Rest in Yahweh, and wait patiently for him. Don’t fret because of him who prospers in his way, because of the man who makes wicked plots happen.
Parallel Translations
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Rest in Yahweh, and wait patiently for him. Don’t fret because of him who prospers in his way, because of the man who makes wicked plots happen.
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Rest in the LORD, and wait patiently for him: fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in his way, because of the man who bringeth wicked devices to pass.
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Resign thyself unto the LORD, and wait patiently for Him; fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in his way, because of the man who bringeth wicked devices to pass.
Cross-references (22)
Passages linked to Psalms 37:7 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Psalms 27:14 Wait for Yahweh. Be strong, and let your heart take courage. Yes, wait for Yahweh.
- James 5:7-11 Be patient therefore, brothers, until the coming of the Lord. Behold, the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient over it, until it receives the early and late rain. You also be patient. Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand. Don’t grumble, brothers, against one another, so that you won’t be judged. Behold, the judge stands at the door. Take, brothers, for an example of suffering and of perseverance, the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. Behold, we call them blessed who endured. You have heard of the perseverance of Job, and have seen the Lord in the outcome, and how the Lord is full of compassion and mercy.
- Psalms 62:5 My soul, wait in silence for God alone, for my expectation is from him.
- Hebrews 10:36-37 For you need endurance so that, having done the will of God, you may receive the promise. “In a very little while, he who comes will come, and will not wait.
- Lamentations 3:25-26 Yahweh is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him. It is good that a man should hope and quietly wait for the salvation of Yahweh.
- Proverbs 20:22 Don’t say, “I will pay back evil.” Wait for Yahweh, and he will save you.
- Habakkuk 2:3 For the vision is yet for the appointed time, and it hurries toward the end, and won’t prove false. Though it takes time, wait for it; because it will surely come. It won’t delay.
- Jeremiah 12:1 You are righteous, Yahweh, when I contend with you; yet I would like to reason the cause with you. Why does the way of the wicked prosper? Why are they all at ease who deal very treacherously?
- Psalms 40:1 I waited patiently for Yahweh. He turned to me, and heard my cry.
- Isaiah 30:15 For thus said the Lord Yahweh, the Holy One of Israel, “You will be saved in returning and rest. Your strength will be in quietness and in confidence.” You refused,
- Psalms 62:1 My soul rests in God alone. My salvation is from him.
- Galatians 6:9 Let’s not be weary in doing good, for we will reap in due season, if we don’t give up.
- Isaiah 8:17 I will wait for Yahweh, who hides his face from the house of Jacob, and I will look for him.
- Joshua 10:12 Then Joshua spoke to Yahweh in the day when Yahweh delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel. He said in the sight of Israel, “Sun, stand still on Gibeon! You, moon, stop in the valley of Aijalon!”
- Ecclesiastes 5:8 If you see the oppression of the poor, and the violent taking away of justice and righteousness in a district, don’t marvel at the matter, for one official is eyed by a higher one, and there are officials over them.
- Isaiah 10:13-14 For he has said, “By the strength of my hand I have done it, and by my wisdom; for I have understanding. I have removed the boundaries of the peoples, and have robbed their treasures. Like a valiant man I have brought down their rulers. My hand has found the riches of the peoples like a nest, and like one gathers eggs that are abandoned, I have gathered all the earth. There was no one who moved their wing, or that opened their mouth, or chirped.”
- Daniel 11:36 “The king will do according to his will. He will exalt himself, and magnify himself above every god, and will speak marvelous things against the God of gods. He will prosper until the indignation is accomplished; for that which is determined will be done.
- Job 21:7-34 “Why do the wicked live, become old, yes, and grow mighty in power? Their child is established with them in their sight, their offspring before their eyes. Their houses are safe from fear, neither is the rod of God upon them. Their bulls breed without fail. Their cows calve, and don’t miscarry. They send out their little ones like a flock. Their children dance. They sing to the tambourine and harp, and rejoice at the sound of the pipe. They spend their days in prosperity. In an instant they go down to Sheol. They tell God, ‘Depart from us, for we don’t want to know about your ways. What is the Almighty, that we should serve him? What profit should we have, if we pray to him?’ Behold, their prosperity is not in their hand. The counsel of the wicked is far from me. “How often is it that the lamp of the wicked is put out, that their calamity comes on them, that God distributes sorrows in his anger? How often is it that they are as stubble before the wind, as chaff that the storm carries away? You say, ‘God lays up his iniquity for his children.’ Let him recompense it to himself, that he may know it. Let his own eyes see his destruction. Let him drink of the wrath of the Almighty. For what does he care for his house after him, when the number of his months is cut off? “Shall any teach God knowledge, since he judges those who are high? One dies in his full strength, being wholly at ease and quiet. His pails are full of milk. The marrow of his bones is moistened. Another dies in bitterness of soul, and never tastes of good. They lie down alike in the dust. The worm covers them. “Behold, I know your thoughts, the plans with which you would wrong me. For you say, ‘Where is the house of the prince? Where is the tent in which the wicked lived?’ Haven’t you asked wayfaring men? Don’t you know their evidences, that the evil man is reserved to the day of calamity, That they are led out to the day of wrath? Who will declare his way to his face? Who will repay him what he has done? Yet he will be borne to the grave. Men will keep watch over the tomb. The clods of the valley will be sweet to him. All men will draw after him, as there were innumerable before him. So how can you comfort me with nonsense, because in your answers there remains only falsehood?”
- Psalms 50:8 I don’t rebuke you for your sacrifices. Your burnt offerings are continually before me.
- Jonah 1:11 Then they said to him, “What shall we do to you, that the sea may be calm to us?” For the sea grew more and more stormy.
- Revelation 13:3-10 One of his heads looked like it had been wounded fatally. His fatal wound was healed, and the whole earth marveled at the beast. They worshiped the dragon, because he gave his authority to the beast, and they worshiped the beast, saying, “Who is like the beast? Who is able to make war with him?” A mouth speaking great things and blasphemy was given to him. Authority to make war for forty-two months was given to him. He opened his mouth for blasphemy against God, to blaspheme his name, and his dwelling, those who dwell in heaven. It was given to him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them. Authority over every tribe, people, language, and nation was given to him. All who dwell on the earth will worship him, everyone whose name has not been written from the foundation of the world in the book of life of the Lamb who has been killed. If anyone has an ear, let him hear. If anyone is to go into captivity, he will go into captivity. If anyone is to be killed with the sword, he must be killed. Here is the endurance and the faith of the saints.
- Psalms 73:3-14 For I was envious of the arrogant, when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. For there are no struggles in their death, but their strength is firm. They are free from burdens of men, neither are they plagued like other men. Therefore pride is like a chain around their neck. Violence covers them like a garment. Their eyes bulge with fat. Their minds pass the limits of conceit. They scoff and speak with malice. In arrogance, they threaten oppression. They have set their mouth in the heavens. Their tongue walks through the earth. Therefore their people return to them, and they drink up waters of abundance. They say, “How does God know? Is there knowledge in the Most High?” Behold, these are the wicked. Being always at ease, they increase in riches. Surely I have cleansed my heart in vain, and washed my hands in innocence, For all day long I have been plagued, and punished every morning.
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
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John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain 7. Be silent to Jehovah. The Psalmist continues the…
7. Be silent to Jehovah. The Psalmist continues the illustration of the same doctrine, namely, that we should patiently and meekly bear those things that usually disquiet our minds; for amid innumerable sources of disquietude and conflict there is need of no small patience. By the similitude of silence, which often occurs in the sacred writings, he declares most aptly the nature of faith; for as our affections rise in rebellion against the will of God, so faith, restoring us to a state of humble and peaceful submission, appeases all the tumults of our hearts. By this expression, therefore, David commands us not to yield to the tumultuous passions of the soul, as the unbelieving do, nor fretfully to set ourselves in opposition to the authority of God, but rather to submit peacefully to him, that he may execute his work in silence. Moreover, as the Hebrew word חול, chul, which we have rendered to wait, sometimes signifies to mourn, and sometimes to wait, the word התחולל, hithcholel, in this place is understood by some as meaning to mourn moderately, or to bear sorrow patiently. It might also be rendered more simply to mourn before God, in order that he might be a witness of all our sorrows; for when the unbelieving give way to doubt and suspense, they rather murmur against him than utter their complaints before him. As, however, the other interpretation is more generally received, namely, that David is exhorting us to hope and patience, I adhere to it. The prophet Isaiah also connects hope with silence in the same sense, (Isaiah 30:15.)
David next repeats what he had said in the first verse, Fret not because of the man who prospereth in his way, or who brings his ways to a happy issue; nor against the man who behaveth himself wickedly, or who accomplishes his devices Of these two interpretations of this last clause, the latter is more in accordance with the scope of the psalm. I confess, indeed, that the word מזמות mezimmoth, is commonly taken in a bad sense for fraud and stratagem. But as זמם zamam, sometimes signifies in general to meditate, the nature of the Hebrew language will bear this meaning, that to execute his devices is of the same import as to effect what he has purposed. Now we see that these two things are connected, namely to dispose his ways according to his desires, or to prosper in his way, and to accomplish his devices It is a very great temptation to us and difficult to bear, when we see fortune smiling upon the ungodly, as if God approved of their wickedness; nay, it excites our wrath and indignation. David, therefore, not contented with a short admonition, insists at some length upon this point.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain When God suffereth the wicked to prosper, it seemeth…
When God suffereth the wicked to prosper, it seemeth to the flesh that he favoreth their doings, Job 21:7 etc.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Psa 37:7 Rest in the LORD, and wait patiently…
Psa 37:7 Rest in the LORD, and wait patiently for him: fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in his way, because of the man who bringeth wicked devices to pass.
Ver. 7. Rest in the Lord] Heb. Be silent to the Lord; Digito compesce labellum, lay thine hand upon thy mouth when chafing ripe, when ready to let fly at those that wrong thee. The more silent the patient is the more shrill the wrong will be; as, Num 12:2, while Moses is dumb, God speaks; deaf, God hears and stirs; the less he said and did the more God struck in for him: and the less any man striveth for himself the more is God his champion; so he do it to the Lord, that is, in obedience to him, and not for a name, as some heathens did.
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And wait patiently for him] Or, put thyself to pain for him; that is, though it go against the hair with thee, and thou find it hard to suffer evil, and to wait patiently for better, yet do it for his sake, and therein thou shalt do thyself no disservice at all.
Who bringeth wicked devices to pass] And pleaseth himself in them, because for present he prospereth; as Dionysius did in his sacrilege, because no harm to him followed upon it. Saeculi laetitia est impunita nequitia, saith Austin.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain Rest in the Lord, Heb. Be silent unto, or…
Rest in the Lord, Heb. Be silent unto, or for, or because of the Lord, i.e. do not murmur nor repine at his dealings, but silently and quietly submit to his will, and adore his judgments, and, as it follows, wait for his help. This advice and command is pressed again and again, to teach us how hard it is to learn and practise this lesson.
In his way, i.e. in his evil way, as it is limited in the following words.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain In these verses we have,
In these verses we have,
I. The foregoing precepts inculcated; for we are so apt to disquiet ourselves with needless fruitless discontents and distrusts that it is necessary there should be precept upon precept, and line upon line, to suppress them and arm us against them. 1. Let us compose ourselves by believing in God: "Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for him (Psa 37:7), that is, be well reconciled to all he does and acquiesce in it, for that is best that is, because it is what God has appointed; and be well satisfied that he will still make all to work for good to us, though we know not how or which way." Be silent to the Lord (so the word is), not with a sullen, but a submissive silence. A patient bearing of what is laid upon us, with a patient expectation of what is further appointed for us, is as much our interest as it is our duty, for it will make us always easy; and there is a great deal of reason for it, for it is making a virtue of necessity. 2. Let us not discompose ourselves at what we see in this world: "Fret not thyself because of him who prospers in his wicked way, who, though he is a bad man, yet thrives and grows rich and great in the world; no, nor because of him who does mischief with his power and wealth, and brings wicked devices to pass against those that are virtuous and good, who seems to have gained his point and to have run them down. If thy heart begins to rise at it, stroke down thy folly, and cease from anger (Psa 37:8), check the first stirrings of discontent and envy, and do not harbour any hard thoughts of God and his providence upon this account. Be not angry at any thing that God does, but forsake that wrath; it is the worst kind of wrath that can be. Fret not thyself in any wise to do evil; do not envy them their prosperity, lest thou be tempted to fall in with them and to take the same evil course that they take to enrich and advance themselves or some desperate course to avoid them and their power." Note, A fretful discontented spirit lies open to many temptations; and those that indulge it are in danger of doing evil.
