, his tears must have pro- ceeded, as Hezekiah's did, from an apprehension of the dis- traction and misery that were likely to ensue to the whole state by his removal from it at that timeh. But whatever it was, his mind was now at ease in relation to it.
And are ive at this time free from any great affliction? Surely we have reason to be thankful for it : for, how number- less are the sources of grief from whence our whole souls may speedily be overwhelmed ! In our own persons we are exposed to diseases and accidents every moment. In our relative con- nexions too, how many occasions of sorrow are ever ready to arise ! the misconduct of one, the unkindness of another, the misfortunes of a third, the death of one that was to us as our own souls, — alas ! alas ! it is a vale of tears that we are passing- through, moaning or bemoaned every hour. Our very pleasures not unfrequently become occasions of the bitterest pains. If then we have been kept for any time in a good measure of peaceful serenity, we may well account it a rich blessing, for which we are bound to adore and magnify our God. It is not from the dust that either our trials or our comforts spring : and, if God have dealt to us an abundance of earthly comfort, whilst so many thousands of our fellow-creatures are racked with pain, or bowed down with sorrows, we ought to acknowledge him as the author and giver of these distinguished privileges.]
3. His feet from falling —
[On more than one occasion, David's " feet had well nigh slipped." When urged to kill Saul, and when hastening to avenge himself on Nabal, he was on the brink of a dangerous precipice, from whence however it pleased God to deliver him.
e Isai. vi. 6, 7.
f 1 Pet. i. 3, 4. N. B. This is the very commencement of an Epistle written to " Strangers who were scattered all the world over by cruel persecutions."
8 Ps. xlh. 3. 2 Sam. xhi. o<5. and xv. 30. and xviii. 33.
h Isai. xxxviii. 9 — 14.