Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Psalms 9:10
And they that know thy name will put their trust in thee: for thou, LORD, hast not forsaken them that seek thee.
10. they that know thy name ] Who recognise the character of God thus revealed in His Providence. Cp. “they that love thy name,” Psa 5:11; and Psa 8:1; Psa 91:14.
thou, Lord, hast not forsaken ] Cp. the noble words of Sir 2:10 ; “Look at the generations of old and see; did ever any trust in the Lord, and was confounded? or did any abide in his fear, and was forsaken? or whom did he ever despise, that called upon him?” the “sentence” which “fell with weight” upon John Bunyan’s spirit in the agony of his spiritual despair. “It was with such strength and comfort on my spirit, that I was as if it talked with me.” Grace Abounding, 62 ff.
them that seek thee ] See note on Psa 24:6.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
And they that know thy name – All who are acquainted with thee; all those who have been made acquainted with the manifestations of thy goodness, and with the truth respecting thy character.
Will put their trust in thee – That is, all who have any just views of God, or who understand his real character, will confide in him. This is as much as to say, that he has a character which is worthy of confidence – since they who know him best most unreservedly rely on him. It is the same as saying that all the revelations of his character in his word and works are such as to make it proper to confide in him. The more intimate our knowledge of God, the more entirely shall we trust in him; the more we learn of his real character, the more shall we see that he is worthy of universal love. It is much to say of anyone that the more he is known the more he will be loved; and in saying this of God, it is but saying that one reason why men do not confide in him is that they do not understand his real character.
For thou, Lord, hast not forsaken them that seek thee – Thou hast never left them when they have come to time with a confiding heart. David means, doubtless, to refer here particularly to his own case, to derive a conclusion from his particular case in regard to the general character of God. But what is here affirmed is still true, and always has been true, and always will be true, that God does not forsake those who put their trust in him. Men forsake him; he does not forsake them.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Psa 9:10
They that know Thy name will put their trust in Thee.
The name of God
Know Thy name! What does that imply, but to know all that is included in the revelation of the nature and attributes of Almighty God? Every reader of Scripture is well aware of the infinite importance which it attaches to the word Name in speaking of God. It signifies not merely a designation, however expressive and full of meaning, but a manifestation of the Eternal Deity. The trust of His rational creatures in Him is commensurate with their knowledge of all that is involved in the name. The early patriarchs knew Him by the name Elohim, a marvellous name, containing implicitly the mystery hereafter to be revealed of a plurality of persons in the unity of the Divine nature. They knew Him so far, and adored Him with deep awe and absolute trust in His power, righteousness, and goodwill. That name raised them out of earthly and debasing associations, delivered them from the fetichism of idolatry, and brought them into near contact with the spiritual world; they trusted in Hint according to the measure of their knowledge, and were saved by their faith. A further disclosure of the Divine goodness and love was made by the revelation of the name Jehovah, when the Lord made all His goodness pass before Moses, and proclaimed, Jehovah, Jehovah Elohim, merciful and gracious, long suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth. With that revelation was associated an entire system of typical institutions, preparing the way for a still more perfect discovery, at once quickening the conscience, making it sensible of the extent of human sinfulness, and indicating the conditions and principles of a future atonement. The forms of the living Word, of the living Spirit gradually disclosed themselves to the prophetic vision, never fully revealed, yet ever approaching nearer to a personal manifestation. But the Name itself in its highest sense was first suggested, then declared, by the voices which heralded the incarnation, and by the utterances of the incarnate Word. The full meaning of the words of angelic adoration, Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God of hosts! flashed upon the spirit of man when the Saviour commanded the initiatory rite, the pledge and condition of a new life, to be administered in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. To the exposition of that meaning the purest and highest intellects of Christendom have devoted themselves from the beginning; and if the forms in which their exposition has been accepted by the Church are true and scriptural, can it be questioned that they involve issues of infinite importance to our souls? Can it be a matter of indifference to us whether any one of the leading propositions in such a confession is true or not? can it be a matter on which we can err in wilfulness or negligence without peril? We are responsible indeed only for so much truth as we have the means of knowing. Every man is judged according to that he hath, not according to that he hath not; but for so much as we have received we are, and must be, responsible. The warmth and earnestness of our devotions, of our endeavours to do Gods work, will be proportionate to the sincerity and good faith with which we receive into our hearts that truth which the Eternal Father has communicated to us through the Son and by the Holy Spirit. Our salvation from evil here, and from the penalties of evil hereafter, can only be secured by the access which God the Holy Spirit opens through the Son to the Father–an access of which the conditions vary according to circumstances known only to our Judge, but of which the certain assurance is inseparably bound up with knowledge of the Name by which the Church adores the Triune Jehovah, three Persons, one God–Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. (Canon F. C. Cook.)
