Psalms 3:1

David complains, in great distress, of the number of his enemies, and the reproaches they cast on him, as one forsaken of God, Psa 3:1 , Psa 3:2 ; is confident, notwithstanding, that God will be his protector, Psa 3:3 ; mentions his prayers and supplications, and how God heard him, Psa 3:4 , Psa 3:5 ; derides the impotent malice of has adversaries, and foretells their destruction, Psa 3:6 , Psa 3:7 ; and ascribes salvation to God, Psa 3:8 . This is said to be A Psalm of David, when he fled from Absalom his son - See the account, 2Sam 15:1 (note), etc. And David is supposed to have composed it when obliged to leave Jerusalem, passing by the mount of Olives, weeping, with his clothes rent, and with dust upon his head. This Psalm is suitable enough to these circumstances; and they mutually cast light on each other. If the inscription be correct, this Psalm is a proof that the Psalms are not placed in any chronological order. The word Psalm, מזמור mizmor, comes from זמר zamar, to cut, whether that means to cut into syllables, for the purpose of its being adapted to musical tones, or whether its being cut on wood, etc., for the direction of the singers; what we would call a Psalm in score. This last opinion, however, seems too technical. Verse 1 Lord, how are they increased that trouble me? - We are told that the hearts of all Israel went after Absalom, 2Sam 15:13 ; and David is astonished to find such a sudden and general revolt. Not only the common people, but his counsellors also, and many of his chief captains. How publicly does God take vengeance for the sins which David committed so privately! In the horrible rebellion of Absalom we see the adultery of Bath-sheba, and the murder of Uriah. Now the words of Nathan begin to be fulfilled: "The sword shall not depart from thy house." Verse 2 No help for him in God - These were some of the reproaches of his enemies, Shimei and others: "He is now down, and he shall never be able to rise. God alone can save him from these his enemies; but God has visibly east him off." These reproaches deeply affected his heart; and he mentions them with that note which so frequently occurs in the Psalms, and which occurs here for the first time, סלה selah. Much has been said on the meaning of this word; and we have nothing but conjecture to guide us. The Septuagint always translate it by Διαψαλμα diapsalma, "a pause in the Psalm." The Chaldee sometimes translates it by לעלמין lealmin, "for ever." The rest of the versions leave it unnoticed. It either comes from סל sal, to raise or elevate, and may denote a particular elevation in the voices of the performers, which is very observable in the Jewish singing to the present day; or it may come from סלה salah, to strew or spread out, intimating that the subject to which the word is attached should be spread out, meditated on, and attentively considered by the reader. Fenwick, Parkhurst, and Dodd, contend for this meaning; and think "it confirmed by Psa 9:16 , where the word higgaion is put before selah at the end of the verse." Now higgaion certainly signifies meditation, or a fit subject for meditation; and so shows selah to be really a nota bene, attend to or mind this. Verse 3 Thou, O Lord art a shield - As a shield covers and defends the body from the strokes of an adversary, so wilt thou cover and defend me from them that rise up against me. The lifter up of mine head - Thou wilt restore me to the state from which my enemies have cast me down. This is the meaning of the phrase; and this he speaks prophetically. He was satisfied that the deliverance would take place, hence his confidence in prayer; so that we find him, with comparative unconcern, laying himself down in his bed, expecting the sure protection of the Almighty. Verse 4 I cried unto the Lord with my voice - He was exposed to much danger, and therefore he had need of fervor. He heard me - Notwithstanding my enemies said, and my friends feared, that there was no help for me in my God; yet he heard me out of his holy hill. Selah: mark this, and take encouragement from it. God never forsakes those who trust in him. He never shuts out the prayer of the distressed. Verse 5 I laid me down and slept - He who knows that he has God for his Protector may go quietly and confidently to his bed, not fearing the violence of the fire, the edge of the sword, the designs of wicked men, nor the influence of malevolent spirits. I awaked - Though humanly speaking there was reason to fear I should have been murdered in my bed, as my most confidential servants had been corrupted by my rebellious son; yet God, my shield, protected me. I both slept and awaked; and