The Expositor's Bible: The Psalms, Vol. 3: Psalms XC.-CL.Maclaren, Alexander
Religion
The Expositor's Bible: The Psalms, Vol. 3: Psalms XC.-CL.
Maclaren, Alexander
Bible. Psalms -- Commentaries
The last part (vv. 10-12) puts foremost the prayer for conformity
of will with God's, and, though it closes with recurring prayer
for outward deliverance, yet breathes desires for more inward
blessings. As in the preceding verses, there are, in these closing
ones, many echoes of other psalms. The sequence of petitions and
pleas is instructive. To do, not merely to know, God's will is the
condition of all blessedness, and will be the deepest desire of
every man who is truly God's servant. But that obedience of heart
and hand must be taught by God, and He regards our taking Him for
our God as establishing a claim on Him to give all illumination
of heart and all bending of will and all skill of hand which are
necessary to make us doers of His will. His teaching is no mere
outward communication of knowledge, but an inbreathing of power to
discern, and of disposition and ability to perform, what is His
will. Ver. 10_b_ is best taken as a continuous sentence, embodying
a prayer for guidance. The plea on which it rests remains the same,
though the statement of it as a separate clause is not adopted in
our translation. For the fact that God's spirit is "good"--_i.e._,
beneficently self-communicative--heartens us to ask, and binds Him to
give, all such direction as is needed. This is not a mere repetition
of the prayer in ver. 8, but transcends it. "A level land" (or,
according to a possible suggested emendation, _path_) is one in which
the psalmist can freely walk, unhindered in doing God's will. His
next petition goes deepest of the three, inasmuch as it asks for that
new Divine life to be imparted, without which no teaching to do God's
will can be assimilated, and no circumstances, however favourable,
will conduce to doing it. He may not have known all the depth which
his prayer sounded; but no man who has real desires to conform heart
and life to the supreme will of God but must have felt his need of
a purer life to be poured into his spirit. As this prayer is deep,
so its plea is high. "For Thy name's sake"--nothing can be pleaded
of such force as that. God supremely desires the glory of His name;
and, for the sake of men whose blessedness depends on their knowing
and loving it, will do nothing that can dim its lustre. His name is
the record of His past acts, the disclosure of that in Him which
is knowable. That name contains the principles of all His future
acts. He will be what He has been. He will magnify His name; and the
humblest, most tormented soul that can say, "Thou art my God," may
be sure that Divinely given life will throb in it, and that even its
lowliness may contribute to the honour of the name.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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