Trusting in God
Few words are more frequently used in the Bible than the word faith, and the thing which it is intended to describe is of prime importance. The author of the Epistle to the Hebrews devotes an entire chapter to showing its majesty and weight. In the Epistle to the Romans the word faith plays a leading part, but the word is not defined. Still, the word is not always used in the same sense. Sometimes it is applied to what a man believes, the body of doctrine which constitutes the Divine deposit of the Church. Sometimes the word is used to describe the firmness of a mans personal convictions, or the consistency of his conduct, as when it is said that whatever is not of faith is sin. In the great majority of instances, however, faith describes a personal relation of unqualified confidence between man and God. This is the simple root from which the other forms of faith grow. Faith is trust, a trust without suspicion or fear, trust passing into glad and habitual surrender, so that He in whom we trust becomes our teacher, guide, and master. Such trust, if intelligently exercised, promotes fixedness of conviction and steadiness of moral purpose–it issues in deliberate fidelity and loyalty. And when this trust is challenged by the reason, either the reason in me, or the reason in others, the answer forms a bed of truth which takes the name of faith, because it represents the rational basis of trust or conviction. Faith as a system of doctrine simply states what I believe, or why I trust. Faith as fixedness of personal conviction simply describes trust as perfect and habitual. Primarily, therefore, faith is neither a body of doctrine nor a mental and moral quality, but a purely personal relation between myself and another, the relation of trust on the part of man in God. Saving faith is just this, confidence in God issuing in consecration. For it is plain that I can neither trust nor distrust an imaginary being, a being of whose existence I have no evidence. To trust in God is to affirm that He is. Still, that alone does not provoke confidence and surrender. We do not trust all whom we know. Knowledge of another may prevent confidence, as well as provoke it. His character may be such that we are repelled from him, instead of being attracted to him. They in whom we trust must be trustworthy. It depends altogether, therefore, upon what God really is, whether the knowledge of Him is fitted to provoke our trust. It is plain, therefore, that the statement of the Psalmist must not be made to mean that all men will put their trust in God when they come to have a right knowledge of Him. Ignorance is not the sole cause of unbelief and sin. The real thought is this, that wherever men come to put their trust in God, it will be because they have come to know what God really is. Knowledge may not issue in trust, but without knowledge trust cannot be. There is nothing magical about it. Faith, or trust, is not a supernatural gift of God, bestowed or withheld at His pleasure; it is His gift only so far as His enlightened Spirit is His gift, only so far as a true knowledge of what God is is the gift of God. Three conceptions of God we can trace in the history of the world; but of these three there is only one, the Christian conception, which provokes to sweet and sunny trust. We may think of God as the embodiment of almighty power, personally indifferent whether He creates or destroys, with countenance as cold, as impassive, as that of the Egyptian Sphinx, eternally rigid in His will, eternally frigid in His emotions, without either smiles or tears, without hate and without love. Or we may think of Him as the embodiment of almighty energy, rooted in and confluent with eternal reason and absolute justice, never Himself guilty of folly or of wrong, keeping Himself beyond the reach of deserved reproach, but enforcing His law with pitiless severity, claiming His pound of flesh, whether the surgery kills or cures, exacting the debt to the last farthing, deaf to all entreaty, granting no reprieve, proffering no help. Or, we may think of Him as in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, as righteousness and love incarnate. The first repels; the second chills; the third alone attracts and warms. The first is a monster of cruelty; the second is an iceberg; the third alone is a life-giving sun. The first deifies power; the second deifies reason; the third deifies love, love carrying the cross in its heart, and which is indifferent to none. The gods of paganism simply represented superior power and cunning. They were greater than men, but they were no better than men. Faith in the gods there was none, and there could not be. And it is not otherwise with that more refined conception of God which identifies Him with force, the energy by which all things are constituted, without personal consciousness and without moral qualities, without either love or hate, without either vice or virtue, hearing no prayer, rewarding no obedience, punishing no disobedience. Such a god is only a god in name. He does not care for me; He does not know what care is, and how then can I care for Him; how can I bring myself to trust in Him? Nor is the case much better with that truer and deeper conception of God which identifies Him with the absolute reason and the moral order of the universe. It was impossible for thoughtful men to rest in a conception of God which robbed Him of thought and character. The law of cause and effect assorted itself. The ground of the universe must be possessed of all that appears in the universe. But there is thought, at least in me, and there is conscience, at least in me. And if these be in me, they must be in the First and Universal Cause of all things, whether that cause be regarded as distinct from the universe or not. And so, even the ancients came to look upon the universe as embodied reason and justice. Things were not loose and disjointed; they were compact and ordered. Plato regarded the Idea as formative and eternal energy. Aristotle dilates at length, and with warmth of eloquence, upon the universal presence of design. Science has itself dug the grave of vulgar materialism. A rational origin and a moral end of the universe are everywhere recognised. The very word evolution is a confession of universal reason and of orderly movement, Neither the old nor the new philosophical theism can produce faith. It is like an iceberg, majestic and imposing, but chilling the air. It may produce, it has produced, moral awe and resignation to ones lot; but it has not produced, and it cannot produce, trust–with the quiet heart and the radiant face and the laughing, singing lips. It may produce Ecclesiastes, but it cannot write Psa 23:1-6. For in all this reign of reason it discovers no indulgence for ignorance; in all this reign of justice it hears no gospel of mercy for the sinner. There is no pity for the weak and the wicked. The name of God is not unconscious and unfeeling energy, from which we shrink; nor is it crystallised and crystallising reason and justice, before which we are self-condemned and dumb; but it is Jesus Christ, who came to seek and to save the lost. The omnipotence of God does not make Him attractive to me. The omniscience of God sounds the death knell of my hope. The justice of God thrusts me into the dungeon of despair. In such an atmosphere there cannot be the first breath of faith. But when you make it clear to me that this omnipotent, omniscient, holy God is also infinite in His tenderness, that He loves me and wants me, that He is my Father, and that in Christ His Fatherhood has become Incarnate, so that when I see Him I see the Father, my faith is kindled and my trust knows no misgiving. Perfect love casteth out fear. But perfect love in you and in me is the response to perfect love in God for you and for me. So faith will be perfect, trust in God will be fearless and sunny only as we know Gods name, and hide ourselves beneath its sheltering wings. Here is the secret of peace; all is well, because God loves me. (A. J. F. Behrends, D. D.)
