Psalms 105:8-15
EXPOSITION Verse 8. He hath remembered his covenant for ever. Here is the basis of all his dealings with his people: he had entered into covenant with them in their father Abraham, and to this covenant he remained faithful. The exhortation to remember (Psalms 105:5) receives great force from the fact that God has remembered. If the Lord has his promise in memory surely we ought not to forget the wonderful manner in which he keeps it. To us it should be matter for deepest joy that never in any instance has the Lord been unmindful of his covenant engagements, nor will he be so world without end. O that we were as mindful of them as he is. The word which he commanded to a thousand generations. This is only an amplification of the former statement, and serves to set before us the immutable fidelity of the Lord during the changing generations of men. His judgments are threatened upon the third and fourth generations of them that hate him, but his love runs on for ever, even to "a thousand generations." His promise is here said to be commanded, or vested with all the authority of a law. It is a proclamation from a sovereign, the firman of an Emperor whose laws shall stand fast in every jot and tittle though heaven and earth shall pass away. Therefore let us give thanks unto the Lord and talk of all his wondrous works, so wonderful for their faithfulness and truth. EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS Verse 8. -- He hath remembered his covenant. As a long series of years had elapsed between the promise and the performance, the prophet uses the word "remember," intimating that the Divine promise does not become obsolete by length of time, but that even when the world imagines that they are extinguished and wholly forgotten, God retains as distinct a remembrance of them as ever, that he may accomplish them in due season. --John Calvin. Verse 8. -- The word which he commanded. All that God says must of necessity be said with authority, so that even his promises partake of the nature of commands. -- Joseph Addison Alexander. EXPOSITION Verse 9. Which covenant he made with Abraham. When the victims were divided and the burning lamp passed between the pieces (Gen. 15.) then the Lord made, or ratified, the covenant with the patriarch. This was a solemn deed, performed not without blood, and the cutting in pieces of the sacrifice; it points us to the greater covenant which in Christ Jesus is signed, sealed, and ratified, that it may stand fast for ever and ever. And his oath unto Isaac. Isaac did not in vision see the solemn making of the covenant, but the Lord renewed unto him his oath (Genesis 26:2-5). This was enough for him, and must have established his faith in the Most High. We have the privilege of seeing in our Lord Jesus both the sacrificial seal, and the eternal oath of God, by which every promise of the covenant is made yea and amen to all the chosen seed. HINTS FOR PASTORS AND LAYPERSONS Verse 9. -- The making, swearing, and confirming of the covenant. See our comment on these verses with the passages referred to. EXPOSITION Verse 10. And confirmed the same unto Jacob for a law. Jacob in his wondrous dream (Ge 28:10-15) received a pledge that the Lord's mode of procedure with him would be in accordance with covenant relations: for said Jehovah, "I will not leave thee till I have done that which I have spoken to thee of." Thus, if we may so speak with all reverence, the covenant became a law unto the Lord himself by which he bound himself to act. O matchless condescension, that the most free and sovereign Lord should put himself under covenant bonds to Iris chosen, and make a law for himself, though he is above all law. And to Israel for an everlasting covenant. When he changed Jacob's name he did not change his covenant, but it is written, "he blessed him there" (Genesis 32:29), and it was with the old blessing, according to the unchangeable word of abiding grace. EXPOSITION Verse 11. Saying, Unto thee will I give the land of Canaan, the lot of your inheritance. This repetition of the great covenant promise is recorded in Genesis 35:9-12 in connection with the change of Jacob's name, and very soon after that slaughter of the Shechemites, which had put the patriarch into such great alarm and caused him to use language almost identical with that of the next verse. When they were but a few men in number; yea, very few, and strangers in it. Jacob said to Simeon and Levi, "Ye have troubled me to make me to stink among the inhabitants of the land, among the Canaanites and the Perizzites: and I being few in number, they shall gather themselves together against me, and slay me, and I shall be destroyed, and my house." Thus the fears of the man of God declared themselves, and they were reasonable if we look only at the circumstances in which he was placed, but they are soon seen to be groundless when we remember that the covenant promise, which guaranteed the possession of the land, necessarily implied the preservation of the race to whom the promise was made. We often fear where no fear is. The blessings promised to the