Song of Solomon 7 Commentary

quicken me"), or his promise, the word which he has spoken, mercy secured by the new covenant: Quicken me according to the tenour of that covenant. 150 They draw nigh that follow after mischief: they are far from thy law. 151 Thou art near, O Lord ; and all thy commandments are truth. Here is, I. The apprehension David was in of danger from his enemies. 1. They were very malicious, and industrious in prosecuting their malicious designs: They follow after mischief, any mischief they could do to David or his friends; they would let slip no opportunity nor let fall any pursuit that might be to his hurt. 2. They were very impious, and had no fear of God before their eyes: They are far from thy law, setting themselves as far as they can out of the reach of its convictions and commands. The persecutors of God's people are such as make light of God himself; we may therefore be sure that God will take his people's part against them. 3. They followed him closely and he was just ready to fall into their hands

: They draw nigh, nigher than they were; so that they got ground of him. They were at his heels, just upon his back. God sometimes suffers persecutors to prevail very far against his people, so that, as David said ( 1 Sam. xx. 3 ), There is but a step between them and death. Perhaps this comes in here as a reason why David was so earnest in prayer, v. 149 . God brings us into imminent perils, as he did Jacob, that, like him, we may wrestle for a blessing. II. The assurance David had of protection with God: " They draw nigh to destroy me, but thou art near, O Lord! to save me, not only mightier than they and therefore able to help me against them, but nearer than they and therefore ready to help." It is the happiness of the saints that, when trouble is near, God is near, and no trouble can separate between them and him. He is never far to seek, but he is within our call, and means are within his call, Deut. iv. 7 . All thy commandments are truth. The enemies thought to defeat the promises God had made to David, but he was sure it was out of their power; they were inviolably true, and would be infallibly performed. 152 Concerning thy testimonies, I have known of old that thou hast founded them for ever. This confirms what he had said in the close of the foregoing verses, All thy commandments are truth; he means the covenant, the word which God has commanded to a thousand generations. This is firm, as true as truth itself. For, 1. God has founded it so; he has framed it for a perpetuity. Such is the constitution of it, and so well ordered is it in all things, that it cannot but be sure. The promises are founded for ever, so that when heaven and earth shall have passed away every iota and tittle of the promise shall stand firm, 2 Cor. i. 20 . 2. David had found it so, both by a work of God's grace upon his heart (begetting in him a full persuasion of the truth of God's word and enabling him to rely upon it with a full satisfaction) and by the works of his providence on his behalf, fulfilling the promise beyond what he

expected. Thus he knew of old, from the days of his youth, ever since he began to look towards God, that the word of God is what one may venture one's all upon. This assurance was confirmed by the observations and experiences of his own life all along, and of others that had gone before him in the ways of God. All that ever dealt with God, and trusted in him will own that they have found him faithful. 20. RESH. 153 Consider mine affliction, and deliver me: for I do not forget thy law. 154 Plead my cause, and deliver me: quicken me according to thy word. Here, I. David prays for succour in distress. Is any afflicted? let him pray; let him pray as David does here. 1. He has an eye to God's pity, and prays, " Consider my affliction; take it into thy thoughts, and all the circumstances of it, and sit not by as one unconcerned." God is never unmindful of his people's afflictions, but he will have us to put him in remembrance ( Isa. xliii. 26 ), to spread our case before him, and then leave it to his compassionate consideration to do in it as in his wisdom he shall think fit, in his own time and way. 2. He has an eye to God's power and prays, Deliver me; and again, " Deliver me; consider my troub

les and bring me out of them." God has promised deliverance ( Ps. l. 15 ) and we may pray for it, with submission to his will and with regard to his glory, that we may serve him the better. 3. He has an eye to God's righteousness, and prays, " Plead my cause; be thou my patron and advocate, and take me for thy client." David had a just cause, but his adversaries were many and mighty, and he was in danger of being run down by them; he therefore begs of God to clear his integrity and silence their false accusations. If God do not plead his people's cause, who will? He is righteous, and they commit themselves to him, and therefore he will do it, and do it effectually, Isa. li. 22 ; Jer. l. 34 . (4.) He has an eye to God's grace, and prays, " Quicken me. Lord, I am weak, and unable to bear my troubles; my spirit is apt to droop and sink. O that thou wouldst revive and comfort me, till the deliverance is wrought!" II. He pleads his dependence upon the word of God and his obedient regard to its directions: Quicken and deliver me according to thy word of promise, for I do not forget thy precepts. The more closely we cleave to the word of God, both as our rule and as our stay, the more assurance we may have of deliverance in due time. 155 Salvation is far from the wicked: for they seek not thy statutes. Here is, 1. The description of wicked men. They do not only do God's statutes, but they do not so much as seek them; they do not acquaint themselves with them, nor so much as desire to know their duty, nor in the least endeavour to do it. Those are wicked indeed who do not think the law of God worth enquiring after, but are altogether regardless of it, being resolved to live at large and to walk in the way of their heart. 2. Their doom: Salvation is far from them. They cannot upon any good grounds promise themselves temporal deliverance. Let not that man think that he shall receive any thing of the Lord. How can those expect to seek God's favour with success, when they are in adversity, who never sought his statutes when they were in prosperity? But eternal salvation is certainly far from them. They flatter themselves with a conceit that it is near, and th