The knowledge of God essential to trust in Him
The secret of all holy living is trust in God. The eleventh chapter of Hebrews is the great Bible proof of this. But how to obtain this faith? that is the question. For nothing is harder to a human soul. Diverse answers might be given.
1. Ask it of God, for faith is His gift. But our text tells another way.
2. Know God better. They that know Thy name will, etc. In earthly affairs we do not confide where we do not know. And so if God be unknown by us we shall not trust Him. Abraham was called the friend of God–he knew God so well, and so he got another name–the Father of the faithful, because he so trusted in God. Now this knowledge must not be merely theoretical, but that of the heart. Then such will trust in Him; they cannot help it. (C. M. Merry.)
Trust in God
The Psalm expresses the confidence of Israel in Jehovah. Some say that these Psalms are only patriotic odes, and that we have no right to draw inferences from them in regard to spiritual religion. Now, no doubt, many have read into these Psalms ideas and feelings that are not and could not be there, for they are Christian in their origin. But still we are justified in using them so as to maintain our own faith. For the religion of the Old Testament (compare the old Roman law) had a wonderful expansiveness. No doubt the trust told of here meant Israels confidence that when they went into battle Jehovah would be with them. Now consider–
I. The condition of this trust. Knowledge of Jehovahs name, true heartfelt and experimental knowledge.
II. The trust itself–a confidence not for infallible success, but that life could not be in vain.
III. The reason for this trust. Thou hast not forsaken, etc. Experience proves this true. (J. A. Picton.)
Confidence
Names in Scripture are descriptive of character in those to whom they are given.
I. The name of God therefore tells of His character. The declaration of Gods name (Exo 34:1-35). Now this name of God is different from our conceptions. Some rob Him altogether of the awful features of His character, and others of His goodness. All the attributes of Jehovah have met in Christ. Love, justice–see Gethsemane and the Cross as showing Gods hatred of sin.
II. The knowledge of this name. It means the knowledge of approval, of heart assent to what he finds in God. If we wanted to get a child to trust his parent, we would speak not so much of the childs duty as of the parents character. Hence, to awaken trust in God, we are to show the excellence and beauty of the character of God. (J. Blundell.)
Vital knowledge necessary to real peace
At many a martyrs stake, at many a dying bed, in many a scene of trial, these words have been proved true. His people have felt God near to them at these times, and this is file God in whom we must all trust. And this trust is through knowledge.
1. It is not a commonplace possession of every man. Far from it. What is it? It is not mere hearsay nor any theoretical knowledge of God.
2. But it is the knowledge of love. Love gains knowledge as nothing else can. The world does not love, and so does not know God.
3. And it is in harmony with the convictions of the understanding.
4. It is the knowledge of experience, resulting from holding communion with God. Love leads to such communion, and that to experience. We learn by experience the delicate excellencies of a character, which we could never have seen by a momentary glance; we understand its harmonious proportions which a cursory look would never have shown us. The man that loves to hear the ocean breaking on the shore, will detect harmonies in what is monotonous to everyone beside. Now this knowledge of experience or of communion is what Gods people have of Him. But you must make real effort to know His name. The mere repetition of Lord, Lord, will do but little. But to utter His name in the fulness of knowledge is to uncurtain heaven, and see its glories once. But if we will not know God as we should, then we are sure to misjudge Him. A guilty conscience makes everyone suppose that God is nothing but severe. And then you cannot trust. Look again; would you see Him as He is? See Him in His love, in His sacrifice for you, and then you will learn to trust Him. And this is most important, for there is DO shelter but in Him, and unless we trust Him we cannot enter that shelter. And that means death. Oh, then, may God give us to know His name. (P. B. Power, M. A.)
The name of God
The name of God is the revelation of the Divine perfections, through His works and Word. He is–
I. A just God and a Saviour. Much was said in words and by promises under the old dispensation bearing witness to this name. The sacrifices did the same. But Christ was the great witness of this name. The servants of Benhadad believed in the name the kings of Israel had for mercy, and therefore submitted themselves. And the Publican believed in God as merciful, and therefore appealed to Him. Thus the Lord proclaimed His name to Moses. And at last that mercy of God appeared in Christ. All His works while on earth confirmed it. And He was made perfect through suffering, made perfect in mercy thereby.
II. As Almighty. That name is impressed upon creation, but is seen most in Christ in delivering His Church. And in His resurrection and His dominion over the empire of death, and His upholding of His kingdom in the world, and giving success to the preaching of the Gospel.
III. As righteousness. This is seen in His atonement, whereby Gods righteousness is declared, so that He can be just, and yet the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus.
IV. As wisdom. This seen in creation, but yet more in redemption. For in it the law and its transgressor are exalted together. Once the law might have said, To spare him will be my disgrace; but the wisdom of God appointed that to spare him would be its highest honour. The person of Christ is the chief wonder of this wisdom. This is the treasury of the Divine name. In Him all fulness dwells.
V. And this name will be trusted by all who know it. Many have heard of it who do not know it. The way to know it is to read it in Christ. (D. Charles.)