seed of Abraham were not dependent upon the number of his descendants, or their position in this world. The covenant was made with one man, and consequently the number could never be less, and that one man was not the owner of a foot of soil in all the land, save only a cave in which to bury his dead, and therefore his seed could not have less inheritance than he. The smallness of a church, and the poverty of its members, are no barriers to the divine blessing, if it be sought earnestly by pleading the promise. Were not the apostles few, and the disciples feeble, when the good work began? Neither because we are strangers and foreigners here below, as our fathers were, are we in any the more danger: we are like sheep in the midst of wolves, but the wolves cannot hurt us, for our shepherd is near. EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS Verse 11. -- The lot of your inheritance: literally lbh, the cord of your inheritance, an expression taken from the ancient method of measuring land by the cord or line; whence the measuring cord is metonymically put for the part measured, and divided by the cord. Thus, "the lines, ~ylbx, the cords, are fallen unto me in pleasant places," i.e., as the psalmist explains it: "I have a goodly heritage." Psalms 16:6 --Samuel Chandler. Verse 11. -- Your inheritance. The change of the number (from "thee" to "your") points out that God made a covenant with all the people in general, though lie spake the words only to a few individuals; even as we have seen a little before, that it was a decree or an everlasting law. The holy patriarchs were the first and principal persons into whose hands the promise was committed; but they did not embrace the grace which was offered to them as belonging only to themselves, but as a blessing which their posterity in common with them were to become sharers of. --John Calvin. EXPOSITION Verse 12. -- When they were but a few men in number. bpsm ytm. Literally, "homines numeri", men of number; so few as easily to be numbered: in opposition to what their posterity afterwards were, as the sand of the sea, without number. --Samuel Chandler. EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS Verse 12. -- One would think that all the world would have been upon them; but here was the protection, God has a negative voice, "He suffered no man to do them wrong." Many had (as we say) an aching tooth at the people of God, their finger itched to be dealing with them, and the text shows four advantages the world had against them. First, "They were few." Secondly, "very few." Thirdly, "strangers." Fourthly, unsettled. What hindered their enemies? It was the Lord's negative voice. "He reproved kings for their sakes; saying, Touch not mine anointed, and do my prophets no harm." We see an instance of this (Genesis 35:5). When Jacob and his family journeyed, "the terror of God was upon the cities that were round about them, and they did not pursue after the sons of Jacob." They had a mind to pursue after them, to revenge the slaughter of the Shechemites; but God said, Pursue not, and then they could not pursue, they must stay at home. And when his people the Jews were safe in Canaan he encourages them to come up freely to worship at Jerusalem, by this assurance, "No man shall desire the land, when thou shalt go up to appear before the Lord thy God, thrice in the year" (Exodus 34:24). God can stop not only hands from spoiling, but hearts from desiring. --Joseph Caryl. HINTS FOR PASTORS AND LAYPERSONS Verse 12. -- Comfort to the few. The typical and spiritual Israel few at first. A few in the ark peopled the world. Small companies have done wonders. Christ's presence is promised to two or three. God saith not by many or by few, etc. EXPOSITION Verse 13. When they went from one nation, to another, from one Kingdom to another people. Migrating as the patriarchs did from the region of one tribe to the country of another they were singularly preserved. The little wandering family might have been cut off root and branch had not a special mandate been issued from the throne for their protection. It was not the gentleness of their neighbours which screened them; they were hedged about by the mysterious guardianship of heaven. Whether in Egypt, or in Philistia, or in Canaan, the heirs of the promises, dwelling in their tents, were always secure. EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS Verse 13. -- From one kingdom to another people. Where we might have expected from kingdom to kingdom, the car is somewhat disappointed by the phrase, "from one kingdom to another people," which may have been intended to distinguish the Egyptian and other monarchies from the more democratical or patriarchal institutions of the Arabians and other nations. --Joseph Addison Alexander. Verse 13. -- Though frequent flitting is neither desirable nor commendable, yet sometimes there is a just and necessary occasion for it, and it may be the lot of some of the best of men. --Matthew Henry. HINTS FOR PASTORS AND LAYPERSONS Verse 13. --- Genesis 2:3Genesis 26:11
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