1 My cry goes to God! Indeed, I cry to God for help, and for him to listen to me.
2 In the day of my trouble I sought the Lord. My hand was stretched out in the night, and didn’t get tired. My soul refused to be comforted.
3 I remember God, and I groan. I complain, and my spirit is overwhelmed.
4 You hold my eyelids open. I am so troubled that I can’t speak.
5 I have considered the days of old, the years of ancient times.
6 I remember my song in the night. I consider in my own heart; my spirit diligently inquires:
7 “Will the Lord reject us forever? Will he be favorable no more?
8 Has his loving kindness vanished forever? Does his promise fail for generations?
9 Has God forgotten to be gracious? Has he, in anger, withheld his compassion?”
KJVKing James Version
1 I cried unto God with my voice, even unto God with my voice; and he gave ear unto me.
2 In the day of my trouble I sought the Lord: my sore ran in the night, and ceased not: my soul refused to be comforted.
3 I remembered God, and was troubled: I complained, and my spirit was overwhelmed. Selah.
4 Thou holdest mine eyes waking: I am so troubled that I cannot speak.
5 I have considered the days of old, the years of ancient times.
6 I call to remembrance my song in the night: I commune with mine own heart: and my spirit made diligent search.
7 Will the Lord cast off for ever? and will he be favourable no more?
8 Is his mercy clean gone for ever? doth his promise fail for evermore?
9 Hath God forgotten to be gracious? hath he in anger shut up his tender mercies? Selah.
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JPSJPS Tanakh (1917)
1 (77-1) For the Leader; for Jeduthun. A Psalm of Asaph. (77-2) I will lift up my voice unto God, and cry; I will lift up my voice unto God, that He may give ear unto me.
2 (77-3) In the day of my trouble I seek the Lord; with my hand uplifted, mine eye streameth in the night without ceasing; my soul refuseth to be comforted.
3 (77-4) When I think thereon, O God, I must moan; when I muse thereon, my spirit fainteth. Selah
4 (77-5) Thou holdest fast the lids of mine eyes; I am troubled, and cannot speak.
5 (77-6) I have pondered the days of old, the years of ancient times.
6 (77-7) In the night I will call to remembrance my song; I will commune with mine own heart; and my spirit maketh diligent search:
7 (77-8) 'Will the Lord cast off for ever? and will He be favourable no more?
8 (77-9) Is His mercy clean gone for ever? Is His promise come to an end for evermore?
9 (77-10) Hath God forgotten to be gracious? Hath He in anger shut up his compassions?' Selah
Psalms 42:8(v6)Yahweh will command his loving kindness in the daytime. In the night his song shall be with me: a prayer to the God of my life.
Psalms 3:4(v1)I cry to Yahweh with my voice, and he answers me out of his holy hill.
Psalms 4:4(v6)Stand in awe, and don’t sin. Search your own heart on your bed, and be still.
Psalms 50:15(v2)Call on me in the day of trouble. I will deliver you, and you will honor me.”
Genesis 37:35(v2)All his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted. He said, “For I will go down to Sheol to my son,…
Show all 100 cross-references
Psalms 139:23-24(v6)Search me, God, and know my heart. Try me, and know my thoughts. See if there is any wicked way in me, and lead me in the everlasting way.
Isaiah 26:9(v2)With my soul I have desired you in the night. Yes, with my spirit within me I will seek you earnestly; for when your judgments are in the…
Psalms 85:1(v7)Yahweh, you have been favorable to your land. You have restored the fortunes of Jacob.
Isaiah 26:16(v2)Yahweh, in trouble they have visited you. They poured out a prayer when your chastening was on them.
Lamentations 3:40(v6)Let us search and try our ways, and turn again to Yahweh.
Deuteronomy 32:7(v5)Remember the days of old. Consider the years of many generations. Ask your father, and he will show you; your elders, and they will tell…
Job 10:2(v6)I will tell God, ‘Do not condemn me. Show me why you contend with me.
Psalms 61:2(v3)From the end of the earth, I will call to you when my heart is overwhelmed. Lead me to the rock that is higher than I.
Psalms 89:46(v7)How long, Yahweh? Will you hide yourself forever? Will your wrath burn like fire?
Psalms 142:2-3(v3)I pour out my complaint before him. I tell him my troubles. When my spirit was overwhelmed within me, you knew my route. On the path in…
Ecclesiastes 1:16(v6)I said to myself, “Behold, I have obtained for myself great wisdom above all who were before me in Jerusalem. Yes, my heart has had great…
Isaiah 51:9(v5)Awake, awake, put on strength, arm of Yahweh! Awake, as in the days of old, the generations of ancient times. Isn’t it you who cut Rahab in…
Lamentations 3:31-32(v7)For the Lord will not cast off forever. For though he causes grief, yet he will have compassion according to the multitude of his loving…
Acts 16:25(v6)But about midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them.
Romans 11:1-2(v7)I ask then, did God reject his people? May it never be! For I also am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. God…
Hebrews 5:7(v2)He, in the days of his flesh, having offered up prayers and petitions with strong crying and tears to him who was able to save him from…
Esther 4:1-4(v2)Now when Mordecai found out all that was done, Mordecai tore his clothes, and put on sackcloth with ashes, and went out into the middle of…
Job 7:13-15(v4)When I say, ‘My bed will comfort me. My couch will ease my complaint;’ then you scare me with dreams, and terrify me through visions: so…
Job 31:23(v3)For calamity from God is a terror to me. Because of his majesty, I can do nothing.
Job 35:10(v6)But no one says, ‘Where is God my Maker, who gives songs in the night,
Psalms 50:1(v1)The Mighty One, God, Yahweh, speaks, and calls the earth from sunrise to sunset.
Psalms 85:5(v7)Will you be angry with us forever? Will you draw out your anger to all generations?
Psalms 142:1-3(v1)I cry with my voice to Yahweh. With my voice, I ask Yahweh for mercy. I pour out my complaint before him. I tell him my troubles. When my…
Jonah 1:2(v6)“Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and preach against it, for their wickedness has come up before me.”
Jonah 2:1-2(v2)Then Jonah prayed to Yahweh, his God, out of the fish’s belly. He said, “I called because of my affliction to Yahweh. He answered me. Out…
Numbers 23:19(v8)God is not a man, that he should lie, nor a son of man, that he should repent. Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and…
Job 6:4(v3)For the arrows of the Almighty are within me. My spirit drinks up their poison. The terrors of God set themselves in array against me.
Job 7:11(v3)“Therefore I will not keep silent. I will speak in the anguish of my spirit. I will complain in the bitterness of my soul.
Job 23:15-16(v3)Therefore I am terrified at his presence. When I consider, I am afraid of him. For God has made my heart faint. The Almighty has terrified…
Psalms 6:6(v4)I am weary with my groaning. Every night I flood my bed. I drench my couch with my tears.
Psalms 39:1(v1)I said, “I will watch my ways, so that I don’t sin with my tongue. I will keep my mouth with a bridle while the wicked is before me.”
Psalms 42:5(v3)Why are you in despair, my soul? Why are you disturbed within me? Hope in God! For I shall still praise him for the saving help of his…
Psalms 42:11(v3)Why are you in despair, my soul? Why are you disturbed within me? Hope in God! For I shall still praise him, the saving help of my…
Psalms 43:5(v3)Why are you in despair, my soul? Why are you disturbed within me? Hope in God! For I shall still praise him: my Savior, my helper, and my…
Psalms 55:4-5(v3)My heart is severely pained within me. The terrors of death have fallen on me. Fearfulness and trembling have come on me. Horror has…
Psalms 62:1(v1)My soul rests in God alone. My salvation is from him.
Psalms 102:1-2(v2)Hear my prayer, Yahweh! Let my cry come to you. Don’t hide your face from me in the day of my distress. Turn your ear to me. Answer me…
Psalms 102:3-28(v3)For my days consume away like smoke. My bones are burned as a torch. My heart is blighted like grass, and withered, for I forget to eat my…
Psalms 143:4-5(v3)Therefore my spirit is overwhelmed within me. My heart within me is desolate. I remember the days of old. I meditate on all your doings. I…
Psalms 143:5(v5)I remember the days of old. I meditate on all your doings. I contemplate the work of your hands.
Isaiah 49:14-15(v9)But Zion said, “Yahweh has forsaken me, and the Lord has forgotten me.” “Can a woman forget her nursing child, that she should not have…
Jeremiah 17:17(v3)Don’t be a terror to me. You are my refuge in the day of evil.
Jeremiah 31:15(v2)Yahweh says: “A voice is heard in Ramah, lamentation and bitter weeping, Rachel weeping for her children. She refuses to be comforted for…
Lamentations 3:39(v3)Why does a living man complain, a man for the punishment of his sins?
Hosea 5:13(v2)“When Ephraim saw his sickness, and Judah his wound, Then Ephraim went to Assyria, and sent to king Jareb: but he is not able to heal you,…
Romans 9:6(v8)But it is not as though the word of God has come to nothing. For they are not all Israel that are of Israel.
1 Corinthians 11:28-32(v6)But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread, and drink of the cup. For he who eats and drinks in an unworthy way eats…
2 Peter 3:9(v8)The Lord is not slow concerning his promise, as some count slowness; but he is patient with us, not wishing that anyone should perish, but…
Genesis 32:7-12(v2)Then Jacob was greatly afraid and was distressed. He divided the people who were with him, and the flocks, and the herds, and the camels,…
Genesis 32:28(v2)He said, “Your name will no longer be called Jacob, but Israel; for you have fought with God and with men, and have prevailed.”
Numbers 14:34(v8)After the number of the days in which you spied out the land, even forty days, for every day a year, you will bear your iniquities, even…
2 Kings 19:3-4(v2)They said to him, “Hezekiah says, ‘Today is a day of trouble, of rebuke, and of rejection; for the children have come to the point of…
2 Kings 19:15-20(v2)Hezekiah prayed before Yahweh, and said, “Yahweh, the God of Israel, who are enthroned above the cherubim, you are the God, even you alone,…
2 Chronicles 6:28(v2)“If there is famine in the land, if there is pestilence, if there is blight or mildew, locust or caterpillar; if their enemies besiege them…
Job 2:13(v4)So they sat down with him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and no one spoke a word to him, for they saw that his grief was very…
Job 11:13(v2)“If you set your heart aright, stretch out your hands toward him.
Psalms 6:2-3(v2)Have mercy on me, Yahweh, for I am faint. Yahweh, heal me, for my bones are troubled. My soul is also in great anguish. But you, Yahweh—how…
Psalms 13:1-2(v7)How long, Yahweh? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long shall I take counsel in my soul, having…
Psalms 18:6(v2)In my distress I called on Yahweh, and cried to my God. He heard my voice out of his temple. My cry before him came into his ears.
Psalms 34:6(v1)This poor man cried, and Yahweh heard him, and saved him out of all his troubles.
Psalms 37:24(v7)Though he stumble, he shall not fall, for Yahweh holds him up with his hand.
Psalms 38:3-8(v2)There is no soundness in my flesh because of your indignation, neither is there any health in my bones because of my sin. For my iniquities…
Psalms 40:11(v9)Don’t withhold your tender mercies from me, Yahweh. Let your loving kindness and your truth continually preserve me.
Psalms 44:1(v5)We have heard with our ears, God; our fathers have told us what work you did in their days, in the days of old.
Psalms 63:6(v2)when I remember you on my bed, and think about you in the night watches.
Psalms 86:7(v2)In the day of my trouble I will call on you, for you will answer me.
Psalms 88:1-3(v2)Yahweh, the God of my salvation, I have cried day and night before you. Let my prayer enter into your presence. Turn your ear to my cry.…
Psalms 88:3-18(v3)For my soul is full of troubles. My life draws near to Sheol. I am counted among those who go down into the pit. I am like a man who has no…
Psalms 89:38(v7)But you have rejected and spurned. You have been angry with your anointed.
Psalms 130:1-2(v2)Out of the depths I have cried to you, Yahweh. Lord, hear my voice. Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my petitions.
Proverbs 18:14(v2)A man’s spirit will sustain him in sickness, but a crushed spirit, who can bear?
Isaiah 1:5-6(v2)Why should you be beaten more, that you revolt more and more? The whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint. From the sole of the foot…
Jeremiah 15:18(v8)Why is my pain perpetual, and my wound incurable, which refuses to be healed? Will you indeed be to me as a deceitful brook, like waters…
Hosea 6:1(v2)“Come! Let’s return to Yahweh; for he has torn us to pieces, and he will heal us; he has injured us, and he will bind up our wounds.
Habakkuk 3:17-18(v6)For though the fig tree doesn’t flourish, nor fruit be in the vines; the labor of the olive fails, the fields yield no food; the flocks are…
Luke 16:25-26(v8)“But Abraham said, ‘Son, remember that you, in your lifetime, received your good things, and Lazarus, in the same way, bad things. But here…
John 11:31(v2)Then the Jews who were with her in the house and were consoling her, when they saw Mary, that she rose up quickly and went out, followed…
2 Corinthians 12:7-8(v2)By reason of the exceeding greatness of the revelations, that I should not be exalted excessively, a thorn in the flesh was given to me: a…
1 Chronicles 25:3(v1)Of Jeduthun, the sons of Jeduthun: Gedaliah, Zeri, Jeshaiah, Shimei, Hashabiah, and Mattithiah, six, under the hands of their father…
1 Chronicles 25:6(v1)All these were under the hands of their father for song in Yahweh’s house, with cymbals, stringed instruments, and harps, for the service…
Esther 6:1(v4)On that night, the king couldn’t sleep. He commanded the book of records of the chronicles to be brought, and they were read to the king.
Job 6:3(v4)For now it would be heavier than the sand of the seas, therefore have my words been rash.
Psalms 25:6(v9)Yahweh, remember your tender mercies and your loving kindness, for they are from old times.
Psalms 44:9(v7)But now you rejected us, and brought us to dishonor, and don’t go out with our armies.
Psalms 51:1(v9)Have mercy on me, God, according to your loving kindness. According to the multitude of your tender mercies, blot out my transgressions.
Psalms 55:16-17(v1)As for me, I will call on God. Yahweh will save me. Evening, morning, and at noon, I will cry out in distress. He will hear my voice.
Psalms 74:1(v7)God, why have you rejected us forever? Why does your anger smolder against the sheep of your pasture?
Psalms 74:12-18(v5)Yet God is my King of old, working salvation throughout the earth. You divided the sea by your strength. You broke the heads of the sea…
Psalms 79:5(v7)How long, Yahweh? Will you be angry forever? Will your jealousy burn like fire?
Psalms 116:1-2(v1)I love Yahweh, because he listens to my voice, and my cries for mercy. Because he has turned his ear to me, therefore I will call on him as…
Isaiah 27:11(v8)When its boughs are withered, they will be broken off. The women will come and set them on fire, for they are a people of no understanding.…
Isaiah 40:27(v9)Why do you say, Jacob, and speak, Israel, “My way is hidden from Yahweh, and the justice due me is disregarded by my God?”
Isaiah 63:9-15(v5)In all their affliction he was afflicted, and the angel of his presence saved them. In his love and in his pity he redeemed them. He bore…
Isaiah 63:15(v9)Look down from heaven, and see from the habitation of your holiness and of your glory. Where are your zeal and your mighty acts? The…
Lamentations 3:17(v3)You have removed my soul far away from peace. I forgot prosperity.
100 distinct cross-references across this passage (105 total citations).
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this passage (27 sources)
Historical commentary, presented as a primary source — not an endorsement.
John Calvin1540 · Public DomainOn vv1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 91. My voice came to God, and I cried.…
1. My voice came to God, and I cried. This is not a mere complaint, as some interpreters explain it, denoting the surprise which the people of God felt in finding that he who hitherto had been accustomed to grant their requests shut his ears to them, and was called upon in vain. It appears more probable that the prophet either speaks of the present feeling of his mind, or else calls to remembrance how he had experienced that God was inclined and ready to hear his prayers. There can be no doubt that he describes the greatness of the sorrow with which he was afflicted; and, in nay opinion, he denotes a continued act both by the past and the future tenses of the verbs. In the first place, he declares that he did not foolishly rend the air with his cries, like many who pour forth bitter cries without measure and at random under their sorrows; but that he addressed his speech to God when necessity constrained him to cry. The copula and, which is joined to the verb cried, should be resolved into the adverb of time when, in this way, When I cried my voice came to God At the same time, he also shows, that although he had been constrained often to reiterate his cries, he had not given over persevering in prayer. What is added immediately after is intended for the confirmation of his faith: And he heard me. The copula and, as in many other places, is here put instead of the causal adverb for. The meaning is, that he encouraged himself to cry to God, from the consideration that it was God’s usual manner to show his favor and mercy towards him.
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 translators1599 · Public DomainOn vv1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8The Prophet teacheth us by his example to flee…
The Prophet teacheth us by his example to flee unto God for help in our necessities.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp1656 · Public DomainOn vv1–9Psa 77:1 « To the chief Musician, to Jeduthun,…
Psa 77:1 « To the chief Musician, to Jeduthun, A Psalm of Asaph. » I cried unto God with my voice, [even] unto God with my voice; and he gave ear unto me.
A Psalm of Asaph] Or, for Asaph; David’s melancholy psalm some call it, made by him when he was in grievous affliction and desertion. Out of which he seeketh to wind by earnest prayer, by deep meditation upon God’s former favours and unchangeable nature; and, lastly, by calling to mind God’s wondrous works of old, both in proving and in preserving his Church and chosen.
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Ver. 1. I cried unto God with my voice, &c.] I prayed instantly and constantly, and sped accordingly. No faithful prayer is ineffectual.
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 Poole1685 · Public DomainOn vv1–9This verse seems to contain the sum of the…
This verse seems to contain the sum of the whole Psalm, consisting of two parts, to wit, his earnest cry to God in his deep distress; and God’s gracious return to his prayers, by supporting him under them, and giving him assurance of a good issue out of them; of both which he speaks more distinctly and particularly, of the first from Psa 77:2-10, of the latter thence to the end.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry1710 · Public DomainOn v1We have here the lively portraiture of a good…
We have here the lively portraiture of a good man under prevailing melancholy, fallen into and sinking in that horrible pit and that miry clay, but struggling to get out. Drooping saints, that are of a sorrowful spirit, may here as in a glass see their own faces. The conflict which the psalmist had with his griefs and fears seems to have been over when he penned this record of it; for he says (Psa 77:1), I cried unto God, and he gave ear unto me, which, while the struggle lasted, he had not the comfortable sense of, as he had afterwards; but he inserts it in the beginning of his narrative as an intimation that his trouble did not end in despair; for God heard him, and, at length, he knew that he heard him. Observe,
I. His melancholy prayers. Being afflicted, he prayed (Jam 5:13), and, being in an agony, he prayed more earnestly (Psa 77:1): My voice was unto God, and I cried, even with my voice unto God. He was full of complaints, loud complaints, but he directed them to God, and turned them all into prayers, vocal prayers, very earnest and importunate. Thus he gave vent to his grief and gained some ease; and thus he took the right way in order to relief (Psa 77:2): In the day of my trouble I sought the Lord. Note, Days of trouble must be days of prayer, days of inward trouble especially, when God seems to have withdrawn from us; we must seek him and seek till we find him. In the day of his trouble he did not seek for the diversion of business or recreation, to shake off his trouble that way, but he sought God, and his favour and grace. Those that are under trouble of mind must not think to drink it away, or laugh it away, but must pray it away. My hand was stretched out in the night and ceased not; so Dr. Hammond reads the following words, as speaking the incessant importunity of his prayers. Compare Psa 143:5, Psa 143:6.
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II. His melancholy grief. Grief may then be called melancholy indeed, 1. When it admits of no intermission; such was his: My sore, or wound, ran in the night, and bled inwardly, and it ceased not, no, not in the time appointed for rest and sleep. 2. When it admits of no consolation; and that also as his case: My soul refused to be comforted; he had no mind to hearken to those that would be his comforters. As vinegar upon nitre, so is he that sings songs to a heavy heart, Pro 25:20. Nor had he any mind to think of those things that would be his comforts; he put them far from him, as one that indulged himself in sorrow. Those that are in sorrow, upon any account, do not only prejudice themselves, but affront God, if they refuse to be comforted.
III. His melancholy musings. He pored so much upon the trouble, whatever it was, personal or public, that, 1. The methods that should have relieved him did but increase his grief, Psa 77:3. (1.) One would have thought that the remembrance of God would comfort him, but it did not: I remembered God and was troubled, as poor Job (Job 23:15); I am troubled at his presence; when I consider I am afraid of him. When he remembered God his thoughts fastened only upon his justice, and wrath, and dreadful majesty, and thus God himself became a terror to him. (2.) One would have thought that pouring out his soul before God would give him ease, but it did not; he complained, and yet his spirit was overwhelmed, and sank under the load. 2. The means of his present relief were denied him, v. 4. He could not enjoy sleep, which, if it be quiet and refreshing, is a parenthesis to our griefs and cares: "Thou holdest my eyes waking with thy terrors, which make me full of tossings to and fro until the dawning of the day." He could not speak, by reason of the disorder of his thoughts, the tumult of his spirits, and the confusion his mind was in: He kept silence even from good while his heart was hot within him; he was ready to burst like a new bottle (Job 32:19), and yet so troubled that he could not speak and refresh himself. Grief never preys so much upon the spirits as when it is thus smothered and pent up.
IV. His melancholy reflections (Psa 77:5, Psa 77:6): "I have considered the days of old, and compared them with the present days; and our former prosperity does but aggravate our present calamities: for we see not the wonders that our fathers told us off." Melancholy people are apt to pore altogether upon the days of old and the years of ancient times, and to magnify them, for the justifying of their own uneasiness and discontent at the present posture of affairs. But say not thou that the former days were better than these, because it is more than thou knowest whether they were or no, Ecc 7:10. Neither let the remembrance of the comforts we have lost make us unthankful for those that are left, or impatient under our crosses. Particularly, he called to remembrance his song in the night, the comforts with which he had supported himself in his former sorrows and entertained himself in his former solitude. These songs he remembered, and tried if he could not sing them over again; but he was out of tune for them, and the remembrance of them did but pour out his soul in him, Psa 43:4. See Job 35:10.
V. His melancholy fears and apprehensions: "I communed with my own heart, Psa 77:6. Come, my soul, what will be the issue of these things? What can I think of them and what can I expect they will come to at last? I made diligent search into the causes of my trouble, enquiring wherefore God contended with me and what would be the consequences of it. And thus I began to reason, Will the Lord cast off for ever, as he does for the present? He is not now favourable; and will he be favourable no more? His mercy is now gone; and is it clean gone for ever? His promise now fails; and does it fail for evermore? God is not now gracious; but has he forgotten to be gracious? His tender mercies have been withheld, perhaps in wisdom; but are they shut up, shut up in anger?" Psa 77:7-9. This is the language of a disconsolate deserted soul, walking in darkness and having no light, a case not uncommon even with those that fear the Lord and obey the voice of his servant, Isa 50:10. He may here be looked upon, 1. As groaning under a sore trouble. God hid his face from him, and withdrew the usual tokens of his favour. Note, Spiritual trouble is of all trouble most grievous to a gracious soul; nothing wounds and pierces it like the apprehensions of God's being angry, the suspending of his favour and the superseding of his promise; this wounds the spirit; and who can bear that? 2. As grappling with a strong temptation. Note, God's own people, in a cloudy and dark day, may be tempted to make desperate conclusions about their own spiritual state and the condition of God's church and kingdom in the world, and, as to both, to give up all for gone. We may be tempted to think that God has abandoned us and cast us off, that the covenant of grace fails us, and that the tender mercy of our God shall be for ever withheld from us. But we must not give way to such suggestions as these. If fear and melancholy ask such peevish questions, let faith answer them from the Scripture: Will the Lord cast off for ever? God forbid, Rom 11:1. No; the Lord will not cast off his people, Psa 94:14. Will he be favourable no more? Yes, he will; for, though he cause grief, yet will he have compassion, Lam 3:32. Is his mercy clean gone for ever? No; his mercy endures for ever; as it is from everlasting, it is to everlasting, Psa 103:17. Doth his promise fail for evermore? No; it is impossible for God to lie, Heb 6:18. Hath God forgotten to be gracious? No; he cannot deny himself, and his own name which he hath proclaimed gracious and merciful, Exo 34:6. Has he in anger shut up his tender mercies? No; they are new every morning (Lam 3:23); and therefore, How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? Hos 11:8, Hos 11:9. Thus was he going on with his dark and dismal apprehensions when, on a sudden, he first checked himself with that word, Selah, "Stop there; go no further; let us hear no more of these unbelieving surmises;" and he then chid himself (Psa 77:10): I said, This is my infirmity. He is soon aware that it is not well said, and therefore, "Why art thou cast down, O my soul? I said, This is my affliction" (so some understand it); "This is the calamity that falls to my lot and I must make the best of it; every one has his affliction, his trouble in the flesh; and this is mine, the cross I must take up." Or, rather, "This is my sin; it is my iniquity, the plague of my own heart." These doubts and fears proceed from the want and weakness of faith and the corruption of a distempered mind. note, (1.) We all know that concerning ourselves of which we must say, "This is our infirmity, a sin that most easily besets us." (2.) Despondency of spirit, and distrust of God, under affliction, are too often the infirmities of good people, and, as such, are to be reflected upon by us with sorrow and shame, as by the psalmist here: This is my infirmity. When at any time it is working in us we must thus suppress the rising of it, and not suffer the evil spirit to speak. We must argue down the insurrections of unbelief, as the psalmist here: But I will remember the years of the right hand of the Most High. He had been considering the years of ancient times (Psa 77:5), the blessings formerly enjoyed, the remembrance of which did only add to his grief; but now he considered them as the years of the right hand of the Most High, that those blessings of ancient times came from the Ancient of days, from the power and sovereign disposal of his right hand who is over all, God, blessed for ever, and this satisfied him; for may not the Most High with his right hand make what changes he pleases?
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill1763 · Public DomainOn vv1–9I cried unto God with my voice,.... Which is…
I cried unto God with my voice,.... Which is to be understood of prayer, and that vocal, and which is importunate and fervent, being made in distress; see Psa 3:4, or "my voice was unto God" (h), "and I cried"; it was directed to him, and expressed in a very loud and clamorous way:
even unto God with my voice; or "my voice was unto God"; which is repeated to show that he prayed again and again, with great eagerness and earnestness, his case being a very afflicted one:
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and he gave ear unto me; his prayer was not without success; God is a God hearing and answering prayer, according to his promise, Psa 50:15.
(h) "vox mea ad Deum", Pagninus, Montanus, Musculus, "fertur", Junius & Tremellius; "erat", Cocceius.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley1765 · Public DomainOn vv1–7The psalmist complains of deep distress, and temptations to…
The psalmist complains of deep distress, and temptations to despair, ver. 1-10. He encourages himself to hope, by the remembrance of what God had done formerly, ver. 11-20. To the chief musician, to Jeduthun, A psalm of Asaph.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke1810 · Public DomainOn vv1–9The psalmist's ardent prayer to God in the tine…
PSALM LXXVII
The psalmist's ardent prayer to God in the tine of distress,
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1-4.
The means he used to excite his confidence, 5-12.
God's wonderful works in behalf of his people, 13-20.
NOTES ON PSALM LXXVII
The title, "To the chief Musician, (or conqueror,) to Jeduthun, A Psalm of Asaph." On this title we may observe that both Asaph and Jeduthun were celebrated singers in the time of David, and no doubt were masters or leaders of bands which long after their times were called by their names. Hence Psalms composed during and after the captivity have these names prefixed to them. But there is reason to believe also, that there was a person of the name of Asaph in the captivity at Babylon. The author must be considered as speaking in the persons of the captive Israelites, It may however be adapted to the case of any individual in spiritual distress through strong temptation, or from a sense of the Divine displeasure in consequence of backsliding.
Verse 1. I cried unto God] The repetition here marks the earnestness of the psalmist's soul; and the word voice shows that the Psalm was not the issue of private meditation, but of deep mental trouble, which forced him to speak his griefs aloud.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson1811 · Public DomainOn vv1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7Psa 77:1. I cried unto God, &c. — This…
Psa 77:1. I cried unto God, &c. — This verse seems to contain the sum of the whole Psalm, consisting of two parts, namely, his earnest cry to God in his deep distress, and God’s gracious answer to his prayers, by supporting him under his troubles, and giving him assurance of a good issue out of them; of both which he speaks distinctly and particularly as he proceeds in the Psalm.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes1834 · Public DomainOn vv1–9I cried unto God with my voice - That…
I cried unto God with my voice - That is, he cried or prayed audibly. It was not mere mental prayer. See the notes at Psa 3:4.
Even unto God with my voice - The repetition here is emphatic. The idea is that it was an earnest or fervent cry. Compare the notes at 2Co 12:8.
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And he gave ear unto me - See Psa 5:1, note; Psa 17:6, note.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures1864 · Public DomainOn v1Psalms 77
Psalms 77
To the chief Musician, to Jeduthun A Psalm of Asaph
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2 I cried unto God with my voice,
Even unto God with my voice; and he gave ear unto me.
3 In the day of my trouble I sought the Lord:
My sore ran in the night and ceased not:
My soul refused to be comforted.
4 I remembered God, and was troubled:
I complained, and my spirit was overwhelmed. Selah.
5 Thou holdest mine eyes waking:
I am so troubled that I cannot speak.
6 I have considered the days of old,
The years of ancient times.
7 I call to remembrance my song in the night:
I commune with mine own heart: and my spirit made diligent search.
8 Will the Lord cast off forever?
And will he be favorable no more?
9 Is his mercy clean gone forever?
Doth his promise fail for evermore?
10 Hath God forgotten to be gracious?
Hath he in anger shut up his tender mercies? Selah.
11 And I said, This is my infirmity:
But I will remember the years of the right hand of the Most High.
12 I will remember the works of the Lord:
Surely I will remember thy wonders of old.
13 I will meditate also of all thy work,
And talk of thy doings.
14 Thy way, O God, is in the sanctuary:
Who is so great a God as our God?
15 Thou art the God that doest wonders:
Thou hast declared thy strength among the people.
16 Thou hast with thine arm redeemed thy people,
The sons of Jacob and Joseph. Selah.
17 The waters saw thee, O God,
The waters saw thee; they were afraid:
The depths also were troubled.
18 The clouds poured out water:
The skies sent out a sound:
Thine arrows also went abroad.
19 The voice of thy thunder was in the heaven:
The lightnings lightened the world:
The earth trembled and shook.
20 Thy way is in the sea,
And thy path in the great waters,
And thy footsteps are not known.