The effect of knowing God
By those who know Gods name, are meant those who know God Himself and His nature. Trusting in God, does very naturally take in all the expectations we have of what He hath promised, and knowing His name is a raising our minds to a just sense of His nature, by the contemplation of His works of creation and providence. Apply to three points–
I. The immortality of man. Men stumble at this, that our weak race, which is hasting to a change that hath all the appearance of ending, should not really die, but live on, and have their share in all the revolutions which the world is to undergo, as long as God Himself shall have His being. Consider what we have in the knowledge of God, and His works, which may further us in the belief of it. There must be an eternity of time and duration. Through it God must surely preserve His being, and He surely will preserve a world. He will always have creatures before Him. Is it most likely that God should choose to continue creatures before Him, by giving eternity to the souls of men: or by letting these die, and end as they do in appearance, and by raising up other new ones in their places? If the souls of men are really abolished, and end at death, I do not know; but we may say that they are the only substances in the whole compass of beings that are so. If the eternal duration be granted, there is–
II. The greatness of the glory and reward. Descriptions of heaven are but borrowed expressions from such things as we understand, but the happiness itself is something that is greater than we can yet conceive. The fabric of the world, wonderful as it is, is really a thousand times greater, and more wonderful in itself than it is in our thoughts. For we only behold creation through a perspective.
III. The punishments of the other world. To their fears of these, unbelieving men oppose the great goodness of God. But consider Gods providences and judgments upon us now. Evidently, we ought not to argue that Gods goodness will not suffer Him to punish, for it does. (Francis Hutchinson, D. D.)
Thou, Lord, hast not forsaken them that seek Thee.
Dilemma and deliverance
Let us note–
I. A fiery dart of Satan constantly shot at the people of God. It is the suggestion that God has forsaken us. Of all the arrows of hell it is the most sharp, the most poisonous, the most deadly. It is sent against us–
1. When we have fallen into sin. Then comes the suggestion, this fiery dart, Ah, wretch that you are, God will never forgive that sin; you have been so ungrateful, such a hypocrite, such a liar.
2. In time of great trouble. The deep waters are around and almost overflow you; just then, when in the very deepest part of the stream, Satan sends this suggestion into your very soul–thy God hath forsaken thee.
3. In prospect of some great toil and enterprise. When the trumpet is sounded for some dreadful battle, when there is a deep soil to be ploughed, there comes this dark thought. And this arrow is most grievous, and most dangerous; and it bears the full impress of its Satanic maker.
II. The Divine buckler which God has provided against this fiery dart. It is the fact that God hath not, no never, forsaken them that fear Him. How dreadful to think that the child of God might fall and perish. What witnesses these are to the truth of the text. From Abraham down to Paul. And your own experience, if you will be honest with yourself, will prove it yet again. And look at the teachings of nature as to the fidelity of God. We believe in the truth and love of earthly friends. Shall we not believe in God?
III. Let us wear this buckler, and so use our precious privilege to seek God in the day of trouble. You, afflicted ones, you oppressed with the sense of sin. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 10. They that know thy name] Who have an experimental acquaintance with thy mercy, will put their trust in thee, from the conviction that thou never hast forsaken, and never will forsake, them that trust in thee.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
They that know, i.e. that thoroughly understand and duly consider. Thy name, i.e. thy nature and perfections, thy infinite power, and wisdom, and faithfulness, and goodness; which make a person a most fit and proper object for trust. The name of God is most frequently put for God, as he hath manifested himself in his word and works, as Deu 28:58; Psa 7:17; 20:1; Pro 18:10, &c.
Thou hast not forsaken; the experience of thy faithfulness to thy people in all ages is a just ground for their confidence.
Them that seek thee, i.e. that seek help and relief from thee by fervent prayer, mixed with faith, or trust in God, as is expressed in the former clause.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
And they that know thy name,…. As proclaimed in the Gospel, a God gracious and merciful, and forgiving sin; and as in Christ, in whom his name is, and in whom he is the God of love, grace, and mercy, though out of him a consuming fire; or the name of Christ himself, the Word of the Lord, who is the refuge of saints and sinners; his name Jesus, a Saviour: such who know him to be the able, willing, complete, all sufficient, and everlasting Saviour; who know his power and faithfulness to keep what is committed to him; and who know him not merely notionally and speculatively, and in a professional way only, but affectionately, spiritually, and experimentally: such
will put their trust in thee; as they have great reason to do; and the more they know of the grace and mercy of God in Christ, and of the ability and suitableness of Christ as a Saviour, the more strongly will they place their trust and confidence in him;
for thou, Lord, hast not forsaken them that seek thee: who are first sought out by God in the effectual calling, and then under the influence and direction of his grace and Spirit seek him in Christ, where he is only to be found; and seek Christ and his righteousness above all things else, and with their whole hearts, and diligently; and seek to Christ alone for life and salvation, and continue seeking the Lord, by prayer and supplication, for whatever they stand in need of; these God does not forsake: he may sometimes hide his face from them, as he does from his own children, and did from his own Son, yet he never forsakes them totally and finally; nor will he forsake the work of his own hands, which he has wrought in them, but will perfect it; he will never leave them so as that they shall perish by sin, Satan, or any enemy; he will not forsake them in life, nor at death, but will be the strength of their hearts, and their portion for ever.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
In the tenth verse, the Psalmist teaches us, that when the Lord delivers the righteous, the fruit which results from it is, that they themselves, and all the rest of the righteous, acquire increasing confidence in his grace; for, unless we are fully persuaded that God exercises a care about men and human affairs, we must necessarily be troubled with constant disquietude. But as most men shut their eyes that they may not see the judgments of God, David restricts this advantage to the faithful alone, and, certainly, where there is no godliness, there is no sense of the works of God. It is also to be observed, that he attributes to the faithful the knowledge of God; because from this religion proceeds, whereas it is extinguished through the ignorance and stupidity of men. Many take the name of God simply for God himself; but, as I have observed in my remarks on a preceding psalm, I think something more is expressed by this term. As God’s essence is hidden and incomprehensible, his name just means his character, so far as he has been pleased to make it known to us. David next explains the ground of this trust in God to be, that he does not forsake those who seek him God is sought in two ways, either by invocation and prayers, or by studying to live a holy and an upright life; and, indeed, the one is always inseparably joined with the other. But as the Psalmist is here treating of the protection of God, on which the safety of the godly depends, to seek God, as I understand it, is to betake ourselves to him for help and relief in danger and distress.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(10) They that know.They who know the name of Jehovah will trust Him, because they know it to be a watchword of strength and protection.