my life is still whole in me. Verse 6 I Will not be afraid of ten thousands - Strength and numbers are nothing against the omnipotence of God. He who has made God his refuge certainly has no cause to fear. Verse 7 Arise, O Lord - Though he knew that God had undertaken his defense, yet he knew that his continued protection depended on his continual prayer and faith. God never ceases to help as long as we pray. When our hands hang down, and we restrain prayer before him, we may then justly fear that our enemies will prevail. Those blast smitten - That is, Thou wilt smite. He speaks in full confidence of God's interference; and knows as surely that he shall have the victory, as if he had it already. Breaking the jaws and the teeth are expressions which imply, confounding and destroying an adversary; treating him with extreme contempt; using him like a dog, etc. Verse 8 Salvation belongeth unto the Lord - It is God alone who saves. He is the fountain whence help and salvation come; and to him alone the praise of all saved souls is due. His blessing is upon his people. Those who are saved from the power and the guilt of sin are his people. His mercy saved them; and it is by his blessing being continually upon them, that they continue to be saved. David adds his selah here also: mark this! 1. Salvation comes from God. 2. Salvation is continued by God. These are great truths; mark them! ANALYSIS OF THE THIRD PSALM The occasion of this Psalm was Absalom's rebellion. David being deserted by his subjects, railed on by Shimei, pursued for his crown and life by his ungracious son, and not finding to whom to make his moan, betakes himself to his God; and before him he expostulates his wrong, confesses his faith, and makes his prayer. There are three strains of this accurate Psalm: I. His complaint. II. The confession of his confidence. III. His petition. I. He begins with a sad and bitter complaint, amplified, 1. By the number and multitude of his enemies. They were many, very many; they were multiplied and increased: "All Israel was gathered together from Dan to Beer-sheba, as the sand of the sea for multitude;" 2Sa 17:11 . 2. From their malice they came together to do him mischief. They rose up, not for him, but against him; not to honour, but to trouble him; not to defend him as they ought, but to take away his crown and life; 2Sa 17:2 . 3. From their insults and sarcasm. It was not Shimei only, but many, that said it: "Many-say there is no help for him in his God." II. The second part of the Psalm sets forth David's confidence:- 1. To their multitude, he opposeth ONE GOD. But THOU, O LORD! 2. To their malicious insurrection, Jehovah; who, he believed, 1. Would be a buckler to receive all the arrows shot against him. 2. His glory, to honour, though they went about to dishonour, him. 3. The lifter up of his head, which they wished to lay low enough. 3. To their vain boast of desertion, There is no help for him in his God, he opposeth his own experience, "I cried unto the Lord, and he heard me." 4. By whose protection being sustained and secured, he deposes all care and fear, all anxiety and distraction. 1. He sleeps with a quiet mind: "I laid me down and slept, I awoke." 2. He sings a requiem: "I will not be afraid of ten thousands of the people, that have set themselves against me round about." III. In the close, or third part, he petitions and prays, notwithstanding his security: "Arise, O Lord; save me, O my God!" To move God to grant his request, he thankfully reminds him of what he had done before:- 1. "Arise and save me, for thou hast smitten all mine enemies." Thou art the same God: do then the same work; be as good to thy servant as ever thou hast been. 2. He inserts an excellent maxim: Salvation belongeth unto the Lord. As if he had said, It is thy property and prerogative to save. If thou save not, I expect it from none other. 3. Lastly, as a good king should, in his prayers he remembers his subjects. He prayed for those who were using him despitefully: Thy blessing be upon thy people! To the same sense, Coverdale, in his translation. Introduction

