dealt bountifully with us.
EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS
Verse 1. "How long wilt thou forget me, O Lord?" etc.
The departures of God from true believers are never final; they may
be tedious, but they are temporary. As the evil spirit is said to
depart from Christ for a season (Luke 4:13; though he quitted that
temptation, he did not quit his design, so as to tempt no more), so
the good Spirit withdraws from those that are Christ's, for a season
only, 'tis with a purpose of coming again. When he hath most
evidently forsaken, 'tis as unquestionable that sooner or later he
will return; and the happiness of his return will richly recompense
for the sadness of his desertion; Isaiah 54:7, "For a small moment
have I forsaken thee; but with great mercies will I gather thee;"
here is not only a gathering after a forsaking, but "great
mercies" to make amends for "a small moment." He who
hath
engaged to be our God for ever, cannot depart for ever. Timothy
Cruso, 1696.
Verse 1. "How long wilt thou forget me, O Lord?"
Whatever be the pressing need of Christ's followers in troubles, and
their constant cleaving to duty for all that; and whatever be
Christ's purpose of love toward them, yet he seeth it fit ofttimes
not to come to them at first, but will let the trial go on till it
come to a height, and be a trial indeed, and put them seriously to
it; for before he came he lets them row "about five and twenty or
thirty furlongs" (the last of which make near four miles, eight
furlongs going to a mile); and (Mark 6:48) he came not till the
fourth watch of the night, which is the morning watch. We are indeed
very sparing of ourselves in trouble, and do soon begin to think that
we are low and tried enough, and therefore would be delivered; but
our wise Lord seeth that we need more. George Hutcheson,
1657.
Verse 1. "How long," etc. Enquire into the causes of
God's anger. He is never angry but when there is very great reason,
when we force him to be so. What is that accursed thing in our
hearts, or in our lives, for which God hides his face, and frowns
upon us? What particular disobedience to his commands is it for which
he has taken up the rod? Job 10:2; "I will say unto God, Do not
condemn me; shew me wherefore thou contendest with me;" as if he
should say, Lord, my troubles and my sorrows are very well known. . .
. . . We must not cease to be solicitous to know what are the
particular sins that have made him to tear us up by the roots, to
throw us down as with a whirlwind; what is it that has made him so
long angry with us, and so long to delay his help, that if any evil
be undiscovered in our souls, we may lament it with a seasonable
grief, and get a pardon for it. It is not the common course of God's
providence to cover his servants with so thick a darkness as this is,
which our troubled souls labour under in the day, or rather in the
night of his displeasure; and, therefore, we may with humility desire
to know why he proceeds with us in a way that is so singular; for it
is some way delightful to the understanding to pierce into the
reasons and causes of things. Timothy Rogers.
Verse 1. "How long wilt thou forget me," etc. For God
to forget David, not to mind him, or look after him, is much!
If his eye be never so little once off us, the spiritual adversary is
ready presently to seize on us, as the kite on the chick if the hen
look not carefully after it. . . . . . As a father will sometimes
cross his son to try the child's disposition, to see how he will take
it, whether he will mutter and grumble at it, and grow humorous and
wayward, neglect his duty to his father because his father seemeth to
neglect him, or make offer to run away and withdraw himself from his
father's obedience because he seemeth to carry himself harshly and
roughly toward him, and to provoke him thereunto; so doth God
likewise ofttimes cross his children and seemeth to neglect them, so
to try their disposition, what metal they are made of, how they stand
affected towards him: whether they will neglect God because God
seemeth to neglect them, forbear to serve him because he seemeth to
forget them, cease to depend upon him because he seemeth not to look
after them, to provide for them, or to protect them. Like Joram's
prophane pursuivant, "This evil," saith he, "is of the Lord; what
should I wait for the Lord any longer?" Or whether they will
constantly cleave to him, though he seem not to regard them, nor to
have any care of them; and say with Isaiah, "Yet will I wait upon
God, though he have hid his face from us, and I will look for him
though he look not on us;" for, "They are blessed that wait on him;
and he will not fail in due time to show mercy unto all them that do
so constantly wait on him." Isaiah 8:17; 30:18. As Samuel dealt with
Saul; he kept away till the last hour, to see what Saul would do when
Samuel seemed not to keep touch with him. So doth God with his
saints, and with those that be in league with him; he withdraweth
himself oft, and keeps aloof off for a long time together to try what
they will do, and what courses they will take when God seemeth to
break with them and to leave them in the suds, as we say; amidst many
difficulties much perplexed, as it was with David at this time.
Thomas Gataker, 1637.
Verse 1.
1. For desertions. I think them like
lying fallow of lean and weak land for some years, while it gathers
sap for a better crop. It is possible to gather gold, where it may be
had, with moonlight. Oh, if I could but creep one foot, or half a
foot, nearer in to Jesus, in such dismal night as that when he is
away, I should think it a happy absence!