Seek.From root meaning to tread or frequent a place, possibly with allusion to frequenting the courts of the Temple.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
DISCOURSE: 502
THE NAME OF GOD A GROUND OF TRUST
Psa 9:10. They that know thy name will put their trust in thee: for thou, Lord, hast not forsaken them that seek thee.
IN reading the Holy Scriptures, we should not be satisfied with inquiring into their sense and meaning, but should mark very particularly the character of God, as set forth in them. In the sacred volume, the portrait of Jehovah, if I may so express myself, is drawn, as it were, at full length: so that, as far as such weak creatures as we are able to comprehend his Divine Majesty, we may form correct notions respecting him. Few persons ever enjoyed better opportunities for discovering his real character than David, who was favoured with such ample manifestations of Gods power and grace. On what occasion he wrote this psalm, we know not. It is clear that he wrote it subsequent to his bringing up of the ark to Mount Zion, and before he had vanquished all the surrounding nations. But, from all that he had seen and known of God, he gives this testimony respecting him: They that know thy name will put their trust in thee: for thou, Lord, hast not forsaken them that seek thee.
For the elucidating of these words, I will endeavour to shew,
I.
What the knowledge of Gods name imports
It imports, not merely a knowledge of the different names by which he is called, but a knowledge of him,
1.
In his own essential perfections
[He was pleased to reveal himself to Moses in express terms, declarative of all his glorious perfections: The Lord descended in the cloud, and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the Lord. And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty [Note: Exo 34:5-7.]. But he had previously placed Moses in a clift of the rock in Horeb [Note: Exo 33:19-23.]; which rock was a very eminent type of Christ [Note: 1Co 10:4.]: and I doubt not but that this was intended to shew, that in Christ alone he could be so viewed by fallen man. It is in Christ alone that all these perfections unite and harmonize; and in Christ alone can God be called a just God and a Saviour [Note: Isa 45:21. Rom 3:26.]. Now, to apprehend God aright, we must have a view of him as revealed in the person of his Son, who is the image of the invisible God [Note: Col 1:15.], the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person [Note: Heb 1:3.]. It is in his face alone that all the glory of the Deity shines forth [Note: 2Co 4:6.].]
2.
In all his diversified dispensations
[A view of Gods dispensations is particularly marked in my text, as necessary to a just estimate of his character: They that know thy name will put their trust in thee: FOR thou, Lord, hast not forsaken them that seek thee. In truth, it is from the history of Gods dealings with his people, far more than from any abstract descriptions of him in the sacred writings, that we learn to estimate his character aright. When did he ever forsake one who sought him? When did he ever say to any, Seek ye my face in vain [Note: Isa 45:19.]? Never did he reject one mourning penitent, or abandon one who humbly and steadfastly relied upon him. His compassion to the penitent, and his fidelity to the believing soul, have never failed. From the beginning of the world has he been, in these respects, without variableness or shadow of turning [Note: Jam 1:17.]. This we learn from the Prophet Samuel: The Lord will not forsake his people, because it has pleased him to make you his people [Note: 1Sa 12:22.]. True, he may chastise his people for their offences; but yet he will not utterly forsake them [Note: Psa 89:30-36.]. He may even forsake them for a time; but he will surely return to them in tender mercy, at the appointed season [Note: Isa 54:7-8.]. His assertions on this head are as strong as it is possible for language to express. He has said to every believing soul, I will never leave thee; I will never, never forsake thee [Note: Heb 13:5. See the Greek.]. Now, it is a view of Gods character in these respects, illustrated and confirmed by his actual dispensations; it is this, I say, which properly constitutes the knowledge of his name.]
Having ascertained what this knowledge is, I proceed to shew,
II.
How it will evince its existence in the soul
Beyond a doubt, it will lead the person, in whom it is,
1.
