Psa 144:5-8 | TDavid | STEP | EXPOSITION Verse 5 . Bow thy heavens, O LORD, and come down. The heavens are the Lord's own, and he who exalted them can bow them. His servant is struggling against bitter foes, and he finds no help in men, therefore he entreats Jehovah to come down to his rescue. It is, indeed, a coming down for Jehovah to interfere in the conflicts of his tried people. Earth cries to heaven to stoop; nay, the cry is to the Lord of heaven to bow the heaven, and appear among the sons of earth. The Lord has often done this, and never more fully than when in Bethlehem the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us: now doth he know the way, and he never refuses to come down to defend his beloved ones. David would have the real presence of God to counterbalance the mocking appearance of boastful man: eternal verity could alone relieve him of human vanity. Touch the mountains, and they shall smoke. It was so when the Lord appeared on Sinai; the strongest pillars of earth cannot bear the weight of the finger of God. He is a consuming fire, and his touch kindles the peaks of the Alps, and makes them smoke. If Jehovah would appear, nothing could stand before him; if the mighty mountains smoke at his touch, then all mortal power which is opposed to the Lord must end in smoke. How long suffering he is to his adversaries, whom he could so readily consume. A touch would do it; God's finger of flame would set the hills on fire, and consume opposition of every kind. EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS Verse 5 . Bow thy heavens . This expression is derived from the appearance of the clouds during a tempest: they hang low, so as to obscure the hills and mountains, and seem to mingle earth and heaven together. Such an appearance is figuratively used to depict the coming of God, to execute vengeance upon the enemies of his people. See , and other instances. --William Walford. Verse 5 . Bow thy heavens , O LORD, and come down, etc. This was never so remarkably fulfilled as in the incarnation of Jesus Christ, when heaven and earth were, as it were, brought together. Heaven itself was, as it were, made to bow that it might be united to the earth. God did, as it were, come down and bring heaven with him. He not only came down to the earth, but he brought heaven down with him to men and for men. It was a most strange and wonderful thing. But this will be more remarkably fulfilled still by Christ's second coming, when he will indeed bring all heaven down with him -- viz., all the inhabitants of heaven. Heaven shall be left empty of its inhabitants to come down to the earth; and then the mountains shall smoke, and shall indeed flow down at his presence, as in . --Jonathan Edwards. Verse 5 . Touch the mountains , and they shall smoke. The meaning is, when God doth but lay his hand upon great men, upon the mightiest of the world, he makes them smoke or fume, which some understand of their anger; they are presently in a passion, if God do but touch them. Or we may understand it of their consumption. A smoking mountain will soon be a burnt mountain. In our language, to make a man smoke is a proverbial expression for destroying or subduing. --Joseph Caryl. Verse 5-6. Bow thy heavens, Jehovah, Come down in thy might; Let the rays of thy glory The mountaintops light. With the bolts of thy thunder Discomfit my foe, With the flash of thine arrows Their force overthrow. --William Digby Seymour. HINTS FOR PASTORS AND LAYPERSONS Verse 5 . Condescension, visitation, contact, and conflagration.

Psalms 144:5-8

EXPOSITION

Verse 5. Bow thy heavens, O LORD, and come down. The heavens are the Lord's own, and he who exalted them can bow them. His servant is struggling against bitter foes, and he finds no help in men, therefore he entreats Jehovah to come down to his rescue. It is, indeed, a coming down for Jehovah to interfere in the conflicts of his tried people. Earth cries to heaven to stoop; nay, the cry is to the Lord of heaven to bow the heaven, and appear among the sons of earth. The Lord has often done this, and never more fully than when in Bethlehem the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us: now doth he know the way, and he never refuses to come down to defend his beloved ones. David would have the real presence of God to counterbalance the mocking appearance of boastful man: eternal verity could alone relieve him of human vanity.