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II. The foregoing reasons, taken from the approaching ruin of the wicked notwithstanding their prosperity, and the real happiness of the righteous notwithstanding their troubles, are here much enlarged upon and the same things repeated in a pleasing variety of expression. We were cautioned (Psa 37:7) not to envy the wicked either worldly prosperity or the success of their plots against the righteous, and the reasons here given respect these two temptations severally: -
1. Good people have no reason to envy the worldly prosperity of wicked people, nor to grieve or be uneasy at it, (1.) Because the prosperity of the wicked will soon be at an end (Psa 37:9): Evil-doers shall be cut off by some sudden stroke of divine justice in the midst of their prosperity; what they have got by sin will not only flow away from them (Job 20:28), but they shall be carried away with it. See the end of these men (Psa 73:17), how dear their ill-got gain will cost them, and you will be far from envying them or from being willing to espouse their lot, for better, for worse. Their ruin is sure, and it is very near (Psa 37:10): Yet a little while, and the wicked shall not be what they now are; they are brought into desolation in a moment, Psa 73:19. Have a little patience, for the Judge stands before the door, Jam 5:8, Jam 5:9. Moderate your passion, for the Lord is at hand, Phi 4:5. And when their ruin comes it will be an utter ruin; he and his shall be extirpated; the day that comes shall leave him neither root nor branch (Mal 4:1): Thou shalt diligently consider his place, where but the other day he made a mighty figure, but it shall not be, you will not find it; he shall leave nothing valuable, nothing honourable, behind. him. To the same purport (Psa 37:20), The wicked shall perish; their death is their perdition, because it is the termination of all their joy and a passage to endless misery. Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord; but undone, for ever undone, are the dead that die in their sins. The wicked are the enemies of the Lord; such those make themselves who will not have him to reign over them, and as such he will reckon with them: They shall consume as the fat of lambs, they shall consume into smoke. Their prosperity, which gratifies their sensuality, is like the fat of lambs, not solid or substantial, but loose and washy; and, when their ruin comes, they shall fall as sacrifices to the justice of God and be consumed as the fat of the sacrifices was upon the altar, whence it ascended in smoke. The day of God's vengeance on the wicked is represented as a sacrifice of the fat of the kidneys of rams (Isa 34:6); for he will be honoured by the ruin of his enemies, as he was by the sacrifices. Damned sinners are sacrifices, Mar 9:49. This is a good reason why we should not envy them their prosperity; while they are fed to the full, they are but in the fattening for the day of sacrifice, like a lamb in a large place (Hos 4:16), and the more they prosper the more will God be glorified in their ruin. (2.) Because the condition of the righteous, even in this life, is every way better and more desirable than that of the wicked, Psa 37:16. In general, a little that a righteous man has of the honour, wealth, and pleasure of this world, is better than the riches of many wicked. Observe, [1.] The wealth of the world is so dispensed by the divine Providence that it is often the lot of good people to have but a little of it, and of wicked people to have abundance of it; for thus God would show us that the things of this world are not the best things, for, if they were, those would have most that are best and dearest to God. [2.] That a godly man's little is really better than a wicked man's estate, though ever so much; for it comes from a better hand, from a hand of special love and not merely from a hand of common providence, - it is enjoyed by a better title (God gives it to them by promise, Gal 3:18), - it is theirs by virtue of their relation to Christ, who is the heir of all things, - and it is put to better use; it is sanctified to them by the blessing of God. Unto the pure all things are pure, Tit 1:15. A little wherewith God is served and honoured is better than a great deal prepared for Baal or for a base lust. The promises here made to the righteous secure them such a happiness that they need not envy the prosperity of evil-doers. Let them know to their comfort, First, That they shall inherit the earth, as much of it as Infinite Wisdom sees good for them; they have the promise of the life that now is, Ti1 4:8. If all the earth were necessary to make them happy, they should have it. All is theirs, even the world, and things present, as well as things to come, Co1 3:21, Co1 3:22. They have it by inheritance, a safe and honourable title, not by permission only and connivance. When evil-doers are cut off the righteous sometimes inherit what they gathered. The wealth of the sinner is laid up for the just, Job 27:17; Pro 13:22. This promise is here made, 1. To those that live a life of faith (Psa 37:9); Those that wait upon the Lord, as dependents on him, expectants from him, and suppliants to him, shall inherit the earth, as a token of his present favour to them and an earnest of better things intended for them in the other world. God is a good Master, that provides plentifully and well, not only for his working servants, but for his waiting servants. 2. To those that live a quiet and peaceable life (Psa 37:11): The meek shall inherit the earth. They are in least danger of being injured and disturbed in the possession of what they have and they have most satisfaction in themselves and consequently the sweetest relish of their creature-comforts. Our Saviour has made this a gospel promise, and a confirmation of the blessings he pronounced on the meek, Mat 5:5. Secondly, That they shall delight themselves in the abundance of peace, Psa 37:11. Perhaps they have not abundance of wealth to delight in; but they have that which is better, abundance of peace, inward peace and tranquility of mind, peace with God, and then peace in God, that great peace which those have that love God's law, whom nothing shall offend (Psa 119:165), that abundance of peace which is in the kingdom of Christ (Psa 72:7), that peace which the world cannot give (Joh 14:27), and which the wicked cannot have, Isa 57:21. This they shall delight themselves in, and in it they shall have a continual feast; while those that have abundance of wealth do but cumber and perplex themselves with it and have little delight in it. Thirdly, That God knows their days, Psa 37:18. He takes particular notice of them, of all they do and of all that happens to them. He keeps account of the days of their service, and not one day's work shall go unrewarded, and of the days of their suffering, that for those also they may receive a recompence. He knows their bright days, and has pleasure in their prosperity; he knows their cloudy and dark days, the days of their affliction, and as the day is so shall the strength be. Fourthly, That their inheritance shall be for ever; not their inheritance in the earth, but that incorruptible indefeasible one which is laid up for them in heaven. Those that are sure of an everlasting inheritance in the other world have no reason to envy the wicked their transitory possessions and pleasures in this world. Fifthly, That in the worst of times it shall go well with them (Psa 37:19): They shall not be ashamed of their hope and confidence in God, nor of the profession they have made of religion; for the comfort of that will stand them in stead, and be a real support to them, in evil times. When others droop they shall lift up their heads with joy and confidence: Even in the days of famine, when others are dying for hunger round about them, they shall be satisfied, as Elijah was; in some way or other God will provide food convenient for them, or give them hearts to be satisfied and content without it, so that, if they should be hardly bestead and hungry, they shall not (as the wicked do) fret themselves and curse their king and their God (Isa 7:21), but rejoice in God as the God of their salvation even when the fig-tree does not blossom, Hab 3:17, Hab 3:18.
2. Good people have no reason to fret at the occasional success of the designs of the wicked against the just. Though they do bring some of their wicked devices to pass, which makes us fear they will gain their point and bring them all to pass, yet let us cease from anger, and not fret ourselves so as to think of giving up the cause. For,
(1.) Their plots will be their shame, Psa 37:12, Psa 37:13. It is true the wicked plotteth against the just; there is a rooted enmity in the seed of the wicked one against the righteous seed; their aim is, if they can, to destroy their righteousness, or, if that fail, then to destroy them. With this end in view they have acted with a great deal both of cursed policy and contrivance (they plot, they practice, against the just), and of cursed zeal and fury - they gnash upon them with their teeth, so desirous are they, if they could get it into their power, to eat them up, and so full of rage and indignation are they because it is not in their power; but by all this they do but make themselves ridiculous. The Lord shall laugh at them, Psa 2:4, Psa 2:5. They are proud and insolent, but God shall pour contempt upon them. he is not only displeased with them, but he despises them and all their attempts as vain and ineffectual, and their malice as impotent and in a chain; for he sees that his day is coming, that is, [1.] The day of God's reckoning, the day of the revelation of his righteousness, which now seems clouded and eclipsed. Men have their day now. This is your hour, Luk 22:53. But God will have his day shortly, a day of recompences, a day which will set all to rights, and render that ridiculous which now passes for glorious. It is a small thing to be judged of man's judgment, Co1 4:3. God's day will give a decisive judgment. [2.] The day of their ruin. The wicked man's day, the day set for his fall, that day is coming, which denotes delay; it has not yet come, but certainly it will come. The believing prospect of that day will enable the virgin, the daughter of Zion, to despise the rage of her enemies and laugh them to scorn, Isa 37:22.
(2.) Their attempts will be their destruction, Psa 37:14, Psa 37:15. See here, [1.] How cruel they are in their designs against good people. They prepare instruments of death, the sword and the bow, no less will serve; they hunt for the precious life. That which they design is to cast down and slay; it is the blood of the saints they thirst after. They carry on the design very far, and it is near to be put in execution: They have drawn the sword, and bent the bow; and all these military preparations are made against the helpless, the poor and needy (which proves them to be very cowardly), and against the guiltless, such as are of upright conversation, that never gave them any provocation, nor offered injury to them or any other person, which proves them to be very wicked. Uprightness itself will be no fence against their malice. But, [2.] How justly their malice recoils upon themselves: Their sword shall turn into their own heart, which implies the preservation of the righteous from their malice and the filling up of the measure of their own iniquity by it. Sometimes that very thing proves to be their own destruction which they projected against their harmless neighbours; however, God's sword, which their provocations have drawn against them, will give them their death's wound.
(3.) Those that are not suddenly cut off shall yet be so disabled for doing any further mischief that the interests of the church shall be effectually secured: Their bows shall be broken (Psa 37:15); the instruments of their cruelty shall fail them and they shall lose those whom they had made tools of to serve their bloody purposes with; nay, their arms shall be broken, so that they shall not be able to go on with their enterprises, Psa 37:17. But the Lord upholds the righteous, so that they neither sink under the weight of their afflictions nor are crushed by the violence of their enemies. He upholds them both in their integrity and in their prosperity; and those that are so upheld by the rock of ages have no reason to envy the wicked the support of their broken reeds.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain Cease from anger,.... Either at these wicked men who…
Cease from anger,.... Either at these wicked men who are so prosperous, or at God, who for the present suffers it; see Jon 4:9, Pro 19:3;
and forsake wrath; which is anger wrought up to a greater degree; and the rather to be shunned and avoided, as being very disagreeable to the character of a good man;
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fret not thyself in any wise to do evil; evil may be done by fretting at the prosperity of wicked men, or by imitating them, doing as they do, in hope of being prosperous as they are; from which the psalmist dissuades by reasons following.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain Rest - Do not repine at his dealings, but…
Rest - Do not repine at his dealings, but quietly submit to his will, and wait for his help.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 7. Rest in the Lord] דום dom, "be…
Verse 7. Rest in the Lord] דום dom, "be silent, be dumb." Do not find fault with thy Maker; he does all things well for others, he will do all things well for thee.
And wait patiently for him] והתחולל לו vehithcholel lo, and set thyself to expect him; and be determined to expect, or wait for him. Such is the import of a verb in the hithpoel conjugation.
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A heathen gives good advice on a similar subject: -
Nil ergo optabunt homines? Si consilium vis,
Permittes ipsis expendere Numinibus, quid
Conveniat nobis, rebusque sit utile nostris.
Nam pro jucundis aptissima quaeque dabunt Di.
Carior est illis homo, quam sibi.
Juv. Sat. x. 346.
"What then remains? Are we deprived of will?
Must we not wish, for fear of wishing ill?
Receive my counsel, and securely move;
Intrust thy pastime to the powers above.
Leave them to manage for thee, and to grant
What their unerring wisdom sees thee want.
In goodness, as in greatness, they excel:
Ah, that we loved ourselves but half so well!"
DRYDEN.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain Psa 37:7-8. Rest in the Lord — Hebrew, דום,…
Psa 37:7-8. Rest in the Lord — Hebrew, דום, dom, Be silent unto, or for, or because of, the Lord: that is, do not murmur or repine at his dealings with thee, but silently and quietly submit to his will, and adore his judgments, and, as it follows, wait for his help. This advice and command is urged again and again, to teach us how hard it is to learn and practise this lesson. Fret not because of him who prospereth in his way — In his evil way, as it is limited in the following words. Cease from anger —
Either against the sinner for his success, or against God for suffering him to prosper. Fret not, &c., in any wise to do evil — Or, at least so far as to do evil. If any such anger or grief do secretly arise in thy mind, take care that it do not cause thee to reproach or distrust God’s providence, or to dislike his ways, or to approve of or imitate the wicked practices of those men, in hopes of the same success.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain Rest in the Lord - Margin, “Be silent to…
Rest in the Lord - Margin, “Be silent to the Lord.” The Hebrew word means to be mute, silent, still: Job 29:21; Lev 10:3; Lam 3:28. Hence, to be silent to anyone; that is, to listen to him in silence; and the idea in the phrase here, ““be silent to Jehovah,”” is that of waiting in silent patience or confidence for his interposition; or, in other words, of leaving the whole matter with him without being anxious as to the result.