To renounce all false confidences
[Man, whilst ignorant of God, is always leaning on an arm of flesh. See Gods ancient people, how continually were even they, notwithstanding all their advantages, trusting in the creature, rather than in God. To Egypt or Assyria they looked, in their troubles, rather than to their heavenly protector [Note: Isa 31:1. Hos 5:13; Hos 7:11.]. Indeed, there was not any thing on which they would not rely, rather than on God [Note: Isa 22:8-11.]. But, when they were made sensible of their folly, and had discovered the real character of God, they instantly renounced all these false confidences, saying, Asshur shall not save us; we will not ride upon horses; neither will we say any more to the work of our hands, Ye are our gods: for in Thee the fatherless findeth mercy [Note: Hos 14:3.]. The same proneness to creature-confidence is found amongst ourselves. Who does not, at first, rely on his own wisdom to guide him, his own strength to support him, and his own goodness to procure for him acceptance with God? But, in conversion we learn where alone our hope is to be placed, even in God, who worketh all our works in us [Note: Isa 26:12.], and in Christ, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption [Note: 1Co 1:30.]. This was the effect of conversion in St. Paul, who accounted all his former attainments to be but loss for Christ, and desired to be found in Christ, not having his own righteousness, which was of the Law, but the righteousness which was of God by faith in Christ [Note: Php 3:7-9.]. And the same effect invariably follows from a discovery of God as reconciled to us in Christ Jesus.]
2.
To rely solely upon God
[Yes, indeed, they who know his name will trust in him. See in David the confidence which such knowledge inspires. The Lord is my shepherd: I shall not want [Note: Psa 23:1.]. See him when he goes forth against Goliath: Thou comest to me with a sword, and with a spear, and with a shield; but I come to thee in the name of the Lord of Hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom thou hast defied. This day will the Lord deliver thee into mine hand; and I will smite thee, and take thine head from thee; and I will give the carcases of the host of the Philistines this day unto the fowls of the air, and to the wild beasts of the earth; that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel [Note: 1Sa 17:45-46.]. See him when all around him were reduced to despair: In the Lord put I my trust; how say ye to my soul, Flee as a bird to your mountain? for, lo, the wicked bend their bow; they make ready their arrow upon the string, that they may privily shoot at the upright in heart: and if the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do? What? The Lord is in his holy temple; the Lords throne is in heaven; his eyes behold, his eye-lids try the children of men: and, as he knows all their machinations against me, so he knows all my necessities; and will assuredly deliver me out of their hands [Note: Psa 11:1-4. Bishop Homes translation.]. His deliberate sentiment, on all occasions, was this: Shall I lift up mine eyes unto the hills? (to any earthly powers?) From whence, then, cometh my help? My help cometh of the Lord, who made heaven and earth [Note: Psa 121:1-2. The marginal translation.], and, therefore, is infinitely superior to both. Of St. Pauls confidence I forbear to speak, because that must of necessity occur to the minds of all who read the Holy Scriptures [Note: Rom 8:31-39.]: but this I will say, that there is nothing more severely reproved, throughout the inspired volume, than diffidence and distrust; nor any thing more highly commended than faith [Note: Jer 17:5-8.].]
What, then, is my advice to all? To every one amongst you I say,
1.
Study the Holy Scriptures
[From human writings you may learn something of God: but from the Scriptures alone can you acquire such a knowledge of him as it is your privilege and your duty to possess. In reading them, mark his every perfection, as displayed in his dealings with the children of men. IF you notice facts only, you will read to little purpose: it is his glory, as beaming forth throughout the whole, which you are chiefly to contemplate: and, if your mind be habituated to contemplate that, you can never want a ground of consolation or of confidence in any state to which you may, by any possibility, be reduced.]
2.
Follow the examples of the Scripture saints
[In comparing the character of those who profess Christianity with that of the saints recorded in holy writ, one would be tempted to think that they were of a different species, and belonging to two different worlds: for really, if we heard of persons inhabiting one of the planets, they could not differ more widely in their sentiments and habits, than the nominal Christian differs from the Scripture saints. What, for instance, were St. Pauls sentiments? I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, my Lord. And what were his habits? To me, to live is Christ, ana to die is gain. Forgetting the things which are behind, ana reaching forth unto those that are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. Compare this with the great mass of Christians around us, and say what resemblance there is between them. Verily, if we will serve God aright, we must be followers of the Apostle, even as he was of Christ. As for the worlds judgment, whether they will approve it, or not, we are not to regard it. We must approve ourselves to God; and both put our trust in him and serve him, as those who know they shall be judged by him in the last day. If we follow the footsteps of the flock, then shall we be numbered among the sheep of Christ, and dwell in his fold for ever and ever.]
Fuente: Charles Simeon’s Horae Homileticae (Old and New Testaments)
Psa 9:10 And they that know thy name will put their trust in thee: for thou, LORD, hast not forsaken them that seek thee.
Ver. 10. And they that know thy name will put their trust in thee ] They can do no otherwise that savingly know God’s sweet attributes and noble acts for his people. We never trust a man till we know him, and bad men are better known than trusted. Not so the Lord, for where his name is poured out as an ointment, there the virgins love him, fear him, rejoice in him, repose upon him.
Them that seek thee
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Thy name. See note on Psa 5:11.
put their trust = confide. Hebrew. batah. See App-69.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
trust (See Scofield “Psa 2:12”).
Fuente: Scofield Reference Bible Notes
Knowing and Trusting
And they that know thy name will put their trust in thee; for thou, Lord, hast not forsaken them that seek thee.Psa 9:10.
This Psalm is the foundation of many ancient Collects. Dante quotes it to St. James in Paradise. He says hope had first come to him
From him who sang
The songs of the Supreme, himself supreme
Among his tuneful brethren. Let all hope
In Thee, so spake his anthem, who have known
Thy name.1 [Note: Paradiso, Canto xxv. 11. 715.]
I.