Touch the mountains, and they shall smoke. It was so when the Lord appeared on Sinai; the strongest pillars of earth cannot bear the weight of the finger of God. He is a consuming fire, and his touch kindles the peaks of the Alps, and makes them smoke. If Jehovah would appear, nothing could stand before him; if the mighty mountains smoke at his touch, then all mortal power which is opposed to the Lord must end in smoke. How long suffering he is to his adversaries, whom he could so readily consume. A touch would do it; God's finger of flame would set the hills on fire, and consume opposition of every kind.

EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS

Verse 5. Bow thy heavens. This expression is derived from the appearance of the clouds during a tempest: they hang low, so as to obscure the hills and mountains, and seem to mingle earth and heaven together. Such an appearance is figuratively used to depict the coming of God, to execute vengeance upon the enemies of his people. See Psalms 18:10, and other instances. --William Walford.

Verse 5. Bow thy heavens, O LORD, and come down, etc. This was never so remarkably fulfilled as in the incarnation of Jesus Christ, when heaven and earth were, as it were, brought together. Heaven itself was, as it were, made to bow that it might be united to the earth. God did, as it were, come down and bring heaven with him. He not only came down to the earth, but he brought heaven down with him to men and for men. It was a most strange and wonderful thing. But this will be more remarkably fulfilled still by Christ's second coming, when he will indeed bring all heaven down with him -- viz., all the inhabitants of heaven. Heaven shall be left empty of its inhabitants to come down to the earth; and then the mountains shall smoke, and shall indeed flow down at his presence, as in Isaiah 64:1. --Jonathan Edwards.

Verse 5. Touch the mountains, and they shall smoke. The meaning is, when God doth but lay his hand upon great men, upon the mightiest of the world, he makes them smoke or fume, which some understand of their anger; they are presently in a passion, if God do but touch them. Or we may understand it of their consumption. A smoking mountain will soon be a burnt mountain. In our language, to make a man smoke is a proverbial expression for destroying or subduing. --Joseph Caryl.

Verse 5-6. Bow thy heavens, Jehovah,

Come down in thy might;

Let the rays of thy glory

The mountaintops light.

With the bolts of thy thunder

Discomfit my foe,

With the flash of thine arrows

Their force overthrow. --William Digby Seymour.

HINTS FOR PASTORS AND LAYPERSONS

Verse 5. Condescension, visitation, contact, and conflagration.

EXPOSITION

Verse 6. Cast forth lightning, and scatter them. The Eternal can hurl his lightnings wheresoever he pleases, and effect his purpose instantaneously. The artillery of heaven soon puts the enemy to flight: a single bolt sets the armies running hither and thither in utter rout.

Shoot out thine arrows, and destroy them. Jehovah never misses the mark; his arrows are fatal to his foes when he goes forth to war. It was no common faith which led the poet king to expect the Lord to use his thunderbolts on behalf of a single member of that race which he had just now described as "like to vanity." A believer in God may without presumption expect the Almighty Lord to use on his behalf all the stores of his wisdom and power: even the terrible forces of tempest shall be marshalled to the fight, for the defence of the Lord's chosen. When we have once mastered the greater difficulty of the Lord's taking any interest in us, it is but a small thing that we should expect him to exert his great power on our behalf. This is far from being the only time in which this believing warrior had thus prayed: Psalms 18:1-50 is specially like the present; the good man was not abashed at his former boldness, but here repeats himself without fear.

EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS

Verse 6. Cast forth lightning. The Hebrew here is, "Lighten lightning"; that is, Send forth lightning. The word is used as a verb nowhere else. --Albert Barnes.

EXPOSITION

Verse 7. Send thine hand from above. Let thy long and strong arm be stretched out till thine hand seizes my foes, and delivers me from them.

Rid me, and deliver me out of great waters. Make a Moses of me, -- one drawn out of the waters. My foes pour in upon me like torrents, they threaten to overwhelm me; save me from their force and fury; take them from me, and me from them.