21 Thou leddest thy people like a flock
By the hand of Moses and Aaron.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
Contents and Composition.—On the superscription compare Introd., § 12, No. 6 In three strophes, of which the first and third end with Selah, we hare presented to us a prayer of one in deep distress. It begins with the earnest declaration that he is sighing and crying to God unceasingly (Psa_77:2-4), and, after recounting his sad reminiscences of happy days that were past (Psa_77:5-7) it lets us hear his anxious question (Psa_77:8-10), whether God’s mercy had forever forsaken him. In three strophes, of which the second ends with Selah, a growing calmness is exhibited. The Psalmist first finds consolation in reflecting upon God’s controlling hand in this affliction as well as in His former deeds (Psa_77:11-13) and then extols (Psa_77:14-16) God the Holy and Almighty One, as the Deliverer of His people even until now, and finally gives a poetical picture of the deliverance from Egypt, (Psa_77:17-20). A concluding verse (21) represents this Divine guidance of the people under an image frequent in the Asaph-Psalms, in such a manner that it excites an expectation of its continuance, and yet the thought which is presented is here developed no further. There is no sufficient ground, however, for the conjecture that the Psalm is incomplete (Tholuck), or that we have it in a mutilated form (Rosenmueller, Olshausen) or that it forms a part of Psalms 80. (Pareau, Instit. interpr., Vet. Test., p. 330). Such an abrupt termination can be explained on the ground of a poetical purpose (De Wette), nor is it without other example in the Bible (Hupfeld). The attaching of the verse to the lyrical strophe, Psa_77:17 ff., which itself varies from the regular rhythmical structure, is unexpected. The contents of the passage resemble Psa_97:4, but especially Psalms 114., and Hab_3:10 f. It is doubtful which of these passages should be regarded as the earliest. With reference to Psa_97:4, at all events, the resemblances are quite general, and therefore only casual (Philippson), but in the case of the other two passages the whole manner of expression declares the opposite. According to Hupfeld, a comparison favors the supposition that the one before us is the latest. We need not however assume that a later addition was made to the Psalm (Köster) perhaps by the Psalmist himself (Hupfeld). Neither have we sufficient reason to refer the whole Psalm to the age of the Syrian oppression (Venema, Olshausen) and to bring it into special connection with 1Ma_3:38 (Hitzig). The period of the Babylonian exile might be thought of (Ewald and most). Since, however, the destruction of the temple is not mentioned, and strong evidence can be adduced to show that the prophecy of Habakkuk presupposes this Psalm (Delitzsch, Hengst., Caspari); it appears also admissible to bring the latter into connection with the destruction of the Ten Tribes. More definite indications fail us. Even the mention of Joseph along with Jacob, Psa_77:16 b, might be due to the recollection of the deliverance of the people in Egypt (Targ., Calvin, Geier, and others). But it is still more natural to assume that Ephraim, the tribe second in importance (Psa_78:67) and the kingdom of Israel (Psa_80:2; Psa_81:6) are alluded to. Nothing more definite aids us to discover the affliction which is here bewailed, which, though experienced personally, and expressed as that of an individual, clearly represents a national calamity. [Dr. Moll seems undecided as to which of the passages above discussed has the priority in composition. If the Psalm can be shown to have been prior to the prophecy, we have a limit on one side, for it is generally acknowledged that Habakkuk wrote in the days of Josiah. For a full presentation of this side of the question, see Delitzsch’s Comm. on Hab., pp. 118–125, or the extracts made therefrom in his Comm. on Psalms, and in that of Hengstenberg. He uses two arguments which appear to most to be satisfactory. 1. That the acknowledged principle of Hab. in the structure of the 3d chapter was to imitate the Psalms, and that the presumption is therefore in favor of his being here the imitator and not the originator. 2. That it is improbable that the Psalmist “would have described a past deliverance in language borrowed from the prophetic description of a deliverance yet to come.” The arguments of Hupfeld on the other side are mainly based on his own subjective taste, and proceed chiefly upon the assumption that those of the corresponding expressions which are more natural and correct as to conception and diction are the earlier. This, therefore, assumes that the Psalmist in copying changed for the worse. Is it not at least as likely that the prophet, in imitating, altered for the better? Alexander favors the position of Delitzsch. Perowne feels that there is some force in Hupfeld’s arguments, and is therefore undecided. If the Psalm is the earlier it is therefore not later than the reign of Josiah. It is naturally brought into connection with the perplexing and harassing thoughts that filled the minds of the pious at that time in the contemplation both of the present and of the future.—Perowne and Barnes regard the speaker as recording his own personal experience. Alexander regards the Church as speaking through the Psalmist. The view of Dr. Moll, as above, mediates between these, and is most probably the correct one. For the feelings are all personal, while the recollections of the past, which are contrasted with the present, are all of national blessings.—J. F. M.]
Psa_77:3-4. My hand is stretched out in the night. [E. V., My sore ran in the night]. This expression [Heb. נִגְּרָה] usually employed of water (2Sa_14:14) and of tears (Lam_3:49) is here transferred to the hand. [German hingegossen. The two ideas cannot be rendered into English by one word, as is done here by Dr. Moll.—J. F. M.] But this mode of expression is not chosen because the hand is bedewed by tears (old expositors in Geier), or because it lies exhausted and powerless, and as an image of the decay that consumes the whole body (Hengst.); but, as the sequel shows, to describe the constant turning to God as an unchangeable inclination of the soul amid the ebb and flow of the tides of feeling. [The Rabbins understood יַד to mean the stroke of the hand, and therefore the wound, but did not connect it immediately with the verb. Our translators obtained the meaning “sore” from this, and construed directly with נגרה. Hence, “My sore ran in the night.” The next verb primarily means to be cold, next to be numb, stiff, still, to cease. The true rendering is: My hand was stretched forth in the night and was not still. Delitzsch: “The Psalmist toils in the time of his trouble to force his way to God, who has withdrawn Himself as though wishing to know nothing of him; his hand is stretched forth in the night time, without being relaxed, it is unbent, does not fall back while directed heavenward.”—J. F. M.] The præterites also in Psa_77:3, which many of the old translators have transferred to the whole strophe, express what is long since begun and still continues. The translation: eye, instead of: hand (Targ.) is not due to another text, but to a false effort at explanation. [Psa_77:4, should be translated, not as in our version, but: I remember God and groan. I think and my spirit is overwhelmed.—J. F. M.]
The eyelids, Psa_77:5, are here described as guards, or still better as shields. The translation: night-watches (Hengst., Hupfeld) cannot be proved either by the similar word, Psa_63:7, nor by Lam_2:19. [Hengst. and Hupf. assume that שְׁמֻרֹות is for אַשְׁמֻרֹות. Alexander differs from both views, and retains the view that it is a participle, giving it the passive sense: “my eyes kept,” that is, kept fast. But to take it in the active sense, as is done in E. V., and thought possible by Perowne, is incorrect.—J. F. M.]
Psa_77:11; Psa_77:17. This is my infirmity.—Others translate (with the Targ.): my entreaty is this. But the meaning: suffering, or more strictly: disease, wound, is rendered certain by Jer_10:19. In the next sentence expositors differ very greatly. But there should really only be hesitation between the translation: changing, or: years. In favor of the latter it may be urged that already in Psa_77:6 this explanation is indisputably to be given to the same word-form, and that the following thought is a more natural sequel to it. Then the assurance that God’s hand, and not the wickedness and power of men, had brought this season of humiliation (1Pe_5:6), inflicts, indeed, a wound in the heart. Yet it suggests also the comforting thought that everything is ordered duly and rightly, and therefore the sufferer, though still unrelieved, can win hope from the recollection of God’s former acts of help and deeds of mercy. And he gains it the more fully, the more willingly he humbles himself under the hand of such a God, and resigns himself to His holy will. If the translation: changing (Sept. and most of the ancient versions) is preferred, then it must be observed that the active sense: the hand of God can change everything (Luther) is linguistically not admissible, but only the passive, that the hand of God has been changed (Maurer, Hupfeld, Hitzig). But even then it is difficult to connect with what follows: and the thought itself is unintelligible and ambiguous. Then, the explanation that the supposition of a change in God’s actions and government is only a delusion, and that the Psalmist acknowledges this fancy to have been his former infirmity, is only gained by importing it into the words of the text. [Perowne translates: This is my sorrow, that the right hand of the Highest hath changed. Hengstenberg, with whom Alexander mainly agrees, explains by saying that the years are years of suffering inflicted by the hand of God, and so agrees with the explanation given above. The words in italics in E. V. are to be omitted. In Psa_77:17 instead of: “they were afraid,” render: they trembled.—J. F. M.]
Psa_77:19. In the whirlwind.—[E. V., In the heavens]. The rendering: wheel (the ancient versions and Isaaki) is here so much the less applicable, as galgal does not denote the form of the wheel when at rest, but its whirling motion. The rendering: sphæra, arch of heaven (most of the older translators after Kimchi) is therefore unsuitable. We must consequently understand either the whirlwind accompanying the under-storm (most of the moderns since J. D. Michaelis) or the rolling of the thunder (Aben Ezra, Maurer), and not introduce the idea of the wheels of Jehovah’s chariot (Rosenmueller, Hupfeld), but that of the rapid succession of thunder peals (Hengst., Böttcher). [Perowne translates: in the rolling, and explains it of God’s chariot, or of the whirlwind, though in his critical note he denies that the latter meaning can be supported. Alexander approves of the rendering whirlwind, and, in opposition to Hengstenberg, refers to Isa_17:13 as showing that that idea may be deduced from it.—J. F. M.]
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
1. There are times when the recollection of God’s former help, does not alleviate the pangs of present suffering, but only increases them. We experience, then, not only deep anguish, sleepless nights, disquieting thoughts, which toss us to and fro, but among the blows and shocks, which make us at one time shriek out, at another lose our breath, so that we cannot speak, scruples will arise, which grow into temptations, and, by the contrast of former and present circumstances, experiences, and feelings, doubt is excited as to our state of grace, and we hesitate as to the attitude of God towards us. Deliverance from such anxieties and dangers is effected by an unceasing wrestling or struggling on our way to God through all barriers, by prayer, and even with sighs and groans. Then we must not merely call to mind the hand of God, which rules in all events, but also resign ourselves truly to it in humble self-surrender, and ground our hope anew also upon the actual deeds of His might and grace, which have established and preserved the Church.
2. And thus lamentation is soon exchanged for a song of praise. The pious soul thinks no longer of itself and of its transient suffering, but of God’s eternal glory. The evidences of that shine out before him with comforting power from the history of revelation and redemption, even if God’s footsteps are not presented visibly to him as He marches through the world. And God is, and remains, even when through the instrumentality of human servants, the safe and trustworthy Leader of His people to the promised goal. Yes! He not only leads them through the sea and the desert, He tends them, too, as the Shepherd of His flock.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
Those who are under suffering like to think about themselves, and brood over their situation. It were better for them to meditate upon God’s doings.—The events of history not only awaken recollections, they excite also hopes.—God’s ruling in the affairs of the world we should not merely recognize and admit, we should also be willing to be subject to it ourselves.—Remain thou with the flock of God, and then He will never fail thee in need.—God is and remains Comforter, Leader, and Provider for His Church and each of her members.—God’s ways conduct surely to the goal, but all do not recognize them, nor all walk in them.—We must toil after God until we find Him, and after we have found Him we must not leave Him.—To surrender ourselves into God’s hands is the surest means of being lifted above even the deepest sorrows.—God has means and ways enough to help His people, but they are usually other than men expect.—By praising and extolling the glory of God, we soonest forget our earthly suffering and personal affliction.
Luther: If God were to be present with His help just when we think He should, all would be wrong. Let us learn that. well. And therefore this Psalm will show God to us, and teach us His way of helping, namely, that we are not to despair of God when it goes ill with us, but just then expect help most certainly, and not trust our own thoughts.
Starke: It is a glorious attribute of faith that it does not cease in prayer and supplication till God at last causes His gracious countenance to shine, and appears with His comfort and help.—Gather for thyself in good days a treasure of the comforting words of Scripture; times of drought are coming when no comfort holds.—Trust nothing but God’s mercy, and thou wilt certainly never be betrayed by false consolation.—It is better for the heart to pray without the mouth than the mouth without the heart.—In tribulation much is learned, and more in an hour than at other times in many years, for then is experienced in deed and in truth all that God’s word says.—God is Lord of nature; therefore can He create help when the help of nature fails.—Those who fill ecclesiastical and civil positions should cultivate brotherly unity after the example of Moses and Aaron, and then the discharge of their duties will be so much the more blessed.—Frisch: Let God’s word and the glorious and marvellous redemption of His children therein recorded be precious to thee, and then thou wilt be better contented with what He ordains for thee. Thou wilt ever discover more of God, how wonderful He is in His ways, holy in His works, unsearchable in His wisdom, immovable in His righteousness, and inexhaustible in His mercy.—Rieger: It is the crowning excellence of all God’s ways that He so unites the revealed and the concealed together as at once to strengthen and to exercise our faith.—Richter (Hausbibel): Here learn how the thought of faith, that Jehovah is, in all changes, the same unchangeable God to-day as He was in the most remote ages and events, when He proved Himself to be the inscrutable Saviour of His people, can calm and bless a soul which grieves over Israel’s troubles, and is tempted in utter darkness.—Tholuck: Shall God, to whose nature it belongs to be gracious, and faithfully to keep His promises, make an exception in my case? Impossible.—Diedrich: Our God must ever remain our support, even if we had only His deeds in the past to contemplate with delight. He will, however, again manifest His glory when He beholds us seeking consolation in Him.—Taube: Sleepless, helpless, speechless, comfortless, this is a clear and true picture of the condition of our poor hearts, when God closes the veil, and we are left alone abandoned to ourselves.—The obscurity and darkness are not in God’s heart, words, and ways, but upon our eyes and hearts.
[Barnes: Even in shallow waters, when one wades through them, the path closes at once, and the way cannot be traced, but God’s ways are like those of one who should move over a great ocean—over a boundless sea—where none could hope to follow Him.—J. F. M.]
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Daniel D. Whedon1874 · Public DomainOn vv1–91. I cried unto God— “My distresses were great,…
1. I cried unto God— “My distresses were great, and I had none but God to go to.”—Hammond.
He gave ear unto me—The rabbinical construction takes the verb as a peculiar form of the imperative, (hear thou me,) which suits better the feelings of the psalmist as not having yet received the answer to prayer. The complaint goes on to Psa_77:9, and the subsequent part of the psalm describes only the triumph of faith, not the formal fulfilment of his request. Compare Hab_3:17-19
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 Colleges1878 · Public DomainOn vv1–91. “Aloud unto God let me cry,
1. “Aloud unto God let me cry,
Yea, aloud unto God, and he will give ear to me.”
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1–3. The Psalmist relates how, under the pressure of calamity, he could find no consolation even in prayer.
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 Readers1878 · Public DomainOn vv1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7(1) I cried . . .—Better, following the Hebrew…
(1) I cried . . .—Better, following the Hebrew literally,
“My voice to God—and let me cry;
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My voice to God—and He hears me.”
The Authorised Version has followed the LXX. and Vulg. in neglecting the striking changes in mood running through this psalm. Soliloquy and narrative alternate as the poet’s mood impels him—now to give vent to his feelings in sobs and cries, now to analyse and describe them.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary1880 · Public DomainOn vv1–9THIS psalm is the lament and expostulation with God…
THIS psalm is the lament and expostulation with God of some afflicted person, perhaps Asaph, who speaks as the mouthpiece of his countrymen, complaining of Israel"s apparent desertion by God (vers. 1-9), but thence rising into a higher strain of hope and confidence, based on a recollection of Jehovah"s past mercies (vers. 10-20). The particular occasion which called forth the psalm cannot be determined. The psalm consists of six stanzas of three verses each, to which is appended one of two verses only. The pause mark, "selah," occurs at the end of the first, the third, and the fifth stanzas.
I cried unto God with my voice, even unto God with my voice. The repetition marks the intensity of the appeal, "with my voice that the appellant is not content with mere silent prayer. And he gave ear unto me; rather, "that he may hearken unto me" (Cheyne), or "and do thou hearken unto me" (Hengstenberg, Kay).
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HOMILIES BY S. CONWAY Vers. 1-20. From darkness to dawn.
So may this psalm be described. We have the night of weeping followed by the morning, if not of joy, yet of peace. It is a portraiture to which the experience of myriads of souls has answered and will answer. Hence, for the help of all such, the psalm has been given. We know not who the writer was, nor when, nor the special reason why, the psalm was written. We only know that it is the utterance of a heart that had been sorely troubled, but to whom light and peace came again. We are shown the darkness, the paling of that darkness, and the dawn.
I THE DARKNESS.
1. It was very dark. There was great trouble. He tells of it in vers. 2, 3, 4. And prayer seemed no good, notwithstanding it was very earnest, hence spoken aloud (ver. 1) and prolonged all the night through (ver. 2: "My hand in the night hath been stretched out the hand of entreaty and prayer and ceased not"). Nevertheless, no comfort came.
2. His grief seems to have prompted distrust. As Jacob (Gen_37:35) about Joseph, and David about his child (2Sa_12:17) and about Absalom, (2Sa 18) so here there was what there should not have been the refusing to be comforted.
3. But this made the darkness yet deeper. He could not remember God (ver. 3). He could not realize his presence and help; he could only sigh in distress. He could not commune with his own heart, but his spirit was too overwhelmed. He would sleep, but could not. He would speak to God, but his trouble was too great. The distressed soul, as it often does, utterly broke down. But a breakdown like that brings speedily the help of God. He will never leave his people in a strait like that, blessed be his Name! And so we see
II THE PALING OF THE DARKNESS. Those who ascend high mountains to witness the glory of the dawn are told of its advent by the paling of the darkness. And spiritually, we see this here. God sends the thoughts of his servant back to "the days of old" (ver. 5), and to the bright joyous periods which were like a "song," and their sweet memories came back and talked to him, and set his spirit in "diligent search," so that he was compelled to come to the conclusion that all his dark and dreadful thoughts about the Lord"s casting off forever, and being favourable no more (see vers. 7, 8, 9), were all impossible of belief, mere nightmares of the soul, altogether false and untrue. Then in ver. 10 he comes to see how he has been led to think such sad thoughts. "Then I said, This is my sorrow, that the right hand of the Highest hath changed." Yes, God"s providence had changed, but not his heart. Before we pass on, let us ask Why does God let his servants suffer such eclipse of all joy as is recorded here? Partly by way of reproof. The psalmist "refused to be comforted." We often do when, would we only say, "I will trust," then we should find that we should "not be afraid." It is the letting in of doubt and unbelief that works such harm. Or, if not for reproof, then for the sake of others, that when we find them in darkness, we may be able to tell them how God helped us.
III THE DAWN. This came through his remembrance of, and meditation on:
1. The deeds, so wondrous, of the Lord (vers. 11, 12).
2. What God himself was so holy and so great (ver. 13).
3. The recollection of God"s special act of redemption (vers. 15-19).
4. The shepherd care of God. S.C.
HOMILIES BY R. TUCK Ver. 1. Complaining to God.
"I will cry unto God with my voice, and may he give ear unto me!" No historical associations can be fixed for this psalm. It is the psalm of one deeply interested in the welfare of Israel, who takes as a burden on his own heart the depressed condition of the nation, and gloomily regards it as a sign of the withdrawal of God"s favour. The trouble of the writer is not persona], but relative; and with its moods may be compared the prayers of Daniel (Da 9) and of Nehemiah (Ne 1). It is well that there should always be persons who take the burdens of their nation on their own hearts; recognize the Divine relation to national condition; and put their feeling and desire into intercessory prayer. Under some phases of Christianity there is danger of religion becoming too strictly personal too little concerned with corporate and national life. This psalm is characteristically a psalm of complaint; it is the utterance of a man in sore perplexity and distress, who can only see the dark side even of Divine dealings. Was he right or wrong? May we say he was both right and wrong?
I ON THE FACE OF IT, COMPLAINING MUST BE WRONG. It is usually the utterance of the discontented mind. A man complains when he imagines himself to be neglected or ill used. At the bottom of complaining generally lies an overweening sense of our own importance the idea that we deserve better than we get. This, in part, may have affected the psalmist. Not concerning himself, but concerning the favoured nation. He complains because he thinks the nation deserved better at the hands of God than it was receiving. He was jealous for his people. Fancied desert is the root out of which complainings spring. But what desert can man or nation have before God, that can form ground of reproach? And whoever makes much of his "deserts" must be reminded of his "ill deserts." "If thou, Lord, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand?" Complaining of God must be wrong; because it shows
(1) no proper understanding of ourselves;
(2) no worthy apprehension of his wisdom and goodness.
Even in the strangest experiences, submission, not complaint, is the becoming thing.
II ON FURTHER CONSIDERATION, WE MAY SAY, COMPLAINING IS RIGHT. As a sign of confidence in God, it is right; but then it will be complaining to God, not of him. Openness before God means that we speak freely to him just what is in our thought and heart, Relief comes to us only when, in such ways, we can make full and free expression of our confidence, and tell God what we do think and feel, even though we know it is wrong to think and feel it. Reserve is the bane of friendship. There must be no reserve with God. And the very best way in which to become ashamed of our complainings is to speak them out before God. The infinite patience and gentleness towards us seems to search us through and through. R.T.
HOMILIES BY C. SHORT Vers. 1-15. Refuge in God"s unchangeableness.
Occasion of the psalm uncertain. "The poet flees from the sorrowful present away into the memory of the years of olden times, and consoles himself especially with the deliverance out of Egypt. But it remains obscure what kind of affliction it is which drives him to find refuge from the God now hidden in the God who was formerly manifest.
I HE PERSEVERES IN PRAYER, THOUGH HE HAS NO SENSE OF THE PRESENCE OR MERCY OF GOD. (Vers. 1-3)
II WHEN HE CAN NO LONGER PRAY, HE FALLS BACK IN THOUGHT UPON THE MEMORIES OF THE PAST. (Vers. 4-6)
III IF GOD HAS FORSAKEN HIM, IT IS SOMETHING INCONSISTENT WITH HIS NATURE AND COVENANT. (Vers. 7-9) His promises cannot fail; his mercy, which is from everlasting, cannot be blotted out from his nature. Ver. 10 is of doubtful interpretation.
IV HE WILL CONQUER HIS DOUBTS BY REMEMBERING GOD"S WONDERS WROUGHT FOR HIS PEOPLE OF OLD. (Vers. 10-15) Because God must be unchangeable. God redeemed his people from their afflictions in Egypt; therefore he will redeem them from their present affliction. 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. Spurgeon1885 · Public DomainOn vv1–9To the Chief Musician, to Jeduthun. It was meet…
To the Chief Musician, to Jeduthun. It was meet that another leader of the psalmody should take his turn. No harp should be silent in the courts of the Lord's house. A Psalm of Asaph. Asaph was a man of exercised mind, and often touched the minor key; he was thoughtful, contemplative, believing, but withal there was a dash of sadness about him, and this imparted a tonic flavour to his songs. To follow him with understanding, it is needful to have done business on the great waters, and weathered many an Atlantic gale.
If we follow the poetical arrangement, and divide at the Selahs, we shall find the troubled man of God pleading in Ps 77:1-3, and then we shall hear him lamenting and arguing within himself, Ps 77:4-9. From Ps 77:10-15 his meditations run toward God, and in the close he seems as in a vision to behold the wonders of the Red Sea and the wilderness. At this point, as if lost in an ecstasy, he hurriedly closes the Psalm with an abruptness, the effect of which is quite startling. The Spirit of God knows when to cease speaking, which is more than those do who, for the sake of making a methodical conclusion, prolong their words even to weariness. Perhaps this Psalm was meant to be a prelude to the next, and, if so, its sudden close is accounted for. The hymn now before us is for experienced saints only, but to them it will be of rare value as a transcript of their own inner conflicts.
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Ver. 1. I cried unto God with my voice. This Psalm has much sadness in it, but we may be sure it will end well, for it begins with prayer, and prayer never has an ill issue. Asaph did not run to man but to the Lord, and to him he went, not with studied, stately, stilted words, but with a cry, the natural, unaffected, unfeigned expression of pain. He used his voice also, for though vocal utterance is not necessary to the life of prayer, it often seems forced upon us by the energy of our desires. Sometimes the soul feels compelled to use the voice, for thus it finds a freer vent for its agony. It is a comfort to hear the alarm bell ringing when the house is invaded by thieves.
Even unto God with my voice. He returned to his pleading. If once sufficed not, he cried again. He needed an answer, he expected one, he was eager to have it soon, therefore he cried again and again, and with his voice too, for the sound helped his earnestness.
And he gave ear unto me. Importunity prevailed. The gate opened to the steady knock. It shall be so with us in our hour of trial, the God of grace will hear us in due season.
Whole Psalm. Whenever, and by whomsoever, the Psalm may have been written, it clearly is individual, not national. It utterly destroys all the beauty, all the tenderness and depth of feeling in the opening portion, if we suppose that the people are introduced speaking in the first person. The allusions to the national history may indeed show that the season was a season of national distress, and that the sweet singer was himself bowed down by the burden of the time, and oppressed by woes which he had no power to alleviate; but it is his own sorrow, not the sorrow of others under which he sighs, and of which he has left the pathetic record. J. J. Stewart Perowne.
Ver. 1. In the beginning of the Psalm, before speaking of his sorrows, he hastens to show the necessary and most efficacious remedy for allaying sorrow. He says that he did not, as many do, out of their impatience of grief or murmuring, either accuse God of cruelty or tyranny, or utter blasphemous words by which dishonour might fall upon God, or by indulging in sorrow and distrust hasten his own destruction, or fill the air with vain complaining, but fled straight to God and to him unburdened his sorrow, and sought that he would not shut him out from that grace which he bountifully offers to all. This is the only and sure sovereign remedy which most effectually heals his griefs. Mollerus.
Ver. 1. I cried. To the Orientals the word qeu presented the idea of a crash, as of the heavens sending out thunders and lightnings. Whence beyond other things he metaphorically says, he cried for sorrow; ...shaken with a tempest of thoughts he burst out into an open and loud sounding complaint. Hermann Venema.
Ver. 1. Even unto God with my voice. The repetition here is emphatic. The idea is that it was an earnest or fervent cry. Albert Barnes.
Ver. 1. (last clause). At the second knock, the door of grace flew open: the Lord heard me. John Collings.
Ver. 1. The benefit of using the voice in private prayer.
Ver. 1,3,5,10. Note the wise man's progress out of his soul trouble.
I. I cried.
II. I remembered.
III. I considered.
IV. I said.
"An Exposition upon the Seventy-seventh Psalm, made by the constant Martyr of Christ, Master John Hooper, Bishop of Gloucester and Worcester." In the "Later Writings of Bishop Hooper." (In Parker Society's Publications, and also in the "British Reformer's" series of the Religious Tract Society.)
Psalms 77:2*
Ver. 1,3,5,10. Note the wise man's progress out of his soul trouble.
I. I cried.
II. I remembered.
III. I considered.
IV. I said.
Psalms 77:4*
Ver. 1,3,5,10. Note the wise man's progress out of his soul trouble.
I. I cried.
II. I remembered.
III. I considered.
IV. I said.
Ver. 1,3,5,10. Note the wise man's progress out of his soul trouble.
I. I cried.
II. I remembered.
III. I considered.
IV. I said.
Charles H. Spurgeon's The Treasury of David (1869–1885) — public domain. Psalms only. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
The Biblical Illustrator1887 · Public DomainOn vv1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 9I cried unto God with my voice, even unto…
Psa_77:1-20
I cried unto God with my voice, even unto God with my voice; and He gave ear unto me.
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The faculty of human thought
The whole psalm may be used to illustrate the faculty of human thought. Throughout the whole the author speaks of remembering, considering, musing, making diligent search, meditating, etc, etc.
I. It is a power that can inflame the soul with longings for God (Psa_77:1-2). By thought this man brought the Eternal into his soul, even in the stillness and darkness of night. It presented Him as an Object to whom he appealed in his distress, and from whom he received relief.
II. It has power to fill the soul with mingled emotions.
1. Here is sadness (Psa_77:2-10). The writer says, his soul refused to be comforted, he was troubled, overwhelmed, so troubled that he could neither sleep nor speak, so troubled that he cries out, Will God cast off for ever? and will He be favourable no more? What sinful man can think upon God without being troubled with remorse and troubled with forebodings? Thought can lash the soul into a tempest, can kindle it into a hell.
2. Here is joy (Psa_77:10-20). And I said, this is my infirmity; or rather, my hope.
(1) The joy of gratitude. I remember the years of the right hand of the Most High. Thoughts upon the past mercies of God have a power to kindle the soul into raptures of gratitude.
(2) Joy of adoration. Thy way, O God, is in the sanctuary; or, Thy way is holy. The holiness of God is suited to inspire us with holy rapture.
(3) Joy of trustfulness. Thou art the God that doest wonders. The psalmist remembers what God had done in conducting the children of Israel through the Red Sea into the promised land; and this inspired and exalted him with new hope. Thus, thought can fill the soul either with sadness or with joy. It createst the weather within--cloudy or sunny, stormy or calm; the seasons within--spring, summer, autumn, or winter. What a wonderful faculty is this with which Heaven has endowed us, this faculty of thought.
III. It is a power over which man has a personal control. The psalmist speaks of himself as directing his own thoughts. I sought, I remembered, I considered. This power over thought is the dignity of our nature, and is that which invests us with responsibility. Man has no direct power over any faculty but this. He has no immediate control over his feelings or faiths. He could no more awaken love or produce repentance by a direct effort, than he could create a world. He can think or not think--think upon this subject or that, in this aspect or another, consecutively or desultorily, profoundly or superficially. This he can do; and herein is his freedom. (Homilist.)
Gods ear open to the cry of the needy
A cheque without a signature at the bottom is nothing but a worthless piece of paper. The stroke of a pen confers on it all its value. The prayer of a poor child of Adam is a feeble thing in itself, but once endorsed by the hand of the Lord Jesus, it availeth much. There was an officer in the city of Rome who was appointed to have his doors always open, in order to receive any Roman citizen who applied to him for help. Just so the ear of the Lord Jesus is ever open to the cry of all who want mercy and grace. It is His office to help them. (J. C. Ryle.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible1887 · Public DomainOn v1Psalms 77
Psalms 77
THE occasion of the profound sadness of the first part of this psalm may be inferred from the thoughts which brighten it into hope in the second. These were the memories of past national deliverance. It is natural to suppose that present national disasters were the causes of the sorrow which enveloped the psalmists spirit and suggested questions of despair, only saved from being blasphemous because they were so wistful. But it by no means follows that the singer is simply the personified nation. The piercing tone of individual grief is too clear, especially in the introductory verses, to allow of that hypothesis. Rather, the psalmist has taken into his heart the troubles of his people. Public calamity has become personal pain. What dark epoch has left its marks in this psalm remains uncertain. If Delitzschs contention that Habakkuk 3 is in part drawn from it were indubitably established, the attribution of the psalm to the times of Josiah would be plausible; but there is, at least, room for doubt whether there has been borrowing, and if so, which is original and which echo. The calamities of the Exile in their severity and duration would give reasonable ground for the psalmists doubts whether God had not cast off His people forever. No brief or partial eclipse of His favour would supply adequate occasion for these.
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The psalm falls into two parts, in the former of which (Psa_77:1-9) deepest gloom wraps the singers spirit, while in the latter (Psa_77:10-20) the clouds break. Each of these parts fall into three strophes, usually of three verses; but in the concluding strophe, consisting of five, Selah stands at the end of the first and third, and is not present at the end of the second, because it is more closely connected with the third than with the first. In like manner the first strophe of the second part (Psa_77:10-12) has no Selah, but the second has (Psa_77:13-15); the closing strophe (Psa_77:16-20) being thus parted off.
The psalmists agitation colours his language, which fluctuates in the first six verses between expressions of resolve or desire (Psa_77:1, Psa_77:3, Psa_77:6) and simple statement of fact (Psa_77:2, Psa_77:4, Psa_77:5). He has prayed long and earnestly, and nothing has been laid in answer on his outstretched palm. Therefore his cry has died down into a sigh. He fain would lift his voice to God, but dark thoughts make him dumb for supplication, and eloquent only in self-pitying monologue. A man must have waded through like depths to understand this pathetic bewilderment of spirit. They who glide smoothly over a sunlit surface of sea little know the terrors of sinking with choked lungs, into the abyss. A little experience will go further than much learning in penetrating the meaning of these moanings of lamed faith. They begin with an elliptical phrase, which, in its fragmentary character, reveals the psalmists discomposure. "My voice to God" evidently needs some such completion as is supplied above; and the form of the following verb ("cry") suggests that the supplied one should express wish or effort. The repetition of the phrase in Psa_77:1 b strengthens the impression of agitation. The last words of that clause may be a petition, "give ear," but are probably better taken as above. The psalmist would fain cry to God, that he may be heard. He has cried, as he goes on to tell in calmer mood in Psa_77:2, and has apparently not been heard. He describes his unintermitted supplications by a strong metaphor. The word rendered "stretched out" is literally poured out as water, and is applied to weeping eyes. {Lam_3:49} The Targum substitutes eye for hand here. but that is commentary, not translation. The clause which we render "without ceasing" is literally "and grew not stiff." That word, too, is used of tears, and derivatives from it are found in the passage just referred to in Lamentations ("intermission"), and in Lam_2:18 ("rest"). It carries on the metaphor of a stream, the flow of which is unchecked. The application of this metaphor to the hand is harsh, but the meaning is plain-that all night long the psalmist extended his hand in the attitude of prayer, as if open to receive Gods gift. His voice "rose like a fountain night and day"; but brought no comfort to his soul; and he bewails himself in the words which tell of Jacobs despair when he heard that Joseph was dead. So rooted and inconsolable does he think his sorrows. The thought of God has changed its nature, as if the sun were to become a source of darkness. When he looks up, he can only sigh; when he looks within, his spirit is clothed or veiled-i.e., wrapped in melancholy.