Knowledge of the Name of God
The name of God stands for His Person, His character. A mans name is often the exact opposite of himself, but Gods names are revelations of God. The early patriarchs knew Him by the name Elohim. They knew Him so far, and adored Him with deep awe and absolute trust in His power, righteousness, and goodwill. That name raised them out of earthly and debasing associations, delivered them from the fetishism of idolatry, and brought them into near contact with the spiritual world; they trusted in Him according to the measure of their knowledge, and were saved by their faith. A further disclosure of the Divine goodness and love was made by the revelation of the name Jehovah, when the Lord made all His goodness pass before Moses, and proclaimed, Jehovah, Jehovah Elohim, merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth. With that revelation was associated an entire system of typical institutions, preparing the way for a still more perfect discovery, at once quickening the conscience, making it sensible of the extent of human sinfulness, and indicating the conditions and principles of a future atonement. The forms of the living Word and of the living Spirit gradually disclosed themselves to the prophetic vision, never fully revealed, yet ever approaching nearer to a personal manifestation; but the Name itself in its highest sense was first suggested, then declared, by the voices which heralded the Incarnation and by the utterances of the Incarnate Word.
1. God is, of course, the embodiment of almighty power. But we learn that He uses His power for beneficent ends. It was His almighty power that shaped a world into being. At His voice chaos became order, darkness fled, and light and life came. It is by His power that He moves every atom of the globe, expands and beautifies every leaf, erects every blade of grass, builds up every tree, and paints every flower in the garden. His Almightiness flashes in the lightning, rolls in the thunder, guides the light, roars in the volcano, wings the angels, and feeds the sparrows. It is His almighty hand that seizes the curtain of darkness, and swings it across the chambers of the sky every night, and puts tired man to rest, and covers him with His feathers. It is His power that sends the sun every morning to wake us to duty and pleasure.
I sing the almighty power of God,
Which made the mountains rise;
Which spread the flowing seas abroad,
And built the lofty skies.
Does this not help me? Yes. If God is almighty, then He is able to help and keep me. If He is possessed of all power I may put my soul and body and all my concerns into His hands, assured that none shall be able to pluck me out. Help is laid upon one that is mighty, so I may trust and not be afraid. I am poor and feeble; He is strong. In my pilgrimage I often come into danger, and may fall, but underneath is the omnipotent arm of God.
When we have got into our blood for ever the conception of God which crowns Him the King, Holy and Almighty, we are prepared upon a sound moral basis to receive Him as the loving and merciful Father. One therefore anticipates that the new doctrine will be based on the conception of the Divine Fatherhoodnot the Fatherhood that throws away the Judgeship and the Righteousness of God, but the Fatherhood that gathers these up into a nobler and final unity; and that the Incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ, as the revelation of the Father and the Head of the human race, will yield more blessed and practical fruit in the life of the race from year to year.1 [Note: John Watson, The Cure of Souls.]
2. God is also the embodiment of perfect justice; but we must complement this truth by saying that He is the Everlasting Father. We cannot trust an impersonal force, who neither loves nor hates and who hears no prayer. Such a God is only a God in name. He does not care for me; He does not know what care is, and how then can I care for Him; how can I bring myself to trust in Him? It were a blessing if I could only be like Himunconscious and carelesslike the insect of a summers day, or the flower by the wayside, or the fish that sport in the sea. My reason, my consciencethese are my curse! The birds of the air are my superiors. For, with such a God, all that you count best in me is stifled and is a monstrous blunder. The heavens are brass, the earth is iron, and no one is to be pitied as am I, who cry but receive no answer. I can only hate the system which gave me birth, and to talk of trust is to mock me, to add insult to injury.
Truly there is no law but truth; there is
No judge but justice. They who use the sword
Shall perish by the sword, for no reward
Is there but virtue, nor shall evil miss
The strict revenge of its calamities,
Since in and of ourselves, perforce, are scored
Exact effects for every deed and word,
Nor life, nor death forego the least of this!
Nothing effects our destinies save we:
Ours is the seed we sow, the fruit we reap
Yea, and the hearts one flame of ecstasy,
And the souls vigil we are sworn to keep,
And lifes low average of strife and sleep,
And, O, the best we are and dare not be!2 [Note: George C. Lodge, Poems and Dramas, ii. 141.]
There is no power to generate trust in any philosophy that identifies God with the order of the universe. There is no pity for the weak and the wicked. Tennyson does not put it too strongly when he represents Nature as not only careless of the single life, but as crying, from scarped cliff and quarried stone
A thousand types are gone;
I care for nothing, all shall go.
And philosophical theism, deifying reason and moral law, can rise no higher than the moan
Oh yet we trust that somehow good
Will be the final goal of ill,
To pangs of nature, sins of will,
Defects of doubt, and taints of blood.
Even so much as that no classic poetry or philosophy had ventured to utter. It had no such dream. And whence Tennyson brought it becomes clear when Christmas bells are ringing
Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be!1 [Note: A. J. F. Behrends.]
In his Jungle Books, Kipling gives us his view of the order in which we have our place, and it is all summed up in this stanza with which he closes his description of the Jungle
Now these are the laws of the jungle,
and many and mighty are they;
But the head and the hoof of the law,
and the haunch and the hump, isObey!