From the hand of strange children. From foreigners of every race; men strange to me and thee, who therefore must work evil to me, and rebellion against thyself. Those against whom he pleaded were out of covenant with God; they were Philistines and Edomites; or else they were men of his own nation of black heart and traitorous spirit, who were real strangers, though they bore the name of Israel. Oh to be rid of those infidel, blaspheming beings who pollute society with their false teachings and hard speeches! Oh to be delivered from slanderous tongues, deceptive lips, and false hearts! No wonder these words are repeated, for they are the frequent cry of many a tried child of God; -- "Rid me, and deliver me." The devil's children are strange to us: we can never agree with them, and they will never understand us: they are aliens to us, and we are despised by them. O Lord, deliver us from the evil one, and from all who are of his race.

EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS

Verse 7. Send thine hand from above. Hebrew, hands, both hands, all thy whole power, for I need it. --John Trapp.

Verse 7. Rid me, and deliver me. Away, you who theorize about suffering, and can do no more than descant upon it, away! for in the time of weeping we cannot endure your reasonings. If you have no means of delivering us, if you have nothing but sententious phrases to offer, put your hands on your mouths; enwrap yourselves in silence! It is enough to suffer; but to suffer and listen to you is more than we can bear. If Job's mouth was nigh unto blasphemy, the blame is yours, ye miserable comforters, who talked instead of weeping. If I must suffer, then I pray for suffering without fine talk! --E. De Pressense.

Verse 7. Rid me, and deliver me ... from the hand of strange children. We must remember that as the Grecians (conceiting themselves the best bred people in the world) called all other nations "barbarians"; so the people of Israel, the stock of Abraham (being God's peculiar covenant people), called all other nations "aliens" or "strangers"; and because they were hated and maligned by all other nations, therefore they called all professed strangers enemies; so the word is used (Isaiah 1:7), "Your land strangers shall devour"; that is, enemies shall invade and prevail over you. "Deliver me out of the hand of strange children", or out of the hand of strangers; that is, out of the hand of mine enemies. The Latin word alienus is often put for hostis, and the Roman orator (Cicero) telleth us that "he who is now called a stranger was called an enemy by our ancestors." The reason was because strangers proved unkind to, yea, turned enemies against those that entertained them. -- Joseph Caryl.

Verse 7. Strange children. He calls them strangers, not in respect of generic origin, but character and disposition. --John Calvin.

Verse 7. The strange children, now the enemies of David, shall be either won to willing subjection, or else shall be crushed under the triumphant Messiah (Psalms 2:1-12). The Spirit by David spake things the deep significance of which reached further than even he understood (1 Peter 1:11-12). --Andrew Robert Fausset.

HINTS FOR PASTORS AND LAYPERSONS

Verse 7-8,. 11. Repetitions, not vain. Repetitions in prayer are vain when they result from form, thoughtlessness, or superstition; but not, e.g.,

EXPOSITION

Verse 8. Whose mouth speaketh vanity. No wonder that men who are vanity speak vanity. "When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own. "They cannot be depended upon, let them promise as fairly as they may: their solemn declarations are light as the foam of the sea, in no wise to be depended upon. Good men desire to be rid of such characters: of all men deceivers and liars are among the most disgusting to true hearts.

And their right hand is a right hand of falsehood. So far their hands and their tongues agree, for they are vanity and falsehood. These men act as falsely as they speak, and prove themselves to be all of a piece. Their falsehood is right handed, they lie with dexterity, they deceive with all their might. It is a dreadful thing when a man's expertness lies more in lies than in truth; when he can neither speak nor act without proving himself to be false. God save us from lying mouths, and hands of falsehood.

EXPLANATORY NOTES AND QUAINT SAYINGS

Verse 8. Whose mouth speaketh vanity, etc. Two things go naturally together in the verse - - the lying tongue and deceitful hand. The meaning is that upon the matter in hand nothing was to be looked for from any of their promises, since it was only to deceive that they flattered with their mouth and gave the hand. --John Calvin.

Verse 8. Their right hand is a right hand of falsehood. The pledge of the right hand, which used to be a witness of good faith, was violated by treachery and wickedness. -- Cicero. Philip. xi. c. 2.

HINTS FOR PASTORS AND LAYPERSONS

Verse 8. What is "a right hand of falsehood"? Ask the hypocrite, the schemer, the man of false doctrine, the boaster, the slanderer, the man who forgets his promise, the apostate.