2. If I knew that the Beloved were only
gone away for trial, and further humiliation, and not smoked out of
the house with new provocations, I would forgive desertions and hold
my peace at his absence. But Christ's bought absence (that I bought
with my sin), is two running boils at once, one upon each side; and
what side then can I lie on?
3. I know that, as night and shadows are
good for flowers, and moonlight and dews are better than a continual
sun, so is Christ's absence of special use, and that it hath some
nourishing virtue in it, and giveth sap to humility, and putteth an
edge on hunger, and furnisheth a fair field to faith to put forth
itself, and to exercise its fingers in gripping it seeth not what.
Samuel Rutherford, 1600-1661.
Verses 1, 2. That which the French proverb hath of sickness is
true of all evils, that they come on horseback and go away on foot;
we have often seen that a sudden fall, or one meal's surfeit, has
stuck by many to their graves; whereas pleasures come like oxen, slow
and heavily, and go away like post-horses, upon the spur. Sorrows,
because they are lingering guests, I will entertain but moderately,
knowing that the more they are made of the longer they will continue:
and for pleasures, because they stay not, and do but call to drink at
my door, I will use them as passengers with slight respect. He is his
own best friend that makes the least of both of them. Joseph
Hall.
Verses 1, 2. "HOW LONG wilt thou forget me? HOW
LONG
wilt thou hide thy face from me? HOW LONG shall I take
counsel in my soul?" The intenseness of the affliction renders it
trying to our fortitude; but it is by the continuance of it that
patience is put to the test. It is not under the sharpest, but the
longest trials, that we are most in danger of fainting. In the first
case, the soul collects all its strength, and feels in earnest to
call in help from above; but, in the last, the mind relaxes, and
sinks into despondency. When Job was accosted with evil tidings in
quick succession, he bore it with becoming fortitude; but when he
could see no end to his troubles, he sunk under them. Andrew
Fuller.
Verse 1-4. Everything is strangely changed; all its
comeliness, and beauty, and glory, vanishes when the life is
gone: life is the pleasant thing; 'tis sweet and comfortable; but
death with its pale attendants, raises a horror and aversion to it
everywhere. The saints of God dread the removal of his favour, and
the hiding of his face; and when it is hid, a faintness, and a cold
amazement and fear seizes upon every part, and they feel strange
bitterness, and anguish, and tribulation, which makes their joints to
tremble, and is to them as the very pangs of death. Timothy
Rogers.
Verses 1, 5, 6. Prayer helps towards the increase and growth
of grace, by drawing the habits of grace into exercise. Now, as
exercise brings benefit to the body, so does prayer to the soul.
Exercise doth help to digest or breathe forth those humours that clog
the spirits. One that stirs little we see grow pursy, and is soon
choked up with phlegm, which exercise clearly clears the body of.
Prayer is the saint's exercise-field, where his graces are breathed;
it is as the wind to the air, it brightens the soul; as bellows to
the fire, which clears the coal of those ashes that smother them. The
Christian, while in this world, lives in an unwholesome climate; one
while, the delights of it deaden and dull his love to Christ; another
while, the trouble he meets in it damps his faith on the promise. How
now should the Christian get out of these distempers, had he not a
throne of grace to resort to, where, if once his soul be in a melting
frame, he (like one laid in a kindly sweat), soon breathes out the
malignity of his disease, and comes into his right temper again? How
often do we find the holy prophet, when he first kneels down to pray,
full of fears and doubts, who, before he end the duty part, grows
into a sweet familiarity with God, and repose in his own spirit!
(Psalm 13:1), he begins his prayer as if he thought God would never
give him a kind look more: "How long wilt thou forget me, O Lord?
for ever?" But by that time he had exercised himself a little in
duty, his distemper wears off, the mists scatter, and his faith
breaks out as the sun in its strength, verses 5, 6: "I have
trusted in thy mercy; my heart shall rejoice in thy salvation. I will
sing unto the Lord." Thus his faith lays the cloth, expecting a
feast ere long to be set on: he that now questioned whether he should
ever hear good news from heaven, is so strong in faith as to make
himself merry with the hopes of that mercy which he is assured will
come at last. Abraham began with fifty, but his faith got ground on
God every step, till he brought down the price of their lives to ten.
William Gurnall.
Verses 1, 6. Whatever discouragements thou meetest with in
thine attendance on God in ordinances, be like the English jet, fired
by water, and not like our ordinary fires, quenched by it; let them
add to, not diminish, thy resolution and courage; let not one repulse
beat thee off; be violent, give a second storm to the kingdom of
heaven. Parents sometimes hide themselves to make their children
continue seeking. He that would not at first open his mouth, nor
vouchsafe the woman of Canaan a word, doth, upon her continued and
fervent petition, at last open his hand and give her whatsoever she