And wait patiently for him - For his bringing the matter to a proper issue. He may seem to delay long; it may appear strange that he does not interpose; you may wonder that he should suffer an innocent man to be thus accused and calumniated; but you are not to be anxious and troubled. God does not always interpose in behalf of the innocent at once; and there may be valuable ends to accomplish in reference to yourself - in the discipline of your own spirit; in bringing out in your case the graces of gentleness, patience, and forgiveness; and in leading you to examine yourself and to understand your own character - which may make it proper that he should not interpose immediately. It may be added that, however important thee seems to us, it is of no consequence to God; “nullum tempus occurrit” (as the lawyers say), to him; and more important results may be secured by delay than would be gained by an immediate interposition in correcting the evil and redressing the wrong. All that the promise implies is that justice will be done, but whether sooner or later must be left to Him; and that our character will be finally safe in His hands.
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Fret not thyself - See the notes at Psa 37:1.
Because of him who prospereth in his way - Because a wicked man has a prosperous life, or is not at once dealt with as he deserves.
Because of the man who bringeth wicked devices to pass - Because the man is allowed to accomplish his purposes of wickedness, or is not arrested at once in his schemes of guilt.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain Rest in--literally, "Be silent to the Lord."
Rest in--literally, "Be silent to the Lord."
and wait--Be submissive--avoid petulance and murmurings, anger and rash doing.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain 7. Rest in the Lord—Literally, be silent to the…
7. Rest in the Lord—Literally, be silent to the Lord. Hush the heart into quietness from fear and questioning. See Psalms 131
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 7. Stanza of Daleth. The remedy for impatience.
7. Stanza of Daleth. The remedy for impatience.
Rest in the Lord] Or, Be still before (Heb. be silent to) the Lord (R.V. marg.), in the calmness of faith. Cp. Psa_62:1; Psa_62:5; and for illustration see Isa_7:4; Isa_30:15.
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who bringeth wicked devices to pass] Lit. who doeth (cp. Psa_37:1 b, and contrast Psa_37:3; Psa_37:5 b) crafty devices.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (7) Rest . . .—Better, Hush! Be still! See…
(7) Rest . . .—Better, Hush! Be still! See margin. The good man, seeing merit unrewarded and wickedness, on the other hand, constantly successful, is tempted to repine. For a later echo of the poet’s thought, irradiated by Christian hope, we may recur to Coleridge’s well-known “Complaint” and its “reproof.”
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain Rest in the Lord; literally, be silent; i.e. do…
Rest in the Lord; literally, be silent; i.e. do not murmur; make no complaint; be silently acquiescent and resigned. And wait patiently for him. Be content to await his time, which is sure to be the right time. Meanwhile possess your soul in patience. Fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in his way (comp. ver. 1, of which this brings out the sense). It is when the ungodly prosper that the righteous are apt to repine. Because of the man who bringeth wicked devices to pass. It is the success of the ungodly in their wicked plots and schemes which especially vexes the righteous. (see Job_9:24 Job_12:6 Job_21:7-9 Job_24:2-12 Psa_72:5-12, etc.)
The rest of the soul.
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"Rest in the Lord." If any age ever needed a gospel of rest, it is this in which we live. We often call it "this busy age." But it is more than busy it is restless. Men pride themselves on "living fast." They seek excitement, not refreshment, in their very pleasures. Amusement becomes not recreation, reinvigoration, restful play, fitting you to return with fresh strength and vigour to work, but often an exhausting demand and strain. You are weary after your holiday, not rested. It was a wise as well as a gracious voice which said to the disciples, "Come ye apart, and rest". (Mar_6:31)
I WE NEED REST.
1. Physical rest, in due amount, is a very deep need of life. At our peril we despise it. There are forms of animal]fib which are sleepless, but they are of very low types. The child, for many years, needs to spend half his life in sleep. The strong man needs from a quarter to a third of his time for sleep; and he must not give his waking hours to unnecessary toil, or body and mind will fail under the strain. We are not to think the time spent in sleep sheer waste. The schoolboy knows his task better when he wakes than over-night. You are wiser for "sleeping over" a question. As a new building requires time to settle, so, it seems, do our thoughts. "He giveth his beloved sleep". (Psa_27:2)
2. No less do we need mental rest repose of soul, heart, intellect. Best from doubt in certainty of truth. From care, in trust. From life"s turmoil, in the quieting presence of things unseen and eternal. From the world, in solitary converse with our Father and our Saviour. From restlessness, in peace; not insensibility, not inertness or carelessness, but inward calm.
II GOD IS THE SOUL"S REST. God has made all creation full of delight and profit for man, but not provided full satisfaction, perfect peace, anywhere but in himself. Faith is not a sudden snatch, but an abiding hold. Like the ivy, the soul climbs by clinging close; and as the ivy cannot cling while tossed to and fro by the wind, so the soul must cease to be agitated by stormy restless desires, if it is to take close, strong, peaceful hold on God. Rest in God includes:
1. Reconciliation. It would be absurd to speak of resting in God while our heart is at enmity with him, estranged from him, or careless, ignorant, doubtful, about our personal relation to him. One or other of these must be the case unless we are what Scripture calls reconciled to God. The "glad tidings" is the "word of reconciliation" in a twofold sense:
(1) The message and witness of the fact that God has provided atonement. (2Co_5:19 Rom_5:10)
(2) The message of personal invitation not to Jews, heathen, atheists, notorious offenders, as such, but to men as men, to each one as a sinner. (2Co_5:20) Nature has no gospel. It is Christ who interprets for us the teaching, else unintelligible, of the lilies and the birds. (Mat_6:26, etc.) It is his voice the voice of the Father speaking through the Son that says," I will give you rest". (Mat_11:28)
2. The rest of absolute submission to Gods will, is what he sometimes calls us to. A hard lesson, but holy, profitable, with an after-fruit of peace. Not the highest form of faith, but indispensable to its completeness. For God does not cease to be our Creator, our Sovereign, when we become children of God by faith in Christ Jesus.
3. The rest of unlimited trust. Not mere lying still in God"s hand or at the feet of Jesus; not (as the "Quietists" taught) annihilation of our own will or of personal self; the calm energy of the soul, willingly placing all in God"s hand. Not the stillness of the stagnant pool, but the calm of the deep lake through which a steady current flows. Christ was not passive in Gethsemane; the whole three of his will and purpose was gathered up in "Not my will," etc.
Vers. 7-11. Confidence in God.
The text of the whole psalm is in the first two verses. We are not to be discouraged in the service of God by the prosperity of the wicked; for it is more apparent than real, and is a short-lived prosperity. At the seventh verse the psalm takes a fresh start from the same key-note.
I SILENT TRUST IN GOD, WAITING FOR HIM, IS THE ONLY TRUE SOLUTION OF THE DIFFICULTY. (Ver. 7) Do not vainly argue the question; be silent to God, and he will speak by-and-by and explain the difficulties of his providence.
II ENVIOUS ANGER THAT THE WICKED ARE BETTER OFF THAN YOU IS SINFUL. (Ver. 8) It is an arraignment of God"s providence, which is presumptuous, and a discontent which is ungrateful, and an undervaluing of that inward prosperity which is the greatest good of life.
III IT IS THE RIGHTEOUS WHO REALLY INHERIT THAT WHICH IS BEST IN THIS LIFE. (Vers. 9, 10) The prosperity of evil-doers will soon come to an end; for it is unrighteous, and cannot last in the world of a righteous God. But the righteous have an inward life that turns outward things into gold; they feast royally at the table of God, as is said in the twenty-third psalm.
IV THE PRECEDING THOUGHT IS REPEATED WITH THE PROMISE OF AN ABUNDANCE OF PEACE. (Ver. 11) Our Lord repeats the former part of this verse in the Sermon on the Mount. "The meek those who do not vainly strive and fret over the impossible or the inevitable shall inherit the earth." And shall have peace of heart and mind, which the wicked have not. S.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Charles H. Spurgeon 1885 · Public Domain Ver. 7. Rest in the Lord. This fifth is…
Ver. 7. Rest in the Lord. This fifth is a most divine precept, and requires much grace to carry it out. To hush the spirit, to be silent before the Lord, to wait in holy patience the time for clearing up the difficulties of Providencethat is what every gracious heart should aim at. "Aaron held his peace:" "I opened not my mouth, because thou didst it." A silent tongue in many cases not only shows a wise head, but a holy heart. And wait patiently for him. Time is nothing to him; let it be nothing to thee. God is worth waiting for. "He never is before his time, he never is too late." In a story we wait for the end to clear up the plot; we ought not to prejudge the great drama of life, but stay till the closing scene, and see to what a finis the whole arrives. Fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in his way, because of the man who bringeth wicked devices to pass. There is no good, but much evil, in worrying your heart about the present success of graceless plotters: be not enticed into premature judgmentsthey dishonour God, they weary yourself. Determine, let the wicked succeed as they may, that you will treat the matter with indifference, and never allow a question to be raised as to the righteousness and goodness of the Lord. What if wicked devices succeed and your own plans are defeated! there is more of the love of God in your defeats than in the successes of the wicked.
Ver. 5,7: See Psalms on "Ps 37:5" for further information.
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Ver. 7. Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for him. There are two words in the original, which express the privilege and the duty of resting on Christ: one implies such a state of acquiescence, as silences the clamours of conscience, and composes the perturbation of the spirit; the other signifies the refreshment and repose of a weary pilgrim, when he arrives at the end of his journey, and is settled for life in a secure, commodious, plentiful habitation. James Hervey.
Ver. 7. Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for him. Take the case of one who, with a load above his strength, has been toiling some steep and broken path, when suddenly he finds it lifted off and transferred to another whose strength he knows to be more than equal to the task, and in whose sympathy he can securely trust. What would his feeling be but one of perfect rest, and calm reliance, and joyous freedom, as they went on their way together? And such is the blessedness of rolling our care upon the Lordin weakness we are resting on superior strength, in perplexity and doubt we are resting on superior wisdom, in all times of trial and hard service we can stay ourselves on the assurance of his perfect sympathy. The literal meaning of the word rest, is be silent towards the Lord. With the eye fixed on him let all unbelieving thoughts be stilled, such thoughts as rise and rankle in the querulous spirit when it sees only its troubles, and not God in them, when the mists of earth hide from its sight the eternal stars of heaven. Then like Jacob, it may say morosely, "All these things are against me; "or, like Elijah, despondently, "It is enough now, O Lord, take away my life; "or, like Jonah, fretfully, "I do well to be angry." In regard to all such dark and unbelieving suggestions, the heart is to keep silence, to be still and know that he is God; silent as to murmuring, but not silent as to prayer, for in that holy meditative stillness the heart turns to commune with him. What is "resting in God, "but the instinctive movement and upward glance of the spirit to him; the confiding all one's griefs and fears to him, and feeling strengthened, patient, hopeful in the act of doing so! It implies a willingness that he should choose for us, a conviction that the ordering of all that concerns us is safer in his hands than in our own.
A few practical remarks: 1. Our "resting patiently" in the Lord applies only to the trials which he sends, not to the troubles which even Christians often make for themselves. There is a difference in the burdens that come in the way of duty, and those that come through our wandering into other ways. We can roll the one upon the Lord, but with the other our punishment may be to be left to bear them long, and to be bruised in bearing them. 2. The duty here enjoined is to be carried through all our life. We all admit that patient waiting is needed for the great trials of life, but may not acknowledge so readily that it is needed as much for little, daily, commonplace vexations. But these are as much a test of Christian principle as the other. 3. This resting in God is a criterion of a man's spiritual state. It needs a special faculty of discernment, a new sense to be opened in the soul, before our fallen nature can understand or desire it. James D. Burns, M.A.
Ver. 7. (first clause). Hold thee still (so it may be translated). And this is the hardest precept that is given to man; insomuch that the most difficult precept of action sinks into nothing when compared with this command to inaction. Jerome.