In the next strophe of three verses (Psa_77:4-6) the psalmist plunges yet deeper into gloom, and unfolds more clearly its occasion. Sorrow, like a beast of prey, devours at night; and every sad heart knows how eyelids, however wearied, refuse to close upon as wearied eyes, which gaze wide opened into the blackness and see dreadful things there. This man felt as if Gods finger was pushing up his lids and forcing him to stare out into the night. Buffeted, as if laid on an anvil and battered with the shocks of doom, he cannot speak; he can only moan, as he is doing. Prayer seems to be impossible. But to say, "I cannot pray; would that I could!" is surely prayer, which will reach its destination, though the sender knows it not. The psalmist had found no ease in remembering God. He finds as little in remembering a brighter past. That he should have turned to history in seeking for consolation implies that his affliction was national in its sweep, however intensely personal in its pressure. This retrospective meditation on the great deeds of old is characteristic of the Asaph psalms. It ministers in them to many moods, as memory always does. In this psalm we have it feeding two directly opposite emotions. It may be the nurse of bitter Despair or of bright-eyed Hope. When the thought of God occasions but sighs, the remembrance of His acts can only make the present more doleful. The heavy spirit finds reasons for heaviness in Gods past and in its own.
The psalmist in his sleepless vigils remembers other wakeful times, when his song filled the night with music and "awoke the dawn." Psa_77:6 is parallel with Psa_77:3. The three key words, remember, muse, spirit recur. There, musing ended in wrapping the spirit in deeper gloom. Here, it stings that spirit to activity in questionings, which the next strophe flings out in vehement number and startling plainness. It is better to be pricked to even such interrogations by affliction than to be made torpid by it. All depends on the temper in which they are asked. If that is right, answers which will scatter gloom are not far off.
The comparison of present national evils with former happiness naturally suggests such questions. Obviously, the casting off spoken of in Psa_77:7 is that of the nation, and hence its mention confirms the view that the psalmist is suffering under public calamities. All the questions mean substantially one thing-has God changed? They are not, as some questions are, the strongest mode of asserting their negative; nor are they, like others, a more than half assertion of their affirmative; but they are what they purport to be - the anxious interrogations of an afflicted man, who would fain be sure that God is the same as ever, but is staggered by the dismal contrast of Now and Then. He faces with trembling the terrible possibilities, and, however his language may seem to regard failure of resources or fickleness of purpose or limitations in long suffering as conceivable in God, his doubts are better put into plain speech than lying diffused and darkening, like poisonous mists, in his heart. A thought, be it good or bad, can be dealt with when it is made articulate. Formulating vague conceptions is like cutting a channel in a bog for the water to run. One gets it together in manageable shape, and the soil is drained. So the end of the despondent half of the psalm is marked by the bringing to distinct speech of the suspicions which floated in the singers mind and made him miserable. The Selah bids us dwell on the questions, so as to realise their gravity and prepare ourselves for their answer.
The second part begins in Psa_77:10 with an obscure and much-commented on verse, of which two explanations are possible, depending mainly on the meanings of the two words "sickness" and "years." The former word may mean "my wounding" or "my sickness." The latter is by many commentators taken to be an infinitive verb, with the signification to be changed, and, by others to be a plural noun meaning "years, " as in Psa_77:6. Neglecting some minor differences, we may say that those who understand the word to mean being changed explain the whole thus: "This is my wound (misery, sorrow), that the right hand of the Most High has changed." So the old versions, and Hupfeld, Perowne, and Baethgen. But the use of the word in Psa_77:6 for "years creates a strong presumption that its sense is the same here. As to the other word, its force is best seen by reference to a closely parallel passage in Jer_10:19 -"I said, Truly this is my grief (margin, sickness), and I must bear it"; where the word for grief, though not the same as in the psalm, is cognate. The most probable meaning, then, for the expression here is, "This my affliction is sent from God, and I must bear it with resignation." Then follows an elevating thought expressed in its simplest form like an exclamation, "the years, " etc., -i.e., "I will remember (comp. Psa_77:6) the time when the right hand of Jehovah had the preeminence" (Cheyne, in loc.). Delitzsch leaves the ellipsis unfilled, and takes the whole to mean that the psalmist says to himself that the affliction allotted will only last for the time which the mighty hand of God has determined. The rendering adopted above avoids the awkwardness of using the same word in two different senses in the same context, yields an appropriate meaning, especially in view of the continual references to remembering, and begins the new strophe with a new note of hopefulness, whereas the other renderings prolong the minor key of the first part into the second. It is therefore to be preferred. The revolution in feeling is abrupt. All is sunny and bright in the last half. What makes the change? The recognition of two great truths: first, that the calamity is laid on Israel, and on the psalmist as a member of the nation, by God, and has not come because of that impossible change in Him which the bitter questions had suggested; and, second, the unchangeable eternity of Gods delivering power. That second truth comes to him as with a flash, and the broken words of Psa_77:10 b hail the sudden rising of the new star.
The remainder of the psalm holds fast by that thought of the great deeds of God in the past. It is a signal example of how the same facts remembered may depress or gladden, according to the point of view from which they are regarded. We can elect whether memory shall nourish despondency or gladness. Yet the alternative is not altogether a matter of choice; for the only people to whom "remembering happier things" need not be "a sorrows crown of sorrow" are those who see God in the past, and so are sure that every joy that was and is not shall yet again be, in more thrilling and lasting form. If He shines out on us from the east that we have left behind, His brightness will paint the western sky towards which we travel. Beneath confidence in the perpetuity of past blessings lies confidence in the eternity of God. The "years of the right hand of the Most High" answer all questions as to His change of purpose or of disposition, and supply the only firm foundation for calm assurance of the future. Memory supplies the colours with which Hope paints her truest pictures. That which hath been is that which shall be may be the utterance of the blase man of the world, or of the devout man who trusts in the living God, and therefore knows that
"There shall never be one lost good!
What was shall live as before."
The strophe in Psa_77:13-15 fixes on the one great redeeming act of the Exodus as the pledge of future deeds of a like kind, as need requires. The language is deeply tinged with reminiscences of Exodus 15. "In holiness" (not "in the sanctuary"), the question "Who is so great a God?" the epithet "Who doest wonders," all come from Exo_15:11. "[Thine] arm" in the psalm recalls "By the greatness of Thine arm" in Exodus (Psa_77:16), and the psalmists "redeemed Thy people" reproduces "the people which Thou hast redeemed". {Exo_15:13} The separate mention of "sons of Joseph" can scarcely be accounted for if the psalm is prior to the division of the kingdoms. But the purpose of the designation is doubtful. It may express the psalmists protest against the division as a breach of ancient national unity or his longings for reunion.
The final strophe differs from the others in structure. It contains five verses instead of three, and the verses are (with the exception of the last) composed of three clauses each instead of two. Some commentators have supposed that Psa_77:16-19 are an addition to the original psalm, and think that they do not cohere well with the preceding. This view denies that there is any allusion in the closing verses to the passage of the Red Sea, and takes the whole as simply a description of a theophany, like that in Psalms 18. But surely the writhing of the waters as if in pangs at the sight of Godis such an allusion. Psa_77:19, too, is best understood as referring to the path through the sea, whose waters returned and covered Gods footprints from human eyes. Unless there is such a reference in Psa_77:16-19, the connection with the preceding and with Psa_77:20 is no doubt loose. But that is not so much a reason for denying the right of these verses to a place in the psalm as for recognising the reference. Why should a mere description of a theophany, which had nothing to do with the psalmists theme, have been tacked on to it? No doubt, the thunders, lightnings, and storm so grandly described here are unmentioned in Exodus; and, quite possibly, may be simply poetic heightening of the scene, intended to suggest how majestic was the intervention which freed Israel. Some commentators, indeed, have claimed the picture as giving additional facts concerning the passage of the Red Sea. Dean Stanley, for example, has worked these points into his vivid description; but that carries literalism too far.
The picture in the psalm is most striking. The continuous short clauses crash and flash like the thunders and lightnings. That energetic metaphor of the waters writhing as if panic struck is more violent than Western taste approves, but its emotional vigour as a rendering of the fact is unmistakable. "Thine arrows went to and fro" is a very imperfect transcript of the Hebrew, which suggests the swift zigzag of the fierce flashes. In Psa_77:18 the last word offers some difficulty. It literally means a wheel, and is apparently best rendered as above, the thunder being poetically conceived of as the sound of the rolling wheels of Gods chariot. There are several coincidences between Psa_77:16-19 of the psalm and Hab_3:10-15 : namely, the expression "writhed in pain," applied in Habakkuk to the mountains; the word rendered "overflowing" (A.V.) or "tempest" (R.V.) in Hab_3:10, cognate with the verb in Psa_77:17 of the psalm, and there rendered "poured out"; the designation of lightnings as Gods arrows. Delitzsch strongly maintains the priority of the psalm; Hupfeld as strongly that of the prophet.
The last verse returns to the two-claused structure of the earlier part. It comes in lovely contrast with the majestic and terrible picture preceding, like the wonderful setting forth of the purpose of the other theophany in Psalms 18, which was for no higher end than to draw one poor man from the mighty waters. All this pomp of Divine appearance, with lightnings, thunders, a heaving earth, a shrinking sea, had for its end the leading the people of God to their land, as a shepherd does his flock. The image is again an echo of Exo_15:13. The thing intended is not merely the passage of the Red Sea but the whole process of guidance begun there amid the darkness. Such a close is too abrupt to please some commentators. But what more was needful or possible to be said, in a retrospect of Gods past acts, for the solace of a dark present? It was more than enough to scatter fears and flash radiance into the gloom which had wrapped the psalmist. He need search no further. He has found what he sought; and so he hushes his song and gazes in silence on the all-sufficient answer which memory has brought to all his questions and doubts. Nothing could more completely express the living, ever-present worth of the ancient deeds of God than the "abruptness" with which this psalm ceases rather than ends.
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary1892 · Public DomainOn v1Superscription.—“To the chief Musician, to Jeduthun, a Psalm of…
INTRODUCTION
Superscription.—“To the chief Musician, to Jeduthun, a Psalm of Asaph.” Jeduthun was one of the leaders of sacred music in David’s time (1Ch_16:41-42; 2Ch_5:12). One of the twenty-four musical choirs left by David bore the honorary title Jeduthun or Jedithun, perhaps from him, as its founder (1 Chronicles 25)
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A Psalm of Asaph. See Introduction to Psalms 74.
Occasion.—It is not known, nor have we any means of determining upon what occasion the Psalm was written. But, Perowne has well said concerning it, “Whenever, and by whomsoever, the Psalm may have been written, it clearly is individual, not national. It utterly destroys all the beauty, all the tenderness and depth of feeling in the opening portion, if we suppose that the people are introduced speaking in the first person. The allusions to the national history may indeed show that the season was a season of national distress, and that the sweet singer was himself bowed down by the burden of the time, and oppressed by woes which he had no power to alleviate; but it is his own sorrow, not the sorrow of others, under which he sighs, and of which he has left the pathetic record.” The Psalm is eminently fitted to teach us how we may obtain comfort and peace even in the severest distresses.
Homiletically the Psalm sets before us, First: The good man’s trouble and Deliverer, Psa_77:1-3. Second: The thoughts and inquiries of a godly soul in distress, Psa_77:4-9. Third: The godly soul rising superior to trouble by the devout contemplation of the works and ways of God, Psa_77:10-20.
THE GOOD MAN’S TROUBLE AND DELIVERER
(Psa_77:1-3.)
I. The Good man’s trouble. All men have some measure of acquaintance with trouble. It is not given to us to travel through life under unclouded skies, favoured by refreshing breezes, amid enchanting scenery, with delightful companionships, and upon a pleasant and easy road. There are times when we have to walk in loneliness and sorrow, with weary limbs, and bleeding feet, and aching heart, beneath darkened skies, and amid pelting storms. The good man has no exemption from life’s sorrows and trials. He is exposed to physical trials. Bodily pains and diseases visit and try “the true-born child of God” as well as the wicked. He suffers from social trials also. He has disappointments and losses in business, he is pained by the inconstancy and duplicity of those whom he regarded as true, he suffers by reason of the afflictions and sorrows of those who are dear to him, and he is sometimes stricken with anguish by the invasions of death into the home or social circle. He also experiences religious trials. His own imperfections and sins are a source of grief to him. The contrast between the ideal and the actual in his own life is great and painful. He has seasons of dark doubt, and sad misgiving, and distressful hiding of the face of God from him. Of such experiences the poet sings in this Psalm. The compassions and favours, the mercies and faithfulnesses of God seemed to be all cut off from him. God himself seemed to have forsaken him, cast him off. The intensity of his trouble is seen in that—
1. It was continuous. In the day he sought the Lord by reason of it, and at night his hand was unweariedly outstretched in prayers for deliverance. His grief knew no intermission. His soul obtained no rest either by night or by day.
2. His soul accepted no consolation,—“refused to be comforted.” Some consolations seemed inadequate to his need. Others seemed too precious for one who was so unworthy in his own sight. And so the wounded heart refused the balm which would have healed it.
3. The remembrance of God was painful. We do not wonder that the remembrance of God is painful to the wicked. But that the godly man should find it painful to direct his thoughts to God is indeed strange. Meditation on God should fill the soul of the good man with holiest music. Very sore must have been the trial of the Psalmist when he was troubled at the recollection of God.
4. Meditation increased grief. “I meditated and my spirit was overwhelmed.” Reflection brought no relief to his soul, but seemed to sink him deeper in the abyss of trouble. A very sad state he was in. He is in deep waters, the waves and billows go over him, and he is unable to obtain relief or rest.
“All things have rest: why should we toil alone?
We only toil, who are the first of things,
And make perpetual moan;
Still from one sorrow to another thrown:
Nor ever fold our wings,
And cease from wanderings,
Nor steep our brows in slumber’s holy balm.”
—Tennyson.
These sore trials of godly men by the grace of God are often the means of richest blessings to the soul. As the darkness of night brings out the glory of the starry heavens, so in affliction and trouble some most precious truths shine forth with the greatest brilliance.
“Thou canst not tell
How rich a dowry sorrow gives the soul,
How firm a faith and eagle-sight of God.”
—Alford.
II. The Good man’s Deliverer. In his trouble the Psalmist betook himself to the throne of grace, he had recourse to God. When trouble drives us nearer to God it is already a blessing to us.
1. His application to God involved faith.
(1) In the accessibility of God. The Psalmist felt that he could approach unto God, and speak to Him in prayer. Trouble cannot drive us into any region where He is not. From the deepest abyss of distress the moan of suffering, the cry of penitence, or the prayer for help, will reach the ear and touch the heart of God.
(2) In the sufficiency of God to help those who seek unto Him. The Psalmist would not have cried to God had he not believed in His power to help him. Our God is all-sufficient. There are no sorrows that defy His consolations. There are no wounds which the balm of Gilead cannot heal.
(3) In the goodness of God. Notwithstanding his declaration that he “remembered God and was troubled,” the Psalmist must have believed in God’s kindness and willingness to help him, or he would not have carried his burden to His throne. Though He seems to hide His face from us, yet He is ever gracious and kind. His name and nature are love. When trouble thus leads us to draw closer to God, and to cast out burden upon Him, it has not visited us in vain.
2. His application to God was persevering and earnest. “I cried unto God with my voice, unto God with my voice; and He gave ear unto me. In the day of my trouble I sought the Lord: my hand is stretched out at night unwearied.” The repetition of the first verse is emphatic, presenting the idea of earnest and fervent supplication. The “hand stretched out at night unwearied” in prayer, indicates how importunate and persevering were his supplications. Hearty, fervent, importunate prayers are acceptable to God. Cold, heartless, formal prayers He does not regard. Let the Psalmist’s example be imitated by troubled hearts.
3. His application to God did not lead to immediate relief. He says that God “gave ear unto” him; but he seems to have obtained no immediate respite from his troubles. The Divine answer to our supplications is sometimes the continuance of those very trials or afflictions from which we have prayed to be delivered. The answer to the apostle Paul’s prayer was not the removal of the thorn from the flesh quivering with agony, but, “My grace is sufficient for thee.” The withholding or delaying of that for which we have so importunately pleaded may be the true and gracious answer to our prayers. The blessing may be delayed that our faith and patience may thereby be increased, and that when it comes to us it may come richer and fuller. Or that for which we have asked may be withheld, because Infinite Wisdom sees that to us it would not be a blessing. Thus it is that the earnest, importunate prayers of good men are not always answered at once, and sometimes are not answered at all by granting the thing desired. Yet they are always helpful to the soul, and bring down blessings into the soul from God.
CONCLUSION.—
1. Learn the sacred uses of trouble. “These light afflictions, which are but for a moment, work,” &c. “Tribulation worketh patience, and patience experience,” &c.
“The tears we shed are not in vain;
Nor worthless is the heavy strife;
If, like the buried seed of grain,
They rise to renovated life.
It is through tears our spirits grow;
’Tis in the tempest souls expand,
If it but teaches us to go
To Him who holds it in His hand.
Oh, welcome, then, the stormy blast!
Oh, welcome, then, the ocean’s roar!
Ye only drive more sure and fast
Our trembling bark to Heaven’s bright shore.”—T.C. Upham.
2. Learn the grand resource in trouble. “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.” α. He is all-sufficient. β. He is ever available. γ. He is ever gracious. “From the end of the earth will I cry unto Thee, when my heart is overwhelmed: lead me to the rock that is higher than I.”
PRAYER IN TROUBLE
(Psa_77:1-2.)
We have here—
I. Something common to all men. “The day of trouble.” “Man is born unto trouble, as the sparks fly upward.” With so much of sin in the world sorrow and trouble are inevitable.
II. A commendable example for all men. “I cried unto God, … I sought the Lord.”
1. Earnestly. “I cried with my voice, unto God with my voice.”
2. Perseveringly. “My hand is stretched out at night unwearied.” “In the day” and “in the night” he sought the Lord. “Call upon Me in the day of trouble: I will deliver thee,” &c.
III. A Divine auditor of all men. “He gave ear unto me.” Into the ear of God the cries of humanity are ever entering. Graciously He attends to the feeblest whisper of His people.
IV. A great mistake of some men. “My soul refused to be comforted.” Surely the Psalmist erred in this. God has graciously arranged our life and circumstances so that healing may come to the wounded spirit in many ways. Through the aspects and voices of nature, through the contemplation of His Providence, through His holy Word. To refuse His consolation is,
1. Ungrateful to Him.
2. Injurious to ourselves.
V. An experience which may happen to all men. To pray earnestly and importunately without any immediate reply was the lot of the poet, and may be the lot of all men. Let us learn the lessons of such an experience.
1. Calmly trust Him.
2. Perseveringly pray to Him.
3. Patiently wait for Him.
RECOLLECTIONS OF GOD PAINFUL TO THE WICKED
(Psa_77:3.)
“I remembered God and was troubled.”
Why is the remembrance of God pleasant to some of us and painful to others? Why is it sometimes pleasant, and at other times painful, to the same individual?
I. Briefly state what we mean by remembering God. We certainly mean something more than a transient recollection of the word God, or of any other name by which He is known. By remembering God, the Psalmist meant recollecting those ideas which the term God is used by the inspired writers to signify. An eternal, self-existent, infinitely wise, just, and good Being, &c.
II. Inquire why the recollection of such a being should ever be painful; or, why any of God’s creatures should be troubled at the remembrance of Him. There is nothing in the Divine character and government which necessarily renders the remembrance of God productive of painful emotions. The remembrance of God is always delightful to holy angels, and to the spirits of just men made perfect. The constant presence of God constitutes their heaven. The recollection, also, of His existence, character, and government, is usually, though not always, highly pleasing to all good men. If any are troubled by the remembrance of God, the cause must exist solely in themselves. Nothing but sin can ever render the remembrance of God painful to any of His creatures. If our hearts or consciences condemn us, it is impossible to remember Him without being troubled. It will then be painful to remember that He is our Creator and Benefactor; for the remembrance will be attended with a consciousness of base ingratitude. Painful to think of Him as Lawgiver; for such thoughts will remind us that we have broken His law. So also as to His holiness, omniscience, omnipresence, power, &c.
Nor is this all. Every sinner loves sin. The only happiness with which he is acquainted, consists in gratifying either the desires of the flesh, the desires of the eye, or the pride of life. But all these are contrary to the will of God. He forbids the sinner to pursue them; He commands him to deny himself, &c. He threatens all who do not comply with everlasting punishment.
The more clearly the wicked perceive God’s character and their own, the more light is thrown into their consciences, the more mercies, privileges, and opportunities they have enjoyed and abused, so much the more they will be troubled by a remembrance of God.
APPLICATION.—
1. This subject affords a rule by which we may try ourselves, and which will assist us much in discovering our real characters; for the moral character of every intelligent creature corresponds with his habitual views and feelings respecting God.
2. How wretched is the situation of impenitent sinners; of those, who cannot remember God without being troubled. They cannot enjoy real happiness in this life, for the world cannot afford it, and they dare not look up for it to heaven. How much more wretched must their situation be at death and in eternity!
3. How great are our obligations to God for the gospel of Christ! Were it not for this, the remembrance, and still more the presence of God, would have occasioned nothing but pure, unmingled wretchedness to any human being.
4. Is sin alone the cause which renders the remembrance of God painful? Then let all who have embraced the terms of reconciliation offered by the gospel, all who desire to remember God without being troubled, beware of sin. Swear an eternal war with sin; not only swear, but maintain it.—Edward Payson, D.D., abridged.
THE THOUGHTS AND INQUIRIES OF A GODLY SOUL IN TROUBLE
(Psa_77:4-9)
In our previous section we had to do with the Psalmist’s trouble and his application to God by reason thereof. We have now to do with his mental condition as affected by his troubles.
I. The thoughts of a godly soul in trouble. In the mental exercises of the Psalmist we notice—
1. Reflection on the past doings of God. “I have considered the days of old, the years of ancient tisme.” In his distress the Psalmist considered the former dealings of God with mankind, with a view of obtaining relief from his present troubles and light in his present perplexities. To us it seems that a study of the Divine working in human history is calculated to inspire the student with confidence in God, in the wisdom, righteousness, and goodness of His rule. Yet the Psalmist seems to have obtained no help from his consideration of the ancient doings of God. The state of his own soul spread a black pall over everything.
2. Recollection of times of trouble in his own life, which were also times of song. “I call to remembrance my song in the night.” In the Bible “night” is frequently used figuratively, to represent ignorance, sin, suffering, distress, death. Here it is used as the emblem of distress and trouble. “Where is God, my Maker, who giveth songs in the night?” The poet calls to mind former seasons of affliction and sorrow, in which he realised Divine comforts, and was enabled to sing in the darkness. Yet he seems to find no comfort for his present sorrow. He can discover no star to relieve his present darkness. From the recollection of experiences so precious and helpful as God’s mercies to him in former troubles he is unable to draw any consolation. A godly man’s condition is deplorable indeed when such experiences afford no help and hope.
3. Communion with his own heart. “I communed with mine own heart, and my spirit made diligent search.” He had recalled past experiences of his own, he had reflected and reasoned upon the work of God in human history, now he will consult his own heart. He has tried to get help by the exercise of his intellect, and has failed to do so, now he will seek help by the exercise of his better feelings. “The secret, silent teachings of the heart are often our best and safest guide.” The heart is “the centre of the spiritual, thinking, and conceptional life” (Fuerst’s Lex.); and man can commune with his heart, can contemplate his own spiritual nature and faculties, can examine his own spiritual condition, can speak to his soul and be spoken to by his soul. Thus the poet communes with his own heart. But no help does he receive. The trouble seems to have obtained the complete mastery of his entire nature. Intellect and heart are alike subdued by it. Human history and his own experience are alike darkened by it. The soul which is swayed by grief sees all things shrouded in gloom and sadness. To each of us nature wears the colour of our spirit. This truth is finely expressed in Hamlet. “I have of late lost all my mirth, foregone all custom of exercise: and, indeed, it goes so heavily with my disposition, that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory; this most excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave o’er-hanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire, why, it appears no other thing to me, than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours. What a piece of work is man! How noble in reason! how infinite in faculties! in form and moving, how express and admirable! in action, how like an angel! in apprehension, how like a god! the beauty of the world! the paragon of animals! And yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust? Man delights not me, nor woman neither.” In a somewhat similar plight was the Psalmist. Trouble had so completely mastered him that he could find neither comfort, help, nor hope anywhere.
II. The inquiries of a godly soul in trouble.
The Psalmist makes several inquiries, which may be classified thus. He inquires—
1. As to God’s mindfulness of His people. “Will the Lord cast off for ever?” &c. “Hath God forgotten to be gracious?” &c. God seemed to have “forgotten to be gracious” in His dealings with His servant, and to have so far overlooked him as to lead to the inquiry, “Will the Lord cast off for ever?” It is a sore aggravation of a believer’s trials when the Lord seems to be unmindful of him in his time of need. How severe was the smart of the sisters of Bethany, when several days passed, and their Friend and Lord came not near to them, although they had sent to tell Him of their trouble!
2. As to God’s unchangeableness. In past times He had been to His people a God of mercy and grace, supporting and defending them. Has He changed in this respect? Is it possible that God can change? The thought is “too painful for” us. What misery and desolation would supervene if God, the supremely Good, could change! were to change, and be other than He is! The Psalmist seems to have tasted of this misery as he urged his pain-inspired inquiries.
3. As to God’s faithfulness. “Doth His promise fail for evermore?” Shall the promise which was made to, and good for, one generation, fail to the next generation? Is not the word of Jehovah reliable? The troubled soul seems to find repose nowhere. To him nothing appears firm and true, but sin, labour, and suffering. The shadows presented themselves as the only realities.
These inquiries of the troubled Psalmist reveal the depth and intensity of his sufferings. It is extremely painful to doubt one’s own salvation; but who shall depict the anguish of doubt as to the truth and faithfulness, the righteousness and goodness of God? These inquiries present a hopeful symptom of the spiritual condition of the Psalmist. “It is a wise thing thus to put unbelief through the catechism. Each one of the questions is a dart aimed at the very heart of despair.”
III. Let us offer a few Suggestions to a godly soul in trouble. In his thoughts and inquiries the troubled poet seems much amazed and bewildered. Certain facts were painfully real to him which sorely tried his faith in God, and in His relation to His people. Good men are often tried in like manner. But let us remember—
1. That there is something radically abnormal in the present state of human society. It is not natural that under the government of an almighty, wise, and good Being, there should be so much of suffering, and that sometimes the best of men should be the greatest of sufferers. Suffering is here because sin is here. Find suffering and you find sin, either literally or consequentially. Sin is the unnatural, the abnormal thing. “God made man upright” He is not responsible for sin. He is rather the great Antagonist of all evil.
2. That even godly men need discipline. An educational process is going forward in this life. This world is a great moral school, man is the learner, and suffering is one of the teachers. In the case of the good man suffering is not punitive, but disciplinary, educational. While there are defect and imperfection in us, we need the discipline of the Divine school.
3. That suffering is often the occasion of richest blessing. To a true-hearted man doubt as to any of the great spiritual verities is a painful thing. But such a man doubt almost (if not quite) always conducts to a calmer faith.
“Time tells his tale by shadows, and by clouds
The wind records its progress, by dark doubts
The spirit swiftening on its heavenward course.”—Bailey.
Tennyson has described such a doubter.
“He fought his doubts and gathered strength.
He would not make his judgment blind;
He faced the spectres of the mind,
And laid them: thus he came at length
To find a stronger faith his own;
And Power was with him in the night,
Which makes the darkness and the light,
And dwells not in the light alone.”
The Captain of our salvation was made “perfect through suffering.” And those of His followers in this world who are most like Him are able to say, “We glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation worketh patience,” &c.
“ ‘Glory to God,—to God,’ he saith;
‘Knowledge by suff’ring entereth,
And life is perfected by death.’ ”
THE GODLY SOUL RISING SUPERIOR TO TROUBLE BY THE DEVOUT CONTEMPLATION OF THE WORKS AND WAYS OF GOD
(Psa_77:10-20.)
The mind and heart of the poet are growing calm. His agitation and distress are yielding to the exercise of reason and the power of faith. He is able to reflect to some purpose now.
I. The troubled soul’s consideration of the works and ways of God. “I will remember the works of the Lord,” &c.
1. Recollection of the works and ways of God. How wonderful is the faculty of memory! How great is its conservative power! Memory has been defined as “the treasure house of the mind, wherein the monuments thereof are kept and preserved.” Cicero spoke of it as the “thesaurus omnium rerum. “By means of it nothing in life is lost.
“What wealth in memory’s firm record,
Which, should it perish, could this world recall,
In colours fresh—originally bright—
From the dark shadows of o’erwhelming years.”—Young.
Memory makes the fleeting present abiding and everlasting. How wonderful is its reproductive power! A very small circumstance will unlock and throw wide open its chamber doors; and words and deeds, scenes and circumstances, unthought of for many years, appear with startling vividness before us.
“Slight withal may be the things which bring
Back on the heart the weight which it would fling
Aside for ever; it may be a sound—
A tone of music—summer’s eve—or spring—
A flower—the wind—the ocean—which shall wound,
Striking th’ electric chain wherewith we’re darkly bound;
And how and why we know not, nor can trace
Home to its cloud this lightning of the mind,
But feel the shock renew’d, nor can efface
The blight and blackening which it leaves behind.”—Byron.
The Psalmist calls into exercise this wondrous power, for the relief of his troubled soul. He summons forth from the treasury of memory some of the ancient doings of God. The marvellous works which He had wrought on behalf of His people in former days he makes to live before him. Probably he also called to mind former deeds and ways of God in relation to his own individual life.
2. Reflection on the works and ways of God. “I will meditate also of all Thy work.” Recollection would not have profited the Psalmist unless he had meditated upon the things which he recollected. Thought, meditation, enables us to realise the facts of history, science, philosophy, and theology, and to appropriate to ourselves their lessons. “If I should be asked,” said Dr. Bates, “what I think are the best means and ways to advance the faculties, to make the ordinances fruitful, to increase grace, to enlarge our comfort, and produce holiness, I should answer, meditation, meditation, meditation.” The Psalmist acted wisely in following up his recollection by meditation.
3. Speech concerning the works and ways of God. “Talk of Thy doings.” With the Psalmist recollection and reflection preceded speech. Much of our talk is utterly worthless, because the talkers are not thinkers. It is especially important in relation to religious subjects that meditation should precede speech. The Psalmist did not reserve to himself the results of his meditation, but declared them to others. Others were benefited by reason of his recollection and reflection.