Distress and Confidence. 1 Lord , how are they increased that trouble me! many are they that rise up against me. 2 Many there be which say of my soul, There is no help for him in God. Selah. 3 But thou, O Lord , art a shield for me; my glory, and the lifter up of mine head. The title of this psalm and many others is as a key hung ready at the door, to open it, and let us into the entertainments of it; when we know upon what occasion a psalm was penned we know the better how to expound it. This was composed, or at least the substance of it was meditated and digested in David's thought, and offered up to God, when he fled from Absalom his son, who formed a conspiracy against him, to take away, not his crown only, but his life; we have the story, 2 Sam. xv. , &c. 1. David was now in great grief; when, in his flight, he went up the Mount of Olives, he wept greatly, with his head covered, and marching bare-foot; yet then he composed this comfortable psalm. He wept and prayed, wept and sung, wept and believed; this was sowing in tears. Is any afflicted? Let him pray; nay, let him sing psalms, let him sing this psalm. Is any afflicted with undutiful disobedient children? David was; and yet that did not hinder his joy in God, nor put him out of tune for holy songs. 2. He was now in great danger; the plot against him was laid deep, the party that sought his ruin was very formidable, and his own son at the head of them, so that his affairs seemed to be at the last extremity; yet then he kept hold of his interest in God and improved that. Perils and frights should drive us to God, not drive us from him. 3. He had now a great deal of provocation given him by those from whom he had reason to expect better things, from his son, whom he had been indulgent of, from his subjects, whom he had been so great a blessing to; this he could not but resent, and it was enough to break in upon any man's temper; yet he was so far from any indecent expressions of passion and indignation that he had calmness enough for those acts of devotion which require the greatest fixedness and freedom of thought. The sedateness of his mind was evinced by the Spirit's coming upon him; for the Spirit chooses to move upon the still waters. Let no unkindness, no, not of a child or a friend, ever be laid so much to heart as to disfit us for communion with God. 4. He was now suffering for his sin in the matter of Uriah; this was the evil which, for that sin, God threatened to raise up against him out of his own house ( 2 Sam. xii. 11 ), which, no doubt, he observed, and took occasion thence to renew his repentance for it. Yet he did not therefore cast away his confidence in the divine power and goodness, nor despair of succour. Even our sorrow for sin must not hinder either our joy in God or our hope in God. 5. He seemed cowardly in fleeing from Absalom, and quitting his royal city, before he had had one struggle for it; and yet, by this psalm, it appears he was full of true courage arising from his faith in God. True Christian fortitude consists more in a gracious security and serenity of mind, in patiently bearing and patiently waiting, than in daring enterprises with sword in hand. In these three verses he applies to God. Whither else should we go but to him when any thing grieves us or frightens us? David was now at a distance from his own closet, and from the courts of God's house, where he used to pray; and yet he could find a way open heaven-ward. Wherever we are we may have access to God, and may draw nigh to him whithersoever we are driven. David, in his flight, attends his God, I. With a representation of his distress, v. 1, 2 . He looks round, and as it were takes a view of his enemies' camp, or receives information of their designs against him, which he brings to God, not to his own council-board. Two things he complains of, concerning his enemies:—1. That they were very many: Lord, how are they increased! beyond what they were at first, and beyond whatever he thought they would have been. Absalom's faction, like a snow-ball, strangely gathered in its motion. He speaks of it as one amazed, and well he might, that a people he had so many ways obliged should almost generally revolt from him, rebel against him, and choose for their head such a foolish and giddy young man as Absalom was. How slippery and deceitful are the many! And how little fidelity and constancy are to be found among men! David had had the hearts of his subjects as much as ever any king had, and yet now, of a sudden, he had lost them. As people must not trust too much to princes ( Ps. cxlvi. 3 ), so princes must not build too much upon their interest in the people. Christ, the Son of David, had many enemies. When a great multitude came to seize him, when the crowd cried, Crucify him, Crucify him, how were those then increased that troubled him! Even good people must not think it strange if the stream be against them and the powers that threaten them grow more and more formidable. 