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Psalm 31

Prayer and Praise for Deliverance from Enemies

To the leader. A Psalm of David.

1

In you, O L ord, I seek refuge;

do not let me ever be put to shame;

in your righteousness deliver me.

2

Incline your ear to me;

rescue me speedily.

Be a rock of refuge for me,

a strong fortress to save me.

 

3

You are indeed my rock and my fortress;

for your name’s sake lead me and guide me,

4

take me out of the net that is hidden for me,

for you are my refuge.

5

Into your hand I commit my spirit;

you have redeemed me, O L ord, faithful God.

 

6

You hate those who pay regard to worthless idols,

but I trust in the L ord.

7

I will exult and rejoice in your steadfast love,

because you have seen my affliction;

you have taken heed of my adversities,

8

and have not delivered me into the hand of the enemy;

you have set my feet in a broad place.

 

9

Be gracious to me, O L ord, for I am in distress;

my eye wastes away from grief,

my soul and body also.

10

For my life is spent with sorrow,

and my years with sighing;

my strength fails because of my misery,

and my bones waste away.

 

11

I am the scorn of all my adversaries,

a horror to my neighbors,

an object of dread to my acquaintances;

those who see me in the street flee from me.

12

I have passed out of mind like one who is dead;

I have become like a broken vessel.

13

For I hear the whispering of many—

terror all around!—

as they scheme together against me,

as they plot to take my life.

 

14

But I trust in you, O L ord;

I say, “You are my God.”

15

My times are in your hand;

deliver me from the hand of my enemies and persecutors.

16

Let your face shine upon your servant;

save me in your steadfast love.

17

Do not let me be put to shame, O L ord,

for I call on you;

let the wicked be put to shame;

let them go dumbfounded to Sheol.

18

Let the lying lips be stilled

that speak insolently against the righteous

with pride and contempt.

 

19

O how abundant is your goodness

that you have laid up for those who fear you,

and accomplished for those who take refuge in you,

in the sight of everyone!

20

In the shelter of your presence you hide them

from human plots;

you hold them safe under your shelter

from contentious tongues.

 

21

Blessed be the L ord,

for he has wondrously shown his steadfast love to me

when I was beset as a city under siege.

22

I had said in my alarm,

“I am driven far from your sight.”

But you heard my supplications

when I cried out to you for help.

 

23

Love the L ord, all you his saints.

The L ord preserves the faithful,

but abundantly repays the one who acts haughtily.

24

Be strong, and let your heart take courage,

all you who wait for the L ord.


17. O Jehovah! let me not be ashamed. In these words, the Psalmist continues his prayer, and to strengthen his hopes, he contrasts himself with his enemies; for it would have been more than absurd to permit those who by their wickedness so openly provoked the wrath of God to escape with impunity, and that one who was innocent and relied upon God should be disappointed and made a laughing-stock. Here, accordingly, we perceive what the Psalmist’s comparison implies. Moreover, instead of speaking of his hope or trust, he now speaks of his calling upon God, saying, I have called on thee; and he does this with good reason, for he who relies on the providence of God must flee to him with prayers and strong cries. To be silent in the grave, implies that death, when it befalls the ungodly, restrains and prevents them from doing farther injury. This silence is opposed both to their deceitful and treacherous devices, and to their outrageous insolence. In the very next verse, therefore, he adds, Let lying lips be put to silence, which, in my opinion, includes both their craftiness, and the false pretences and calumnies by which they endeavor to accomplish their designs, and also the vain boasting in which they indulge themselves. For he tells us that they speak with harshness and severity against the righteous, in pride and scorn; because it was their froward conceit, which almost always begets contempt, that made David’s enemies so bold in lying. Whoever proudly arrogates to himself more than is his due, will almost necessarily treat others with contempt.

19. O how great is thy goodness which thou hast hidden for them that fear thee! In this verse the Psalmist exclaims that God is incomprehensibly good and beneficent towards his servants. Goodness here means those divine blessings which are the effects of it. The interrogatory form of the sentence has a peculiar emphasis; for David not only asserts that God is good, but he is ravished with admiration of the goodness which he had experienced. It was this experience, undoubtedly, which caused him break out into the rapturous language of this verse; for he had been marvellously and unexpectedly delivered from his calamities. By his example, therefore, he enjoins believers to rise above the apprehension of their own understanding, in order that they may promise themselves, and expect far more from the grace of God than human reason is able to conceive. He says that the goodness of God is hidden for his servants, because it is a treasure which is peculiar to them. It, no doubt, extends itself in various ways to the irreligious and unworthy, and is set before them indiscriminately; but it displays itself much more plenteously and clearly towards the faithful, because it is they alone who enjoy all God’s benefits for their salvation. God

“maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good,”
(Matthew 5:45,)

and shows himself bountiful even to the irrational creation; but he declares himself a Father, in the true and full sense of the term, to those only who are his servants. It is not without reason, therefore, that the goodness of God is said to be hidden for the faithful, whom alone he accounts worthy of enjoying his favor most intimately and tenderly. Some give a more subtle interpretation of the phrase, the goodness of God is hidden, explaining it as meaning that God, by often exercising his children with crosses and afflictions, hides his favor from them, although, at the same time, he does not forget them. It is more probable, however, that it should be understood of a treasure which God has set apart and laid up in store for them, unless perhaps we choose to refer it to the experience of the saints, because they alone, as I have said, experience in their souls the fruit of divine goodness; whereas brutish stupidity hinders the wicked from acknowledging God as a beneficent Father, even while they are devouring greedily his good things. And thus it comes to pass, that while the goodness of God fills and overspreads all parts of the world, it is notwithstanding generally unknown. But the mind of the sacred writer will be more clearly perceived from the contrast which exists between the faithful and those who are strangers to God’s love. As a provident man will regulate his liberality towards all men in such a manner as not to defraud his children or family, nor impoverish his own house, by spending his substance prodigally on others; so God, in like manner, in exercising his beneficence to aliens from his family, knows well how to reserve for his own children that which belongs to them as it were by hereditary right; that is to say, because of their adoption. 649649     “C’est a dire, a cause de leur adoption.” — Fr. The attempt of Augustine to prove from these words that those who unbelievingly dread God’s judgment have no experience of his goodness, is most inappropriate. To perceive his mistaken view of the passage, it is only necessary to look to the following clause, in which David says that God makes the world to perceive that he exercises inestimable goodness towards those who serve him, both in protecting them and in providing for their welfare. Whence we learn, that it is not of the everlasting blessedness which is reserved for the godly in heaven that the Psalmist here speaks, but of the protection and other blessings which belong to the preservation of the present life; which he declares to be so manifest that even the ungodly themselves are forced to become eye-witnesses of them. The world, I admit, passes over all the works of God with its eyes shut, and is especially ignorant of his fatherly care of the saints; still it is certain that there shine forth such daily proofs of it, that even the reprobate cannot but see them, except in so far as they willingly shut their eyes against the light. David, therefore, speaks according to truth, when he declares that God gives evidences of his goodness to his people before the sons of men, that it may be clearly seen that they do not serve him unadvisedly or in vain. 650650     “Before the sons of men, i.e. openly, so that the world must acknowledge ‘there is a reward for the righteous man.’ Compare Psalm 58:11.” — French and Skinner.


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