II. The troubled soul’s conclusions on the works and ways of God. Placing them in the order in which we find them, the conclusions of the Psalmist on the works and ways of God are, that they are characterised by holiness (Psa_77:13), strength (Psa_77:14), beneficence (Psa_77:15; Psa_77:20), majesty (Psa_77:16-18), and mystery (Psa_77:19). Let us consider them, slightly altering their order.
1. God’s works and ways reveal His strength. “Thou art the God that doest wonders; Thou hast declared Thy strength among the people.” God had made known His great power in crushing the enemies of His people, and delivering them from all their afflictions. No one can meditate upon the works of God in nature, or upon His ways in Providence, without being impressed with His Almightiness. “Thou hast a mighty arm; strong is Thy hand, and high is Thy right hand.” The Almightiness of God should be a warning to evildoers. “Hast thou an arm like God?” The Almightiness of God should be an encouragement to His people. His strong arm is pledged to succour and defend you. He is “mighty to save.”
2. God’s works and ways reveal His majesty. In Psa_77:16-18 the Psalmist mentions some of the mighty works of God in a very poetical manner. The imagery is both sublime and effective; and gives a deep impression, not only of the might of God in these transactions, but also of His majesty. If the majesty of God is so impressive that the earth and the sea are represented as greatly moved thereat, shall man remain unmoved at the contemplation thereof! Is there nothing in the wondrous works and ways of God to awaken the admiration and reverence of men?
3. God’s works and ways reveal His holiness. “O God, in holiness is Thy way.” His way is often mysterious; and can never be comprehended by us, yet is it ever right and pure. The troubled Psalmist when he calmly considered the dealings of God with men, not in the present, in which only a very small fragment is visible, but in ancient time, was convinced that they were all in holiness. Trembling and troubled heart, and sorely perplexed with insoluble enigmas, look away and look calmly to His glorious deeds of ancient date, and thou, too, shalt conclude, “Thy way, O God, is in holiness.”
4. God’s works and ways reveal His beneficence. The manifestation of power and majesty is not sufficient to awaken trust and hope in us, or to afford any encouragement to the despondent and sorrowing heart. Being conscious of sin and ill-desert it is calculated to awaken anxiety and even dread. We fear lest the glorious majesty should consume us, and the great might should smite and destroy us. The revelation of the Divine holiness tends to make manifest the awful contrast between us and God in this respect, by showing the exceeding sinfulness of our hearts and lives. The troubled heart needs to know more of God than this before it can obtain comfort or rest. The Psalmist saw the Divine power and majesty working beneficently. The “mighty arm” of God was displayed in smiting down the wicked oppressor, and delivering the oppressed people. “Thou hast with Thine arm redeemed Thy people, the sons of Jacob and Joseph.” He saw Omnipotence gently and patiently leading His people through the wilderness. God is as great in mercy as He is in majesty. He is infinite in pity as well as in power. He is gracious as He is great. He is as tender as He is terrible. Here, then, may the troubled heart find peace.
5. God’s works and ways are mysterious. The Psalmist had ascertained and declared certain characteristics of the works and ways of God. Might, majesty, holiness, and beneficence he had discovered therein. Yet there was much that remained obscure and mysterious. “Thy way is in the sea, and Thy path in the great waters, and Thy footsteps are not known.” There are certain topics upon which the Most High maintains an inviolable reserve. There are certain regions into which the eye of the most earnest inquirer has never penetrated. “The secret things belong unto the Lord our God.” Moreover, God’s way is so vast that we are able to perceive only a very small portion of it. His purposes and methods are so comprehensive and profound that we can understand them only very partially. But this mystery was by no means painful to the Psalmist. He speaks of it calmly and trustfully; and then speaks of God’s gracious guidance of His people through the wilderness. So also to us mysteries should not be an occasion of unbelief or sorrow, but of patient trust and hope. They should also teach us lessons of humility and reverence. Our own ignorance and inability to comprehend the ways of God should humble us. “We are but of yesterday, and know nothing, because our days upon earth are a shadow.” While the reserve of a Being of such holiness and benevolence should be regarded by us with reverence. “Clouds and darkness are round about Him: righteousness and judgment are the habitation of His throne.” “Mysteries! what are they but worlds at night time speeding on with swift wing to the all-revealing brightness of morning!”
SPIRITUAL INFIRMITIES
(Psa_77:10.)
“I said, This is my infirmity.”
When a good man is made sensible of any evil in his heart or life, he is ready to acknowledge it, and take shame to himself on account of it. “I said, This is my infirmity.” No doubt but the Psalmist had often said it to himself: and such soliloquies are very becoming and may be very useful. He said it also to God, in a way of humble confession. “I acknowledge my sin unto Thee, and mine iniquity have I not hid,” &c. Probably he might say it to his intimate friends, whose piety and sympathy he had often witnessed; for we are commanded to confess our faults one to another, and to pray one for another.
I. Inquire into the nature of that infirmity. By considering the context we may conclude that it consisted in something like the following—
1. A proneness to live too much on frames and feelings. This is common among Christians, and hinders their establishment and growth in grace. Those who live on spiritual frames will be like Reuben; unstable as water, they shall not excel. At one time they are raised to a full assurance of faith, saying, “My mountain stands strong, I shall never be moved;” and at another they are sinking into the depths of despondency, and saying, “Will the Lord cast off for ever, and will He be favourable no more?”
2. Forgetfulness of past mercies is another evil to which good men are subject, and the natural consequence of this is unthankfulness.
3. Distrust with respect to future appearances. When faith was in exercise David could say, “The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear?” &c. (Psa_27:1-3). But here the Psalmist speaks as one that was utterly forsaken. “Will the Lord cast off for ever?” &c. (Psa_77:7-9).
4. Refusing to be comforted in time of distress (Psa_77:2). Moses told the children of Israel that the Lord would bring them out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, and give them the land which He had promised to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob; but they hearkened not unto Moses, for anguish of spirit, and for cruel bondage.
5. Giving vent to distrustful thoughts in unbecoming language too frequently accompanies despondency.
II. The reasons why God suffers such infirmities to attend His people in this life.
1. To promote humility and self-abasement. As creatures, our insignificance should make us humble; but as sinners we have reason to be still more so.
2. To excite watchfulness. Those who are liable to so many miscarriages ought certainly to be upon their guard. If nothing else will preserve the Christian from carnal security, yet the danger to which he is exposed should have that effect. “Let him that thinketh he standeth, take heed lest he fall.”
3. To increase our sympathy and compassion towards others. We are made to know the heart of a stranger by being strangers ourselves. If others are overcome by temptation, we may be so too. “Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault,” &c. (Gal_6:1-2).
4. To show the necessity of a frequent application to Christ, our spiritual Physician. If we had no infirmities, we should not want healing. “They that are whole need not a physician; but they that are sick.” The value of the remedy is known by them that feel the disease, and the need of a Saviour by those who see themselves to be lost. “And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.”
5. To render heaven the more desirable. The Psalmist is now free from all his infirmities, and so will every saint be when he gets to glory. The conflicts we now have with the enemy, and the evils of our own hearts, will give a delightful relish to our happiness hereafter, and heighten the triumphs of the final victory (Psa_17:15; 2Co_5:1-4).
III. Conclude with a few observations.
1. The best of saints have their infirmities.
2. There is some particular infirmity which every man may call his own. “I kept myself,” said David, “from mine iniquity;” that is, from the sin which most easily beset him.
3. It becomes us well to know our particular infirmity, that we may guard against it; for to be without defence is the way to be overcome without resistance.
4. Having discovered what is our easily besetting sin, let us bewail it before God, and seek for help against it.—B … e.
RECOLLECTION, REFLECTION, AND DECLARATION
(Psa_77:11-12.)
The Psalmist in his trouble seeks relief by recollecting the wondrous works of God, and reflecting and speaking thereon.
I. Recollection. “I will remember,” &c. The powers of memory are twofold. They are the power of retention, and the power of reproduction. By virtue of the former, memory is the storehouse of past scenes, circumstances, events, words, deeds. By virtue of the latter we are enabled to reproduce and relive the past. Memory may be regarded in several aspects.
1. As a source of pain. Tennyson has beautifully and truthfully said,—
“A sorrow’s crown of sorrow is remembering happier things.”
“Remembrance wakes with all her busy train,
Swells at my breast, and turns the past to pain.”—Goldsmith
“Will no remorse, will no decay,
O Memory! soothe thee into peace!
When life is ebbing fast away,
Will not thy hungry vultures cease!
Ah, no! as weeds from fading free,
Noxious and rank, yet verdantly
Twine round a ruin’d tower;
So to the heart, untamed, will cling
The memory of an evil thing,
In life’s departing hour:
Green is the weed when grey the wall
And thistles rise while turrets fall.”
—Heraud.
2. As a source of pleasure. “A memory without blot or contamination,” said Charlotte Brontë, “must be an exquisite treasure,—an inexhaustible source of pure refreshment.”
“The joys I have possess’d are ever mine;
Out of thy reach, behind eternity,
Hid in the sacred treasure of the past,
But bless’d remembrance brings them hourly back.”—Dryden.
3. As an aid to faith. So the Psalmist uses it in this case. Observe,
(1) God’s works are wonders. What marvellous things He is ever accomplishing in the material world! What wonders He wrought on behalf of His ancient people! How wonderful are His doings now in the experience of His people,—in their conversion, spiritual education, sanctification, and glorification! Truly, “the bright glories of His grace, beyond His other wonders shine.”
(2) God’s wondrous works should be remembered. Not to remember them would indicate great insensateness of mind. He who does not remember them overlooks the most glorious of records; and cannot be held guiltless of ingratitude.
(3) God’s wondrous works remembered are calculated to inspire confidence. They reveal a Being who is supremely trustworthy.
II. Reflection. “I will meditate,” &c. By means of reflection we are enabled to realise the facts recalled by memory, to perceive their significance and applications; and the emotions which naturally spring from the facts remembered are excited by reflection. Recollection is of little worth comparatively, unless accompanied and followed by meditation. It was by the exercise of both these faculties that the troubled heart of the poet grew calm and victorious.
III. Declaration. “I will talk of Thy doings.” A good man, having passed through experiences similar to those of the Psalmist, should talk of God’s doings. After his trouble, recollection, and meditation, his talk would be—
1. Intelligent. He would not utter crude or rash statements concerning God.
2. Trust-inspiring. His own faith would grow stronger as he recounted to others, &c. The faith of those who heard him would also grow as they thought of his conflict, and how he won the victory.
CONCLUSION.—Here is an example well worthy our imitation. Recollect, meditate, and then speak.
THE WAYS OF GOD
(Psa_77:19.)
I. God’s ways are vast in their extent. “In the sea.” His ways are related—
1. To all ages—past, present, future.
2. To all worlds.
3. To all events.
II. God’s ways are profound in their meaning. “In the great waters.” Not in streams or rivers, but in the immeasurable, unfathomable ocean. His ways are “too deep to sound with mortal lines.”
III. God’s ways are mysterious in their aspect. “Thy footsteps are not known,” cannot be always traced. “They are not always known; or they are not known in all things; yea, they are not altogether known in anything.”
“The acknowledgment of mystery,” says Dr. Huntington, “the frank confession that our being is folded all about with the unknowable, our light fringed on every side with darkness, our little globe swimming in an ocean of unfathomable designs, but God guiding it on and caring for every passenger soul—this is an end of the trying of our faith.”
GOD LEADING HIS PEOPLE
(Psa_77:20.)
I. The Leader of the good. “Thou.” The Leader possesses—
1. Unlimited power, for the protection and support of His people.
2. Perfect intelligence. He knows His people individually and thoroughly. He is perfectly acquainted with the way along which they travel to their destination.
3. Solicitous regard for each member of the flock. He tenderly cares for every one, and for all.
II. The instruments by which they are led. “By the hand of Moses and Aaron.” He still guides instrumentally. How?
1. By His Providence, pointing out our way by the indications of circumstances and current events.
2. By His Word, with its “Thou shalt,” and “Thou shalt not.”
3. By His Spirit influencing our spirits.
4. By the counsel of His servants. The wise and good are here to direct us.
III. The manner in which they are led. “Like a flock. “We have here three ideas.
1. Particularity. The Eastern shepherds have a particular knowledge of each sheep, of its peculiarities, &c. And a name for each sheep. (See illus. in “The Land and the Book,” by Dr. Thomson.) “He calleth his own sheep by name.” “I am the good Shepherd, and know My sheep, and am known of Mine.”
2. Unity. Though the distinctness and individuality of each one is preserved, yet they are not separated. They constitute a “flock.” “One flock” under “one Shepherd.”
3. Leading as contradistinguished from driving. The Eastern shepherd goes before his flock, and so leads them. “And when He putteth forth His own sheep, He goeth before them, and the sheep follow Him; for they know His voice.” Dr. Bushnell briefly, yet clearly and suggestively, states the idea—“He does not drive them on before as a herd of unwilling disciples, but goes before Himself, leading them into paths that He has trod, and dangers He has met, and sacrifices He has borne Himself, calling them after Him, and to be only followers.”
“Jesus still lead on
Till our rest be won;
And although the way be cheerless.
We will follow, calm and fearless:
Guide us by Thy hand
To our Fatherland.”
—Zinsendorf.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Sermon Bible1900 · Public DomainOn v1There are two points of view under which we…
Psa 77:3
There are two points of view under which we wish to present this subject: the strangeness of such an experience and some of the reasons that may account for it.
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I. The strangeness of such an experience—that a man should remember God and yet be troubled. For consider: (1) that such an experience is against all that is made known to us of the nature of God. From the very first, revelation has had one purpose, and could have only one: to present God in such a light that His sinful creatures should come and find rest in Him. (2) It becomes strange when we reflect not only on the nature of God, but on His promises. They are so universal, so free, so full, that they seem fitted to meet every want and satisfy every yearning of the human soul. That the heart of a man who hears these words and believes that they come from the lips of God should be troubled at remembering Him must seem very strange. (3) It must appear strange further when we consider that trouble at the thought of God is declared to be against the experience of all sincere seekers. There is a history of cases reaching all through the Bible, and the burden of them is, "This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him, and saved him out of all his troubles." The appeal of all ages has been, "O Thou that hearest prayer, unto Thee shall all flesh come." (4) Such an experience is against all that we can reasonably believe of the nature of the soul of man. If one theory be true about man’s soul, it is this: that out of God no full, satisfying end can be found for it. The soul is greater than the whole world, and the greater cannot be blessed of the less.
II. Consider some of the reasons that may be given for such an experience as this. (1) The first reason is that many men do not make God the object of sufficient thought. (2) Another reason why many are troubled at the thought of God is that they are seeking Him with a wrong view of the way of access. (3) A third reason is that they are seeking Him with some reserved thought of sin. (4) A fourth reason is that they have a mistaken view of God’s manner of dealing with us in this world.
It is in the experience of the Divine life that doubts melt away or can be held in quiet expectancy of a solution, and that we approach gradually to the calm of those that rest beneath the altar. The thought of God that for a while brings trouble shall be made the source of hope, the pledge that all with you and with His universe shall be ordered to a happy end; and even here amid the trouble and struggle of earth, He can put into the mouth some notes of the praise of heaven.
J. Ker, Sermons, 2nd series, p. 305.
References: Psa 77:2.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xv., No. 853; J. Irons, Thursday Penny Pulpit, vol. xv., p. 237; R. D. B. Rawnsley, Sermons in Country Churches, 1st series, p. 228. Psa 77:3.—Preacher’s Monthly, vol. iii., p. 25; Parker, Old Testament Outlines, p. 122, and Christian Chronicle, Sept. 20th, 1883. Psa 77:5.—C. C. Bartholomew, Sermons chiefly Practical, p. 353.
Psa 77:7-10
The moral to be drawn from this Psalm is that in all troubles and adversities it is our own fault if we have not a light to guide and cheer us, and that the true remedy against despondency is to look back upon the love of God pledged to us and His mercy shown to us in former days.
I. As soon as David looks his desponding thoughts in the face, he sees their absurdity; and he sees, too, that all his painful feelings have arisen, not from the absence of God’s protecting care, but from his own weakness and foolishness. "I said, It is mine own infirmity."
II. If the Psalmist allowed his mind a range wider than his own personal experience, and considered the past evidences of the presence of God with His Church, the conclusion would be the same. If God were with His Church, and David a member of it, he had sufficient to make distrust a fault and despondency a sin.
III. Each one of us in the ordinary progress both of his temporal and spiritual life may find much that is worthy of his imitation in the conduct of David as expressed in the text. In all the roughnesses of the road which we have to pass over, we may, after first acknowledging our own infirmity, repose our minds on the thought of God’s mercies to us in days gone by.
Bishop Harvey Goodwin, Parish Sermons, 2nd series, p. 66.
There are three kinds of speaking in this Psalm: speaking to God, speaking to our fellows, and speaking to one’s self.
I. To how many of our thoughts, and feelings, and spiritual utterances may we apply these words: "This is my infirmity"! Of hard thoughts of God, of dark views of His providence, of distrustful feelings towards God, and often of corresponding thoughts, and views, and feelings towards men, we may say, "This is my infirmity." And the weakness of the body, faults in the spirit, and Satanic influence are the fountains and the causes of these utterances. The Psalmist resolves, as an antidote to despondency and fear, to bring the past and the present, recollections and existing consciousness, the day of his trouble and years of joyousness, the right hand of the Most High and his enemies and troubles—he resolves to bring them into comparison, to bring them together. "I will remember the years of the right hand of the Most High."
II. These words, "the right hand of the Most High," represent the power of God as manifested in all sovereignty and sufficiency on behalf of those who trust in Him. (1) God works. Power is continually going out of Him. (2) God works perfectly. His work is right-hand work. (3) He works as the Most High. He fills the above as well as the beneath. There is One higher than the Law: the Lawgiver.
III. Notice two or three brief exhortations springing from this subject. (1) Commune with your own heart; talk to yourself. (2) Give memory its full share of work in your religious life. (3) Avoid contracted views. Look at today, but look at the years. Look at second causes, and agents, and means; but ever consider the right hand of the Most High.
S. Martin, Penny Pulpit, No. 878.
References: Psa 77:10.—S. Cox, Expositions, 3rd series, p. 152. Psa 77:11, Psa 77:14-15, Psa 77:19, Psa 77:20.—G. Forbes, The Voice of God in the Psalms, p. 251. Psa 77:13.—H. Melvill, Sermons, vol. ii., p. 297.
Psa 77:19
There must be mystery in religion—a religion which lies between the finite and the Infinite. Take away mystery, and we should tear out a page of evidence. But there is more hiddenness about the providence of God than there is about the grace of God. He has revealed much more clearly what He does and what He wills about our souls than about our bodies. This is the reason, perhaps, why faith finds it so much harder work to trust for time than it does for eternity, and why there are so many who have no fear for their salvation, and yet who are hourly anxious about their daily wants.
I. The distinction between the degree of the mystery of providence and grace underlies the text. There is a climax and an anticlimax. (1) Observe "way," "path," "footsteps." The way is greater than the path; the way is broad: the path is necessarily narrow, as in the familiar verse, "In all thy ways"—i.e., in all thy great things—"acknowledge Him, and He will direct thy little things," thy "paths;" while "footsteps" are smaller still than paths—little isolated marks lying here and there along the path. So it runs down—way, path, footsteps. (2) Now see the ascending scale. "Thy way is in the sea"—the sea classically is always shallow water—"Thy path in the great waters," which lie far out, more unfathomable than the shallows of the shore; while the "footsteps" are altogether out of sight, something beyond the sea and beyond the great waters, utterly out of reach: they "are not known."
II. As respects God’s hidden ways, there are one or two things which we ought to consider. (1) God never meant you to understand them. We are to seek the solution of hard problems, and the quelling of our fears, and the answer to our doubts, not in the events themselves, but in the character of God, not in the book of present history, but in the volume of the Scriptures. (2) Faith has its helps. As we live on, many things which were once fearful, involved, and hard come out kind, simple, and plain; we see, if not all, yet some, of the reasons: and we are satisfied where we were once most dissatisfied. The past stands sponsor for the future.
J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 7th series, p. 124.
In the history of Israel we find not merely an impressive symbol, but a great practical truth, the truth, namely, that those who follow God follow a Leader whose footsteps are not known; that, in other words, he who accepts the service of God accepts with it much which he cannot understand. Mystery is bound up with God’s revelation and dealing with the human race.
I. We are not to conclude that because there is a mystery in God’s dealings they are therefore without a plan. We are to remember that the confusion is in us, and not in God’s work; that God’s counsel is not darkened because we are blind.
II. We are not to conclude that this mystery of providence is the outgrowth of unkindness.
III. The Psalmist has evidently reached very satisfactory conclusions on this subject. The secret of his confidence is revealed in the thirteenth verse, in the words, "Thy way, O God, is in the sanctuary," or "Thy way is in holiness." No matter how strange the way if it be a way of holiness!
IV. "Thou leddest Thy people." The true philosophy of life is summed up here, in simply following God.
M. R. Vincent, Gates into the Psalm Country, p. 181.
References: Psa 77:19.—Homiletic Magazine, vol. x., p. 132. Psa 77:19, Psa 77:20.—A. P. Stanley, Sermons on Special Occasions, p. 340; C. J. Vaughan, Memorials of Harrow Sundays, p. 116. Psa 78:3, Psa 78:4.—J. T. Stannard, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xviii.,p. 136. Psa 78:5-7.—H. M. Butler, Harrow Sermons, 2nd series, p. 238. Psa 78:9.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xii., No. 696; S. Baring-Gould, Village Preaching for a Year, 1st series, p. 9. Psa 78:10.—J. N. Norton, Every Sunday, p. 305; J. Baines, Sermons, p. 113.
The Sermon Bible, ed. William Robertson Nicoll (1888–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
F. W. Grant1903 · Public DomainOn v1God’s way in the sea and in the sanctuary.
God’s way in the sea and in the sanctuary.
To the chief musician "to Jeduthun" a psalm of Asaph.
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The last psalm of the series gives us that character of the divine government which causes it to be so fruitful of exercise to the soul of man. Even for the Christian, in this respect, clouds and darkness are about Him still the revolving wheel of the world, with all its remorselessness of change for the fleeting generations, is yet God’s chariot wheel, as indeed the Preacher sees it, only to the increase of his perplexity and the height of the wheel -so high as to be dreadful, in Ezekiel’s vision, -hides with its mystery Him who sits above it. This is what this fifth psalm here presents: God’s footsteps in the sea, and there unknown, with the difficulty for faith engendered by it; -a difficulty pressing for solution, or at least some answer and which is here answered, measurably at
least. It could not yet have the settlement which Christianity has given to it, nor can there be settlement, even with this, which shall leave us with no more exercise of this kind. Faith must still reckon with the unseen, in some sense, as Asaph did; and the psalm will have its use still for every pilgrim. Comforting it is, too, to note that it is for Jeduthun, i.e. "the worshiper," and that it is,
notably also, a sanctuary-psalm. If God’s way is in the sea, His steps unknown, it is no less in the sanctuary also, in the holiness which must be His, and it is from what is known of Him -changeless as He is in nature, -that what is unknown must be determined.
The psalm; as it is a fifth, so it has five parts, the first three of which are taken up with the problem and its solution, while the last two expand the general thought of it, as we have seen.
1. In the first part we have the occasion of the question, but with the preliminary assurance that the psalmist’s cry to God has been answered: "My voice is unto God, and I cry: my voice is unto God, and He hath given ear to me." He then points out how the question which was troubling had risen for him. External difficulty it was that (as commonly) produced the inward perplexity. We are apt to take with calmness enough the difficulties of others, until these become our own: as Eliphaz said to Job, "it toucheth thee, and thou art troubled." So here: "in the day of my strait I sought the Lord" -not Jehovah, but the Almighty Ruler of all: my hand was stretched out in the night and slacked not: my soul refused comfort." The remembrance of God also only made the distress more poignant, for here it was that doubt was assailing him: "I remembered God, and I moaned; I complained, and my spirit was overwhelmed." We have not as yet, however, the special character of this distress made known.
2. In the second section we realize more the nature of the conflict, as having to do with questions which, as Ecclesiastes has it, "God has given to the sons of men to be exercised with." "Thou hast held mine eyelids open," he says: "I am so agitated that I cannot speak." He is occupied with the history of man, with "the days of old, -the years of ancient times" -God’s dealings with men are exercising him; and from these he turns to review his own experience. He remembers his "music in the night," but he is not disposed to music now. He is busy, communing with his own heart, and his spirit making diligent search. But with all this, at present, rest is not attained.
3. The next section brings us however to the interpretation of it all. We find the riddle and its solution also. We see clearly that it is a question which. Israel is above all concerned with, and which a latter-day remnant would certainly be exercised about; while the answer concerns His people at all times, it being the assertion of the faithfulness of God to His own Name, for which He ever acts, and in which they find their resource and refuge.
The question is "Will the Lord cast off forever? and will He show favor no more?" Here the "Lord" is not "Jehovah;" nor is the covenant-Name mentioned until after this question is answered. Covenant they cannot plead: the answer has to come from what God is in Himself, not from relationship, which is the very thing in question. But the "Lord" (Adonai). He in whose hand all power is, has in effect cast off when that power no more acts in their behalf. Will He cast off, then, "forever" (leolamim; "for the ages")? "and will He show favor no more?" There was no doubt, at least, of what He had been to them. Could it be, then, that He would act in opposition to this? A temporary "forsaking" would not be opposition: for chastening means present interest and future blessing; and was this, then, chastening, or renunciation of the favor that He once had shown?
In his next two questions the psalmist weighs his evidences. The divine loving-kindness, can that be at an end -exhausted? is the fountain of love dried up? This is of course an impossibility; and he is arguing that it is an impossibility. And yet in application to themselves, how many are tempted to believe it! How many admit the suggestion of some sin possibly unpardonable to him who sincerely turns to God about it, and would find his refuge in the blood of Christ! But no: there stands as the complete denial of this the unfailing word of divine inspiration: "the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth from all sin." Here is no limit, and who shall make one? Whatever may be true as to unpardonable sin, it cannot mean that any such can be to one who has recourse to the blood of Christ; or that He will cast out, for any cause whatever, any one who in the day of present grace shall come to Him (1Jn 1:7; Joh 6:37).
But this brings us to the second question of the psalmist: "has His word failed for all generations?" Here, too, is an impossibility; but let us see what it implies. It is "His word" that is in question, not "His promise"; and this makes it much more weighty. God has been pleased to give us His word, and this indeed is "loving-kindness" to do so, and the parallelism of the verse is complete. He has written Himself out on the page of Scripture, -given us to see His heart, His mind: it may be in His dealings with this or that person, in His announcement as to this or that event. All this rests (as to its blessing to me) upon the immutability of His nature, the assurance that I shall find Him for myself the self-same God that He has been to others. Were He changeful, capricious, limited, I could argue nothing, find comfort in nothing: -for all generations His word would be practically gone. Were His "loving-kindness" anything but the infinite fount of blessing that it is, no declarations of it for another would help me, no words of other times would avail me now. But blessed be God, this cannot be. He is Himself, always Himself, no attribute at strife with another in His changeless and perfect nature. How I can rejoice, then, that Abraham’s God is mine; and what unfailing assurance any one that will, may gather from His word!
Here then is the point of the argument: it is God Himself in whom we can trust, and that, whatever the present circumstances. "Has the Mighty One (El) forgotten to be gracious? Must any circumstances whatever be allowed to argue infirmity in Him? "Has He shut up (contracted) in anger His compassions?" No, be assured. His very anger is the effect of love itself: cast yourself upon His love, this anger will not harm you; His chastening shall but purify and bless.
And thus we come to a point: shall we argue infirmity in Him or in ourselves? Here there can be no question, and the trouble is ended: "And I said, This is my infirmity" -"my malady," it might be rendered: "there are years of the right hand of the Most High;" -an inadequate statement, which is all the more effective. "God has had years of experience," he says to himself: and that so feebly represents the truth, and yet in that enfeebled form; so forbids doubt, that immediately he is master of himself again, and can only praise Him.
4. Back he can go now at once to Scripture, to those old experiences of God, now once more so available for him. "I will make mention of the works of Jah," he says: "for I remember Thy wonders of old; and I will meditate on all Thy work, and talk of Thy doings." "Jah," the contracted form of Jehovah, speaks in the most energetic, decisive way of the One who is, as if He were the only reality. And so, in a true sense, He is: for "in Him we live and move and have our being," and He governs absolutely where most his authority seems set aside. Had we eyes purged from all films, where would we find a thing which might not be a text from which to descant upon the "works of Jehovah?" and with what blessing to our own souls, as well as to the souls of others. Even the "wonders of old" are but as it were the visible signs and tokens of a manner of work which everywhere has the stamp of the same Author. Indeed that is what gives them their main charm and interest. Oh for eyes without a film! we shall have them: but do not let us be so satisfied with that assurance as to put away from us the present opportunity of learning such glorious things.
But he goes on: "Thy way, O God, is in the sanctuary" -not simply, I think, "in holiness," though that be the main thought. But the sanctuary suggests more than this, -suggests already even, what the next section more develops, the hidden character of His ways, which are yet not hidden of His will, for He is ever seeking to make them known, but of necessity, by reason of men’s estrangement from Him. The sanctuary, thank God, does not to us, as to Israel, so much speak of this: for it is what characterizes Christianity that the veil of it is rent from top to bottom; and we have "boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus" (Heb 10:19). Blessed it is to know this! but beyond measure blessed to draw really near because we know it! Practically still the measure of our knowledge must depend upon that purging of the eyes, of which we have been speaking. The light shines, and here is our responsibility, and here is our privilege. What we see is a question to be answered, each one for himself.
But it is in holiness God’s way is, and "the knowledge of the Holy is understanding": therefore we enter into His mind as His mind enters into us. And then indeed shall we realize: "who is the mighty one (El) so great as God?" And if He be thus necessarily hidden by. His own perfection, yet is He not outside the knowledge of men everywhere: for "Thou art the Mighty One that doeth wonders: Thou hast made known Thy strength among the peoples." And here especially in Israel -through His relationship to these -He is made known, and in the grace which this declares: "with Thine arm hast Thou redeemed Thy people, the sons of Jacob and of Joseph."
5. Here the fifth section opens, and we find in the way in which God manifested Himself as with His people and for their deliverance, how the powers of nature in which He so much hides Himself, are nevertheless perfectly at His disposal, and work in behalf of those with whom He is. The psalmist is drawing the picture manifestly of the deliverance at the Red Sea, although of the convulsions of nature described, the history gives no account. The moral drawn from it is of the widest application.
"The waters saw Thee, O God; the waters saw Thee, they were afraid; the depths also trembled." Nature owned His power, while men doubted the Arm upon which they leaned, or else defied it, after abundant experience. But not only did nature tremble and give place, but the elements yielded themselves to His will: "the clouds poured out water; the skies sent out a sound; Thine arrows also went abroad." But there was that which has ever to man been more like the manifestation of God, and which Scripture recognizes in this way: "The voice of Thy thunder was in the whirlwind; the earth trembled and quaked."
And now comes the moral of God’s clothing Himself in these nature-forms "Thy way is in the sea, and Thy paths in the great waters; and Thy footsteps are not known." True as that may be, yet this "way" is with His people and in their behalf: "Thou leddest Thy people like a flock, by the hand of Moses and Aaron." Thus in the dark as in the light He is the same; and in the dark, we can yet trust Him.
F. W. Grant, The Numerical Bible (4th ed., 1903) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow1909 · Public DomainOn v1The Ps. records the writer's experience of personal perplexity…
The Ps. records the writer's experience of personal perplexity and darkness, which, however, has been caused by the contemplation of Israel's national distress. It may be dated appropriately in the time of the exile. Psa_77:1-3 describe the Psalmist's trouble, in which even prayer has brought no comfort. Psa_77:4-9 speak of his meditations on the brighter past, which lead to the question whether God has finally rejected His people. In Psa_77:10-20 he turns for comfort to the story of God's wonderful works of old, and dwells especially upon His deliverance of Israel from Egypt (Psa_77:15), His sublime manifestation of power at the Red Sea (Psa_77:16-19), and His guidance of His people through the wilderness (Psa_77:20). At this point the Ps. comes to an abrupt close.