Ver. 7. (first clause). The Hebrew word rendered silent is (owr), dom, from which the English word dumb appears to be derived. The silence here enjoined is opposed to murmuring or complaining. James Anderson, in Calvin's Commentary.
Ver. 7. Note again the twin duties, rest and wait.
Ver. 7. Bringeth wicked devices to pass. Observe the opposition between this and God's bringing to pass, in verse five. The ground for grief is that the ungodly appear to achieve their end, the reason for comfort is that our end shall be achieved also, and that in the best manner by God himself. C. H. S.
Ver. 7. Rest in the Lord. What? Where? When? Why? How?
Ver. 7. Peace, patience, self possession.
Ver. 7. Stillness in God. Bishop Wilberforce.
Ver. 7. Rest in the Lord.
1. Rest in the will of God, for whatever he wills is for your good, your highest good.
2. Rest in the love of God, and often meditate on the words of Jesus on this point, "Thou hast loved them as thou hast loved me."
3. Rest in the mercy of God.
4. Rest in the word of God.
5. Rest in the relation thy God fills to thee; he is the Father.
6. Rest in the Lord as he is manifested in Jesus, thy God in covenant.
James Smith.
Psalms 37:8*
Charles H. Spurgeon's The Treasury of David (1869–1885) — public domain. Psalms only. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him:…
Psa_37:7-11
Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him: fret not thyself.
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The good man in trouble
Note the man contemplated. He is a man of real piety, and he is contrasted with the wicked. The wicked are spoken of, but he is spoken to. He is understood to be of a different class altogether. But he is at present in circumstances of trial, and the battle is rather going against him. He sees that which he knows not how to reconcile with the idea that there is a God who judgeth in the earth. A great cloud is upon his spirits.
I. The advice given to him.
1. As to that which he is not to do. He is not to fret himself because of the prosperity of the wicked. It does not mean merely that he is not to be envious, not to indulge in that dark, malignant spirit. I think you must regard him as looking upon some of the great perplexing events of Gods providence. There are a set of wicked men, whose diabolical skill and device are crowned with success. They are bound, perhaps, in a vigorous crusade against God, and against Gods Church, and apparently are successful in their wicked endeavours. You are not to let such thoughts get down into your soul to weaken and destroy your faith in God. Fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in the way. Then there is a second piece of advice, which I should say goes farther because things are getting worse--Cease from anger, and forsake wrath: fret not thyself in any wise to do evil. It is not merely now a man looking upon that which is objective, and being rather disturbed by it; but things are coming near and touching him personally; the successful device has entangled him, and now passion is rising; he is getting excited; he has began to imagine an opposite device, and thinks to overcome strength by strength. Now, he must guard against that, for if affliction have this effect the devil will have the victory then, and not God, in regard to his soul. After these two pieces of advice, which may both be considered negative, though they are put in positive forms--we come to that which is positive. Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him. Do this by a filial trust, with an entire faith. Believe that the Lord lives, acts, governs. Simple advice, but easier to understand than to practise: for our tendency is, under such circumstances, to let go our hold on God. A man has an idea that he can do things better for himself, faith fails, and corruption gets the advantage.
II. Why a man should rest in the Lord. The first thing suggested is, that in spite of all appearances a man must hold to the great fact that there is a great, Divine, presiding personality, an observer, governor, judge--he must keep to that, and hold to that great truth. You, a religious man, having a religious faith in you! but what is your religion and faith good for, if it will not hold you to the primary truths of religion? The second thing suggested is, that the good man should understand that the laws and constitution of things are upon his side, that in the long run they will turn up to be on the side of righteousness, goodness, and virtue, that the working out of things will ultimately be against the bad. Whatever may be the primary prospect of the success of wickedness--evil-doers shall be cut off. Why, some of you have seen that fifty times over. Dear me, I wonder what has become of so and so! I remember twenty years ago he was the most-talked-of man in London; but there was something very dark and suspicious about him. I wonder what has become of him. I have lost sight of him for many years. Another says, I can tell you. All gone to nothing. He sunk, and sunk; all his splendour disappeared, and he gradually came down to poverty and his children too, and the very house in which he lived is in ruins. It is thus that things work out. Sometimes you do not observe the process, but presently, unexpectedly, you see the result of the working out of the law, Yet a little while and the wicked shall not be. And sometimes it is done otherwise, in a more palpable manner. Into smoke shall they consume away.
III. Gods providence and care shall watch over his own. The little that a righteous man hath, etc. A religious life is favourable to life. This is the natural law. Those that wait upon the Lord may have sorrow for a night, but light is sown in the darkness, and joy will spring up with the day. Yet a little time and the wicked shall not be. Thou shalt diligently consider his place, and it shall not be; yes, even though he should call his lands after his own name. I remember the circumstance of a man cutting his name into the stone upon his house, eight inches deep, because he was determined to go down to a remote posterity, upon the house which he had built for himself. I have seen the house, with the letters cut into the stone, almost a foot deep; and it is let now for a school, This may seem a simple matter. Aye, but simple matters illustrate great principles. It is in simple matters that God is most seen. Conclusion.
1. These principles apply to the milder afflictions which we at times are called on to suffer.
2. Whilst remembering the judgment that is coming upon the wicked if they do not repent, we are to pray for them that they may.
3. Lay to heart the truth that God, as surely as He lives, is oil the side of right. You are not in the devils world, He neither made nor governs it. Therefore keep to the right and the true to religious faith and the side of God. (T. Binnecy.)
Rest for the troubled
I. The confident repose. Best in the Lord. Let us do so--
1. In his all-sufficiency for reasonable and sufficient supplies.
2. In His wisdom for counsel and guidance.
3. In His power for protection.
4. In His truth and faithfulness for the fulfilment of Ills promises.
5. In His gracious love for all.
II. The prayerful endurance and expectation.
1. Wait patiently for the Lord, for this is the only way of keeping our minds calm.
2. For His arrangements concerning our afflictions. (M. Wilcox.)
Christian resting and uniting
One of our hardest lessons is to find out the wisdom of our hindrances; how we are to be put forward and upward by being put back and put down. When the company in the Pilgrims Progress had to sit up watching all night at, the house of Gains, Greatheart kept them awake with this riddle, He that would kill must first be overcome. And the truth in it has been practically dug out by trials that broke sleep through many a hard fortune in every Christian experience since. Yes, defeats help progress; a compulsory standing still helps us on. The Cross of Christ solves the riddle, and, gradually, to believing eyes the fact comes out. The precept, Best in the Lord, etc., seems at first too tame for a spiritual ambition. We ask for some positive doctrine, for a task worthy of our energies. Sound a bugle note that calls to close contests and we will follow; but this is a poor, spiritless tiling, this resting and waiting! We must see, if we can, what force there is in this answer. Possibly, if we search deep enough, we shall flied that where some of us fancy our religion ends, it is only feebly begun.
I. Goodness is not so much specific deeds as a faithful heart: it is being, rather than doing, though sure to lead to right doing. If the principle is true, what is often called passive goodness is the necessary condition, nay, the interior fountain of active goodness. A man, that is, must, be a silent believer in his heart before he can be a powerful Christian worker with his arms, or speaker with his lips. He must pray in his closet before he can honour his Maker in the multitude or shop, in pulpit or street.
II. Compare active and passive virtues, and see what each requires to restrain it.
1. Submission--if there be any distinction between these virtues--would fall on the side of the passive graces. But in all the compass of human achievements there is not one that more tasks the stoutest energies of the soul, not one that demands a more resolute gathering up of all the resolution left. And yet men speak of it, of this resting in the Lord, as one of your passive, secondary, ignoble virtues.
2. So, too, with gentleness of temper and of speech. There is natural amiability, but that has cost no struggle. But do we not know some persons that need all the weapons in the Christian armoury, and all the watchfulness of the camp, to reach that plain achievement, the soft answer that turneth away wrath? So, then, the passive virtues, as they are called, are those that require the greatest effort, and, according to Christ, are therefore of the greatest worth. All the nine beatitudes, with, perhaps, one exception, pronounce their blessing on what the world would call tame and passive traits. So does Christianity turn upside down the vulgar vanity of our ambition, and empty our worldliness of blessedness. But the subject reaches on to wider applications yet. Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him, is--
III. A counsel addressed to the habit and tendency of these times; and no time perhaps ever needed to listen to it more; a time more eager to conquer the world by putting girdles of intelligence and bonds of travel about it, than to feel its dependence on Heaven; readier to run, to work, to build, to ask questions, to yoke the elements, than to kneel, to believe, to have patience and to pray. But the strength of a community is not in its enterprising, self-confident, profane or prayer-less great men, but in the men, be they few or many, who while they are diligent in business, and faithful in public spirit, rest secretly in the Lord, and wait patiently every day for Him.
IV. See again, what besides righteous labour such a stillness supposes. To wait patiently for God is to hold the heart open for what God gives. Subjection, then, it implies. It is to expect His love; and so it implies file penitence that goes before pardon. It is to believe He will give and guide; and so it implies faith. And it implies, too, self-restraint, self-renunciation, prayer, thanksgiving; and these are not the elements of mans infirmity. We must not be surprised that men are so slow to learn this lesson. When it is learnt, then will Christs kingdom have come. Let us help it forward as we best can. Meanwhile, we must rest and wait. So, too, in regard to the manifold sins and sorrows of human life: the slowness of our own growth in goodness; the secret sorrows of our homes--in regard to all them, and every other like to them, take the precept of our text. Let one subject regulate our judgments of one another: save us from morbid discontents, and cause to abide ever in the Lord, that we may rest in Him. (S. T. Huntingdon, D. D.)
Resting in the Lord
Rest and security are sought universally, but seldom found. The want of interior quiet is felt by every one; it is the deepest desire of our being, but it is pursued wisely only by a few. That the Lord intended man to enjoy rest may be known by these three considerations; first, He has made it the inmost affection of every human being; secondly, restlessness is destructive to the health of both mind and body; thirdly, God has assured us in His Word, and provided in His works, that we may come into a state of rest.
1. It may not appear at first sight evident that the demand for rest is an interior feeling in every one. Yet very little reflection will make it plain.
(1) Under the restless garb of the busiest of mankind abides the constant desire to procure a sufficiency. Look at the energetic tradesman; he seems incessantly active; he labours early and late; nothing seems so foreign to him as rest. Yet let him unbosom himself, and you will find all this activity arises from a wish to secure the means of attain ins a secure rest in his declining years. He believes he can only be satisfied in the gratification of his desires, and when he has won all that his wishes require, he will recline in peace and enjoy rest.
(2) The rest, which is the inward aim of the soul, and to which every man may attain, is foreshadowed by the contentment of little children, though theirs is the peace of ignorance, not the peace of wisdom. They find their wants supplied, and they have no cares. They have full confidence in the love of their parents, and no doubt as to their power.
2. We may be assured that rest is intended to be enjoyed by us in this world from the circumstance that restlessness disturbs and destroys the health of both mind and body, and is therefore in contrariety to the laws which build up both. Opposites cannot come from God.
3. We are invited, by frequent calls in the Word, to rest on the Divine love and wisdom. (J. Bailey, Ph. D.)
Waiting upon God
Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him (Psa_37:7). This is not a call to indolence, but to action enveloped in repose. In all probability the writer was one of the leading men of action of his age. Our deeds should have their origin and their completion in patient waiting.
(1) Restfulness is the preparation for service; it is the interior fountain of active goodness. The man that would give must first receive.
(2) Restfulness should be the spirit in which action is concluded. The fretful anxiety which looks back upon faithful work is a denial of God and a weakening of the soul. This is a call to service with the fret taken away. There is no true rest for man save in the thought of God. Aubrey de Vere relates a conversation he had with Wordsworth in Lakeland. The poet remarked that travellers boasted much of Swiss mountains because they were two or three times as high as the English, but he added, I reply that the clouds gather so low on them that half of them remain commonly out of sight. His visitor did not wish to contradict him, and so the poet went on declaiming. You cannot see those boasted Swiss mountains when the clouds hang low. Certainly not, replied the prudent visitor. Then, after a pause, his veracity prevailed, and he added, But I must admit you know that they are there. I will lift up mine eyes to the hills, from whence cometh my strength. Sometimes the clouds gather, but it makes all the difference to life to know that the hills are there. We rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him.