2. That they were very malicious. They rose up against him; they aimed to trouble him; but that was not all: they said of his soul, There is no help for him in God. That is, (1.) They put a spiteful and invidious construction upon his troubles, as Job's friends did upon him, concluding that, because his servants and subjects forsook him thus and did not help him, God had deserted him and abandoned his cause, and he was therefore to be looked on, or rather to be looked off, as a hypocrite and a wicked man. (2.) They blasphemously reflected upon God as unable to relieve him: "His danger is so great that God himself cannot help him." It is strange that so great unbelief should be found in any, especially in many, in Israel, as to think any party of men too strong for Omnipotence to deal with. (3.) They endeavoured to shake his confidence in God and drive him to despair of relief from him: "They have said it to my soul;" so it may be read; compare Ps. xi. 1 ; xlii. 10 . This grieved him worst of all, that they had so bad an opinion of him as to think it possible to take him off from that foundation. The mere temptation was a buffeting to him, a thorn in his flesh, nay, a sword in his bones. Note, A child of God startles at the very thought of despairing of help in God; you cannot vex him with any thing so much as if you offer to persuade him that there is no help for him in God. David comes to God, and tells him what his enemies said of him, as Hezekiah spread Rabshakeh's blasphemous letter before the Lord. "They say, There is no help for me in thee; but, Lord, if it be so, I am undone. They say to my soul, There is no salvation " (for so the word is) " for him in God; but, Lord, do thou say unto my soul, I am thy salvation ( Ps. xxxv. 3 ) and that shall satisfy me, and in due time silence them." To this complaint he adds Selah, which occurs about seventy times in the book of Psalms. Some refer it to the music with which, in David's time, the psalms were sung; others to the sense, and that it is a note commanding a solemn pause. Selah—Mark that, or, " Stop there, and consider a little." As here, they say, There is no help for him in God, Selah. "Take time for such a thought as this. Get thee behind me, Satan. The Lord rebuke thee! Away with such a vile suggestion!" II. With a profession of his dependence upon God, v. 3 . An active believer, the more he is beaten off from God, either by the rebukes of Providence or the reproaches of enemies, the faster hold he will take of him and the closer will he cleave to him; so David here, when his enemies said, There is no help for him in God, cries out with so much the more assurance, " But thou, O Lord! art a shield for me; let them say what they will, I am sure thou wilt never desert me, and I am resolved I will never distrust thee." See what God is to his people, what he will be, what they have found him, what David found in him. 1. Safety: " Thou art a shield for me, a shield about me" (so some), "to secure me on all sides, since my enemies surrounded me." Not only my shield ( Gen. xv. 1 ), which denotes an interest in the divine protection, but a shield for me, which denotes the present benefit and advantage of that protection. 2. Honour: Thou art my glory. Those whom God owns for his are not safe and easy, but really look great, and have true honour put upon them, far above that which the great ones of the earth are proud of. David was now in disgrace; the crown had fallen from his head; but he will not think the worse of himself while he has God for his glory, Isa. lx. 19 . " Thou art my glory; thy glory I reckon mine" (so some); "this is what I aim at, and am ambitious of, whatever my lot is, and whatever becomes of my honour—that I may be to my God for a name and a praise." 3. Joy and deliverance: " Thou art the lifter up of my head; thou wilt lift up my head out of my troubles, and restore me to my dignity again, in due time; or, at least, thou wilt lift up my head under my troubles, so that I shall not droop nor be discouraged, nor shall my spirits fail." If, in the worst of times, God's people can lift up their heads with joy, knowing that all shall work for good to them, they will own it is God that is the lifter up of their head, that gives them both cause to rejoice and hearts to rejoice. In singing this, and praying it over, we should possess ourselves with an apprehension of the danger we are in from the multitude and malice of our spiritual enemies, who seek the ruin of our souls by driving us from our God, and we should concern ourselves in the distresses and dangers of the church of God, which is every where spoken against, every where fought against; but, in reference to both, we should encourage ourselves in our God, who owns and protects and will in due time crown his own interest both in the world and in the hearts of his people.