Title.—Jeduthun] see on Psalms 39.
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1. Cried.. gave] RV 'will cry.. will give.'
2. My sore ran] RV 'my hand was stretched out,' in the attitude of prayer.
3. Selah] see on Psa_3:4.
4. Mine eyes waking] rather, 'the guards of my eyes.' The eyelids are kept from closing.
6. My song in the night] a former time of happiness and praise: see Psa_42:8; Job_35:10.
10. This is my infirmity] The Psalmist here recognises that his doubts are due to his own weakness and not to any change in God.
10b. RM reads, 'That the right hand of the Most High doth change,' which may be taken as an exclamation, mentioning the idea only to dismiss it as impossible.
11. Remember] RV 'make mention of.'
12. Talk of] RV 'muse on.'
13. In the sanctuary] RV 'in holiness.'
14. People] RV 'peoples.'
15. The sons of Jacob and Joseph] Jacob represents the kingdom of Judah, and Joseph (father of Ephraim and Manasseh) the northern kingdom of Israel. The division of the nation is clearly hinted at: see on Psa_80:1, Psa_80:2.
16. The waters] the Red Sea: Exo_14:21-31.
17. Sound] thunder. Arrows] lightning.
18. Heaven] RV 'whirlwind.'
19. Is., are] RV 'was.. were.' Footsteps.. not known] when the waters had returned to their place.
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. I. Scofield1917 · Public DomainOn v1(See Scofield "Psa 39:1").
Jeduthun
(See Scofield "Psa 39:1").
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein1922 · Public DomainOn v1Psalm 77
Psalm 77
The Distressed Saint and His Comfort
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1. The distress (Psa 77:1-10)
2. The comfort (Psa 77:11-20)
This Psalm shows the distress of the saint in deepest exercise of soul. He earnestly seeks the Lord and never leaves off. “my hand was stretched out in the night, and failed not” (literal translation of Psa 77:2). He moaned and complained and his spirit was overwhelmed. Then in still greater distress he asks, “Will the Lord cast off forever?--Is His mercy come to an end forever?”--”Hath God forgotten to be gracious?” The comfort comes to him as he thinks of God’s past dealings, as he remembers His work of old. He realizeth “Thy way, O God, is in the sanctuary, who is so great a God as our God?” He remembers how God redeemed His people Israel in the past, and this being His way as a holy God, the God of the Sanctuary, He will redeem again and manifest His power. One can easily see how this Psalm also is Israelitish and finds its application in the last days.
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann1924 · Public DomainOn v1The Tribulation and Comfort of the Righteous.
The Tribulation and Comfort of the Righteous.
To the chief musician, to Jeduthun, at that time in charge of the Temple music, a psalm of Asaph, the psalm picturing the relief experienced by believers in the midst of affliction, by calling to mind God’s former and wonderful acts of deliverance.
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v. 1. I cried unto God with my voice, even unto God with my voice, in importunate supplication; and He gave ear unto me, in a gracious answer and act of deliverance.
v. 2. In the day of my trouble, at the time when affliction beset him strongly, I sought the Lord, the All-powerful; my sore ran in the night and ceased not, rather, my hand is stretched out in the night, without being relaxed, he does not draw it back, he does not cease from crying to the Lord; my soul refused to be comforted, so thoroughly had his affliction discouraged him.
v. 3. I remembered God and was troubled, groaning at the thought that Jehovah, once his Helper, had now apparently forsaken him; I complained, and my spirit was overwhelmed, so overcome that he could no longer think clearly. Selah.
v. 4. Thou holdest mine eyes waking, holding the lids of his eyes open, depriving him of sleep on account of the misery which he felt; I am so troubled that I cannot speak, he is speechless from the excessive amount of his affliction. But his meditation now turns to the past.
v. 5. I have considered the days of old, of ages long past, the years of ancient times, when the manifestations of God’s power and mercy were so numerous.
v. 6. I call to remembrance my song in the night, when a feeling of happy gratitude caused him to use even the night season for anthems of praise; I commune with mine own heart, meditating in the seclusion of his inmost soul, making comparisons with the past happiness and the present misery; and my spirit made diligent search, trying to become clear in his own mind regarding the ways of the Lord. A summary of his meditation is now given.
v. 7. Will the Lord cast off forever? Can it be possible that He will utterly forsake the afflicted? And will He be favorable no more, never again showing His good pleasure in the afflicted soul trusting in Him?
v. 8. Is His mercy clean gone forever Has He for gotten all His merciful promises? Doth His promise fail forevermore? Surely such a course would not harmonize with the outstanding attributes of His essence.
v. 9. Hath God forgotten to be gracious, to look upon His children with kind favor? Hath He in anger shut up His tender mercies? Selah. Note how closely these meditations agree with those in the experience of every believer. The psalmist now shakes off all feelings of doubt.
v. 10. And I said, This is my infirmity, the suffering which was his lot in life; but I will remember the years of the right hand of the Most High, when the almighty power of Jehovah sustained him.
v. 11. I will remember the works of the Lord, with praise and thanksgiving; surely I will remember Thy wonders of old, for there are miracles of God in the life of every believer, just as there are in the history of the Church.
v. 12. I will meditate also of all Thy work, pondering upon them most carefully, and talk of Thy doings, by which God revealed His divine attributes to men.
v. 13. Thy way, O God, is in the Sanctuary, literally, "in holiness"; everything that He does accords with the holiness of His essence. Who is so great a God as our God? His perfections place Him above all so-called gods and idols of the heathen.
v. 14. Thou art the God that doest wonders, continually performing miracles of kindness and mercy; thou hast declared Thy strength among the people, revealing among the nations of the world His almighty power.
v. 15. Thou hast with Thine arm redeemed Thy people, His uplifted, almighty arm providing deliverance to Israel, the sons of Jacob and Joseph, the latter being especially mentioned as bearers of the right of the firstborn. Selah.
v. 16. The waters saw Thee, O God; the waters saw Thee, namely, when He made ready to cleave the waters of the Red Sea; they were afraid; the depths also were troubled, being filled with awe and trembling before the power of the Creator, Exo 14:21.
v. 17. The clouds poured out water, during a mighty thunderstorm revealing Jehovah’s power; the skies sent out a sound, the entire firmament sounding; Thine arrows also went abroad, the lightnings being pictured as active and aggressive.
v. 18. The voice of Thy thunder was in the heaven, or "in the whirlwind"; the lightnings lightened the world; the earth trembled and shook. The entire passage seems to be an elaborate picture. of the mighty phenomena preceding and accompanying the giving of the Law on Mount Sinai, all the powers of nature being used in the service of Jehovah, in the revelation of His incomparable majesty.
v. 19. Thy way is in the sea and Thy path in the great waters, the trackless deep being obliged to offer Him a road, and Thy footsteps are not known, the full mysteries of His omnipotence and providence being beyond the comprehension of men.
v. 20. Thou leddest Thy people like a flock, His hand both protecting and guiding them, by the hand of Moses and Aaron, His representatives before the children of Israel, Exo 14:29-31. All believers may rest assured that the God of Israel, Jehovah, will lead them, individually and collectively, through all the tribulations of this present time to everlasting salvation.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Tyndale Open Study Notes2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0On vv1, 3, 4, 7Ps 77 The psalmist laments that God has turned…
Ps 77 The psalmist laments that God has turned away from him, even though he feels innocent. He reflects on his situation (77:3, 6, 12) and finds hope (see 25:5) in remembering God’s past deeds (77:11).
77:1-3 The night provides a special opportunity for prayer and meditation (77:6, 11; see 6:6; 16:7; 17:3; 30:5; 63:6; 119:55, 62, 148).
John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9 1. My voice came to God, and I cried.…
1. My voice came to God, and I cried. This is not a mere complaint, as some interpreters explain it, denoting the surprise which the people of God felt in finding that he who hitherto had been accustomed to grant their requests shut his ears to them, and was called upon in vain. It appears more probable that the prophet either speaks of the present feeling of his mind, or else calls to remembrance how he had experienced that God was inclined and ready to hear his prayers. There can be no doubt that he describes the greatness of the sorrow with which he was afflicted; and, in nay opinion, he denotes a continued act both by the past and the future tenses of the verbs. In the first place, he declares that he did not foolishly rend the air with his cries, like many who pour forth bitter cries without measure and at random under their sorrows; but that he addressed his speech to God when necessity constrained him to cry. The copula and, which is joined to the verb cried, should be resolved into the adverb of time when, in this way, When I cried my voice came to God At the same time, he also shows, that although he had been constrained often to reiterate his cries, he had not given over persevering in prayer. What is added immediately after is intended for the confirmation of his faith: And he heard me. The copula and, as in many other places, is here put instead of the causal adverb for. The meaning is, that he encouraged himself to cry to God, from the consideration that it was God’s usual manner to show his favor and mercy towards him.
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 On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8 The Prophet teacheth us by his example to flee…
The Prophet teacheth us by his example to flee unto God for help in our necessities.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv1–9 Psa 77:1 « To the chief Musician, to Jeduthun,…
Psa 77:1 « To the chief Musician, to Jeduthun, A Psalm of Asaph. » I cried unto God with my voice, [even] unto God with my voice; and he gave ear unto me.
A Psalm of Asaph] Or, for Asaph; David’s melancholy psalm some call it, made by him when he was in grievous affliction and desertion. Out of which he seeketh to wind by earnest prayer, by deep meditation upon God’s former favours and unchangeable nature; and, lastly, by calling to mind God’s wondrous works of old, both in proving and in preserving his Church and chosen.
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Ver. 1. I cried unto God with my voice, &c.] I prayed instantly and constantly, and sped accordingly. No faithful prayer is ineffectual.
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 On vv1–9 This verse seems to contain the sum of the…
This verse seems to contain the sum of the whole Psalm, consisting of two parts, to wit, his earnest cry to God in his deep distress; and God’s gracious return to his prayers, by supporting him under them, and giving him assurance of a good issue out of them; of both which he speaks more distinctly and particularly, of the first from Psa 77:2-10, of the latter thence to the end.
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 On v1 We have here the lively portraiture of a good…
We have here the lively portraiture of a good man under prevailing melancholy, fallen into and sinking in that horrible pit and that miry clay, but struggling to get out. Drooping saints, that are of a sorrowful spirit, may here as in a glass see their own faces. The conflict which the psalmist had with his griefs and fears seems to have been over when he penned this record of it; for he says (Psa 77:1), I cried unto God, and he gave ear unto me, which, while the struggle lasted, he had not the comfortable sense of, as he had afterwards; but he inserts it in the beginning of his narrative as an intimation that his trouble did not end in despair; for God heard him, and, at length, he knew that he heard him. Observe,
I. His melancholy prayers. Being afflicted, he prayed (Jam 5:13), and, being in an agony, he prayed more earnestly (Psa 77:1): My voice was unto God, and I cried, even with my voice unto God. He was full of complaints, loud complaints, but he directed them to God, and turned them all into prayers, vocal prayers, very earnest and importunate. Thus he gave vent to his grief and gained some ease; and thus he took the right way in order to relief (Psa 77:2): In the day of my trouble I sought the Lord. Note, Days of trouble must be days of prayer, days of inward trouble especially, when God seems to have withdrawn from us; we must seek him and seek till we find him. In the day of his trouble he did not seek for the diversion of business or recreation, to shake off his trouble that way, but he sought God, and his favour and grace. Those that are under trouble of mind must not think to drink it away, or laugh it away, but must pray it away. My hand was stretched out in the night and ceased not; so Dr. Hammond reads the following words, as speaking the incessant importunity of his prayers. Compare Psa 143:5, Psa 143:6.
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II. His melancholy grief. Grief may then be called melancholy indeed, 1. When it admits of no intermission; such was his: My sore, or wound, ran in the night, and bled inwardly, and it ceased not, no, not in the time appointed for rest and sleep. 2. When it admits of no consolation; and that also as his case: My soul refused to be comforted; he had no mind to hearken to those that would be his comforters. As vinegar upon nitre, so is he that sings songs to a heavy heart, Pro 25:20. Nor had he any mind to think of those things that would be his comforts; he put them far from him, as one that indulged himself in sorrow. Those that are in sorrow, upon any account, do not only prejudice themselves, but affront God, if they refuse to be comforted.
III. His melancholy musings. He pored so much upon the trouble, whatever it was, personal or public, that, 1. The methods that should have relieved him did but increase his grief, Psa 77:3. (1.) One would have thought that the remembrance of God would comfort him, but it did not: I remembered God and was troubled, as poor Job (Job 23:15); I am troubled at his presence; when I consider I am afraid of him. When he remembered God his thoughts fastened only upon his justice, and wrath, and dreadful majesty, and thus God himself became a terror to him. (2.) One would have thought that pouring out his soul before God would give him ease, but it did not; he complained, and yet his spirit was overwhelmed, and sank under the load. 2. The means of his present relief were denied him, v. 4. He could not enjoy sleep, which, if it be quiet and refreshing, is a parenthesis to our griefs and cares: "Thou holdest my eyes waking with thy terrors, which make me full of tossings to and fro until the dawning of the day." He could not speak, by reason of the disorder of his thoughts, the tumult of his spirits, and the confusion his mind was in: He kept silence even from good while his heart was hot within him; he was ready to burst like a new bottle (Job 32:19), and yet so troubled that he could not speak and refresh himself. Grief never preys so much upon the spirits as when it is thus smothered and pent up.
IV. His melancholy reflections (Psa 77:5, Psa 77:6): "I have considered the days of old, and compared them with the present days; and our former prosperity does but aggravate our present calamities: for we see not the wonders that our fathers told us off." Melancholy people are apt to pore altogether upon the days of old and the years of ancient times, and to magnify them, for the justifying of their own uneasiness and discontent at the present posture of affairs. But say not thou that the former days were better than these, because it is more than thou knowest whether they were or no, Ecc 7:10. Neither let the remembrance of the comforts we have lost make us unthankful for those that are left, or impatient under our crosses. Particularly, he called to remembrance his song in the night, the comforts with which he had supported himself in his former sorrows and entertained himself in his former solitude. These songs he remembered, and tried if he could not sing them over again; but he was out of tune for them, and the remembrance of them did but pour out his soul in him, Psa 43:4. See Job 35:10.
V. His melancholy fears and apprehensions: "I communed with my own heart, Psa 77:6. Come, my soul, what will be the issue of these things? What can I think of them and what can I expect they will come to at last? I made diligent search into the causes of my trouble, enquiring wherefore God contended with me and what would be the consequences of it. And thus I began to reason, Will the Lord cast off for ever, as he does for the present? He is not now favourable; and will he be favourable no more? His mercy is now gone; and is it clean gone for ever? His promise now fails; and does it fail for evermore? God is not now gracious; but has he forgotten to be gracious? His tender mercies have been withheld, perhaps in wisdom; but are they shut up, shut up in anger?" Psa 77:7-9. This is the language of a disconsolate deserted soul, walking in darkness and having no light, a case not uncommon even with those that fear the Lord and obey the voice of his servant, Isa 50:10. He may here be looked upon, 1. As groaning under a sore trouble. God hid his face from him, and withdrew the usual tokens of his favour. Note, Spiritual trouble is of all trouble most grievous to a gracious soul; nothing wounds and pierces it like the apprehensions of God's being angry, the suspending of his favour and the superseding of his promise; this wounds the spirit; and who can bear that? 2. As grappling with a strong temptation. Note, God's own people, in a cloudy and dark day, may be tempted to make desperate conclusions about their own spiritual state and the condition of God's church and kingdom in the world, and, as to both, to give up all for gone. We may be tempted to think that God has abandoned us and cast us off, that the covenant of grace fails us, and that the tender mercy of our God shall be for ever withheld from us. But we must not give way to such suggestions as these. If fear and melancholy ask such peevish questions, let faith answer them from the Scripture: Will the Lord cast off for ever? God forbid, Rom 11:1. No; the Lord will not cast off his people, Psa 94:14. Will he be favourable no more? Yes, he will; for, though he cause grief, yet will he have compassion, Lam 3:32. Is his mercy clean gone for ever? No; his mercy endures for ever; as it is from everlasting, it is to everlasting, Psa 103:17. Doth his promise fail for evermore? No; it is impossible for God to lie, Heb 6:18. Hath God forgotten to be gracious? No; he cannot deny himself, and his own name which he hath proclaimed gracious and merciful, Exo 34:6. Has he in anger shut up his tender mercies? No; they are new every morning (Lam 3:23); and therefore, How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? Hos 11:8, Hos 11:9. Thus was he going on with his dark and dismal apprehensions when, on a sudden, he first checked himself with that word, Selah, "Stop there; go no further; let us hear no more of these unbelieving surmises;" and he then chid himself (Psa 77:10): I said, This is my infirmity. He is soon aware that it is not well said, and therefore, "Why art thou cast down, O my soul? I said, This is my affliction" (so some understand it); "This is the calamity that falls to my lot and I must make the best of it; every one has his affliction, his trouble in the flesh; and this is mine, the cross I must take up." Or, rather, "This is my sin; it is my iniquity, the plague of my own heart." These doubts and fears proceed from the want and weakness of faith and the corruption of a distempered mind. note, (1.) We all know that concerning ourselves of which we must say, "This is our infirmity, a sin that most easily besets us." (2.) Despondency of spirit, and distrust of God, under affliction, are too often the infirmities of good people, and, as such, are to be reflected upon by us with sorrow and shame, as by the psalmist here: This is my infirmity. When at any time it is working in us we must thus suppress the rising of it, and not suffer the evil spirit to speak. We must argue down the insurrections of unbelief, as the psalmist here: But I will remember the years of the right hand of the Most High. He had been considering the years of ancient times (Psa 77:5), the blessings formerly enjoyed, the remembrance of which did only add to his grief; but now he considered them as the years of the right hand of the Most High, that those blessings of ancient times came from the Ancient of days, from the power and sovereign disposal of his right hand who is over all, God, blessed for ever, and this satisfied him; for may not the Most High with his right hand make what changes he pleases?
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 On vv1–9 I cried unto God with my voice,.... Which is…
I cried unto God with my voice,.... Which is to be understood of prayer, and that vocal, and which is importunate and fervent, being made in distress; see Psa 3:4, or "my voice was unto God" (h), "and I cried"; it was directed to him, and expressed in a very loud and clamorous way:
even unto God with my voice; or "my voice was unto God"; which is repeated to show that he prayed again and again, with great eagerness and earnestness, his case being a very afflicted one:
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and he gave ear unto me; his prayer was not without success; God is a God hearing and answering prayer, according to his promise, Psa 50:15.
(h) "vox mea ad Deum", Pagninus, Montanus, Musculus, "fertur", Junius & Tremellius; "erat", Cocceius.
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 On vv1–7 The psalmist complains of deep distress, and temptations to…
The psalmist complains of deep distress, and temptations to despair, ver. 1-10. He encourages himself to hope, by the remembrance of what God had done formerly, ver. 11-20. To the chief musician, to Jeduthun, A psalm of Asaph.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv1–9 The psalmist's ardent prayer to God in the tine…
PSALM LXXVII
The psalmist's ardent prayer to God in the tine of distress,
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1-4.
The means he used to excite his confidence, 5-12.
God's wonderful works in behalf of his people, 13-20.
NOTES ON PSALM LXXVII
The title, "To the chief Musician, (or conqueror,) to Jeduthun, A Psalm of Asaph." On this title we may observe that both Asaph and Jeduthun were celebrated singers in the time of David, and no doubt were masters or leaders of bands which long after their times were called by their names. Hence Psalms composed during and after the captivity have these names prefixed to them. But there is reason to believe also, that there was a person of the name of Asaph in the captivity at Babylon. The author must be considered as speaking in the persons of the captive Israelites, It may however be adapted to the case of any individual in spiritual distress through strong temptation, or from a sense of the Divine displeasure in consequence of backsliding.
Verse 1. I cried unto God] The repetition here marks the earnestness of the psalmist's soul; and the word voice shows that the Psalm was not the issue of private meditation, but of deep mental trouble, which forced him to speak his griefs aloud.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7 Psa 77:1. I cried unto God, &c. — This…
Psa 77:1. I cried unto God, &c. — This verse seems to contain the sum of the whole Psalm, consisting of two parts, namely, his earnest cry to God in his deep distress, and God’s gracious answer to his prayers, by supporting him under his troubles, and giving him assurance of a good issue out of them; of both which he speaks distinctly and particularly as he proceeds in the Psalm.
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 On vv1–9 I cried unto God with my voice - That…
I cried unto God with my voice - That is, he cried or prayed audibly. It was not mere mental prayer. See the notes at Psa 3:4.
Even unto God with my voice - The repetition here is emphatic. The idea is that it was an earnest or fervent cry. Compare the notes at 2Co 12:8.
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And he gave ear unto me - See Psa 5:1, note; Psa 17:6, note.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures 1864 · Public Domain On v1 Psalms 77
Psalms 77
To the chief Musician, to Jeduthun A Psalm of Asaph
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2 I cried unto God with my voice,
Even unto God with my voice; and he gave ear unto me.
3 In the day of my trouble I sought the Lord:
My sore ran in the night and ceased not:
My soul refused to be comforted.
4 I remembered God, and was troubled:
I complained, and my spirit was overwhelmed. Selah.
5 Thou holdest mine eyes waking:
I am so troubled that I cannot speak.
6 I have considered the days of old,
The years of ancient times.
7 I call to remembrance my song in the night:
I commune with mine own heart: and my spirit made diligent search.
8 Will the Lord cast off forever?
And will he be favorable no more?
9 Is his mercy clean gone forever?
Doth his promise fail for evermore?
10 Hath God forgotten to be gracious?
Hath he in anger shut up his tender mercies? Selah.
11 And I said, This is my infirmity:
But I will remember the years of the right hand of the Most High.
12 I will remember the works of the Lord:
Surely I will remember thy wonders of old.
13 I will meditate also of all thy work,
And talk of thy doings.
14 Thy way, O God, is in the sanctuary:
Who is so great a God as our God?
15 Thou art the God that doest wonders:
Thou hast declared thy strength among the people.
16 Thou hast with thine arm redeemed thy people,
The sons of Jacob and Joseph. Selah.
17 The waters saw thee, O God,
The waters saw thee; they were afraid:
The depths also were troubled.
18 The clouds poured out water:
The skies sent out a sound:
Thine arrows also went abroad.
19 The voice of thy thunder was in the heaven:
The lightnings lightened the world:
The earth trembled and shook.
20 Thy way is in the sea,
And thy path in the great waters,
And thy footsteps are not known.
21 Thou leddest thy people like a flock
By the hand of Moses and Aaron.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
Contents and Composition.—On the superscription compare Introd., § 12, No. 6 In three strophes, of which the first and third end with Selah, we hare presented to us a prayer of one in deep distress. It begins with the earnest declaration that he is sighing and crying to God unceasingly (Psa_77:2-4), and, after recounting his sad reminiscences of happy days that were past (Psa_77:5-7) it lets us hear his anxious question (Psa_77:8-10), whether God’s mercy had forever forsaken him. In three strophes, of which the second ends with Selah, a growing calmness is exhibited. The Psalmist first finds consolation in reflecting upon God’s controlling hand in this affliction as well as in His former deeds (Psa_77:11-13) and then extols (Psa_77:14-16) God the Holy and Almighty One, as the Deliverer of His people even until now, and finally gives a poetical picture of the deliverance from Egypt, (Psa_77:17-20). A concluding verse (21) represents this Divine guidance of the people under an image frequent in the Asaph-Psalms, in such a manner that it excites an expectation of its continuance, and yet the thought which is presented is here developed no further. There is no sufficient ground, however, for the conjecture that the Psalm is incomplete (Tholuck), or that we have it in a mutilated form (Rosenmueller, Olshausen) or that it forms a part of Psalms 80. (Pareau, Instit. interpr., Vet. Test., p. 330). Such an abrupt termination can be explained on the ground of a poetical purpose (De Wette), nor is it without other example in the Bible (Hupfeld). The attaching of the verse to the lyrical strophe, Psa_77:17 ff., which itself varies from the regular rhythmical structure, is unexpected. The contents of the passage resemble Psa_97:4, but especially Psalms 114., and Hab_3:10 f. It is doubtful which of these passages should be regarded as the earliest. With reference to Psa_97:4, at all events, the resemblances are quite general, and therefore only casual (Philippson), but in the case of the other two passages the whole manner of expression declares the opposite. According to Hupfeld, a comparison favors the supposition that the one before us is the latest. We need not however assume that a later addition was made to the Psalm (Köster) perhaps by the Psalmist himself (Hupfeld). Neither have we sufficient reason to refer the whole Psalm to the age of the Syrian oppression (Venema, Olshausen) and to bring it into special connection with 1Ma_3:38 (Hitzig). The period of the Babylonian exile might be thought of (Ewald and most). Since, however, the destruction of the temple is not mentioned, and strong evidence can be adduced to show that the prophecy of Habakkuk presupposes this Psalm (Delitzsch, Hengst., Caspari); it appears also admissible to bring the latter into connection with the destruction of the Ten Tribes. More definite indications fail us. Even the mention of Joseph along with Jacob, Psa_77:16 b, might be due to the recollection of the deliverance of the people in Egypt (Targ., Calvin, Geier, and others). But it is still more natural to assume that Ephraim, the tribe second in importance (Psa_78:67) and the kingdom of Israel (Psa_80:2; Psa_81:6) are alluded to. Nothing more definite aids us to discover the affliction which is here bewailed, which, though experienced personally, and expressed as that of an individual, clearly represents a national calamity. [Dr. Moll seems undecided as to which of the passages above discussed has the priority in composition. If the Psalm can be shown to have been prior to the prophecy, we have a limit on one side, for it is generally acknowledged that Habakkuk wrote in the days of Josiah. For a full presentation of this side of the question, see Delitzsch’s Comm. on Hab., pp. 118–125, or the extracts made therefrom in his Comm. on Psalms, and in that of Hengstenberg. He uses two arguments which appear to most to be satisfactory. 1. That the acknowledged principle of Hab. in the structure of the 3d chapter was to imitate the Psalms, and that the presumption is therefore in favor of his being here the imitator and not the originator. 2. That it is improbable that the Psalmist “would have described a past deliverance in language borrowed from the prophetic description of a deliverance yet to come.” The arguments of Hupfeld on the other side are mainly based on his own subjective taste, and proceed chiefly upon the assumption that those of the corresponding expressions which are more natural and correct as to conception and diction are the earlier. This, therefore, assumes that the Psalmist in copying changed for the worse. Is it not at least as likely that the prophet, in imitating, altered for the better? Alexander favors the position of Delitzsch. Perowne feels that there is some force in Hupfeld’s arguments, and is therefore undecided. If the Psalm is the earlier it is therefore not later than the reign of Josiah. It is naturally brought into connection with the perplexing and harassing thoughts that filled the minds of the pious at that time in the contemplation both of the present and of the future.—Perowne and Barnes regard the speaker as recording his own personal experience. Alexander regards the Church as speaking through the Psalmist. The view of Dr. Moll, as above, mediates between these, and is most probably the correct one. For the feelings are all personal, while the recollections of the past, which are contrasted with the present, are all of national blessings.—J. F. M.]
Psa_77:3-4. My hand is stretched out in the night. [E. V., My sore ran in the night]. This expression [Heb. נִגְּרָה] usually employed of water (2Sa_14:14) and of tears (Lam_3:49) is here transferred to the hand. [German hingegossen. The two ideas cannot be rendered into English by one word, as is done here by Dr. Moll.—J. F. M.] But this mode of expression is not chosen because the hand is bedewed by tears (old expositors in Geier), or because it lies exhausted and powerless, and as an image of the decay that consumes the whole body (Hengst.); but, as the sequel shows, to describe the constant turning to God as an unchangeable inclination of the soul amid the ebb and flow of the tides of feeling. [The Rabbins understood יַד to mean the stroke of the hand, and therefore the wound, but did not connect it immediately with the verb. Our translators obtained the meaning “sore” from this, and construed directly with נגרה. Hence, “My sore ran in the night.” The next verb primarily means to be cold, next to be numb, stiff, still, to cease. The true rendering is: My hand was stretched forth in the night and was not still. Delitzsch: “The Psalmist toils in the time of his trouble to force his way to God, who has withdrawn Himself as though wishing to know nothing of him; his hand is stretched forth in the night time, without being relaxed, it is unbent, does not fall back while directed heavenward.”—J. F. M.] The præterites also in Psa_77:3, which many of the old translators have transferred to the whole strophe, express what is long since begun and still continues. The translation: eye, instead of: hand (Targ.) is not due to another text, but to a false effort at explanation. [Psa_77:4, should be translated, not as in our version, but: I remember God and groan. I think and my spirit is overwhelmed.—J. F. M.]
The eyelids, Psa_77:5, are here described as guards, or still better as shields. The translation: night-watches (Hengst., Hupfeld) cannot be proved either by the similar word, Psa_63:7, nor by Lam_2:19. [Hengst. and Hupf. assume that שְׁמֻרֹות is for אַשְׁמֻרֹות. Alexander differs from both views, and retains the view that it is a participle, giving it the passive sense: “my eyes kept,” that is, kept fast. But to take it in the active sense, as is done in E. V., and thought possible by Perowne, is incorrect.—J. F. M.]
Psa_77:11; Psa_77:17. This is my infirmity.—Others translate (with the Targ.): my entreaty is this. But the meaning: suffering, or more strictly: disease, wound, is rendered certain by Jer_10:19. In the next sentence expositors differ very greatly. But there should really only be hesitation between the translation: changing, or: years. In favor of the latter it may be urged that already in Psa_77:6 this explanation is indisputably to be given to the same word-form, and that the following thought is a more natural sequel to it. Then the assurance that God’s hand, and not the wickedness and power of men, had brought this season of humiliation (1Pe_5:6), inflicts, indeed, a wound in the heart. Yet it suggests also the comforting thought that everything is ordered duly and rightly, and therefore the sufferer, though still unrelieved, can win hope from the recollection of God’s former acts of help and deeds of mercy. And he gains it the more fully, the more willingly he humbles himself under the hand of such a God, and resigns himself to His holy will. If the translation: changing (Sept. and most of the ancient versions) is preferred, then it must be observed that the active sense: the hand of God can change everything (Luther) is linguistically not admissible, but only the passive, that the hand of God has been changed (Maurer, Hupfeld, Hitzig). But even then it is difficult to connect with what follows: and the thought itself is unintelligible and ambiguous. Then, the explanation that the supposition of a change in God’s actions and government is only a delusion, and that the Psalmist acknowledges this fancy to have been his former infirmity, is only gained by importing it into the words of the text. [Perowne translates: This is my sorrow, that the right hand of the Highest hath changed. Hengstenberg, with whom Alexander mainly agrees, explains by saying that the years are years of suffering inflicted by the hand of God, and so agrees with the explanation given above. The words in italics in E. V. are to be omitted. In Psa_77:17 instead of: “they were afraid,” render: they trembled.—J. F. M.]
Psa_77:19. In the whirlwind.—[E. V., In the heavens]. The rendering: wheel (the ancient versions and Isaaki) is here so much the less applicable, as galgal does not denote the form of the wheel when at rest, but its whirling motion. The rendering: sphæra, arch of heaven (most of the older translators after Kimchi) is therefore unsuitable. We must consequently understand either the whirlwind accompanying the under-storm (most of the moderns since J. D. Michaelis) or the rolling of the thunder (Aben Ezra, Maurer), and not introduce the idea of the wheels of Jehovah’s chariot (Rosenmueller, Hupfeld), but that of the rapid succession of thunder peals (Hengst., Böttcher). [Perowne translates: in the rolling, and explains it of God’s chariot, or of the whirlwind, though in his critical note he denies that the latter meaning can be supported. Alexander approves of the rendering whirlwind, and, in opposition to Hengstenberg, refers to Isa_17:13 as showing that that idea may be deduced from it.—J. F. M.]