I. This spirit of patient waiting is in itself a high achievement of the christian Character. In religion all means are ends, and all ends only means to some larger end. Repentance is not only a condition of salvation, but also a part of the work; it is an indication of a deep change which God works within the heart. To wait patiently upon the Lord is a means of grace, but it is also a feature of a lofty spirit. Our God is the God of patience. How patiently He waits as Creator--not at once, but slowly have order and beauty emerged from chaos; how patiently He stands as the World Redeemer, while men scourge and revile and spit at Him, and crown Him with thorns, and smite Him with their hands! He waits patiently to see of the travail of His soul, and is able to breathe the spirit of calm, fearless, hopeful endurance into all His people.
II. This spirit of milder afflictions which we at times are called on to suffer.
2. Whilst remembering the judgment that is coming upon the wicked if they do not repent, we are to pray for them that they may.
3. Lay to heart the truth that God, as surely as lie lives, is on the side of right. You are not in the devils world. He neither made nor governs it. Therefore keep to the right and the true, to religious faith and the side of God. (T. Binney.)
Rest for the troubled
I. The confident repose. Rest in the Lord. Let us do so--
1. In His all-sufficiency for reasonable and sufficient supplies.
2. In His wisdom for counsel and guidance.
3. In His power for protection.
4. In His truth and faithfulness for the fulfilment of His promises.
5. In His gracious love for all.
II. The prayerful endurance and expectation.
1. Wait patiently for the Lord, for this is the only way of keeping our minds calm.
2. For His arrangements concerning our afflictions. (R. M. Wilcox.)
Christian resting and uniting
One of our hardest lessons is to find out the wisdom of our hindrances; how we are to be put forward and upward by being put back and put down. When the company in the Pilgrims Progress had to sit up watching all night at the house of Gains, Greatheart kept them awake with this riddle, He that would kill must first be overcome. And the truth in it has been practically dug out by trials that broke sleep through many a hard fortune in every Christian experience since. Yes, defeats help progress; a compulsory standing still helps us on. The Cross of Christ solves the riddle, and, gradually, to believing eyes the fact comes out. The precept, Rest in the Lord, etc., seems at first too tame for a spiritual ambition. We ask for some positive doctrine, for a task worthy of our energies. Sound a bugle note that calls to close contests and we will follow; but this is a poor, spiritless thing, this resting and waiting! We must see, if we can, what force there is in this answer. Possibly, if we search deep enough, we shall find that where some of us fancy our religion ends, it is only feebly begun.
I. Goodness is not so much specific deeds as a faithful heart: it is being, rather than doing, though sure to lead to right doing. If the principle is true, what is often called passive goodness is the necessary condition, nay, the interior fountain of active goodness. A man, that is, must be a silent believer in his heart before he call be a powerful Christian worker with his arms, or speaker with his lips. He, must pray in his closet before he can honour his Maker in the multitude or shop, in pulpit or street,
II. Compare active and passive virtues, and see what each requires to restrain it.
1. Submission--if there be any distinction between these virtues--would fall on the side of the passive graces. But in all the compass of human achievements there is not one that more tasks the stoutest energies of the soul, not one that demands a more resolute gathering up of all the resolution left. And yet men speak of it, of this resting in the Lord, as one of your passive, secondary, ignoble virtues.
2. So, too, with gentleness of temper and of speech. There is natural amiability, but that has cost no struggle. But do we not know some persons that need all the weapons in the Christian armoury, and all the watchfulness of the camp, to reach that plain achievement, the soft answer that turneth away wrath? So, then, the passive virtues, as they are called, are those that require the greatest effort, and, according to Christ, are therefore of the greatest worth. All the nine beatitudes, with, perhaps, one exception, pronounce their blessing on what the world would call tame and passive traits. So does Christianity turn upside down the vulgar vanity of our ambition, and empty our worldliness of blessedness. But the subject reaches on to wider applications yet. Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him, is--
III. A counsel addressed to the habit and tendency of these times; and no time perhaps ever needed to listen to it more; a time more eager to conquer the world by putting girdles of intelligence and bonds of travel about it, than to feel its dependence on Heaven; readier to run, to work, to build, to ask questions, to yoke the elements, than to kneel, to believe, to have patience and to pray. But the strength of a community is not in its enterprising, self-confident, profane or prayer-less great men, but in the men, be they few or many, who while they are diligent in business, and faithful in public spirit, rest secretly in the Lord, and wait patiently every day for Him.
IV. See again, what besides righteous labour such a stillness supposes. To wait patiently for God is to hold the heart open for what God gives. Subjection, then, it implies. It is to expect His love; and so it implies the penitence that goes before pardon. It is to believe He will give and guide; and so it implies faith. And it implies, too, self-restraint, self-renunciation, prayer, thanksgiving; and these are not the elements of mans infirmity. We must not be surprised that men are so slow to learn this lesson. When it is learnt, then will Christs kingdom have come. Let us help it forward as we best can. Meanwhile, we must rest and wait. So, too, in regard to the manifold sins and sorrows of human life: the slowness of our own growth in goodness; the secret sorrows of our homes--in regard to all them, and every other like to them, take the precept of our text. Let one subject regulate our judgments of one another: save us from morbid discontents, and cause to abide ever in the Lord, that we may rest in Him. (S. T. Huntingdon, D. D.)
Resting in the Lord
Rest and security are sought universally, but seldom found. The want of interior quiet is felt by every one; it is the deepest desire of our being, but it is pursued wisely only by a few. That the Lord intended man to enjoy rest may be known by these three considerations; first, He has made it the inmost affection of every human being; secondly, restlessness is destructive to the health of both mind and body; thirdly, God has assured us in His Word, and provided in His works, that we may come into a state of rest.
1. It may not appear at first sight evident that the demand for rest is an interior feeling in every one. Yet very little reflection will make it plain.
(1) Under the restless garb of the busiest of mankind abides the constant desire to procure a sufficiency. Look at the energetic tradesman; he seems incessantly active; he labours early and late; nothing seems so foreign to him as rest. Yet let him unbosom himself, and you will find all this activity arises from a wish to secure the means of attaining a secure rest in his declining years. He believes he can only be satisfied in the gratification of his desires, and when he has won all that his wishes require, he will recline in peace and enjoy rest.
(2) The rest, which is the inward aim of the soul, and to which every man may attain, is foreshadowed by the contentment of little children, though theirs is the peace of ignorance, not the peace of wisdom. They find their wants supplied, and they have no cares. They have full confidence in the love of their parents, and no doubt as to their power.
2. We may be assured that rest is intended to be enjoyed by us in this world from the circumstance that restlessness disturbs and destroys the health of both mind and body, and is therefore in contrariety to the laws which build up both. Opposites cannot come from God.
3. We are invited, by frequent calls in the Word, to rest on the Divine love and wisdom. (J. Bailey, Ph. D.)
Waiting upon God
Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him (Psa_37:7). This is not a call to indolence, but to action enveloped in repose. In all probability the writer was one of the leading men of action of his age. Our deeds should have their origin and their completion in patient waiting.
(1) Restfulness is the preparation for service; it is the interior fountain of active goodness. The man that would give must first receive.
(2) Restfulness should be the spirit in which action is concluded. The fretful anxiety which looks back upon faithful work is a denial of God and a weakening of the soul. This is a call to service with the fret taken away. There is no true rest for man save in the thought of God. Aubrey de Vere relates a conversation he had with Wordsworth in Lakeland. The poet remarked that travellers boasted much of Swiss mountains because they wore two or three times as high as the English, but he added, I reply that the clouds gather so low on them that half of them remain commonly out of sight. His visitor did not wish to contradict him, and so the poet went on declaiming. You cannot see those boasted Swiss mountains when the clouds hang low. Certainly not, replied the prudent visitor. Then, after a pause, his veracity prevailed, and he added,:But I must admit you know that they are there. I will lift up mine eyes to the hills, from whence cometh my strength. Sometimes the clouds gather, but it makes all the difference to life to know that the hills are there. We rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him.
I. This spirit of patient waiting is in itself a high achievement of the Christian character. In religion all means are ends, and all ends only means to some larger end. Repentance is not only a condition of salvation, but also a part of the work; it is an indication of a deep change which God works within the heart. To wait patiently upon the Lord is a means of grace, but it is also a feature of a lofty spirit. Our God is the God of patience. How patiently He waits as Creator--not at once, but slowly have order and beauty emerged from chaos; how patiently He stands as the World Redeemer, while men scourge and revile and spit at Him, and crown Him with thorns, and smite Him with their hands! He waits patiently to see of the travail of His soul, and is able to breathe the spirit of calm, fearless, hopeful endurance into all His people.
II. This spirit of patient waiting is necessary for the highest and most permanent service. In Mr. Winston Churchills Life of his father we have the story of one who had it in him to be one of the most influential workers of his age, but who failed because he was all impulse, impatience, restlessness, and left little behind save the memory of a most pathetic career. After his conspicuous blunder he wrote to his wife from Mafeking: Well, I have had quite enough of it all. I have waited with patience for the tide to turn, but it has not turned, and will not now turn in time. All confirms me in my decision to have done with politics and try to make a little money for the boys and ourselves. That is the secret of impermanent service--the tide has not turned, and will not turn now in time. In whose time? Man has no right to fix the time. Of the hour knoweth no man, but only the Father. Our times are in His hand. How patiently Christ waited; for thirty years He waited in obscurity for the ministry to begin. He remained hopeful in the presence of the cross, the symbol, it would seem, to others, of everlasting defeat and shame.
III. This should be a message of comfort to us amid lifes painful perplexities, One night Henry Drummond sat up with a young man who had lost himself in philosophical speculations. I seem to be walking round and round and arriving nowhere, he said sadly, and I am thoroughly tired of it all. True, said Drummond, but you are not too tired to lie down. The psalmist had been wandering in the same bewildering way. He had fretted himself because of the prosperity of evildoers; all his theological ideas had been disturbed by the little that the righteous hath and the abundance of many wicked. But he was not too tired to lie down, and to the weary in every age he proclaims the glad restfulness of the soul in God. There are times when reason fails us. (Trevor H. Davies.)
Rest in the Lord
It was more difficult for David to do this, than for us to do it. He had more at stake, and less to help him; he bad all the mysteries which beset us, and many more peculiar to his age and to the dispensation under which he lived. He found it harder than we do, to sever temporal disasters from Divine inflictions; and yet he could use this inspiring language, and summon his brothers to rest in Jehovah, and wait patiently for Him. But men now seem only too disposed not to trouble themselves: fatalism, and indifference to unseen things, are so common that advice very different from Davids is often imperatively needed. But the worlds rest and quietness is only an apparent one, not real.
I. Thy rest of weariness. The body rests; it is this rest which knits up the ravelled sleeve of care, which is sore labours bath, balm of hurt minds, great natures second course, chief nourisher in lifes feast. All life is submitted to this law. The leafless winter, the hushed songsters of the forest, the infant slumbering on its mothers breast, the sealed eyes of the shipboy cradled on the surge, and all the magic of night as she moves from land to land and touches all with her opiate wand, tell the same story. Work demands rest, and rest is the stimulus of work. The intellect itself must have its quiet places and still retreats, where holy calm, and unconscious growth, and secret renovation, repairs its losses. Further, weariness comes at times even to the relief of the spiritual faculty, and gives the half-awakened spirit its first lessons in the mighty art of faith,. Perhaps we have been eagerly seeking to reconcile Gods truth to our own standards; to adjust Jehovahs attributes for Him; to enter the kingdom of heaven like a man, with violence, and not as a little child. Perhaps we have been striving to fill up the bottomless abyss of need in our hearts with our own merits, and we find the undertaking impossible. Now, at length, beaten with the struggle, and ceasing our efforts, we may be taking an enforced rest; we may just lie quiet for a time, and this may seem to be a rest in God; while, on the contrary, it is only an inevitable pause in our fruitless endeavour, a hall of energy by which the mind recovers its power of self-infliction. But if, on the other hand, we will go simply, humbly, trustingly to God as our Father, then rest may be found. Better far to learn the lesson of faith, and so be filled with peace, resting in the Lord.
II. The rest of strength. This is a far higher thing than that we have now considered. It is a voluntary rest, which is to some extent within our own power; it is a sign of vigour rather than weakness, of strong will rather than of over-taxed effort. This rest of conscious strength is closely associated with every Christian grace, and is as necessary to our success in the conflicts of the divine life, as it is to the culture of our higher nature. Neither faith, nor hope, nor love can be maintained within us without the rest of faith, the rest of hope, and the rest of love. Faith fights a good fight, which requires, however, that it rest in God. And hope, too, needs to rest in the fruition of that which God has given. And love is quickened by quiet hours of patient waiting for the Lord. Prayer, also, and work depend on resting in the Lord. It often requires all our strength to sit still and believe in the love of God, and even to augment our confidence in that love, when what we think to be our proper interests are disregarded, and apparently trifled with, and perhaps in our view utterly sacrificed. The philosopher maunders to us about general laws, and the good of the whole; the unafflicted Christian does what is little better, he suggests a few of the commonplaces of consolation. Blessed is the man that maketh the Lord his trust!