at they are going to heaven; but they are mistaken: it is far from them. They thrust it from them by thrusting the Saviour from them; it is so far from them that they cannot reach it, and the longer they persist in sin the further it is; nay, while salvation is far from them, damnation is near; it slumbers not. Behold, the Judge stands before the door. 156 Great are thy tender mercies, O Lord : quicken me according to thy judgments. Here, 1. David admires God's grace: Great are thy tender mercies, O Lord! The goodness of God's nature, as it is his glory, so it is the joy of all the saints. His mercies are tender, for he is full of compassion; they are many, they are great, a fountain that can never be exhausted. He is rich in mercy to all that call upon him. David had spoken of the misery of the wicked ( v. 155 ); but God is good notwithstanding; there were tender mercies sufficient in God to have saved them, if they had not " despised the riches of those mercies. " Those that are delivered from the sinner's doom are bound for ever to own the greatness of God's mercies which delivered them. 2. He begs for God's grace, reviving quickening grace, according to his judgments, that is, acc

ording to the tenour of the new covenant (that established rule by which he goes in dispensing that grace) or according to his manner, his custom or usage, with those that love his name, v. 132 . 157 Many are my persecutors and mine enemies; yet do I not decline from thy testimonies. Here is, 1. David surrounded with difficulties and dangers: Many are my persecutors and my enemies. When Saul the king was his persecutor and enemy no marvel that many more were so: multitudes will follow the pernicious ways of abused authority. David, being a public person, had many enemies, but withal he had many friends, who loved him and wished him well; let him set the one over-against the other. In this David was a type both of Christ and his church. The enemies, the persecutors, of both, are many, very many. 2. David established in the way of his duty, notwithstanding: " Yet do I not decline from thy testimonies, as knowing that while I adhere to them God is for me; and then no matter who is against me." A man who is steady in the way of his duty, though he may have many enemies, needs fear none.

159 Consider how I love thy precepts: quicken me, O Lord , according to thy lovingkindness. Here is, 1. David's appeal to God concerning his love to his precepts: "Lord, thou knowest all things, thou knowest that I love them; consider it then, and deal with me as thou usest to deal with those that love thy word, which thou hast magnified above all thy name." He does not say, "Consider how I fulfil thy precepts;" he was conscious to himself that in many things he came short; but, "Consider how I love them." Our obedience is pleasing to God, and pleasant to ourselves, only when it comes from a principle of love. 2. His petition thereupon: " Quicken me, to do my duty with vigour; revive me, keep me alive, not according to any merit of mine, though I love thy word, but according to thy lovingkindness; " to that we owe our lives, nay, that is better than life itself. We need not desire to be quickened any further than God's lov

ingkindness will quicken us. 160 Thy word is true from the beginning: and every one of thy righteous judgments endureth for ever. David here comforts himself with the faithfulness of God's word, for the encouragement of himself and others to rely upon it. 1. It has always been found faithful hitherto, and never failed any that ventured upon it; It is true from the beginning. Ever since God began to reveal himself to the children of men all he said was true and to be trusted. The church, from its beginning, was built upon this rock. It has not gained its validity by lapse of time, as many governments, whose best plea is prescription and long usage, Quod initio non valet, tractu temporis convalescit—That which, at first, wanted validity, in the progress of time acquired it. But the beginning of God's word was true (so some read it); his government was laid on a sure foundation. And all,

in every age, that have received God's word in faith and love, have found every saying in it faithful and well worthy of all acceptation. 2. It will be found faithful to the end, because righteous: " Every one of thy judgments remains for ever unalterable and of perpetual obligation, adjusting men's everlasting doom." 21. SCHIN. 161 Princes have persecuted me without a cause: but my heart standeth in awe of thy word. David here lets us know, 1. How he was discouraged in his duty by the fear of man: Princes persecuted him. They looked upon him as a traitor and an enemy to the government, and under that notion sought his life, and bade him go serve other gods, 1 Sam. xxvi. 19 . It has been the common lot of the best men to be persecuted; and the case is the worse if princes be the persecutors, for they have not only the sword in their hand, and therefore can do the more hurt, but they have the law on their side, and can do it with reputation and a colour of justice. It is sad that the power which magistrates have from God, and should use for him, should ever be employed against him. But marvel not at the matter, Eccl. v. 8 . It was a

comfort to David that when princes persecuted him he could truly say it was without cause, he never gave them any provocation. 2. How he was kept to his duty, notwithstanding, by the fear of God: "They would make me stand in awe of them and their word, and do as they bid me; but my heart stands in awe of thy word, and I am resolved to please God, and keep in with him, whoever is displeased and falls out with me." Every gracious soul stands in awe of the word of God, of the authority of its precepts and the terror of its threatenings; and to those that do so nothing appears, in the power and wrath of man, at all formidable. We ought to obey God rather than men, and to make sure of God's favour, though we throw ourselves under the frowns of all the world, Luke xii. 4, 5 . The heart that stands in awe of God's word is armed against the temptations that arise from persecution. 162 I rejoice at thy word, as one that findeth great spoil. Here is, 1. The pleasure David took in the word of God. He rejoiced at it, rejoiced that God had made such a discovery of his mind, that Israel was blessed with that light when other nations sat in darkness, that he was himself let into the understanding of it and had had experience of the power of it. He took a pleasure in reading it, hearing it, and meditating on it, and every thing he met with in it was agreeable to him. He had just now said that his heart stood in awe of his word, and yet here he declares that he rejoiced in it. The more reverence we have for the word of God the more joy we shall find in it. 2. The degree of that pleasure— as one that finds great spoil. This supposes a victory over the enemy. It is through much opposition that a soul comes to this, to rejoice in God's word. But, besides the pleasure and honour of a conquest, there is great advantage gained by the plunder