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
1. There are times when the recollection of God’s former help, does not alleviate the pangs of present suffering, but only increases them. We experience, then, not only deep anguish, sleepless nights, disquieting thoughts, which toss us to and fro, but among the blows and shocks, which make us at one time shriek out, at another lose our breath, so that we cannot speak, scruples will arise, which grow into temptations, and, by the contrast of former and present circumstances, experiences, and feelings, doubt is excited as to our state of grace, and we hesitate as to the attitude of God towards us. Deliverance from such anxieties and dangers is effected by an unceasing wrestling or struggling on our way to God through all barriers, by prayer, and even with sighs and groans. Then we must not merely call to mind the hand of God, which rules in all events, but also resign ourselves truly to it in humble self-surrender, and ground our hope anew also upon the actual deeds of His might and grace, which have established and preserved the Church.
2. And thus lamentation is soon exchanged for a song of praise. The pious soul thinks no longer of itself and of its transient suffering, but of God’s eternal glory. The evidences of that shine out before him with comforting power from the history of revelation and redemption, even if God’s footsteps are not presented visibly to him as He marches through the world. And God is, and remains, even when through the instrumentality of human servants, the safe and trustworthy Leader of His people to the promised goal. Yes! He not only leads them through the sea and the desert, He tends them, too, as the Shepherd of His flock.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
Those who are under suffering like to think about themselves, and brood over their situation. It were better for them to meditate upon God’s doings.—The events of history not only awaken recollections, they excite also hopes.—God’s ruling in the affairs of the world we should not merely recognize and admit, we should also be willing to be subject to it ourselves.—Remain thou with the flock of God, and then He will never fail thee in need.—God is and remains Comforter, Leader, and Provider for His Church and each of her members.—God’s ways conduct surely to the goal, but all do not recognize them, nor all walk in them.—We must toil after God until we find Him, and after we have found Him we must not leave Him.—To surrender ourselves into God’s hands is the surest means of being lifted above even the deepest sorrows.—God has means and ways enough to help His people, but they are usually other than men expect.—By praising and extolling the glory of God, we soonest forget our earthly suffering and personal affliction.
Luther: If God were to be present with His help just when we think He should, all would be wrong. Let us learn that. well. And therefore this Psalm will show God to us, and teach us His way of helping, namely, that we are not to despair of God when it goes ill with us, but just then expect help most certainly, and not trust our own thoughts.
Starke: It is a glorious attribute of faith that it does not cease in prayer and supplication till God at last causes His gracious countenance to shine, and appears with His comfort and help.—Gather for thyself in good days a treasure of the comforting words of Scripture; times of drought are coming when no comfort holds.—Trust nothing but God’s mercy, and thou wilt certainly never be betrayed by false consolation.—It is better for the heart to pray without the mouth than the mouth without the heart.—In tribulation much is learned, and more in an hour than at other times in many years, for then is experienced in deed and in truth all that God’s word says.—God is Lord of nature; therefore can He create help when the help of nature fails.—Those who fill ecclesiastical and civil positions should cultivate brotherly unity after the example of Moses and Aaron, and then the discharge of their duties will be so much the more blessed.—Frisch: Let God’s word and the glorious and marvellous redemption of His children therein recorded be precious to thee, and then thou wilt be better contented with what He ordains for thee. Thou wilt ever discover more of God, how wonderful He is in His ways, holy in His works, unsearchable in His wisdom, immovable in His righteousness, and inexhaustible in His mercy.—Rieger: It is the crowning excellence of all God’s ways that He so unites the revealed and the concealed together as at once to strengthen and to exercise our faith.—Richter (Hausbibel): Here learn how the thought of faith, that Jehovah is, in all changes, the same unchangeable God to-day as He was in the most remote ages and events, when He proved Himself to be the inscrutable Saviour of His people, can calm and bless a soul which grieves over Israel’s troubles, and is tempted in utter darkness.—Tholuck: Shall God, to whose nature it belongs to be gracious, and faithfully to keep His promises, make an exception in my case? Impossible.—Diedrich: Our God must ever remain our support, even if we had only His deeds in the past to contemplate with delight. He will, however, again manifest His glory when He beholds us seeking consolation in Him.—Taube: Sleepless, helpless, speechless, comfortless, this is a clear and true picture of the condition of our poor hearts, when God closes the veil, and we are left alone abandoned to ourselves.—The obscurity and darkness are not in God’s heart, words, and ways, but upon our eyes and hearts.
[Barnes: Even in shallow waters, when one wades through them, the path closes at once, and the way cannot be traced, but God’s ways are like those of one who should move over a great ocean—over a boundless sea—where none could hope to follow Him.—J. F. M.]
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv1–9 1. I cried unto God— “My distresses were great,…
1. I cried unto God— “My distresses were great, and I had none but God to go to.”—Hammond.
He gave ear unto me—The rabbinical construction takes the verb as a peculiar form of the imperative, (hear thou me,) which suits better the feelings of the psalmist as not having yet received the answer to prayer. The complaint goes on to Psa_77:9, and the subsequent part of the psalm describes only the triumph of faith, not the formal fulfilment of his request. Compare Hab_3:17-19
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 On vv1–9 1. “Aloud unto God let me cry,
1. “Aloud unto God let me cry,
Yea, aloud unto God, and he will give ear to me.”
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1–3. The Psalmist relates how, under the pressure of calamity, he could find no consolation even in prayer.
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 On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7 (1) I cried . . .—Better, following the Hebrew…
(1) I cried . . .—Better, following the Hebrew literally,
“My voice to God—and let me cry;
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My voice to God—and He hears me.”
The Authorised Version has followed the LXX. and Vulg. in neglecting the striking changes in mood running through this psalm. Soliloquy and narrative alternate as the poet’s mood impels him—now to give vent to his feelings in sobs and cries, now to analyse and describe them.
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 On vv1–9 THIS psalm is the lament and expostulation with God…
THIS psalm is the lament and expostulation with God of some afflicted person, perhaps Asaph, who speaks as the mouthpiece of his countrymen, complaining of Israel"s apparent desertion by God (vers. 1-9), but thence rising into a higher strain of hope and confidence, based on a recollection of Jehovah"s past mercies (vers. 10-20). The particular occasion which called forth the psalm cannot be determined. The psalm consists of six stanzas of three verses each, to which is appended one of two verses only. The pause mark, "selah," occurs at the end of the first, the third, and the fifth stanzas.
I cried unto God with my voice, even unto God with my voice. The repetition marks the intensity of the appeal, "with my voice that the appellant is not content with mere silent prayer. And he gave ear unto me; rather, "that he may hearken unto me" (Cheyne), or "and do thou hearken unto me" (Hengstenberg, Kay).
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HOMILIES BY S. CONWAY Vers. 1-20. From darkness to dawn.
So may this psalm be described. We have the night of weeping followed by the morning, if not of joy, yet of peace. It is a portraiture to which the experience of myriads of souls has answered and will answer. Hence, for the help of all such, the psalm has been given. We know not who the writer was, nor when, nor the special reason why, the psalm was written. We only know that it is the utterance of a heart that had been sorely troubled, but to whom light and peace came again. We are shown the darkness, the paling of that darkness, and the dawn.
I THE DARKNESS.
1. It was very dark. There was great trouble. He tells of it in vers. 2, 3, 4. And prayer seemed no good, notwithstanding it was very earnest, hence spoken aloud (ver. 1) and prolonged all the night through (ver. 2: "My hand in the night hath been stretched out the hand of entreaty and prayer and ceased not"). Nevertheless, no comfort came.
2. His grief seems to have prompted distrust. As Jacob (Gen_37:35) about Joseph, and David about his child (2Sa_12:17) and about Absalom, (2Sa 18) so here there was what there should not have been the refusing to be comforted.
3. But this made the darkness yet deeper. He could not remember God (ver. 3). He could not realize his presence and help; he could only sigh in distress. He could not commune with his own heart, but his spirit was too overwhelmed. He would sleep, but could not. He would speak to God, but his trouble was too great. The distressed soul, as it often does, utterly broke down. But a breakdown like that brings speedily the help of God. He will never leave his people in a strait like that, blessed be his Name! And so we see
II THE PALING OF THE DARKNESS. Those who ascend high mountains to witness the glory of the dawn are told of its advent by the paling of the darkness. And spiritually, we see this here. God sends the thoughts of his servant back to "the days of old" (ver. 5), and to the bright joyous periods which were like a "song," and their sweet memories came back and talked to him, and set his spirit in "diligent search," so that he was compelled to come to the conclusion that all his dark and dreadful thoughts about the Lord"s casting off forever, and being favourable no more (see vers. 7, 8, 9), were all impossible of belief, mere nightmares of the soul, altogether false and untrue. Then in ver. 10 he comes to see how he has been led to think such sad thoughts. "Then I said, This is my sorrow, that the right hand of the Highest hath changed." Yes, God"s providence had changed, but not his heart. Before we pass on, let us ask Why does God let his servants suffer such eclipse of all joy as is recorded here? Partly by way of reproof. The psalmist "refused to be comforted." We often do when, would we only say, "I will trust," then we should find that we should "not be afraid." It is the letting in of doubt and unbelief that works such harm. Or, if not for reproof, then for the sake of others, that when we find them in darkness, we may be able to tell them how God helped us.
III THE DAWN. This came through his remembrance of, and meditation on:
1. The deeds, so wondrous, of the Lord (vers. 11, 12).
2. What God himself was so holy and so great (ver. 13).
3. The recollection of God"s special act of redemption (vers. 15-19).
4. The shepherd care of God. S.C.
HOMILIES BY R. TUCK Ver. 1. Complaining to God.
"I will cry unto God with my voice, and may he give ear unto me!" No historical associations can be fixed for this psalm. It is the psalm of one deeply interested in the welfare of Israel, who takes as a burden on his own heart the depressed condition of the nation, and gloomily regards it as a sign of the withdrawal of God"s favour. The trouble of the writer is not persona], but relative; and with its moods may be compared the prayers of Daniel (Da 9) and of Nehemiah (Ne 1). It is well that there should always be persons who take the burdens of their nation on their own hearts; recognize the Divine relation to national condition; and put their feeling and desire into intercessory prayer. Under some phases of Christianity there is danger of religion becoming too strictly personal too little concerned with corporate and national life. This psalm is characteristically a psalm of complaint; it is the utterance of a man in sore perplexity and distress, who can only see the dark side even of Divine dealings. Was he right or wrong? May we say he was both right and wrong?
I ON THE FACE OF IT, COMPLAINING MUST BE WRONG. It is usually the utterance of the discontented mind. A man complains when he imagines himself to be neglected or ill used. At the bottom of complaining generally lies an overweening sense of our own importance the idea that we deserve better than we get. This, in part, may have affected the psalmist. Not concerning himself, but concerning the favoured nation. He complains because he thinks the nation deserved better at the hands of God than it was receiving. He was jealous for his people. Fancied desert is the root out of which complainings spring. But what desert can man or nation have before God, that can form ground of reproach? And whoever makes much of his "deserts" must be reminded of his "ill deserts." "If thou, Lord, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand?" Complaining of God must be wrong; because it shows
(1) no proper understanding of ourselves;
(2) no worthy apprehension of his wisdom and goodness.
Even in the strangest experiences, submission, not complaint, is the becoming thing.
II ON FURTHER CONSIDERATION, WE MAY SAY, COMPLAINING IS RIGHT. As a sign of confidence in God, it is right; but then it will be complaining to God, not of him. Openness before God means that we speak freely to him just what is in our thought and heart, Relief comes to us only when, in such ways, we can make full and free expression of our confidence, and tell God what we do think and feel, even though we know it is wrong to think and feel it. Reserve is the bane of friendship. There must be no reserve with God. And the very best way in which to become ashamed of our complainings is to speak them out before God. The infinite patience and gentleness towards us seems to search us through and through. R.T.
HOMILIES BY C. SHORT Vers. 1-15. Refuge in God"s unchangeableness.
Occasion of the psalm uncertain. "The poet flees from the sorrowful present away into the memory of the years of olden times, and consoles himself especially with the deliverance out of Egypt. But it remains obscure what kind of affliction it is which drives him to find refuge from the God now hidden in the God who was formerly manifest.
I HE PERSEVERES IN PRAYER, THOUGH HE HAS NO SENSE OF THE PRESENCE OR MERCY OF GOD. (Vers. 1-3)
II WHEN HE CAN NO LONGER PRAY, HE FALLS BACK IN THOUGHT UPON THE MEMORIES OF THE PAST. (Vers. 4-6)
III IF GOD HAS FORSAKEN HIM, IT IS SOMETHING INCONSISTENT WITH HIS NATURE AND COVENANT. (Vers. 7-9) His promises cannot fail; his mercy, which is from everlasting, cannot be blotted out from his nature. Ver. 10 is of doubtful interpretation.
IV HE WILL CONQUER HIS DOUBTS BY REMEMBERING GOD"S WONDERS WROUGHT FOR HIS PEOPLE OF OLD. (Vers. 10-15) Because God must be unchangeable. God redeemed his people from their afflictions in Egypt; therefore he will redeem them from their present affliction. 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 On vv1–9 To the Chief Musician, to Jeduthun. It was meet…
To the Chief Musician, to Jeduthun. It was meet that another leader of the psalmody should take his turn. No harp should be silent in the courts of the Lord's house. A Psalm of Asaph. Asaph was a man of exercised mind, and often touched the minor key; he was thoughtful, contemplative, believing, but withal there was a dash of sadness about him, and this imparted a tonic flavour to his songs. To follow him with understanding, it is needful to have done business on the great waters, and weathered many an Atlantic gale.
If we follow the poetical arrangement, and divide at the Selahs, we shall find the troubled man of God pleading in Ps 77:1-3, and then we shall hear him lamenting and arguing within himself, Ps 77:4-9. From Ps 77:10-15 his meditations run toward God, and in the close he seems as in a vision to behold the wonders of the Red Sea and the wilderness. At this point, as if lost in an ecstasy, he hurriedly closes the Psalm with an abruptness, the effect of which is quite startling. The Spirit of God knows when to cease speaking, which is more than those do who, for the sake of making a methodical conclusion, prolong their words even to weariness. Perhaps this Psalm was meant to be a prelude to the next, and, if so, its sudden close is accounted for. The hymn now before us is for experienced saints only, but to them it will be of rare value as a transcript of their own inner conflicts.
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Ver. 1. I cried unto God with my voice. This Psalm has much sadness in it, but we may be sure it will end well, for it begins with prayer, and prayer never has an ill issue. Asaph did not run to man but to the Lord, and to him he went, not with studied, stately, stilted words, but with a cry, the natural, unaffected, unfeigned expression of pain. He used his voice also, for though vocal utterance is not necessary to the life of prayer, it often seems forced upon us by the energy of our desires. Sometimes the soul feels compelled to use the voice, for thus it finds a freer vent for its agony. It is a comfort to hear the alarm bell ringing when the house is invaded by thieves.
Even unto God with my voice. He returned to his pleading. If once sufficed not, he cried again. He needed an answer, he expected one, he was eager to have it soon, therefore he cried again and again, and with his voice too, for the sound helped his earnestness.
And he gave ear unto me. Importunity prevailed. The gate opened to the steady knock. It shall be so with us in our hour of trial, the God of grace will hear us in due season.
Whole Psalm. Whenever, and by whomsoever, the Psalm may have been written, it clearly is individual, not national. It utterly destroys all the beauty, all the tenderness and depth of feeling in the opening portion, if we suppose that the people are introduced speaking in the first person. The allusions to the national history may indeed show that the season was a season of national distress, and that the sweet singer was himself bowed down by the burden of the time, and oppressed by woes which he had no power to alleviate; but it is his own sorrow, not the sorrow of others under which he sighs, and of which he has left the pathetic record. J. J. Stewart Perowne.
Ver. 1. In the beginning of the Psalm, before speaking of his sorrows, he hastens to show the necessary and most efficacious remedy for allaying sorrow. He says that he did not, as many do, out of their impatience of grief or murmuring, either accuse God of cruelty or tyranny, or utter blasphemous words by which dishonour might fall upon God, or by indulging in sorrow and distrust hasten his own destruction, or fill the air with vain complaining, but fled straight to God and to him unburdened his sorrow, and sought that he would not shut him out from that grace which he bountifully offers to all. This is the only and sure sovereign remedy which most effectually heals his griefs. Mollerus.
Ver. 1. I cried. To the Orientals the word qeu presented the idea of a crash, as of the heavens sending out thunders and lightnings. Whence beyond other things he metaphorically says, he cried for sorrow; ...shaken with a tempest of thoughts he burst out into an open and loud sounding complaint. Hermann Venema.
Ver. 1. Even unto God with my voice. The repetition here is emphatic. The idea is that it was an earnest or fervent cry. Albert Barnes.
Ver. 1. (last clause). At the second knock, the door of grace flew open: the Lord heard me. John Collings.
Ver. 1. The benefit of using the voice in private prayer.
Ver. 1,3,5,10. Note the wise man's progress out of his soul trouble.
I. I cried.
II. I remembered.
III. I considered.
IV. I said.
"An Exposition upon the Seventy-seventh Psalm, made by the constant Martyr of Christ, Master John Hooper, Bishop of Gloucester and Worcester." In the "Later Writings of Bishop Hooper." (In Parker Society's Publications, and also in the "British Reformer's" series of the Religious Tract Society.)
Psalms 77:2*
Ver. 1,3,5,10. Note the wise man's progress out of his soul trouble.
I. I cried.
II. I remembered.
III. I considered.
IV. I said.
Psalms 77:4*
Ver. 1,3,5,10. Note the wise man's progress out of his soul trouble.
I. I cried.
II. I remembered.
III. I considered.
IV. I said.
Ver. 1,3,5,10. Note the wise man's progress out of his soul trouble.
I. I cried.
II. I remembered.
III. I considered.
IV. I said.
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 On vv1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 9 I cried unto God with my voice, even unto…
Psa_77:1-20
I cried unto God with my voice, even unto God with my voice; and He gave ear unto me.
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The faculty of human thought
The whole psalm may be used to illustrate the faculty of human thought. Throughout the whole the author speaks of remembering, considering, musing, making diligent search, meditating, etc, etc.
I. It is a power that can inflame the soul with longings for God (Psa_77:1-2). By thought this man brought the Eternal into his soul, even in the stillness and darkness of night. It presented Him as an Object to whom he appealed in his distress, and from whom he received relief.
II. It has power to fill the soul with mingled emotions.
1. Here is sadness (Psa_77:2-10). The writer says, his soul refused to be comforted, he was troubled, overwhelmed, so troubled that he could neither sleep nor speak, so troubled that he cries out, Will God cast off for ever? and will He be favourable no more? What sinful man can think upon God without being troubled with remorse and troubled with forebodings? Thought can lash the soul into a tempest, can kindle it into a hell.
2. Here is joy (Psa_77:10-20). And I said, this is my infirmity; or rather, my hope.
(1) The joy of gratitude. I remember the years of the right hand of the Most High. Thoughts upon the past mercies of God have a power to kindle the soul into raptures of gratitude.
(2) Joy of adoration. Thy way, O God, is in the sanctuary; or, Thy way is holy. The holiness of God is suited to inspire us with holy rapture.
(3) Joy of trustfulness. Thou art the God that doest wonders. The psalmist remembers what God had done in conducting the children of Israel through the Red Sea into the promised land; and this inspired and exalted him with new hope. Thus, thought can fill the soul either with sadness or with joy. It createst the weather within--cloudy or sunny, stormy or calm; the seasons within--spring, summer, autumn, or winter. What a wonderful faculty is this with which Heaven has endowed us, this faculty of thought.
III. It is a power over which man has a personal control. The psalmist speaks of himself as directing his own thoughts. I sought, I remembered, I considered. This power over thought is the dignity of our nature, and is that which invests us with responsibility. Man has no direct power over any faculty but this. He has no immediate control over his feelings or faiths. He could no more awaken love or produce repentance by a direct effort, than he could create a world. He can think or not think--think upon this subject or that, in this aspect or another, consecutively or desultorily, profoundly or superficially. This he can do; and herein is his freedom. (Homilist.)
Gods ear open to the cry of the needy
A cheque without a signature at the bottom is nothing but a worthless piece of paper. The stroke of a pen confers on it all its value. The prayer of a poor child of Adam is a feeble thing in itself, but once endorsed by the hand of the Lord Jesus, it availeth much. There was an officer in the city of Rome who was appointed to have his doors always open, in order to receive any Roman citizen who applied to him for help. Just so the ear of the Lord Jesus is ever open to the cry of all who want mercy and grace. It is His office to help them. (J. C. Ryle.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible 1887 · Public Domain On v1 Psalms 77
Psalms 77
THE occasion of the profound sadness of the first part of this psalm may be inferred from the thoughts which brighten it into hope in the second. These were the memories of past national deliverance. It is natural to suppose that present national disasters were the causes of the sorrow which enveloped the psalmists spirit and suggested questions of despair, only saved from being blasphemous because they were so wistful. But it by no means follows that the singer is simply the personified nation. The piercing tone of individual grief is too clear, especially in the introductory verses, to allow of that hypothesis. Rather, the psalmist has taken into his heart the troubles of his people. Public calamity has become personal pain. What dark epoch has left its marks in this psalm remains uncertain. If Delitzschs contention that Habakkuk 3 is in part drawn from it were indubitably established, the attribution of the psalm to the times of Josiah would be plausible; but there is, at least, room for doubt whether there has been borrowing, and if so, which is original and which echo. The calamities of the Exile in their severity and duration would give reasonable ground for the psalmists doubts whether God had not cast off His people forever. No brief or partial eclipse of His favour would supply adequate occasion for these.
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The psalm falls into two parts, in the former of which (Psa_77:1-9) deepest gloom wraps the singers spirit, while in the latter (Psa_77:10-20) the clouds break. Each of these parts fall into three strophes, usually of three verses; but in the concluding strophe, consisting of five, Selah stands at the end of the first and third, and is not present at the end of the second, because it is more closely connected with the third than with the first. In like manner the first strophe of the second part (Psa_77:10-12) has no Selah, but the second has (Psa_77:13-15); the closing strophe (Psa_77:16-20) being thus parted off.
The psalmists agitation colours his language, which fluctuates in the first six verses between expressions of resolve or desire (Psa_77:1, Psa_77:3, Psa_77:6) and simple statement of fact (Psa_77:2, Psa_77:4, Psa_77:5). He has prayed long and earnestly, and nothing has been laid in answer on his outstretched palm. Therefore his cry has died down into a sigh. He fain would lift his voice to God, but dark thoughts make him dumb for supplication, and eloquent only in self-pitying monologue. A man must have waded through like depths to understand this pathetic bewilderment of spirit. They who glide smoothly over a sunlit surface of sea little know the terrors of sinking with choked lungs, into the abyss. A little experience will go further than much learning in penetrating the meaning of these moanings of lamed faith. They begin with an elliptical phrase, which, in its fragmentary character, reveals the psalmists discomposure. "My voice to God" evidently needs some such completion as is supplied above; and the form of the following verb ("cry") suggests that the supplied one should express wish or effort. The repetition of the phrase in Psa_77:1 b strengthens the impression of agitation. The last words of that clause may be a petition, "give ear," but are probably better taken as above. The psalmist would fain cry to God, that he may be heard. He has cried, as he goes on to tell in calmer mood in Psa_77:2, and has apparently not been heard. He describes his unintermitted supplications by a strong metaphor. The word rendered "stretched out" is literally poured out as water, and is applied to weeping eyes. {Lam_3:49} The Targum substitutes eye for hand here. but that is commentary, not translation. The clause which we render "without ceasing" is literally "and grew not stiff." That word, too, is used of tears, and derivatives from it are found in the passage just referred to in Lamentations ("intermission"), and in Lam_2:18 ("rest"). It carries on the metaphor of a stream, the flow of which is unchecked. The application of this metaphor to the hand is harsh, but the meaning is plain-that all night long the psalmist extended his hand in the attitude of prayer, as if open to receive Gods gift. His voice "rose like a fountain night and day"; but brought no comfort to his soul; and he bewails himself in the words which tell of Jacobs despair when he heard that Joseph was dead. So rooted and inconsolable does he think his sorrows. The thought of God has changed its nature, as if the sun were to become a source of darkness. When he looks up, he can only sigh; when he looks within, his spirit is clothed or veiled-i.e., wrapped in melancholy.
In the next strophe of three verses (Psa_77:4-6) the psalmist plunges yet deeper into gloom, and unfolds more clearly its occasion. Sorrow, like a beast of prey, devours at night; and every sad heart knows how eyelids, however wearied, refuse to close upon as wearied eyes, which gaze wide opened into the blackness and see dreadful things there. This man felt as if Gods finger was pushing up his lids and forcing him to stare out into the night. Buffeted, as if laid on an anvil and battered with the shocks of doom, he cannot speak; he can only moan, as he is doing. Prayer seems to be impossible. But to say, "I cannot pray; would that I could!" is surely prayer, which will reach its destination, though the sender knows it not. The psalmist had found no ease in remembering God. He finds as little in remembering a brighter past. That he should have turned to history in seeking for consolation implies that his affliction was national in its sweep, however intensely personal in its pressure. This retrospective meditation on the great deeds of old is characteristic of the Asaph psalms. It ministers in them to many moods, as memory always does. In this psalm we have it feeding two directly opposite emotions. It may be the nurse of bitter Despair or of bright-eyed Hope. When the thought of God occasions but sighs, the remembrance of His acts can only make the present more doleful. The heavy spirit finds reasons for heaviness in Gods past and in its own.
The psalmist in his sleepless vigils remembers other wakeful times, when his song filled the night with music and "awoke the dawn." Psa_77:6 is parallel with Psa_77:3. The three key words, remember, muse, spirit recur. There, musing ended in wrapping the spirit in deeper gloom. Here, it stings that spirit to activity in questionings, which the next strophe flings out in vehement number and startling plainness. It is better to be pricked to even such interrogations by affliction than to be made torpid by it. All depends on the temper in which they are asked. If that is right, answers which will scatter gloom are not far off.
The comparison of present national evils with former happiness naturally suggests such questions. Obviously, the casting off spoken of in Psa_77:7 is that of the nation, and hence its mention confirms the view that the psalmist is suffering under public calamities. All the questions mean substantially one thing-has God changed? They are not, as some questions are, the strongest mode of asserting their negative; nor are they, like others, a more than half assertion of their affirmative; but they are what they purport to be - the anxious interrogations of an afflicted man, who would fain be sure that God is the same as ever, but is staggered by the dismal contrast of Now and Then. He faces with trembling the terrible possibilities, and, however his language may seem to regard failure of resources or fickleness of purpose or limitations in long suffering as conceivable in God, his doubts are better put into plain speech than lying diffused and darkening, like poisonous mists, in his heart. A thought, be it good or bad, can be dealt with when it is made articulate. Formulating vague conceptions is like cutting a channel in a bog for the water to run. One gets it together in manageable shape, and the soil is drained. So the end of the despondent half of the psalm is marked by the bringing to distinct speech of the suspicions which floated in the singers mind and made him miserable. The Selah bids us dwell on the questions, so as to realise their gravity and prepare ourselves for their answer.
The second part begins in Psa_77:10 with an obscure and much-commented on verse, of which two explanations are possible, depending mainly on the meanings of the two words "sickness" and "years." The former word may mean "my wounding" or "my sickness." The latter is by many commentators taken to be an infinitive verb, with the signification to be changed, and, by others to be a plural noun meaning "years, " as in Psa_77:6. Neglecting some minor differences, we may say that those who understand the word to mean being changed explain the whole thus: "This is my wound (misery, sorrow), that the right hand of the Most High has changed." So the old versions, and Hupfeld, Perowne, and Baethgen. But the use of the word in Psa_77:6 for "years creates a strong presumption that its sense is the same here. As to the other word, its force is best seen by reference to a closely parallel passage in Jer_10:19 -"I said, Truly this is my grief (margin, sickness), and I must bear it"; where the word for grief, though not the same as in the psalm, is cognate. The most probable meaning, then, for the expression here is, "This my affliction is sent from God, and I must bear it with resignation." Then follows an elevating thought expressed in its simplest form like an exclamation, "the years, " etc., -i.e., "I will remember (comp. Psa_77:6) the time when the right hand of Jehovah had the preeminence" (Cheyne, in loc.). Delitzsch leaves the ellipsis unfilled, and takes the whole to mean that the psalmist says to himself that the affliction allotted will only last for the time which the mighty hand of God has determined. The rendering adopted above avoids the awkwardness of using the same word in two different senses in the same context, yields an appropriate meaning, especially in view of the continual references to remembering, and begins the new strophe with a new note of hopefulness, whereas the other renderings prolong the minor key of the first part into the second. It is therefore to be preferred. The revolution in feeling is abrupt. All is sunny and bright in the last half. What makes the change? The recognition of two great truths: first, that the calamity is laid on Israel, and on the psalmist as a member of the nation, by God, and has not come because of that impossible change in Him which the bitter questions had suggested; and, second, the unchangeable eternity of Gods delivering power. That second truth comes to him as with a flash, and the broken words of Psa_77:10 b hail the sudden rising of the new star.
The remainder of the psalm holds fast by that thought of the great deeds of God in the past. It is a signal example of how the same facts remembered may depress or gladden, according to the point of view from which they are regarded. We can elect whether memory shall nourish despondency or gladness. Yet the alternative is not altogether a matter of choice; for the only people to whom "remembering happier things" need not be "a sorrows crown of sorrow" are those who see God in the past, and so are sure that every joy that was and is not shall yet again be, in more thrilling and lasting form. If He shines out on us from the east that we have left behind, His brightness will paint the western sky towards which we travel. Beneath confidence in the perpetuity of past blessings lies confidence in the eternity of God. The "years of the right hand of the Most High" answer all questions as to His change of purpose or of disposition, and supply the only firm foundation for calm assurance of the future. Memory supplies the colours with which Hope paints her truest pictures. That which hath been is that which shall be may be the utterance of the blase man of the world, or of the devout man who trusts in the living God, and therefore knows that
"There shall never be one lost good!
What was shall live as before."
The strophe in Psa_77:13-15 fixes on the one great redeeming act of the Exodus as the pledge of future deeds of a like kind, as need requires. The language is deeply tinged with reminiscences of Exodus 15. "In holiness" (not "in the sanctuary"), the question "Who is so great a God?" the epithet "Who doest wonders," all come from Exo_15:11. "[Thine] arm" in the psalm recalls "By the greatness of Thine arm" in Exodus (Psa_77:16), and the psalmists "redeemed Thy people" reproduces "the people which Thou hast redeemed". {Exo_15:13} The separate mention of "sons of Joseph" can scarcely be accounted for if the psalm is prior to the division of the kingdoms. But the purpose of the designation is doubtful. It may express the psalmists protest against the division as a breach of ancient national unity or his longings for reunion.