III. I have now briefly to allude to a third form of this great duty and privilege--the rest of victory which flows out of deep faith; that peace with God which Jesus gives, which passes all understanding. Here patience has her perfect work, and is entire, wanting nothing. The Lord is my Shepherd, says the holy psalmist, I shall want nothing. (H. Reynolds, D. D.)
Stillness in God
The trial for which this precept is intended to strengthen us is the irritation to which all are tempted by the sight of successful wickedness. But there shall be a setting right of all such seeming injustice. But the precept has a wider application than this.
I. What is implied in holding ourselves still in God. The word still means hold thee in stillness upon God. It is the quality of mind which is the opposite of restlessness. And we are to hold still in God in reference both to things temporal and things spiritual. Restlessness has a twofold sort of bitterness which trust in God must extirpate.
1. It springs from dissatisfaction with the present, or from anxiety about the future. There is a deep melancholy in the heart of every man, bound up in the very bundle of his life, which, like the breath of myrrh, is ever ready to spread itself over all his being; and in spirits of the deepest tone there is most of this: it is the yearning after our true portion, but it will make all life restless unless we learn to lean upon God, believing that He is Truth and Love, and is ours through Christ Jesus. In common life this must be our rest; and in great sorrow too. Then we must learn to be at rest, not indeed by striving unnaturally not to feel sorrow, but by our taking the sorrow from God. It is not being sanguine, but being trustful, that is required of us.
2. And in things spiritual the precept is just the same. Stillness the very opposite of self-trust, which is the common root of these two false schemes--seemingly so opposite--of the spiritual life--the life of the mere formalist, and that of him who is engaged in a heart-eating searching into his own frame and feelings. For both are building on self, not on God. It is not that silence of spirit, that meditation and stillness, that uniting upon God which are so closely connected with true religion. And this stillness is, perhaps, that feature of religion which is most seldom to be met with in our day. It is a busy age, and we love activity. We need to be silent before God in order to realize our personal reconciliation with Him through the blood of Atonement, to walk in His Spirit, to spend our lives as His obedient, trusting children. Now, this is the essence of Christianity.
II. It is most blessed, both in regard to our temporal life and that which is spiritual. For in it we become transformed and bear Gods impress. All growth is silent. It is not in the lordly storm, or in the over-mastering hurricane that Nature puts forth her powers of growth and increase. It is amidst the drenching dews, in the still dawning of the spring-time, that the leaf unfolds itself, and the tender shoot steals upwards. And these works of nature are all symbols of the inner growth. In times of quietness the heart unfolds itself before God. If you would grow in grace, enter into thy closet and shut to thy door upon the world; shut it most of all upon thy busy unresting self, and then God shall speak to thee. How silent, surely, is an angels heart when God is nigh; how is self hushed there; how, as some earthly vapour by the sun, is every power of His mighty being drawn up into adoration! And this truly is to know Him.
III. How are we to grow in this great grace? And, first, need I say, that such growth must be the work of His grace. That it is not natural to us; that nothing is, indeed, less natural. Only the Spirit brooding over our hearts can secure this. He renews, calms, cools, purifies them. He who said to the waves, Peace, be still, must create this great calm. Therefore must we draw near to God if we would win so great a blessing. This must be our rule. Draw near to Him in the covenant of His Sons blood: to Him as the Loving, the True, the Great: as Love, as Truth, as Holiness, as Power, gathered into one adorable Person; one real Being; and that Being your portion, your friend, your rest: for this is life eternal, to know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent. (Bishop S. Wilberforce.)
Rest in the Lord
Our text being where it is in this psalm is an instance of the great rule that the Lord does nothing by halves. In Psa_37:1 the Lord found His servant liable to fretfulness and envy, and exhorted him to cease from fretting; and He did not stay the operation of His grace till He had perfected that which concerned him, and brought him up to the elevated point of our text, Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him. Rest is a blessing which properly belongs to the people of God, although they do not enjoy one tithe so much of it as they might. So let us consider--
I. The steps to this royal chamber of repose. They are shown in this psalm--
1. Fret not thyself. You are not in the fields among the wild beasts; cease to hunt them: Come within doors into your Fathers house. Come away from contact with worldlings. The griefs which make the ungodly pine are not for you. Then--
2. When you have thus come out of the field into the palace of love, the first staircase is described as trust and do. Trust in the Lord and do good. Not a dead faith which will not serve you at all, but one which will do as well as receive. It is through the exercise of faith that comfort comes to the heart. When thou hast learned this lesson, thou wilt have ascended a noble staircase of the royal palace, and it will land thee in the Kings dining-room, where it is written, Verily thou shalt be fed. If thou hast a living, active faith, thou shalt be provided for. Leave the fields, and thy brethren sowing there, who are complaining that their Father never gave them a kid to make merry with their friends--leave them and come up this first staircase of active faith, and sit down where a feast is spread. Then--
3. Ascend higher, and climb the next staircase, which is marked Delight and desire. Delight thyself also in the Lord, and He shall give thee the desires of thine heart. Think what a good God thou hast; yea, what a blessed God He is. We have mounted now to the royal treasury, the Kings almonry. Here He bids you open all your heart, and pour forth your desires, for He will satisfy them. But you are not up to the royal rest-chamber yet.
4. Climb another stair, marked, Commit thy way and trust. All the steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord. What hast thou to do in ordering thine own way? Now, this brings us into the undressing-room, which stands side by side with the royal bedchamber. Take off the dusty garments of thy cares and commit them to the Lord. Strip thyself of all thy anxieties, and leave thy worn and travel-stained raiment. Then enter the quiet chamber and take your rest; Rest in the Lord.
II. The rest.
1. It is a rest of mind, a sense of security and fixedness;
2. Contentment.
3. Immovable confidence.
4. Submission to all Gods will. The Hebrew is, Be silent to God. One of the old versions reads it, Hold thou still before God.
5. Patient waiting. Feel that you can waive your desires, and tarry the Lords leisure.
6. Peace, unmixed calm.
7. Expectation, especially in regard to the Kingdom of God. Do not fret about that.
III. The royal chamber. Rest in the Lord, in Himself.
1. As your covenant God.
2. As your Father.
3. In His attributes.
4. His word.
5. His will. So that, we can say, Not as I will, but as Thou wilt. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Resting and waiting
I. The meaning of the words. There are many passages which breathe a similar spirit.
1. The meaning here is implied by contrast--see the beginning of the psalm, as to fretting; anxious, worldly care; the unrest of the wicked, of which sin is the great cause.
2. Then think of the Lord Himself, and we see that to rest in Him is to trust in Him, and to be still and silent in our trust: resting, we wait in patient hope and in the assurance of love.
II. Their application. This fitting when--
1. We are troubled about the slow progress of the Gospel. Or, 2, about the general dispensations of Gods providence. The wicked prosper. Our own personal trials, temporal and spiritual. But resting in the Lord is the secret of the highest life, the truest strength and the richest blessedness. (G. L. Jarman.)
Rest in the Lord
1. It may need to be a quiet waiting. The word rest literally means that--Be silent to the Lord. The best thing may be, at times, to wait quietly. There once was an alarm of fire in a crowded hall, and a general rush was made to the door. The alarm proved to be a false one, and by and by the people got back to their seats. It was noticed, however, that one little girl had not moved, and on being asked why, it turned out that her father was a member of the fire brigade, and that he had often impressed upon her that if ever she found herself in a situation of that kind, she was to sit still. That is what God often told His servants of old, and what He tells us yet through His Word, with regard to trying experiences; but how hard to learn the lesson, and obey! Their strength is to sit still.
2. But, assuredly, it should be a hopeful waiting. Let not the stillness be mere torpor. Let not the dumbness be numbness. Hope in God, for I shall yet praise Him, says the psalmist; and that word yet is the keynote of the whole psalm. Perhaps the highest and most difficult thing of all, however, is that it be a patient waiting. Hope may be deferred, the dawn may seem never to be coming, and yet be patient--patient. All will come right, are the words put on the tombstone of President Brand, a late President of the Orange Free State. It was a remark he was in the habit of making in his lifetime. If our trust be in God, may we not take them up too? (J. S. Maver, M. A.)
The believers rest
I. Rest from wandering. O my heart, how thou didst wander, like a weary pilgrim, through the Egypt of thy bondage! Thou didst wander to Sinai, where thou didst hear the law that made thee tremble. Thou didst wander across the wilderness of Sin, where thy good works vexed and tired thee, and thine evil works, like fiery serpents, bit thee; but that is all over now. My soul, thou hast crossed the Jordan, and having found Christ thou hast no inclination to wander more.
II. Rest from all our foes.
III. Rest in the sense of confidence. In this meaning of the word we do really rest in the Lord. We are not Christians if we do not, for the very first mark of a believer is that he rests in Christ for everything. Whatever need thou hast, rest thou on the bare arm of God to supply it.
IV. Rest in the sense of safety.
V. Perfect rest from weariness. We read in Isaiahs prophecy, This is the rest wherewith ye may cause the weary to rest; and I know there are some weary ones here. You are not weary of Gods work, but you are weary of bearing Christs cross, you have had so much shame and so much sorrow; well, rest in the Lord.
VI. The rest of accomplishment. Either Christ completed all that was necessary for your salvation, or He did not. If He did finish it, then rest in Him, and be glad.
VII. The rest of complete satisfaction. Having Christ, we want nothing more. If we go up or down, to the right or to the left, we can find nothing beyond our Lord.
VIII. The rest of conscious enjoyment. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Silent and patient waiting for the Lord
I. Rest in the lord.
1. This implies that we are the Lords people.
(1) By the enlightenment of our minds, the forgiveness of our sins, the regeneration of our nature, and adoption into the family of God.
(2) By separation from the unclean, by self-dedication to God, and by solemn covenant engagements.
2. Being the Lords, we should rest in Him.
3. To rest in the Lord is to be silent in the Lord. Be still; and think not hard thoughts of God, because He permits thee to suffer. Be still; and murmur not against the Lord, because He does not deliver thee at once out of thy distresses.
II. Wait patiently for him.
1. Wait signifies to be strong, firm, stable; to wait, stay, delay: to wait for, to await, from the notion of enduring, holding out, which is kindred with that of strength. It signifies to wait upon God in prayer, with faith and patience.
2. Wait patiently--however long.
3. For Him. To wait for the Lord is to wait for His promised help, and to hope in Him for deliverance out of all our troubles. Hope in God maketh not ashamed. His help will come, if we wait; His help will be sufficient when it does come. (H. O. Crofts, D. D.)
The gate to the waiting-place
When a man has once come into right relations with God, has begun to live for others rather than for self, when his desires are summed up in the prayer--Thy kingdom come, he is apt to grow uneasy as he sees how slow the Divine kingdom is in coming, and how many indications there are of the presence and tremendous power of another and hostile kingdom in society. This psalm is addressed to a soul which is confused and alarmed by this aspect of the world. Over against it all it sets the great truth--God reigns, and the consequent precept--Trust in Him. Yes, is the reply, but He is so long in bringing it to pass: He makes me wait so long. So He does, and probably will; and it is this side of the lesson of faith in God which I want to bring out of this psalm--the lesson of waiting.
1. We are to wait unwaveringly (verse 84). God brings men to His consummations only by His own road. And this is often a severe trial of faith. It is as when one has been travelling for long hours over a rough road, amid storm and mist, with night drawing on, looking, as he gains the top of every successive hill, for the spires of the city to which he is going, and seeing instead only a new stretch of dreary road, and a new hill to be climbed--he is tempted to think his guide has lost the way, and to take matters into his own hands. To the man who waits on God it is indispensable that he trust his guide.
2. To wait on the Lord rightly is to wait cheerfully. Fret not thyself, says the psalmist (Psa_37:1), because of evil-doers; and again (verse8), fret not thyself in any wise to do evil. You have seen two children bidden by their parent to wait in a certain place for an hour, until he should return, or until some promised pleasure should be prepared: and you have seen the one cheerfully occupy himself with a book or with some object at hand, while the other, though he obeyed the command to remain, fretted, and watched the clock, and wondered when father would return, and was angry because he did not come sooner, and began to fear that he would not come at all, and so made himself generally miserable until the hour had expired. Thus, obedience is not always cheerful; and just in proportion to its lack of this element, it is defective. For obedience is of the very nature of faith.
