HOMILIES BY VARIOUS AUTHORS. Vere. 1-28.-Light arising in darkness. The authorship and therefore the date of this psalm cannot be certainly fixed, or whether it be a national or an individual utterance; probably it is the latter, The alternations of thought and feeling are very noteworthy. We have- I. EARNEST PRAYER. (Vers. 1, 2.) There is an ascending scale, reaching to a climax. 1. That the Lord would hear. "Hear, 0 Lord." 2. For close access. "Let my cry come unto thee." Do not hear me from afar, but come near to me. 3. For gracious hearing.· " Hide not thy face," etc.; when I see thee, let not thy face be averted, but graciously turned to me, 4. For attentive hearing. "Incline thine ear; " as one anxious to bear bends down bis ear, that he may more easily hear what is said. 5. For prompt reply. "Answer me speedily;" let there be no long delay. It is a. blessed thing when our troubles and distresses lead us to God in prayer, and in prayer thus earnest and believing. II. SAD OOMPLAINT, There are nine verses of this (vers. 3-11). They tell of: 1. The swift approach of death. (Ver. 3.) As fuel in fierce heat and flame is swifLly consumed, so is it with his life. 2. Of his bitter sorrow. (Ver. 4.) Ail its strength and joy smitten, as is the grass with the sun-stroke, so that he cares not to live, forgets to eat bread. 3. His wasted form. He is worn as a skeletoo, his bones cleave to his flesh. 4. His utter lonelines.~. (Ver. 6.) As the cormorant of the wilderness (Zepb. ii. 14; Isa. xxxiv.11), and as the owl. The owl is called in Arabic," mother of the ruins." 5. His C'tuel enemies. (Ver. 8.) These, when they curse, point to him as an example of misery-; when they would imprecate vengeance on any, they ask that those whom they curse may bo wretched as the psalmist. 6. His abiding and unrelieved sorrow. (Ver. 9.) It mingles with all his food. 7. The cause of it. The Divine displeasur~. "God's wrath has seized and hurled him aloft, only to cast him, as worthless, away " (cf. Isa, xxii. 18). 8. The result of it all. D~ath is close at hand. Not improbably some exile dying far away in Babylon poured forth this bitter complaint. As th<J groans of a sick man are a relief, so is the outpouring of our trouble to God a relief to the burdened heart. It is ever well so to do. But now, out of these depths comes- 111. DIVINE COMFORT. There are eleven verses of this (vers. 12-22). And thi~ comfort is drawn: 1. From the remembrance of the eternal God. (Ver. 12.) God does not die, though man does; God Ii ves to carry on his work when men pass away. 2. The conviction that Zion's redemption is at hand. (Ver. 13.) He gathers this from the fact that the minds of the pe<1ple of God were turned to the fallen Jerusalem ( cf. N eh. i.-iL 3). There were probably many conferences and much interest and pr-,1,yer in regard to Zion (ver. 14); and the psalmist recognizes in all this one of the evidences that God's set tim•3 to be gracious to Zion has come. 3. The anticipation of the blessed results that shall} ,llow on Zion's restoration. (Vers. 15, 16.) This is ever the harbinger of the world's conversion. 4. His grateful sense of the exceeding goodness of God which is to be made manifest (vers. 17-22). He thinks of the destitute, of the prisoner groaning in his misery, of those appointed unto death, and of the blessed help and deliverance t.hat shall come to them all, and his heart leaps up in praise. But next we see- IV. SADNESS SEEKING TO COME DACK AGAIN, (Ver. 23.) As is the way of sadness, 316 THE DOOlt OF PSALMS. [re. on. 1-26.
it haunts the soul, and, though banished a.while, it will return. It was so with the psalmist. The remembrance of his own sore trouble com11s over him e.ge.in, and he bursts out in this piteous lament, "He weakened my strength in the we.y," etc., and he cries, "0 my God, take me not away," etc. But God does not lee.ve him; such boll' troubled souls never are left. We next see- '(r, SAD1''ESS AGAIN DRIVEN AWAY. (Vers. 25-28.) His trust is restored; for: 1. He re11Ulmbers the eternal God. This had been his comfort before (vers. 1, 2); and now it comes to his help once more. "Thou art the same, e.nd thy yenrs," etc. (ver. 27). And then he thinks of: 2. Hu children. They shall be established before God (ver. 28), And so the light again ariseth in the darkness.-8. C. Ver. 7.-" .As a sparrow alone." A sad, a not unseldom, e.nd often e. salutary, con- dition this. For the soul, when thus left alone of men, retreats into the sure sweet shelter of the love of God. We are apt to think we can do very well without that when the smiles and favour of our fellow-men rest upon us. But unquestionably it is e. sad and painful condition, however it may be caused. I. So, OFTEN, THE SOUL SEEMS TO BE. The world says it: 11 God bath forsaken him; persecute him and take him." And the soul itself says the same: "Why art thou so far from me, 0 God?" It is a freq nent complaint. Even our Lord knew this distress. " My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" But he was then, and all God's children were and are wrong; for God never forsakes his people (John xvi. 31, 32). They may think be does. II. So, AT TIMES, IT WILL BE. But this is in regard to the world. The soul must 11 come out, and be separate" (2 Cor. vi. 17 ; of. homily on J er. xii. 9, 11 The speckled bird," p. 325, vol. i). lll. So EVER IT MUST BE IN REGARD TO GoD IN THE WORLD. There can be no compromise.-S. C.