The final strophe differs from the others in structure. It contains five verses instead of three, and the verses are (with the exception of the last) composed of three clauses each instead of two. Some commentators have supposed that Psa_77:16-19 are an addition to the original psalm, and think that they do not cohere well with the preceding. This view denies that there is any allusion in the closing verses to the passage of the Red Sea, and takes the whole as simply a description of a theophany, like that in Psalms 18. But surely the writhing of the waters as if in pangs at the sight of Godis such an allusion. Psa_77:19, too, is best understood as referring to the path through the sea, whose waters returned and covered Gods footprints from human eyes. Unless there is such a reference in Psa_77:16-19, the connection with the preceding and with Psa_77:20 is no doubt loose. But that is not so much a reason for denying the right of these verses to a place in the psalm as for recognising the reference. Why should a mere description of a theophany, which had nothing to do with the psalmists theme, have been tacked on to it? No doubt, the thunders, lightnings, and storm so grandly described here are unmentioned in Exodus; and, quite possibly, may be simply poetic heightening of the scene, intended to suggest how majestic was the intervention which freed Israel. Some commentators, indeed, have claimed the picture as giving additional facts concerning the passage of the Red Sea. Dean Stanley, for example, has worked these points into his vivid description; but that carries literalism too far.
The picture in the psalm is most striking. The continuous short clauses crash and flash like the thunders and lightnings. That energetic metaphor of the waters writhing as if panic struck is more violent than Western taste approves, but its emotional vigour as a rendering of the fact is unmistakable. "Thine arrows went to and fro" is a very imperfect transcript of the Hebrew, which suggests the swift zigzag of the fierce flashes. In Psa_77:18 the last word offers some difficulty. It literally means a wheel, and is apparently best rendered as above, the thunder being poetically conceived of as the sound of the rolling wheels of Gods chariot. There are several coincidences between Psa_77:16-19 of the psalm and Hab_3:10-15 : namely, the expression "writhed in pain," applied in Habakkuk to the mountains; the word rendered "overflowing" (A.V.) or "tempest" (R.V.) in Hab_3:10, cognate with the verb in Psa_77:17 of the psalm, and there rendered "poured out"; the designation of lightnings as Gods arrows. Delitzsch strongly maintains the priority of the psalm; Hupfeld as strongly that of the prophet.
The last verse returns to the two-claused structure of the earlier part. It comes in lovely contrast with the majestic and terrible picture preceding, like the wonderful setting forth of the purpose of the other theophany in Psalms 18, which was for no higher end than to draw one poor man from the mighty waters. All this pomp of Divine appearance, with lightnings, thunders, a heaving earth, a shrinking sea, had for its end the leading the people of God to their land, as a shepherd does his flock. The image is again an echo of Exo_15:13. The thing intended is not merely the passage of the Red Sea but the whole process of guidance begun there amid the darkness. Such a close is too abrupt to please some commentators. But what more was needful or possible to be said, in a retrospect of Gods past acts, for the solace of a dark present? It was more than enough to scatter fears and flash radiance into the gloom which had wrapped the psalmist. He need search no further. He has found what he sought; and so he hushes his song and gazes in silence on the all-sufficient answer which memory has brought to all his questions and doubts. Nothing could more completely express the living, ever-present worth of the ancient deeds of God than the "abruptness" with which this psalm ceases rather than ends.
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On v1 Superscription.—“To the chief Musician, to Jeduthun, a Psalm of…
INTRODUCTION
Superscription.—“To the chief Musician, to Jeduthun, a Psalm of Asaph.” Jeduthun was one of the leaders of sacred music in David’s time (1Ch_16:41-42; 2Ch_5:12). One of the twenty-four musical choirs left by David bore the honorary title Jeduthun or Jedithun, perhaps from him, as its founder (1 Chronicles 25)
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A Psalm of Asaph. See Introduction to Psalms 74.
Occasion.—It is not known, nor have we any means of determining upon what occasion the Psalm was written. But, Perowne has well said concerning it, “Whenever, and by whomsoever, the Psalm may have been written, it clearly is individual, not national. It utterly destroys all the beauty, all the tenderness and depth of feeling in the opening portion, if we suppose that the people are introduced speaking in the first person. The allusions to the national history may indeed show that the season was a season of national distress, and that the sweet singer was himself bowed down by the burden of the time, and oppressed by woes which he had no power to alleviate; but it is his own sorrow, not the sorrow of others, under which he sighs, and of which he has left the pathetic record.” The Psalm is eminently fitted to teach us how we may obtain comfort and peace even in the severest distresses.
Homiletically the Psalm sets before us, First: The good man’s trouble and Deliverer, Psa_77:1-3. Second: The thoughts and inquiries of a godly soul in distress, Psa_77:4-9. Third: The godly soul rising superior to trouble by the devout contemplation of the works and ways of God, Psa_77:10-20.
THE GOOD MAN’S TROUBLE AND DELIVERER
(Psa_77:1-3.)
I. The Good man’s trouble. All men have some measure of acquaintance with trouble. It is not given to us to travel through life under unclouded skies, favoured by refreshing breezes, amid enchanting scenery, with delightful companionships, and upon a pleasant and easy road. There are times when we have to walk in loneliness and sorrow, with weary limbs, and bleeding feet, and aching heart, beneath darkened skies, and amid pelting storms. The good man has no exemption from life’s sorrows and trials. He is exposed to physical trials. Bodily pains and diseases visit and try “the true-born child of God” as well as the wicked. He suffers from social trials also. He has disappointments and losses in business, he is pained by the inconstancy and duplicity of those whom he regarded as true, he suffers by reason of the afflictions and sorrows of those who are dear to him, and he is sometimes stricken with anguish by the invasions of death into the home or social circle. He also experiences religious trials. His own imperfections and sins are a source of grief to him. The contrast between the ideal and the actual in his own life is great and painful. He has seasons of dark doubt, and sad misgiving, and distressful hiding of the face of God from him. Of such experiences the poet sings in this Psalm. The compassions and favours, the mercies and faithfulnesses of God seemed to be all cut off from him. God himself seemed to have forsaken him, cast him off. The intensity of his trouble is seen in that—
1. It was continuous. In the day he sought the Lord by reason of it, and at night his hand was unweariedly outstretched in prayers for deliverance. His grief knew no intermission. His soul obtained no rest either by night or by day.
2. His soul accepted no consolation,—“refused to be comforted.” Some consolations seemed inadequate to his need. Others seemed too precious for one who was so unworthy in his own sight. And so the wounded heart refused the balm which would have healed it.
3. The remembrance of God was painful. We do not wonder that the remembrance of God is painful to the wicked. But that the godly man should find it painful to direct his thoughts to God is indeed strange. Meditation on God should fill the soul of the good man with holiest music. Very sore must have been the trial of the Psalmist when he was troubled at the recollection of God.
4. Meditation increased grief. “I meditated and my spirit was overwhelmed.” Reflection brought no relief to his soul, but seemed to sink him deeper in the abyss of trouble. A very sad state he was in. He is in deep waters, the waves and billows go over him, and he is unable to obtain relief or rest.
“All things have rest: why should we toil alone?
We only toil, who are the first of things,
And make perpetual moan;
Still from one sorrow to another thrown:
Nor ever fold our wings,
And cease from wanderings,
Nor steep our brows in slumber’s holy balm.”
—Tennyson.
These sore trials of godly men by the grace of God are often the means of richest blessings to the soul. As the darkness of night brings out the glory of the starry heavens, so in affliction and trouble some most precious truths shine forth with the greatest brilliance.
“Thou canst not tell
How rich a dowry sorrow gives the soul,
How firm a faith and eagle-sight of God.”
—Alford.
II. The Good man’s Deliverer. In his trouble the Psalmist betook himself to the throne of grace, he had recourse to God. When trouble drives us nearer to God it is already a blessing to us.
1. His application to God involved faith.
(1) In the accessibility of God. The Psalmist felt that he could approach unto God, and speak to Him in prayer. Trouble cannot drive us into any region where He is not. From the deepest abyss of distress the moan of suffering, the cry of penitence, or the prayer for help, will reach the ear and touch the heart of God.
(2) In the sufficiency of God to help those who seek unto Him. The Psalmist would not have cried to God had he not believed in His power to help him. Our God is all-sufficient. There are no sorrows that defy His consolations. There are no wounds which the balm of Gilead cannot heal.
(3) In the goodness of God. Notwithstanding his declaration that he “remembered God and was troubled,” the Psalmist must have believed in God’s kindness and willingness to help him, or he would not have carried his burden to His throne. Though He seems to hide His face from us, yet He is ever gracious and kind. His name and nature are love. When trouble thus leads us to draw closer to God, and to cast out burden upon Him, it has not visited us in vain.
2. His application to God was persevering and earnest. “I cried unto God with my voice, unto God with my voice; and He gave ear unto me. In the day of my trouble I sought the Lord: my hand is stretched out at night unwearied.” The repetition of the first verse is emphatic, presenting the idea of earnest and fervent supplication. The “hand stretched out at night unwearied” in prayer, indicates how importunate and persevering were his supplications. Hearty, fervent, importunate prayers are acceptable to God. Cold, heartless, formal prayers He does not regard. Let the Psalmist’s example be imitated by troubled hearts.
3. His application to God did not lead to immediate relief. He says that God “gave ear unto” him; but he seems to have obtained no immediate respite from his troubles. The Divine answer to our supplications is sometimes the continuance of those very trials or afflictions from which we have prayed to be delivered. The answer to the apostle Paul’s prayer was not the removal of the thorn from the flesh quivering with agony, but, “My grace is sufficient for thee.” The withholding or delaying of that for which we have so importunately pleaded may be the true and gracious answer to our prayers. The blessing may be delayed that our faith and patience may thereby be increased, and that when it comes to us it may come richer and fuller. Or that for which we have asked may be withheld, because Infinite Wisdom sees that to us it would not be a blessing. Thus it is that the earnest, importunate prayers of good men are not always answered at once, and sometimes are not answered at all by granting the thing desired. Yet they are always helpful to the soul, and bring down blessings into the soul from God.
CONCLUSION.—
1. Learn the sacred uses of trouble. “These light afflictions, which are but for a moment, work,” &c. “Tribulation worketh patience, and patience experience,” &c.
“The tears we shed are not in vain;
Nor worthless is the heavy strife;
If, like the buried seed of grain,
They rise to renovated life.
It is through tears our spirits grow;
’Tis in the tempest souls expand,
If it but teaches us to go
To Him who holds it in His hand.
Oh, welcome, then, the stormy blast!
Oh, welcome, then, the ocean’s roar!
Ye only drive more sure and fast
Our trembling bark to Heaven’s bright shore.”—T.C. Upham.
2. Learn the grand resource in trouble. “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.” α. He is all-sufficient. β. He is ever available. γ. He is ever gracious. “From the end of the earth will I cry unto Thee, when my heart is overwhelmed: lead me to the rock that is higher than I.”
PRAYER IN TROUBLE
(Psa_77:1-2.)
We have here—
I. Something common to all men. “The day of trouble.” “Man is born unto trouble, as the sparks fly upward.” With so much of sin in the world sorrow and trouble are inevitable.
II. A commendable example for all men. “I cried unto God, … I sought the Lord.”
1. Earnestly. “I cried with my voice, unto God with my voice.”
2. Perseveringly. “My hand is stretched out at night unwearied.” “In the day” and “in the night” he sought the Lord. “Call upon Me in the day of trouble: I will deliver thee,” &c.
III. A Divine auditor of all men. “He gave ear unto me.” Into the ear of God the cries of humanity are ever entering. Graciously He attends to the feeblest whisper of His people.
IV. A great mistake of some men. “My soul refused to be comforted.” Surely the Psalmist erred in this. God has graciously arranged our life and circumstances so that healing may come to the wounded spirit in many ways. Through the aspects and voices of nature, through the contemplation of His Providence, through His holy Word. To refuse His consolation is,
1. Ungrateful to Him.
2. Injurious to ourselves.
V. An experience which may happen to all men. To pray earnestly and importunately without any immediate reply was the lot of the poet, and may be the lot of all men. Let us learn the lessons of such an experience.
1. Calmly trust Him.
2. Perseveringly pray to Him.
3. Patiently wait for Him.
RECOLLECTIONS OF GOD PAINFUL TO THE WICKED
(Psa_77:3.)
“I remembered God and was troubled.”
Why is the remembrance of God pleasant to some of us and painful to others? Why is it sometimes pleasant, and at other times painful, to the same individual?
I. Briefly state what we mean by remembering God. We certainly mean something more than a transient recollection of the word God, or of any other name by which He is known. By remembering God, the Psalmist meant recollecting those ideas which the term God is used by the inspired writers to signify. An eternal, self-existent, infinitely wise, just, and good Being, &c.
II. Inquire why the recollection of such a being should ever be painful; or, why any of God’s creatures should be troubled at the remembrance of Him. There is nothing in the Divine character and government which necessarily renders the remembrance of God productive of painful emotions. The remembrance of God is always delightful to holy angels, and to the spirits of just men made perfect. The constant presence of God constitutes their heaven. The recollection, also, of His existence, character, and government, is usually, though not always, highly pleasing to all good men. If any are troubled by the remembrance of God, the cause must exist solely in themselves. Nothing but sin can ever render the remembrance of God painful to any of His creatures. If our hearts or consciences condemn us, it is impossible to remember Him without being troubled. It will then be painful to remember that He is our Creator and Benefactor; for the remembrance will be attended with a consciousness of base ingratitude. Painful to think of Him as Lawgiver; for such thoughts will remind us that we have broken His law. So also as to His holiness, omniscience, omnipresence, power, &c.
Nor is this all. Every sinner loves sin. The only happiness with which he is acquainted, consists in gratifying either the desires of the flesh, the desires of the eye, or the pride of life. But all these are contrary to the will of God. He forbids the sinner to pursue them; He commands him to deny himself, &c. He threatens all who do not comply with everlasting punishment.
The more clearly the wicked perceive God’s character and their own, the more light is thrown into their consciences, the more mercies, privileges, and opportunities they have enjoyed and abused, so much the more they will be troubled by a remembrance of God.
APPLICATION.—
1. This subject affords a rule by which we may try ourselves, and which will assist us much in discovering our real characters; for the moral character of every intelligent creature corresponds with his habitual views and feelings respecting God.
2. How wretched is the situation of impenitent sinners; of those, who cannot remember God without being troubled. They cannot enjoy real happiness in this life, for the world cannot afford it, and they dare not look up for it to heaven. How much more wretched must their situation be at death and in eternity!
3. How great are our obligations to God for the gospel of Christ! Were it not for this, the remembrance, and still more the presence of God, would have occasioned nothing but pure, unmingled wretchedness to any human being.
4. Is sin alone the cause which renders the remembrance of God painful? Then let all who have embraced the terms of reconciliation offered by the gospel, all who desire to remember God without being troubled, beware of sin. Swear an eternal war with sin; not only swear, but maintain it.—Edward Payson, D.D., abridged.
THE THOUGHTS AND INQUIRIES OF A GODLY SOUL IN TROUBLE
(Psa_77:4-9)
In our previous section we had to do with the Psalmist’s trouble and his application to God by reason thereof. We have now to do with his mental condition as affected by his troubles.
I. The thoughts of a godly soul in trouble. In the mental exercises of the Psalmist we notice—
1. Reflection on the past doings of God. “I have considered the days of old, the years of ancient tisme.” In his distress the Psalmist considered the former dealings of God with mankind, with a view of obtaining relief from his present troubles and light in his present perplexities. To us it seems that a study of the Divine working in human history is calculated to inspire the student with confidence in God, in the wisdom, righteousness, and goodness of His rule. Yet the Psalmist seems to have obtained no help from his consideration of the ancient doings of God. The state of his own soul spread a black pall over everything.
2. Recollection of times of trouble in his own life, which were also times of song. “I call to remembrance my song in the night.” In the Bible “night” is frequently used figuratively, to represent ignorance, sin, suffering, distress, death. Here it is used as the emblem of distress and trouble. “Where is God, my Maker, who giveth songs in the night?” The poet calls to mind former seasons of affliction and sorrow, in which he realised Divine comforts, and was enabled to sing in the darkness. Yet he seems to find no comfort for his present sorrow. He can discover no star to relieve his present darkness. From the recollection of experiences so precious and helpful as God’s mercies to him in former troubles he is unable to draw any consolation. A godly man’s condition is deplorable indeed when such experiences afford no help and hope.
3. Communion with his own heart. “I communed with mine own heart, and my spirit made diligent search.” He had recalled past experiences of his own, he had reflected and reasoned upon the work of God in human history, now he will consult his own heart. He has tried to get help by the exercise of his intellect, and has failed to do so, now he will seek help by the exercise of his better feelings. “The secret, silent teachings of the heart are often our best and safest guide.” The heart is “the centre of the spiritual, thinking, and conceptional life” (Fuerst’s Lex.); and man can commune with his heart, can contemplate his own spiritual nature and faculties, can examine his own spiritual condition, can speak to his soul and be spoken to by his soul. Thus the poet communes with his own heart. But no help does he receive. The trouble seems to have obtained the complete mastery of his entire nature. Intellect and heart are alike subdued by it. Human history and his own experience are alike darkened by it. The soul which is swayed by grief sees all things shrouded in gloom and sadness. To each of us nature wears the colour of our spirit. This truth is finely expressed in Hamlet. “I have of late lost all my mirth, foregone all custom of exercise: and, indeed, it goes so heavily with my disposition, that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory; this most excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave o’er-hanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire, why, it appears no other thing to me, than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours. What a piece of work is man! How noble in reason! how infinite in faculties! in form and moving, how express and admirable! in action, how like an angel! in apprehension, how like a god! the beauty of the world! the paragon of animals! And yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust? Man delights not me, nor woman neither.” In a somewhat similar plight was the Psalmist. Trouble had so completely mastered him that he could find neither comfort, help, nor hope anywhere.
II. The inquiries of a godly soul in trouble.
The Psalmist makes several inquiries, which may be classified thus. He inquires—
1. As to God’s mindfulness of His people. “Will the Lord cast off for ever?” &c. “Hath God forgotten to be gracious?” &c. God seemed to have “forgotten to be gracious” in His dealings with His servant, and to have so far overlooked him as to lead to the inquiry, “Will the Lord cast off for ever?” It is a sore aggravation of a believer’s trials when the Lord seems to be unmindful of him in his time of need. How severe was the smart of the sisters of Bethany, when several days passed, and their Friend and Lord came not near to them, although they had sent to tell Him of their trouble!
2. As to God’s unchangeableness. In past times He had been to His people a God of mercy and grace, supporting and defending them. Has He changed in this respect? Is it possible that God can change? The thought is “too painful for” us. What misery and desolation would supervene if God, the supremely Good, could change! were to change, and be other than He is! The Psalmist seems to have tasted of this misery as he urged his pain-inspired inquiries.
3. As to God’s faithfulness. “Doth His promise fail for evermore?” Shall the promise which was made to, and good for, one generation, fail to the next generation? Is not the word of Jehovah reliable? The troubled soul seems to find repose nowhere. To him nothing appears firm and true, but sin, labour, and suffering. The shadows presented themselves as the only realities.
These inquiries of the troubled Psalmist reveal the depth and intensity of his sufferings. It is extremely painful to doubt one’s own salvation; but who shall depict the anguish of doubt as to the truth and faithfulness, the righteousness and goodness of God? These inquiries present a hopeful symptom of the spiritual condition of the Psalmist. “It is a wise thing thus to put unbelief through the catechism. Each one of the questions is a dart aimed at the very heart of despair.”
III. Let us offer a few Suggestions to a godly soul in trouble. In his thoughts and inquiries the troubled poet seems much amazed and bewildered. Certain facts were painfully real to him which sorely tried his faith in God, and in His relation to His people. Good men are often tried in like manner. But let us remember—
1. That there is something radically abnormal in the present state of human society. It is not natural that under the government of an almighty, wise, and good Being, there should be so much of suffering, and that sometimes the best of men should be the greatest of sufferers. Suffering is here because sin is here. Find suffering and you find sin, either literally or consequentially. Sin is the unnatural, the abnormal thing. “God made man upright” He is not responsible for sin. He is rather the great Antagonist of all evil.
2. That even godly men need discipline. An educational process is going forward in this life. This world is a great moral school, man is the learner, and suffering is one of the teachers. In the case of the good man suffering is not punitive, but disciplinary, educational. While there are defect and imperfection in us, we need the discipline of the Divine school.
3. That suffering is often the occasion of richest blessing. To a true-hearted man doubt as to any of the great spiritual verities is a painful thing. But such a man doubt almost (if not quite) always conducts to a calmer faith.
“Time tells his tale by shadows, and by clouds
The wind records its progress, by dark doubts
The spirit swiftening on its heavenward course.”—Bailey.
Tennyson has described such a doubter.
“He fought his doubts and gathered strength.
He would not make his judgment blind;
He faced the spectres of the mind,
And laid them: thus he came at length
To find a stronger faith his own;
And Power was with him in the night,
Which makes the darkness and the light,
And dwells not in the light alone.”
The Captain of our salvation was made “perfect through suffering.” And those of His followers in this world who are most like Him are able to say, “We glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation worketh patience,” &c.
“ ‘Glory to God,—to God,’ he saith;
‘Knowledge by suff’ring entereth,
And life is perfected by death.’ ”
THE GODLY SOUL RISING SUPERIOR TO TROUBLE BY THE DEVOUT CONTEMPLATION OF THE WORKS AND WAYS OF GOD
(Psa_77:10-20.)
The mind and heart of the poet are growing calm. His agitation and distress are yielding to the exercise of reason and the power of faith. He is able to reflect to some purpose now.
I. The troubled soul’s consideration of the works and ways of God. “I will remember the works of the Lord,” &c.
1. Recollection of the works and ways of God. How wonderful is the faculty of memory! How great is its conservative power! Memory has been defined as “the treasure house of the mind, wherein the monuments thereof are kept and preserved.” Cicero spoke of it as the “thesaurus omnium rerum. “By means of it nothing in life is lost.
“What wealth in memory’s firm record,
Which, should it perish, could this world recall,
In colours fresh—originally bright—
From the dark shadows of o’erwhelming years.”—Young.
Memory makes the fleeting present abiding and everlasting. How wonderful is its reproductive power! A very small circumstance will unlock and throw wide open its chamber doors; and words and deeds, scenes and circumstances, unthought of for many years, appear with startling vividness before us.
“Slight withal may be the things which bring
Back on the heart the weight which it would fling
Aside for ever; it may be a sound—
A tone of music—summer’s eve—or spring—
A flower—the wind—the ocean—which shall wound,
Striking th’ electric chain wherewith we’re darkly bound;
And how and why we know not, nor can trace
Home to its cloud this lightning of the mind,
But feel the shock renew’d, nor can efface
The blight and blackening which it leaves behind.”—Byron.
The Psalmist calls into exercise this wondrous power, for the relief of his troubled soul. He summons forth from the treasury of memory some of the ancient doings of God. The marvellous works which He had wrought on behalf of His people in former days he makes to live before him. Probably he also called to mind former deeds and ways of God in relation to his own individual life.
2. Reflection on the works and ways of God. “I will meditate also of all Thy work.” Recollection would not have profited the Psalmist unless he had meditated upon the things which he recollected. Thought, meditation, enables us to realise the facts of history, science, philosophy, and theology, and to appropriate to ourselves their lessons. “If I should be asked,” said Dr. Bates, “what I think are the best means and ways to advance the faculties, to make the ordinances fruitful, to increase grace, to enlarge our comfort, and produce holiness, I should answer, meditation, meditation, meditation.” The Psalmist acted wisely in following up his recollection by meditation.
3. Speech concerning the works and ways of God. “Talk of Thy doings.” With the Psalmist recollection and reflection preceded speech. Much of our talk is utterly worthless, because the talkers are not thinkers. It is especially important in relation to religious subjects that meditation should precede speech. The Psalmist did not reserve to himself the results of his meditation, but declared them to others. Others were benefited by reason of his recollection and reflection.
II. The troubled soul’s conclusions on the works and ways of God. Placing them in the order in which we find them, the conclusions of the Psalmist on the works and ways of God are, that they are characterised by holiness (Psa_77:13), strength (Psa_77:14), beneficence (Psa_77:15; Psa_77:20), majesty (Psa_77:16-18), and mystery (Psa_77:19). Let us consider them, slightly altering their order.
1. God’s works and ways reveal His strength. “Thou art the God that doest wonders; Thou hast declared Thy strength among the people.” God had made known His great power in crushing the enemies of His people, and delivering them from all their afflictions. No one can meditate upon the works of God in nature, or upon His ways in Providence, without being impressed with His Almightiness. “Thou hast a mighty arm; strong is Thy hand, and high is Thy right hand.” The Almightiness of God should be a warning to evildoers. “Hast thou an arm like God?” The Almightiness of God should be an encouragement to His people. His strong arm is pledged to succour and defend you. He is “mighty to save.”
2. God’s works and ways reveal His majesty. In Psa_77:16-18 the Psalmist mentions some of the mighty works of God in a very poetical manner. The imagery is both sublime and effective; and gives a deep impression, not only of the might of God in these transactions, but also of His majesty. If the majesty of God is so impressive that the earth and the sea are represented as greatly moved thereat, shall man remain unmoved at the contemplation thereof! Is there nothing in the wondrous works and ways of God to awaken the admiration and reverence of men?
3. God’s works and ways reveal His holiness. “O God, in holiness is Thy way.” His way is often mysterious; and can never be comprehended by us, yet is it ever right and pure. The troubled Psalmist when he calmly considered the dealings of God with men, not in the present, in which only a very small fragment is visible, but in ancient time, was convinced that they were all in holiness. Trembling and troubled heart, and sorely perplexed with insoluble enigmas, look away and look calmly to His glorious deeds of ancient date, and thou, too, shalt conclude, “Thy way, O God, is in holiness.”
4. God’s works and ways reveal His beneficence. The manifestation of power and majesty is not sufficient to awaken trust and hope in us, or to afford any encouragement to the despondent and sorrowing heart. Being conscious of sin and ill-desert it is calculated to awaken anxiety and even dread. We fear lest the glorious majesty should consume us, and the great might should smite and destroy us. The revelation of the Divine holiness tends to make manifest the awful contrast between us and God in this respect, by showing the exceeding sinfulness of our hearts and lives. The troubled heart needs to know more of God than this before it can obtain comfort or rest. The Psalmist saw the Divine power and majesty working beneficently. The “mighty arm” of God was displayed in smiting down the wicked oppressor, and delivering the oppressed people. “Thou hast with Thine arm redeemed Thy people, the sons of Jacob and Joseph.” He saw Omnipotence gently and patiently leading His people through the wilderness. God is as great in mercy as He is in majesty. He is infinite in pity as well as in power. He is gracious as He is great. He is as tender as He is terrible. Here, then, may the troubled heart find peace.
5. God’s works and ways are mysterious. The Psalmist had ascertained and declared certain characteristics of the works and ways of God. Might, majesty, holiness, and beneficence he had discovered therein. Yet there was much that remained obscure and mysterious. “Thy way is in the sea, and Thy path in the great waters, and Thy footsteps are not known.” There are certain topics upon which the Most High maintains an inviolable reserve. There are certain regions into which the eye of the most earnest inquirer has never penetrated. “The secret things belong unto the Lord our God.” Moreover, God’s way is so vast that we are able to perceive only a very small portion of it. His purposes and methods are so comprehensive and profound that we can understand them only very partially. But this mystery was by no means painful to the Psalmist. He speaks of it calmly and trustfully; and then speaks of God’s gracious guidance of His people through the wilderness. So also to us mysteries should not be an occasion of unbelief or sorrow, but of patient trust and hope. They should also teach us lessons of humility and reverence. Our own ignorance and inability to comprehend the ways of God should humble us. “We are but of yesterday, and know nothing, because our days upon earth are a shadow.” While the reserve of a Being of such holiness and benevolence should be regarded by us with reverence. “Clouds and darkness are round about Him: righteousness and judgment are the habitation of His throne.” “Mysteries! what are they but worlds at night time speeding on with swift wing to the all-revealing brightness of morning!”
SPIRITUAL INFIRMITIES
(Psa_77:10.)
“I said, This is my infirmity.”
When a good man is made sensible of any evil in his heart or life, he is ready to acknowledge it, and take shame to himself on account of it. “I said, This is my infirmity.” No doubt but the Psalmist had often said it to himself: and such soliloquies are very becoming and may be very useful. He said it also to God, in a way of humble confession. “I acknowledge my sin unto Thee, and mine iniquity have I not hid,” &c. Probably he might say it to his intimate friends, whose piety and sympathy he had often witnessed; for we are commanded to confess our faults one to another, and to pray one for another.
I. Inquire into the nature of that infirmity. By considering the context we may conclude that it consisted in something like the following—
1. A proneness to live too much on frames and feelings. This is common among Christians, and hinders their establishment and growth in grace. Those who live on spiritual frames will be like Reuben; unstable as water, they shall not excel. At one time they are raised to a full assurance of faith, saying, “My mountain stands strong, I shall never be moved;” and at another they are sinking into the depths of despondency, and saying, “Will the Lord cast off for ever, and will He be favourable no more?”
2. Forgetfulness of past mercies is another evil to which good men are subject, and the natural consequence of this is unthankfulness.
3. Distrust with respect to future appearances. When faith was in exercise David could say, “The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear?” &c. (Psa_27:1-3). But here the Psalmist speaks as one that was utterly forsaken. “Will the Lord cast off for ever?” &c. (Psa_77:7-9).
4. Refusing to be comforted in time of distress (Psa_77:2). Moses told the children of Israel that the Lord would bring them out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, and give them the land which He had promised to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob; but they hearkened not unto Moses, for anguish of spirit, and for cruel bondage.
5. Giving vent to distrustful thoughts in unbecoming language too frequently accompanies despondency.
II. The reasons why God suffers such infirmities to attend His people in this life.
1. To promote humility and self-abasement. As creatures, our insignificance should make us humble; but as sinners we have reason to be still more so.
2. To excite watchfulness. Those who are liable to so many miscarriages ought certainly to be upon their guard. If nothing else will preserve the Christian from carnal security, yet the danger to which he is exposed should have that effect. “Let him that thinketh he standeth, take heed lest he fall.”
3. To increase our sympathy and compassion towards others. We are made to know the heart of a stranger by being strangers ourselves. If others are overcome by temptation, we may be so too. “Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault,” &c. (Gal_6:1-2).
4. To show the necessity of a frequent application to Christ, our spiritual Physician. If we had no infirmities, we should not want healing. “They that are whole need not a physician; but they that are sick.” The value of the remedy is known by them that feel the disease, and the need of a Saviour by those who see themselves to be lost. “And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.”
5. To render heaven the more desirable. The Psalmist is now free from all his infirmities, and so will every saint be when he gets to glory. The conflicts we now have with the enemy, and the evils of our own hearts, will give a delightful relish to our happiness hereafter, and heighten the triumphs of the final victory (Psa_17:15; 2Co_5:1-4).
III. Conclude with a few observations.
1. The best of saints have their infirmities.
2. There is some particular infirmity which every man may call his own. “I kept myself,” said David, “from mine iniquity;” that is, from the sin which most easily beset him.
3. It becomes us well to know our particular infirmity, that we may guard against it; for to be without defence is the way to be overcome without resistance.
4. Having discovered what is our easily besetting sin, let us bewail it before God, and seek for help against it.—B … e.
RECOLLECTION, REFLECTION, AND DECLARATION
(Psa_77:11-12.)
The Psalmist in his trouble seeks relief by recollecting the wondrous works of God, and reflecting and speaking thereon.
I. Recollection. “I will remember,” &c. The powers of memory are twofold. They are the power of retention, and the power of reproduction. By virtue of the former, memory is the storehouse of past scenes, circumstances, events, words, deeds. By virtue of the latter we are enabled to reproduce and relive the past. Memory may be regarded in several aspects.
1. As a source of pain. Tennyson has beautifully and truthfully said,—
“A sorrow’s crown of sorrow is remembering happier things.”
“Remembrance wakes with all her busy train,
Swells at my breast, and turns the past to pain.”—Goldsmith
“Will no remorse, will no decay,
O Memory! soothe thee into peace!
When life is ebbing fast away,
Will not thy hungry vultures cease!