3. We may wait confidently. The psalm backs its exhortations by numerous promises (Psa_37:8; Psa_37:4; Psa_37:6; Psa_37:29). Look especially at Psa_37:23. We have been watching the course of a man in Gods way--a traveller who is long in coming to the end--on whom Gods providence imposes various and trying delays. To the eye of reason it seems as though the man were walking aimlessly; as though his life, with its continual interruption, and confusion, and stumbling, and baffling, were an utter, irredeemable failure. And so it seems not only to reason, but to weak faith. There have come times to most of us when we have lost out of our lives all sense of plan or order, and have just gone on from day to day, doing and taking what the day brought with it. We have thought, I say, that those were disordered periods. They were not. Did you ever study the waves of the ocean? If so, you have noticed that each wave was full of little, irregular swirlings and eddies, moving in all possible directions. And if you could fasten your eyes upon a square foot of that water and shut out all the rest, you might say that it was a mere watery chaos; but when your eye takes in the whole wave, you see that a common movement propels its whole mass, and takes up into itself all these minor movements, and bears them on with the regularity of a marching host. So these spaces of apparent confusion in our lives are not out of order. They are carried on in the larger order of Gods plan. Perhaps we cannot see the whole movement, but it bears steadily and continuously onward, every incident, every crossing and confusion of incidents swept on at Gods own rate, and in nice adjustment with Gods own plan. Mark, too, that the steps are ordered. The whole way is ordered, it is true, but ordered through the steps. Just as gravitation acts upon each separate particle of the stone which rolls down the mountain-side, so Gods general providence reaches its result through the special providences. The philosopher sneers at the marking of the sparrows fall; but it is in the ordering of just such details that God fulfils Himself in history. So our lives are what their details are. The only thing we are to be careful about is that we step each time in Gods track. (March: R. Vincent, D. D.)
Patient waiting upon God
There are many who may wait, but they do not wait patiently upon God. They soon lose heart and lose expectation. They think that everything is against them, because in the little space that they can cover, and the little vision that they possess, they cannot discern that for which they wait. This is especially the case with Christian men in their Christian work. They want the reaper to tread upon the very heels of him that sows the seed. They wish to gather in the harvest almost as scan as they have ploughed the soil or cast in the grain. They forget that they are fellow-workers with God, and that Gods working-day is all time and all eternity. They lose heart and lose faith, and then very speedily they cease to work altogether. It is still more difficult to bear suffering patiently than to serve and to do duty patiently. It is much more easy to bear a heavy affliction, if it be short, than to bear a long affliction, though it be light. In the one case the stroke may stun us, but we may speedily recover and gain new strength and fresh hope. In the other case, the long, weary, exhausting affliction seems to wear out all elasticity, all strength, and all hope in the soul. Hope deferred makes the heart sick, and when that hope is long deferred it often breaks the heart altogether. Hope is the grace of the young; patience is the grace of the mature. Hope is the flush of the morning-dawn, bright and gladsome, indeed; patience is the seeing sun in its golden softness and beauty, gilding and crowning the last hours of the day. Hope enters into the battle full of expectation, and confidence, and strength; patience is the virtue of the veteran who has gained it in many a struggle, in many a march, and in many a triumph. It is much more easy to work energetically if the day of service be short, than to work patiently, faithfully unto the long days end; and it is much more easy to bear the shower that drenches you than to bear the drizzling mist that comes down and wraps you in coldness and chili, (J. Jenkyn Brown.)
Fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in his way.--
The prosperity of the wicked considered
I. With regard to God. Though prejudice is too apt to whisper that Gods ways are not equal, yet a very little serious reflection on His wisdom and justice, and the ends of His various dispensations, together with our own undeservings, would effectually calm all anxious concern or repining on this account. And to any one that shall be so impertinent as to require satisfaction as to Gods distributions, our Saviours answer to St. Peter may be a sufficient reply: If I will that it be thus or thus, what is that to thee?
II. With regard to the persons said to be thus prosperous. Would we allow ourselves leisure to view the precipice which the most exalted sinner stands upon, how unsure his footing, how liable to be shaken by opposition from below, or the hand of vengeance from above, and how much more fatal a fall may be from so dangerous an height; we should find nothing so tempting in it as to raise our discontent, or provoke one wish to change an innocent inglorious safety for so hazardous an eminence.
III. With regard to ourselves. We come all into the world alike naked and defenceless; and it is to the same bountiful hand, which clothes the lilies of the field, we owe our food and raiment. Now, if these are sufficient for our support and even well-being, and all beyond what is requisite for our comfort and convenience, be allowed to be more than what is strictly necessary; why should we quarrel with Providence for not loading us with what, by our own confession, is superfluous, and therefore insignificant to any useful purpose? Do we do well to be angry, if, having a proper competency, we want only what would be a clog and incumbrance? Nay, even though the Almighty should reduce, instead of exalting us, and assign us trouble and disgrace, where perhaps we might hope for a better lot; yet will it not be difficult to find a lenitive for this grievance. Add to this, that a contented deportment, under adversity or distress, is the most probable means of engaging the Almighty to withdraw His scourge. (J. Roe, M. A.)
The folly of fretful envy of the wicked
I. The passion rankling in the heart has an evil tendency.
1. It inflicts an injury on the soul of its possessor. Malign passions are to the soul what the legions of locusts are to the vegetation of the East--they eat up the life. Aye, worse than locusts, they are fiends, kindling fires that burn down to the very centre of being, and reduce to ashes the better parts of human nature.
2. It stimulates to the infliction of injury upon others. Anger stirreth up strife. Men, under the influence of anger, are ever disposed to mischief; their tongues deal out slander, their hands are lifted in battle, and their feet are swift to shed blood.
II. The connection of the wicked with the earth is not enviable.
1. It is exposed to a violent termination. Evil-doers shall be cut off. It is said the wicked shall be driven away in his wickedness. He does not leave the world with a free will. All his sympathies, interests, hopes, are rooted in the earth, and he will hold on to the last with the energy of desperation; still he must go.
2. It is utterly unsatisfying,
III. Their opposition brings on them terrible misery.
1. The seed of the serpent has from the beginning had a venomous animosity to the good. This animosity is here represented
(1) As cunning, it plotteth against the just; it is fertile in schemes of ruin.
(2) As raging. It gnasheth upon him. Like the hidden fire of the volcano, it reveals itself by terrible vibrations.
(3) As practical. Plan and passion will not satisfy it, it must work, and work with more implements than one--sword and bow. In how many ways the wicked labour to beat down the ideas, thwart the plans, and wound the feelings of the righteous!
2. But all this opposition only brings ruin on themselves. The ruin involves
(1) The contempt of Jehovah. Can the boldest imagination create a figure to give a more terrible representation of misery than this--the laugh of the Infinite? Sooner let Him hurl His thunders at me, and rain down His fires on my spirit than laugh at me.
(2) The recoil of their own purposes. Their sword shall enter their own heart, and their bows shall be broken. A remarkable instance of the kind may be found in Esther (chaps. 5-7.) in the case of Haman. A straightforward course is easy, and men are safe in it; but it requires more skill than most men are endowed with to manage a crooked and crafty policy safely, or so as to be safe themselves in pursuing such a course. (Homilist.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain Psa 37:4 - Psa 37:5, Psa 37:7.
Psalms
THE SECRET OF TRANQUILLITY
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Psa 37:4 - Psa 37:5, Psa 37:7.
‘I have been young, and now am old,’ says the writer of this psalm. Its whole tone speaks the ripened wisdom and autumnal calm of age. The dim eyes have seen and survived so much, that it seems scarcely worth while to be agitated by what ceases so soon. He has known so many bad men blasted in all their leafy verdure, and so many languishing good men revived, that-
‘Old experience doth attain
To something of prophetic strain’;
and is sure that ‘to trust in the Lord and do good’ ever brings peace and happiness. Life with its changes has not soured but quieted him. It does not seem to him an endless maze, nor has he learned to despise it. He has learned to see God in it all, and that has cleared its confusion, as the movements of the planets, irregular and apparently opposite, when viewed from the earth, are turned into an ordered whole, when the sun is taken for the centre. What a contrast between the bitter cynicism put into the lips of the son, and the calm cheerful godliness taught, according to our psalm, by the father! To Solomon, old age is represented as bringing the melancholy creed, ‘All is vanity’; David believes, ‘Delight thyself in the Lord, and He shall give thee the desires of thine heart.’ Which style of old age is the nobler? what kind of life will lead to each?
These clauses, which I have ventured to isolate from their context, contain the elements which secure peace even in storms and troubles. I think that, if we consider them carefully, we shall see that there is a well-marked progress in them. They do not cover the same ground by any means; but each of the later flows from the former. Nobody can ‘commit his way unto the Lord’ who has not begun by ‘delighting in the Lord’; and nobody can ‘rest in the Lord’ who has not ‘committed his way to the Lord.’ These three precepts, then, the condensed result of the old man’s lifelong experience, open up for our consideration the secret of tranquillity. Let us think of them in order.
I. Here is the secret of tranquillity in freedom from eager, earthly desires-’Delight thyself in the Lord, and He shall give thee the desires of thine heart.’
The great reason why life is troubled and restless lies not without, but within. It is not our changing circumstances, but our unregulated desires, that rob us of peace. We are feverish, not because of the external temperature, but because of the state of our own blood. The very emotion of desire disturbs us; wishes make us unquiet; and when a whole heart, full of varying, sometimes contradictory longings, is boiling within a man, how can he but tremble and quiver? One desire unfulfilled is enough to banish tranquillity; but how can it survive a dozen dragging different ways? A deep lesson lies in that word distraction, which has come to be so closely attached to desires; the lesson that all eager longing tears the heart asunder. Unbridled and varying wishes, then, are the worst enemies of our repose.
And, still further, they destroy tranquillity by putting us at the mercy of externals. Whatsoever we make necessary for our contentment, we make lord of our happiness. By our eager desires we give perishable things supreme power over us, and so intertwine our being with theirs, that the blow which destroys them lets out our life-blood. And, therefore, we are ever disturbed by apprehensions and shaken by fears. We tie ourselves to these outward possessions, as Alpine travellers to their guides, and so, when they slip on the icy slopes, their fall is our death. If we were not eager to stand on the giddy top of fortune’s rolling wheel, we should not heed its idle whirl; but we let our foolish hearts set our feet there, and thenceforward every lurch of the glittering instability threatens to lame or kill us. He who desires fleeting joys is sure to be restless always, and to be disappointed at the last. For, even at the best, the heart which depends for peace on the continuance of things subjected to a thousand accidents, can only know quietness by forcibly closing its eyes against the inevitable; and, even at the best, such a course must end on the whole in failure. Disappointment is the law for all earthly desires; for appetite increases with indulgence, and as it increases, satisfaction decreases. The food remains the same, but its power to appease hunger diminishes. Possession bring indifference. The dose that lulls into delicious dreams to-day must be doubled to-morrow, if it is to do anything; and there is soon an end of that. Each of your earthly joys fills but a part of your being, and all the other ravenous longings either come shrieking at the gate of the soul’s palace, like a mob yelling for bread, or are starved into silence; but either way there is disquiet. And then, if a man has fixed his happiness on anything lower than the stars, less stable than the heavens, less sufficient than God, there does come, sooner or later, a time when it passes from him, or he from it. Do not venture the rich freightage of your happiness in crazy vessels. If you do, be sure that, somewhere or other, before your life is ended, the poor frail craft will strike on some black rock rising sheer from the depths, and will grind itself to chips there. If your life twines round any prop but God your strength, be sure that, some time or other, the stay to which its tendrils cling will be plucked up, and the poor vine will be lacerated, its clusters crushed, and its sap will bleed out of it.
If, then, our desires are, in their very exercise, a disturbance, and in their very fruition prophesy disappointment, and if that certain disappointment is irrevocable and crushing when it comes, what shall we do for rest? Dear brethren! there is but one answer-’Delight thyself in the Lord.’ These eager desires, transfer to Him; on Him let the affections fix and fasten; make Him the end of your longings, the food of your spirits. This is the purest, highest form of religious emotion-when we can say, ‘Whom have I but Thee? possessing Thee I desire none beside.’ And this glad longing for God is the cure for all the feverish unrest of desires unfulfilled, as well as for the ague fear of loss and sorrow. Quietness fills the soul which delights in the Lord, and its hunger is as blessed and as peaceful as its satisfaction.