Ah, no! as weeds from fading free,
Noxious and rank, yet verdantly
Twine round a ruin’d tower;
So to the heart, untamed, will cling
The memory of an evil thing,
In life’s departing hour:
Green is the weed when grey the wall
And thistles rise while turrets fall.”
—Heraud.
2. As a source of pleasure. “A memory without blot or contamination,” said Charlotte Brontë, “must be an exquisite treasure,—an inexhaustible source of pure refreshment.”
“The joys I have possess’d are ever mine;
Out of thy reach, behind eternity,
Hid in the sacred treasure of the past,
But bless’d remembrance brings them hourly back.”—Dryden.
3. As an aid to faith. So the Psalmist uses it in this case. Observe,
(1) God’s works are wonders. What marvellous things He is ever accomplishing in the material world! What wonders He wrought on behalf of His ancient people! How wonderful are His doings now in the experience of His people,—in their conversion, spiritual education, sanctification, and glorification! Truly, “the bright glories of His grace, beyond His other wonders shine.”
(2) God’s wondrous works should be remembered. Not to remember them would indicate great insensateness of mind. He who does not remember them overlooks the most glorious of records; and cannot be held guiltless of ingratitude.
(3) God’s wondrous works remembered are calculated to inspire confidence. They reveal a Being who is supremely trustworthy.
II. Reflection. “I will meditate,” &c. By means of reflection we are enabled to realise the facts recalled by memory, to perceive their significance and applications; and the emotions which naturally spring from the facts remembered are excited by reflection. Recollection is of little worth comparatively, unless accompanied and followed by meditation. It was by the exercise of both these faculties that the troubled heart of the poet grew calm and victorious.
III. Declaration. “I will talk of Thy doings.” A good man, having passed through experiences similar to those of the Psalmist, should talk of God’s doings. After his trouble, recollection, and meditation, his talk would be—
1. Intelligent. He would not utter crude or rash statements concerning God.
2. Trust-inspiring. His own faith would grow stronger as he recounted to others, &c. The faith of those who heard him would also grow as they thought of his conflict, and how he won the victory.
CONCLUSION.—Here is an example well worthy our imitation. Recollect, meditate, and then speak.
THE WAYS OF GOD
(Psa_77:19.)
I. God’s ways are vast in their extent. “In the sea.” His ways are related—
1. To all ages—past, present, future.
2. To all worlds.
3. To all events.
II. God’s ways are profound in their meaning. “In the great waters.” Not in streams or rivers, but in the immeasurable, unfathomable ocean. His ways are “too deep to sound with mortal lines.”
III. God’s ways are mysterious in their aspect. “Thy footsteps are not known,” cannot be always traced. “They are not always known; or they are not known in all things; yea, they are not altogether known in anything.”
“The acknowledgment of mystery,” says Dr. Huntington, “the frank confession that our being is folded all about with the unknowable, our light fringed on every side with darkness, our little globe swimming in an ocean of unfathomable designs, but God guiding it on and caring for every passenger soul—this is an end of the trying of our faith.”
GOD LEADING HIS PEOPLE
(Psa_77:20.)
I. The Leader of the good. “Thou.” The Leader possesses—
1. Unlimited power, for the protection and support of His people.
2. Perfect intelligence. He knows His people individually and thoroughly. He is perfectly acquainted with the way along which they travel to their destination.
3. Solicitous regard for each member of the flock. He tenderly cares for every one, and for all.
II. The instruments by which they are led. “By the hand of Moses and Aaron.” He still guides instrumentally. How?
1. By His Providence, pointing out our way by the indications of circumstances and current events.
2. By His Word, with its “Thou shalt,” and “Thou shalt not.”
3. By His Spirit influencing our spirits.
4. By the counsel of His servants. The wise and good are here to direct us.
III. The manner in which they are led. “Like a flock. “We have here three ideas.
1. Particularity. The Eastern shepherds have a particular knowledge of each sheep, of its peculiarities, &c. And a name for each sheep. (See illus. in “The Land and the Book,” by Dr. Thomson.) “He calleth his own sheep by name.” “I am the good Shepherd, and know My sheep, and am known of Mine.”
2. Unity. Though the distinctness and individuality of each one is preserved, yet they are not separated. They constitute a “flock.” “One flock” under “one Shepherd.”
3. Leading as contradistinguished from driving. The Eastern shepherd goes before his flock, and so leads them. “And when He putteth forth His own sheep, He goeth before them, and the sheep follow Him; for they know His voice.” Dr. Bushnell briefly, yet clearly and suggestively, states the idea—“He does not drive them on before as a herd of unwilling disciples, but goes before Himself, leading them into paths that He has trod, and dangers He has met, and sacrifices He has borne Himself, calling them after Him, and to be only followers.”
“Jesus still lead on
Till our rest be won;
And although the way be cheerless.
We will follow, calm and fearless:
Guide us by Thy hand
To our Fatherland.”
—Zinsendorf.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Sermon Bible 1900 · Public Domain On v1 There are two points of view under which we…
Psa 77:3
There are two points of view under which we wish to present this subject: the strangeness of such an experience and some of the reasons that may account for it.
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I. The strangeness of such an experience—that a man should remember God and yet be troubled. For consider: (1) that such an experience is against all that is made known to us of the nature of God. From the very first, revelation has had one purpose, and could have only one: to present God in such a light that His sinful creatures should come and find rest in Him. (2) It becomes strange when we reflect not only on the nature of God, but on His promises. They are so universal, so free, so full, that they seem fitted to meet every want and satisfy every yearning of the human soul. That the heart of a man who hears these words and believes that they come from the lips of God should be troubled at remembering Him must seem very strange. (3) It must appear strange further when we consider that trouble at the thought of God is declared to be against the experience of all sincere seekers. There is a history of cases reaching all through the Bible, and the burden of them is, "This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him, and saved him out of all his troubles." The appeal of all ages has been, "O Thou that hearest prayer, unto Thee shall all flesh come." (4) Such an experience is against all that we can reasonably believe of the nature of the soul of man. If one theory be true about man’s soul, it is this: that out of God no full, satisfying end can be found for it. The soul is greater than the whole world, and the greater cannot be blessed of the less.
II. Consider some of the reasons that may be given for such an experience as this. (1) The first reason is that many men do not make God the object of sufficient thought. (2) Another reason why many are troubled at the thought of God is that they are seeking Him with a wrong view of the way of access. (3) A third reason is that they are seeking Him with some reserved thought of sin. (4) A fourth reason is that they have a mistaken view of God’s manner of dealing with us in this world.
It is in the experience of the Divine life that doubts melt away or can be held in quiet expectancy of a solution, and that we approach gradually to the calm of those that rest beneath the altar. The thought of God that for a while brings trouble shall be made the source of hope, the pledge that all with you and with His universe shall be ordered to a happy end; and even here amid the trouble and struggle of earth, He can put into the mouth some notes of the praise of heaven.
J. Ker, Sermons, 2nd series, p. 305.
References: Psa 77:2.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xv., No. 853; J. Irons, Thursday Penny Pulpit, vol. xv., p. 237; R. D. B. Rawnsley, Sermons in Country Churches, 1st series, p. 228. Psa 77:3.—Preacher’s Monthly, vol. iii., p. 25; Parker, Old Testament Outlines, p. 122, and Christian Chronicle, Sept. 20th, 1883. Psa 77:5.—C. C. Bartholomew, Sermons chiefly Practical, p. 353.
Psa 77:7-10
The moral to be drawn from this Psalm is that in all troubles and adversities it is our own fault if we have not a light to guide and cheer us, and that the true remedy against despondency is to look back upon the love of God pledged to us and His mercy shown to us in former days.
I. As soon as David looks his desponding thoughts in the face, he sees their absurdity; and he sees, too, that all his painful feelings have arisen, not from the absence of God’s protecting care, but from his own weakness and foolishness. "I said, It is mine own infirmity."
II. If the Psalmist allowed his mind a range wider than his own personal experience, and considered the past evidences of the presence of God with His Church, the conclusion would be the same. If God were with His Church, and David a member of it, he had sufficient to make distrust a fault and despondency a sin.
III. Each one of us in the ordinary progress both of his temporal and spiritual life may find much that is worthy of his imitation in the conduct of David as expressed in the text. In all the roughnesses of the road which we have to pass over, we may, after first acknowledging our own infirmity, repose our minds on the thought of God’s mercies to us in days gone by.
Bishop Harvey Goodwin, Parish Sermons, 2nd series, p. 66.
Reference: Psa 77:9.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxxi., No. 1843.
Psa 77:10
There are three kinds of speaking in this Psalm: speaking to God, speaking to our fellows, and speaking to one’s self.
I. To how many of our thoughts, and feelings, and spiritual utterances may we apply these words: "This is my infirmity"! Of hard thoughts of God, of dark views of His providence, of distrustful feelings towards God, and often of corresponding thoughts, and views, and feelings towards men, we may say, "This is my infirmity." And the weakness of the body, faults in the spirit, and Satanic influence are the fountains and the causes of these utterances. The Psalmist resolves, as an antidote to despondency and fear, to bring the past and the present, recollections and existing consciousness, the day of his trouble and years of joyousness, the right hand of the Most High and his enemies and troubles—he resolves to bring them into comparison, to bring them together. "I will remember the years of the right hand of the Most High."
II. These words, "the right hand of the Most High," represent the power of God as manifested in all sovereignty and sufficiency on behalf of those who trust in Him. (1) God works. Power is continually going out of Him. (2) God works perfectly. His work is right-hand work. (3) He works as the Most High. He fills the above as well as the beneath. There is One higher than the Law: the Lawgiver.
III. Notice two or three brief exhortations springing from this subject. (1) Commune with your own heart; talk to yourself. (2) Give memory its full share of work in your religious life. (3) Avoid contracted views. Look at today, but look at the years. Look at second causes, and agents, and means; but ever consider the right hand of the Most High.
S. Martin, Penny Pulpit, No. 878.
References: Psa 77:10.—S. Cox, Expositions, 3rd series, p. 152. Psa 77:11, Psa 77:14-15, Psa 77:19, Psa 77:20.—G. Forbes, The Voice of God in the Psalms, p. 251. Psa 77:13.—H. Melvill, Sermons, vol. ii., p. 297.
Psa 77:19
There must be mystery in religion—a religion which lies between the finite and the Infinite. Take away mystery, and we should tear out a page of evidence. But there is more hiddenness about the providence of God than there is about the grace of God. He has revealed much more clearly what He does and what He wills about our souls than about our bodies. This is the reason, perhaps, why faith finds it so much harder work to trust for time than it does for eternity, and why there are so many who have no fear for their salvation, and yet who are hourly anxious about their daily wants.
I. The distinction between the degree of the mystery of providence and grace underlies the text. There is a climax and an anticlimax. (1) Observe "way," "path," "footsteps." The way is greater than the path; the way is broad: the path is necessarily narrow, as in the familiar verse, "In all thy ways"—i.e., in all thy great things—"acknowledge Him, and He will direct thy little things," thy "paths;" while "footsteps" are smaller still than paths—little isolated marks lying here and there along the path. So it runs down—way, path, footsteps. (2) Now see the ascending scale. "Thy way is in the sea"—the sea classically is always shallow water—"Thy path in the great waters," which lie far out, more unfathomable than the shallows of the shore; while the "footsteps" are altogether out of sight, something beyond the sea and beyond the great waters, utterly out of reach: they "are not known."
II. As respects God’s hidden ways, there are one or two things which we ought to consider. (1) God never meant you to understand them. We are to seek the solution of hard problems, and the quelling of our fears, and the answer to our doubts, not in the events themselves, but in the character of God, not in the book of present history, but in the volume of the Scriptures. (2) Faith has its helps. As we live on, many things which were once fearful, involved, and hard come out kind, simple, and plain; we see, if not all, yet some, of the reasons: and we are satisfied where we were once most dissatisfied. The past stands sponsor for the future.
J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 7th series, p. 124.
In the history of Israel we find not merely an impressive symbol, but a great practical truth, the truth, namely, that those who follow God follow a Leader whose footsteps are not known; that, in other words, he who accepts the service of God accepts with it much which he cannot understand. Mystery is bound up with God’s revelation and dealing with the human race.
I. We are not to conclude that because there is a mystery in God’s dealings they are therefore without a plan. We are to remember that the confusion is in us, and not in God’s work; that God’s counsel is not darkened because we are blind.
II. We are not to conclude that this mystery of providence is the outgrowth of unkindness.
III. The Psalmist has evidently reached very satisfactory conclusions on this subject. The secret of his confidence is revealed in the thirteenth verse, in the words, "Thy way, O God, is in the sanctuary," or "Thy way is in holiness." No matter how strange the way if it be a way of holiness!
IV. "Thou leddest Thy people." The true philosophy of life is summed up here, in simply following God.
M. R. Vincent, Gates into the Psalm Country, p. 181.
References: Psa 77:19.—Homiletic Magazine, vol. x., p. 132. Psa 77:19, Psa 77:20.—A. P. Stanley, Sermons on Special Occasions, p. 340; C. J. Vaughan, Memorials of Harrow Sundays, p. 116. Psa 78:3, Psa 78:4.—J. T. Stannard, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xviii.,p. 136. Psa 78:5-7.—H. M. Butler, Harrow Sermons, 2nd series, p. 238. Psa 78:9.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xii., No. 696; S. Baring-Gould, Village Preaching for a Year, 1st series, p. 9. Psa 78:10.—J. N. Norton, Every Sunday, p. 305; J. Baines, Sermons, p. 113.
The Sermon Bible, ed. William Robertson Nicoll (1888–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
F. W. Grant 1903 · Public Domain On v1 God’s way in the sea and in the sanctuary.
God’s way in the sea and in the sanctuary.
To the chief musician "to Jeduthun" a psalm of Asaph.
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The last psalm of the series gives us that character of the divine government which causes it to be so fruitful of exercise to the soul of man. Even for the Christian, in this respect, clouds and darkness are about Him still the revolving wheel of the world, with all its remorselessness of change for the fleeting generations, is yet God’s chariot wheel, as indeed the Preacher sees it, only to the increase of his perplexity and the height of the wheel -so high as to be dreadful, in Ezekiel’s vision, -hides with its mystery Him who sits above it. This is what this fifth psalm here presents: God’s footsteps in the sea, and there unknown, with the difficulty for faith engendered by it; -a difficulty pressing for solution, or at least some answer and which is here answered, measurably at
least. It could not yet have the settlement which Christianity has given to it, nor can there be settlement, even with this, which shall leave us with no more exercise of this kind. Faith must still reckon with the unseen, in some sense, as Asaph did; and the psalm will have its use still for every pilgrim. Comforting it is, too, to note that it is for Jeduthun, i.e. "the worshiper," and that it is,
notably also, a sanctuary-psalm. If God’s way is in the sea, His steps unknown, it is no less in the sanctuary also, in the holiness which must be His, and it is from what is known of Him -changeless as He is in nature, -that what is unknown must be determined.
The psalm; as it is a fifth, so it has five parts, the first three of which are taken up with the problem and its solution, while the last two expand the general thought of it, as we have seen.
1. In the first part we have the occasion of the question, but with the preliminary assurance that the psalmist’s cry to God has been answered: "My voice is unto God, and I cry: my voice is unto God, and He hath given ear to me." He then points out how the question which was troubling had risen for him. External difficulty it was that (as commonly) produced the inward perplexity. We are apt to take with calmness enough the difficulties of others, until these become our own: as Eliphaz said to Job, "it toucheth thee, and thou art troubled." So here: "in the day of my strait I sought the Lord" -not Jehovah, but the Almighty Ruler of all: my hand was stretched out in the night and slacked not: my soul refused comfort." The remembrance of God also only made the distress more poignant, for here it was that doubt was assailing him: "I remembered God, and I moaned; I complained, and my spirit was overwhelmed." We have not as yet, however, the special character of this distress made known.
2. In the second section we realize more the nature of the conflict, as having to do with questions which, as Ecclesiastes has it, "God has given to the sons of men to be exercised with." "Thou hast held mine eyelids open," he says: "I am so agitated that I cannot speak." He is occupied with the history of man, with "the days of old, -the years of ancient times" -God’s dealings with men are exercising him; and from these he turns to review his own experience. He remembers his "music in the night," but he is not disposed to music now. He is busy, communing with his own heart, and his spirit making diligent search. But with all this, at present, rest is not attained.
3. The next section brings us however to the interpretation of it all. We find the riddle and its solution also. We see clearly that it is a question which. Israel is above all concerned with, and which a latter-day remnant would certainly be exercised about; while the answer concerns His people at all times, it being the assertion of the faithfulness of God to His own Name, for which He ever acts, and in which they find their resource and refuge.
The question is "Will the Lord cast off forever? and will He show favor no more?" Here the "Lord" is not "Jehovah;" nor is the covenant-Name mentioned until after this question is answered. Covenant they cannot plead: the answer has to come from what God is in Himself, not from relationship, which is the very thing in question. But the "Lord" (Adonai). He in whose hand all power is, has in effect cast off when that power no more acts in their behalf. Will He cast off, then, "forever" (leolamim; "for the ages")? "and will He show favor no more?" There was no doubt, at least, of what He had been to them. Could it be, then, that He would act in opposition to this? A temporary "forsaking" would not be opposition: for chastening means present interest and future blessing; and was this, then, chastening, or renunciation of the favor that He once had shown?
In his next two questions the psalmist weighs his evidences. The divine loving-kindness, can that be at an end -exhausted? is the fountain of love dried up? This is of course an impossibility; and he is arguing that it is an impossibility. And yet in application to themselves, how many are tempted to believe it! How many admit the suggestion of some sin possibly unpardonable to him who sincerely turns to God about it, and would find his refuge in the blood of Christ! But no: there stands as the complete denial of this the unfailing word of divine inspiration: "the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth from all sin." Here is no limit, and who shall make one? Whatever may be true as to unpardonable sin, it cannot mean that any such can be to one who has recourse to the blood of Christ; or that He will cast out, for any cause whatever, any one who in the day of present grace shall come to Him (1Jn 1:7; Joh 6:37).
But this brings us to the second question of the psalmist: "has His word failed for all generations?" Here, too, is an impossibility; but let us see what it implies. It is "His word" that is in question, not "His promise"; and this makes it much more weighty. God has been pleased to give us His word, and this indeed is "loving-kindness" to do so, and the parallelism of the verse is complete. He has written Himself out on the page of Scripture, -given us to see His heart, His mind: it may be in His dealings with this or that person, in His announcement as to this or that event. All this rests (as to its blessing to me) upon the immutability of His nature, the assurance that I shall find Him for myself the self-same God that He has been to others. Were He changeful, capricious, limited, I could argue nothing, find comfort in nothing: -for all generations His word would be practically gone. Were His "loving-kindness" anything but the infinite fount of blessing that it is, no declarations of it for another would help me, no words of other times would avail me now. But blessed be God, this cannot be. He is Himself, always Himself, no attribute at strife with another in His changeless and perfect nature. How I can rejoice, then, that Abraham’s God is mine; and what unfailing assurance any one that will, may gather from His word!
Here then is the point of the argument: it is God Himself in whom we can trust, and that, whatever the present circumstances. "Has the Mighty One (El) forgotten to be gracious? Must any circumstances whatever be allowed to argue infirmity in Him? "Has He shut up (contracted) in anger His compassions?" No, be assured. His very anger is the effect of love itself: cast yourself upon His love, this anger will not harm you; His chastening shall but purify and bless.
And thus we come to a point: shall we argue infirmity in Him or in ourselves? Here there can be no question, and the trouble is ended: "And I said, This is my infirmity" -"my malady," it might be rendered: "there are years of the right hand of the Most High;" -an inadequate statement, which is all the more effective. "God has had years of experience," he says to himself: and that so feebly represents the truth, and yet in that enfeebled form; so forbids doubt, that immediately he is master of himself again, and can only praise Him.
4. Back he can go now at once to Scripture, to those old experiences of God, now once more so available for him. "I will make mention of the works of Jah," he says: "for I remember Thy wonders of old; and I will meditate on all Thy work, and talk of Thy doings." "Jah," the contracted form of Jehovah, speaks in the most energetic, decisive way of the One who is, as if He were the only reality. And so, in a true sense, He is: for "in Him we live and move and have our being," and He governs absolutely where most his authority seems set aside. Had we eyes purged from all films, where would we find a thing which might not be a text from which to descant upon the "works of Jehovah?" and with what blessing to our own souls, as well as to the souls of others. Even the "wonders of old" are but as it were the visible signs and tokens of a manner of work which everywhere has the stamp of the same Author. Indeed that is what gives them their main charm and interest. Oh for eyes without a film! we shall have them: but do not let us be so satisfied with that assurance as to put away from us the present opportunity of learning such glorious things.
But he goes on: "Thy way, O God, is in the sanctuary" -not simply, I think, "in holiness," though that be the main thought. But the sanctuary suggests more than this, -suggests already even, what the next section more develops, the hidden character of His ways, which are yet not hidden of His will, for He is ever seeking to make them known, but of necessity, by reason of men’s estrangement from Him. The sanctuary, thank God, does not to us, as to Israel, so much speak of this: for it is what characterizes Christianity that the veil of it is rent from top to bottom; and we have "boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus" (Heb 10:19). Blessed it is to know this! but beyond measure blessed to draw really near because we know it! Practically still the measure of our knowledge must depend upon that purging of the eyes, of which we have been speaking. The light shines, and here is our responsibility, and here is our privilege. What we see is a question to be answered, each one for himself.
But it is in holiness God’s way is, and "the knowledge of the Holy is understanding": therefore we enter into His mind as His mind enters into us. And then indeed shall we realize: "who is the mighty one (El) so great as God?" And if He be thus necessarily hidden by. His own perfection, yet is He not outside the knowledge of men everywhere: for "Thou art the Mighty One that doeth wonders: Thou hast made known Thy strength among the peoples." And here especially in Israel -through His relationship to these -He is made known, and in the grace which this declares: "with Thine arm hast Thou redeemed Thy people, the sons of Jacob and of Joseph."
5. Here the fifth section opens, and we find in the way in which God manifested Himself as with His people and for their deliverance, how the powers of nature in which He so much hides Himself, are nevertheless perfectly at His disposal, and work in behalf of those with whom He is. The psalmist is drawing the picture manifestly of the deliverance at the Red Sea, although of the convulsions of nature described, the history gives no account. The moral drawn from it is of the widest application.
"The waters saw Thee, O God; the waters saw Thee, they were afraid; the depths also trembled." Nature owned His power, while men doubted the Arm upon which they leaned, or else defied it, after abundant experience. But not only did nature tremble and give place, but the elements yielded themselves to His will: "the clouds poured out water; the skies sent out a sound; Thine arrows also went abroad." But there was that which has ever to man been more like the manifestation of God, and which Scripture recognizes in this way: "The voice of Thy thunder was in the whirlwind; the earth trembled and quaked."
And now comes the moral of God’s clothing Himself in these nature-forms "Thy way is in the sea, and Thy paths in the great waters; and Thy footsteps are not known." True as that may be, yet this "way" is with His people and in their behalf: "Thou leddest Thy people like a flock, by the hand of Moses and Aaron." Thus in the dark as in the light He is the same; and in the dark, we can yet trust Him.
F. W. Grant, The Numerical Bible (4th ed., 1903) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow 1909 · Public Domain On v1 The Ps. records the writer's experience of personal perplexity…
The Ps. records the writer's experience of personal perplexity and darkness, which, however, has been caused by the contemplation of Israel's national distress. It may be dated appropriately in the time of the exile. Psa_77:1-3 describe the Psalmist's trouble, in which even prayer has brought no comfort. Psa_77:4-9 speak of his meditations on the brighter past, which lead to the question whether God has finally rejected His people. In Psa_77:10-20 he turns for comfort to the story of God's wonderful works of old, and dwells especially upon His deliverance of Israel from Egypt (Psa_77:15), His sublime manifestation of power at the Red Sea (Psa_77:16-19), and His guidance of His people through the wilderness (Psa_77:20). At this point the Ps. comes to an abrupt close.
Title.—Jeduthun] see on Psalms 39.
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1. Cried.. gave] RV 'will cry.. will give.'
2. My sore ran] RV 'my hand was stretched out,' in the attitude of prayer.
3. Selah] see on Psa_3:4.
4. Mine eyes waking] rather, 'the guards of my eyes.' The eyelids are kept from closing.
6. My song in the night] a former time of happiness and praise: see Psa_42:8; Job_35:10.
10. This is my infirmity] The Psalmist here recognises that his doubts are due to his own weakness and not to any change in God.
10b. RM reads, 'That the right hand of the Most High doth change,' which may be taken as an exclamation, mentioning the idea only to dismiss it as impossible.
11. Remember] RV 'make mention of.'
12. Talk of] RV 'muse on.'
13. In the sanctuary] RV 'in holiness.'
14. People] RV 'peoples.'
15. The sons of Jacob and Joseph] Jacob represents the kingdom of Judah, and Joseph (father of Ephraim and Manasseh) the northern kingdom of Israel. The division of the nation is clearly hinted at: see on Psa_80:1, Psa_80:2.
16. The waters] the Red Sea: Exo_14:21-31.
17. Sound] thunder. Arrows] lightning.
18. Heaven] RV 'whirlwind.'
19. Is., are] RV 'was.. were.' Footsteps.. not known] when the waters had returned to their place.
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On v1 (See Scofield "Psa 39:1").
Jeduthun
(See Scofield "Psa 39:1").
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein 1922 · Public Domain On v1 Psalm 77
Psalm 77
The Distressed Saint and His Comfort
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1. The distress (Psa 77:1-10)
2. The comfort (Psa 77:11-20)
This Psalm shows the distress of the saint in deepest exercise of soul. He earnestly seeks the Lord and never leaves off. “my hand was stretched out in the night, and failed not” (literal translation of Psa 77:2). He moaned and complained and his spirit was overwhelmed. Then in still greater distress he asks, “Will the Lord cast off forever?--Is His mercy come to an end forever?”--”Hath God forgotten to be gracious?” The comfort comes to him as he thinks of God’s past dealings, as he remembers His work of old. He realizeth “Thy way, O God, is in the sanctuary, who is so great a God as our God?” He remembers how God redeemed His people Israel in the past, and this being His way as a holy God, the God of the Sanctuary, He will redeem again and manifest His power. One can easily see how this Psalm also is Israelitish and finds its application in the last days.
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On v1 The Tribulation and Comfort of the Righteous.
The Tribulation and Comfort of the Righteous.
To the chief musician, to Jeduthun, at that time in charge of the Temple music, a psalm of Asaph, the psalm picturing the relief experienced by believers in the midst of affliction, by calling to mind God’s former and wonderful acts of deliverance.
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v. 1. I cried unto God with my voice, even unto God with my voice, in importunate supplication; and He gave ear unto me, in a gracious answer and act of deliverance.
v. 2. In the day of my trouble, at the time when affliction beset him strongly, I sought the Lord, the All-powerful; my sore ran in the night and ceased not, rather, my hand is stretched out in the night, without being relaxed, he does not draw it back, he does not cease from crying to the Lord; my soul refused to be comforted, so thoroughly had his affliction discouraged him.
v. 3. I remembered God and was troubled, groaning at the thought that Jehovah, once his Helper, had now apparently forsaken him; I complained, and my spirit was overwhelmed, so overcome that he could no longer think clearly. Selah.
v. 4. Thou holdest mine eyes waking, holding the lids of his eyes open, depriving him of sleep on account of the misery which he felt; I am so troubled that I cannot speak, he is speechless from the excessive amount of his affliction. But his meditation now turns to the past.
v. 5. I have considered the days of old, of ages long past, the years of ancient times, when the manifestations of God’s power and mercy were so numerous.
v. 6. I call to remembrance my song in the night, when a feeling of happy gratitude caused him to use even the night season for anthems of praise; I commune with mine own heart, meditating in the seclusion of his inmost soul, making comparisons with the past happiness and the present misery; and my spirit made diligent search, trying to become clear in his own mind regarding the ways of the Lord. A summary of his meditation is now given.
v. 7. Will the Lord cast off forever? Can it be possible that He will utterly forsake the afflicted? And will He be favorable no more, never again showing His good pleasure in the afflicted soul trusting in Him?
v. 8. Is His mercy clean gone forever Has He for gotten all His merciful promises? Doth His promise fail forevermore? Surely such a course would not harmonize with the outstanding attributes of His essence.
v. 9. Hath God forgotten to be gracious, to look upon His children with kind favor? Hath He in anger shut up His tender mercies? Selah. Note how closely these meditations agree with those in the experience of every believer. The psalmist now shakes off all feelings of doubt.
v. 10. And I said, This is my infirmity, the suffering which was his lot in life; but I will remember the years of the right hand of the Most High, when the almighty power of Jehovah sustained him.
v. 11. I will remember the works of the Lord, with praise and thanksgiving; surely I will remember Thy wonders of old, for there are miracles of God in the life of every believer, just as there are in the history of the Church.
v. 12. I will meditate also of all Thy work, pondering upon them most carefully, and talk of Thy doings, by which God revealed His divine attributes to men.
v. 13. Thy way, O God, is in the Sanctuary, literally, "in holiness"; everything that He does accords with the holiness of His essence. Who is so great a God as our God? His perfections place Him above all so-called gods and idols of the heathen.
v. 14. Thou art the God that doest wonders, continually performing miracles of kindness and mercy; thou hast declared Thy strength among the people, revealing among the nations of the world His almighty power.
v. 15. Thou hast with Thine arm redeemed Thy people, His uplifted, almighty arm providing deliverance to Israel, the sons of Jacob and Joseph, the latter being especially mentioned as bearers of the right of the firstborn. Selah.
v. 16. The waters saw Thee, O God; the waters saw Thee, namely, when He made ready to cleave the waters of the Red Sea; they were afraid; the depths also were troubled, being filled with awe and trembling before the power of the Creator, Exo 14:21.
v. 17. The clouds poured out water, during a mighty thunderstorm revealing Jehovah’s power; the skies sent out a sound, the entire firmament sounding; Thine arrows also went abroad, the lightnings being pictured as active and aggressive.
v. 18. The voice of Thy thunder was in the heaven, or "in the whirlwind"; the lightnings lightened the world; the earth trembled and shook. The entire passage seems to be an elaborate picture. of the mighty phenomena preceding and accompanying the giving of the Law on Mount Sinai, all the powers of nature being used in the service of Jehovah, in the revelation of His incomparable majesty.
v. 19. Thy way is in the sea and Thy path in the great waters, the trackless deep being obliged to offer Him a road, and Thy footsteps are not known, the full mysteries of His omnipotence and providence being beyond the comprehension of men.
v. 20. Thou leddest Thy people like a flock, His hand both protecting and guiding them, by the hand of Moses and Aaron, His representatives before the children of Israel, Exo 14:29-31. All believers may rest assured that the God of Israel, Jehovah, will lead them, individually and collectively, through all the tribulations of this present time to everlasting salvation.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 2, 4, 6, 8 General Information:
General Information:
Parallelism is common in Hebrew poetry. (See: Poetry and Parallelism)
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For the chief musician
"This is for the director of music to use in worship"
Jeduthun
One of David's chief musicians had this same name. This may refer to him. See how you translated this in Psalms 39:1. (See: How to Translate Names)
A psalm of Asaph
"This is a psalm that Asaph wrote." See how this is translated in Psalms 53:1.
translationWords
chief
psalm
Asaph
call
voice
God
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 3, 4, 7 Ps 77 The psalmist laments that God has turned…
Ps 77 The psalmist laments that God has turned away from him, even though he feels innocent. He reflects on his situation (77:3, 6, 12) and finds hope (see 25:5) in remembering God’s past deeds (77:11).
77:1-3 The night provides a special opportunity for prayer and meditation (77:6, 11; see 6:6; 16:7; 17:3; 30:5; 63:6; 119:55, 62, 148).
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.