Think how surely rest comes with delighting in God. For that soul must needs be calm which is freed from the distraction of various desires by the one master-attraction. Such a soul is still as the great river above the falls, when all the side currents and dimpling eddies and backwaters are effaced by the attraction that draws every drop in the one direction; or like the same stream as it nears its end, and, forgetting how it brawled among rocks and flowers in the mountain glens, flows with a calm and equable motion to its rest in the central sea. Let the current of your being set towards God, then your life will be filled and calmed by one master-passion which unites and stills the soul.
And for another reason there will be peace: because in such a case desire and fruition go together. ‘He shall give thee the desires of thine heart.’ Only do not vulgarise that great promise by making it out to mean that, if we will be good, He will give us the earthly blessings which we wish. Sometimes we shall get them, and sometimes not; but our text goes far deeper than that. God Himself is the heart’s desire of those who delight in Him; and the blessedness of longing fixed on Him is that it ever fulfils itself. They who want God have Him. Your truest joy is in His fellowship and His grace. If, set free from creatural delights, our wills reach out towards God, as a plant growing in darkness to the light-then we shall wish for nothing contrary to Him, and the wishes which run parallel to His purposes, and embrace Himself as their only good, cannot be vain. The sunshine flows into the opened eye, the breath of life into the expanding lung-so surely, so immediately the fulness of God fills the waiting, wishing soul. To delight in God is to possess our delight. Heart! lift up thy gates: open and raise the narrow, low portals, and the King of Glory will stoop to enter.
Once more: desire after God will bring peace by putting all other wishes in their right place. The counsel in our text does not enjoin the extinction, but the subordination, of other needs and appetites-’Seek ye first the kingdom of God.’ Let that be the dominant desire which controls and underlies all the rest. Seek for God in everything, and for everything in God. Only thus will you be able to bridle those cravings which else tear the heart. The presence of the king awes the crowd into silence. When the full moon is in the nightly sky, it sweeps the heavens bare of flying cloud-rack, and all the twinkling stars are lost in the peaceful, solitary splendour. So let delight in God rise in our souls, and lesser lights pale before it-do not cease to be, but add their feebleness, unnoticed, to its radiance. The more we have our affections set on God, the more shall we enjoy, because we subordinate, His gifts. The less, too, shall we dread their loss, the less be at the mercy of their fluctuations. The capitalist does not think so much of the year’s gains as does the needy adventurer, to whom they make the difference between bankruptcy and competence. If you have God for your ‘enduring substance,’ you can face all varieties of condition, and be calm, saying-
‘Give what Thou canst, without Thee I am poor,
And with Thee rich, take what Thou wilt away.’
The amulet that charms away disquiet lies here. Still thine eager desires, arm thyself against feverish hopes, and shivering fears, and certain disappointment, and cynical contempt of all things; make sure of fulfilled wishes and abiding joys. ‘Delight thyself in the Lord, and He shall give thee the desires of thine heart.’
II. But this is not all. The secret of tranquillity is found, secondly, in freedom from the perplexity of choosing our path.
‘Commit thy way unto the Lord’-or, as the margin says, ‘roll’ it upon God; leave to Him the guidance of thy life, and thou shalt be at peace on the road.
This is a word for all life, not only for its great occasions. Twice, or thrice, perhaps in a lifetime, a man’s road leads him up to a high dividing point, a watershed as it were, whence the rain runs from the one side of the ridge to the Pacific, and from the other to the Atlantic. His whole future may depend on his bearing the least bit to the right hand or to the left, and all the slopes below, on either side, are wreathed in mist. Powerless as he is to see before him, he has yet to choose, and his choice determines the rest of his days. Certainly he needs some guidance then. But he needs it not less in the small decisions of every hour. Our histories are made up of a series of trifles, in each of which a separate act of will and choice is involved. Looking to the way in which character is made, as coral reefs are built up, by a multitude of tiny creatures whose united labours are strong enough to breast the ocean; looking to the mysterious way in which the greatest events in our lives have the knack of growing out of the smallest; looking to the power of habit to make any action of the mind almost instinctive: it is of far more importance that we should become accustomed to apply this precept of seeking guidance from God to the million trifles than to the two or three decisions which, at the time of making them, we know to be weighty. Depend upon it that, if we have not learned the habit of committing the daily-recurring monotonous steps to Him, we shall find it very, very hard to seek His help, when we come to a fork in the road. So this is a command for all life, not only for its turning-points.
What does it prescribe? First, the subordination-not the extinction-of our own inclinations. We must begin by ceasing from self. Not that we are to cast out of consideration our own wishes. These are an element in every decision, and often are our best helps to the knowledge of our powers and of our duties. But we have to take special care that they never in themselves settle the question. They are second, not first. ‘Thus I will, and therefore thus I decide; my wish is enough for a reason,’ is the language of a tyrant over others, but of a slave to himself. Our first question is to be, not ‘What should I like?’ but ‘What does God will, if I can by any means discover it?’ Wishes are to be held in subordination to Him. Our will is to be master of our passions, and desires, and whims, and habits, but to be servant of God. It should silence all their cries, and itself be silent, that God may speak. Like the lawgiver-captain in the wilderness, it should stand still at the head of the ordered rank, ready for the march, but motionless, till the Pillar lifts from above the sanctuary. Yes! ‘Commit thy way’-unto whom? Conscience? No: unto Duty? No: but ‘unto God’-which includes all these lower laws, and a whole universe besides. Hold the will in equilibrium, that His finger may incline the balance.
Then the counsel of our text prescribes the submission of our judgment to God, in the confidence that His wisdom will guide us. Committing our way unto the Lord does not mean shifting the trouble of patient thought about our duty off our own shoulders. It is no cowardly abnegation of the responsibility of choice which is here enjoined; nor is there any sanction of lazily taking the first vagrant impulse, wafted we know not whence, that rises in the mind, for the voice of God. But, just because we are to commit our way to Him, we are bound to the careful exercise of the best power of our own brains, that we may discover what the will of God is. He does not reveal that will to people who do not care to know it. I suppose the precursor of all visions of Him, which have calmed His servants’ souls with the peace of a clearly recognised duty, has been their cry, ‘Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?’ God counsels men who use their own wits to find out His counsel. He speaks to us through our judgments when they take all the ordinary means of ascertaining our course. The law is: Do your best to find out your duty; suppress inclination, and desire to do God’s will, and He will certainly tell you what it is. I, for my part, believe that the Psalmist spoke a truth when he said, ‘In all thy ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct thy steps.’ Only let the eye be fixed on Him, and He will guide us in the way. If we chiefly desire, and with patient impartiality try, to be directed by Him, we shall never want for direction.
But all this is possible only if we ‘delight in the Lord.’ Nothing else will still our desires-the voice within, and the invitations without, which hinder us from hearing the directions of our Guide. Nothing else will so fasten up and muzzle the wild passions and lusts that a little child may lead them. To delight in Him is the condition of all wise judgment. For the most part, it is not hard to discover God’s will concerning us, if we supremely desire to know and do it; and such supreme desire is but the expression of this supreme delight in Him. Such a disposition wonderfully clears away mists and perplexities; and though there will still remain ample scope for the exercise of our best judgment, and for reliance on Him to lead us, yet he whose single object is to walk in the way that God points, will seldom have to stand still in uncertainty as to what that way is. ‘If thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.’
Thus, dear brethren! these two keys-joy in God, and trust in His guidance-open for us the double doors of ‘the secret place of the Most High’; where all the roar of the busy world dies upon the ear, and the still small voice of the present God deepens the silence, and hushes the heart. Be quiet, and you will hear Him speak-delight in Him, that you may be quiet. Let the affections feed on Him, the will wait mute before Him, till His command inclines it to decision, and quickens it into action; let the desires fix upon His all-sufficiency; and then the wilderness will be no more trackless, but the ruddy blaze of the guiding pillar will brighten on the sand a path which men’s hands have never made, nor human feet trodden into a road. He will ‘guide us with His eye,’ if our eyes be fixed on Him, and be swift to discern and eager to obey the lightest glance that love can interpret. Shall we be ‘like the horse or the mule, which have no understanding,’ and need to be pulled with bridles and beaten with whips before they know how to go; or shall we be like some trained creature that is guided by the unseen cord of docile submission, and has learned to read the duty, which is its joy, in the glance of its master’s eye, or the wave of his hand? ‘Delight thyself in the Lord: commit thy way unto Him.’
III. Our text takes one more step. The secret of tranquillity is found, thirdly, in freedom from the anxiety of an unknown future. ‘Best in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him.’
Such an addition to these previous counsels is needful, if all the sources of our disquiet are to be dealt with. The future is dim, after all our straining to see into its depths. The future is threatening, after all our efforts to prepare for its coming storms. A rolling vapour veils it all; here and there a mountain peak seems to stand out; but in a moment another swirl of the fog hides it from us. We know so little, and what we do know is so sad, that the ignorance of what may be, and the certainty of what must be, equally disturb us with hopes which melt into fears, and forebodings which consolidate into certainties. We are sure that in that future are losses, and sorrows, and death; thank God! we are sure too, that He is in it. That certainty alone, and what comes of it, makes it possible for a thoughtful man to face to-morrow without fear or tumult. The only rest from apprehensions which are but too reasonable is ‘rest in the Lord.’ If we are sure that He will be there, and if we delight in Him, then we can afford to say, ‘As for all the rest, let it be as He wills, it will be well.’ That thought alone, dear friends! will give calmness. What else is there, brethren! for a man fronting that vague future, from whose weltering sea such black, sharp-toothed rocks protrude? Shall we bow before some stern Fate, as its lord, and try to be as stern as It? Shall we think of some frivolous Chance, as tossing its unguided waves, and try to be as frivolous as It? Shall we try to be content with an animal limitation to the present, and heighten the bright colour of the little to-day by the black background that surrounds it, saying, ‘Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die’? Is it not better, happier, nobler, every way truer, to look into that perilous uncertain future, or rather to look past it to the loving Father who is its Lord and ours, and to wait patiently for Him? Confidence that the future will but evolve God’s purposes, and that all these are enlisted on our side, will give peace and power. Without it all is chaos, and we flying atoms in the anarchic mass; or else all is coldblooded impersonal law, and we crushed beneath its chariot-wheels. Here, and here alone, is the secret of tranquillity.
But remember, brethren! that the peaceful confidence of this final counsel is legitimate only when we have obeyed the other two. I have no business, for instance, to expect God to save me from the natural consequences of my own worldliness or folly. If I have taken up a course from eager desires for earthly good, or from obedience to any inclination of my own without due regard to His will, I have no right, when things begin to go awry, to turn round to God and say, ‘Lord! I wait upon Thee to save me.’ And though repentance, and forsaking of our evil ways at any point in a man’s course, do ensure, through Jesus Christ, God’s loving forgiveness, yet the evil consequences of past folly are often mercifully suffered to remain with us all our days. He who has delighted in the Lord, and committed his way unto Him, can venture to front whatever may be coming; and though not without much consciousness of sin and weakness, can yet cast upon God the burden of taking care of him, and claim from his faithful Father the protection and the peace which He has bound Himself to give.
And O dear friends! what a calm will enter our souls then, solid, substantial, ‘the peace of God,’ gift and effluence from the ‘God of peace’! How blessed then to leave all the possible to-morrow with a very quiet heart in His hands! How easy then to bear the ignorance, how possible then to face the certainties, of that solemn future! Change and death can only thin away and finally remove the film that separates us from our delight. Whatever comes here or yonder can but bring us blessing; for we must be glad if we have God, and if our wills are parallel with His, whose Will all things serve. Our way is traced by Him, and runs alongside of His. It leads to Himself. Then rest in the Lord, and ‘judge nothing before the time.’ We cannot criticise the Great Artist when we stand before His unfinished masterpiece, and see dim outlines here, a patch of crude colour there. But wait patiently for Him, and so, in calm expectation of a blessed future and a finished work, which will explain the past, in honest submission of our way to God, in supreme delight in Him who is the gladness of our joy, the secret of tranquillity will be ours.
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 Be still
Be still
"Be quiet"
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translationWords
patient
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Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 37:7 Be still: We should let the Lord be…
37:7 Be still: We should let the Lord be God rather than taking matters into our own hands.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.