3. The supreme name of God is Lovenot love merely as goodwill, but love as active, seeking the lost until they are found, seeking all until they are found. That converts the poets dream into a blessed certainty, and the faintness of his trust into solid assurance. The omnipotence of God does not make Him attractive to me. The omniscience of God sounds the death-knell of my hope. The justice of God thrusts me into the dungeon of despair. In such an atmosphere there cannot be the first breath of faith. But when you make it clear to me that this omnipotent, omniscient, holy God is also infinite in His tenderness, that He loves me and wants me, that He is my Father, and that in Christ His Fatherhood has become incarnate, so that when I see Him I see the Father, my faith is kindled and my trust knows no misgiving. Here, in Gods love for me, sealed by manger, cross, and open grave, is the Ariadne thread which leads me out of the cave of darkness, despair, and death.
When David Gray, the young poet of Kirkintilloch, lay dying in his cottage home by the banks of the Luggie, about which he had sung so sweetly, his last words, whispered in the ear of his mother, were, God has love, and I have faith. With this sweet utterance upon his lips, and this blessed confidence in his heart, he fell asleep.
Another instance of the effect of his preaching is given in the story of how, during a confirmation which he was holding in an East-end church, a poor hawker of infidel literature strolled into the church, and listening to the Bishops address was struck by his assertion of the Fatherhood of God. At the close of the service the man asked a church-worker at the door, with much earnestness, Is what the Bishop says true? Is God indeed the Father of men? Of course it is true, said the lady. Then, said he, my occupation is gone; I have been teaching the reverse of this for years, but I can do so no more.1 [Note: Life of Bishop Walsham How, 170.]
II.
Trust in God
1. In its literal force the term used by the Psalmist means to flee to a refuge. Elsewhere we read, Be merciful unto me, O God, be merciful unto me; for my soul trusteth in thee: yea, in the shadow of thy wings will I make my refuge. The words recall the time when David betook himself to the cave of Adullam for shelter from his persecutors. In imagination we can see the rough sides of the cavern that sheltered him arching over the fugitive, like the wings of some great bird, and just as he has fled thither with eager feet and is safely hidden from his pursuers there, so he has betaken himself to the everlasting Rock, in the cleft of which he is at rest and secure. To trust in God is neither more nor less than to flee to Him for refuge, and there to be at peace. The same presence of the original metaphor, colouring the same religious thought, is found in the beautiful words with which Boaz welcomes Ruth, when he prays for her that the God of Israel may reward her, under whose wings thou art come to trust.
Such a figure as that is worth tomes of theological lectures about the true nature of faith, telling us, as it does, by means of a picture which says a great deal more than many a treatise, that faith is something very different from a cold-blooded act of believing in the truth of certain propositions; that it is the flight of the soulknowing itself to be in peril, and naked, and unarmedinto the strong Fortress.
What is it that keeps a man safe when he thus has around him the walls of some citadel? Is it himself, is it the act by which he took refuge, or is it the battlements behind which he crouches? So in faithwhich is more than a process of a mans understanding, and is not merely the saying, Yes, I believe all that is in the Bible is true; at any rate, it is not for me to contradict it, but is the running of the man, when he knows himself to be in danger, into the very arms of Godit is not the running that makes him safe, but it is the arms to which he runs.
The man that stands with his back against an oak-tree is held firm, not because of his own strength, but because of that on which he leans. There is a beautiful story of a heathen convert who said to a missionarys wife, who had felt faint and asked that she might lean for a space on her stronger arm, If you love me, lean hard. That is what God says to us, If you love Me, lean hard. And if you do, because He is at your right hand, you will not be moved. It is not insanity; it is not arrogance; it is simple faith, to look our enemies in the eyes, and to feel sure that they cannot touch us. Trust in Jehovah; so shall ye be established. Rest on the Lord, and ye shall rest indeed.1 [Note: A. Maclaren.]
Dr. Cochran became the great character of Urumia and of western Persia. A Moslem lady of high rank in the town once remarked, as he was starting away, We always feel that the city is perfectly safe when Dr. Cochran is here. In 1887 Mrs. Cochran wrote: It is wonderful what confidence these people have in us, and even in our people. The Governor gave Joe (Dr. Cochran) his gold watch to send to Europe to be repaired. Joe told him there was no chance to send it unless by some of our Nestorians as far as Constantinople, and there would be several changes of hands, and perhaps it would not be safe. Oh yes, said he, the hands of all your people are good. 2 [Note: R. E. Speer, The Foreign Doctor, 298.]
There is no unbelief!
Whoever plants a seed beneath a sod,
And waits to see it push away the clod,
He trusts in God.
Whoever says, when clouds are in the sky
Be patient, heart: light breaketh by-and-bye,
Trusts the Most High.
Whoever sees, neath winters field of snow,
The silent harvest of the future grow,
Gods power must know.
Whoever lies down on his couch to sleep,
Content to lock each sense in slumber deep,
Knows God will keep.
There is no unbelief!
And day by day, and night, unconsciously,
The heart lives by that faith the lips deny
God knoweth why.1 [Note: Lytton.]
2. The more fully we know God, the more implicitly shall we trust Him. He will draw out our affection and confidence if we really know and understand Him. Trust is from the same root as truthtrue, truer, truesttrust. It is repose upon Gods truth. Faith rests on His faithfulness. Hence the more we know of His truth and faithfulness the more perfectly do we rest and repose upon them. Trust is the response to His attraction, but we need to come within the range of that attraction. His Word He has magnified above all His name as the grand mirror of Himself. Having the written and living Word together, we have no reason to ask, Show us the Father. In the Scriptures and in the Lord Jesus Christ we have a complete exhibition of Gods Being.
Man, whilst ignorant of God, is always leaning on an arm of flesh. See Gods ancient people, how continually were even they, notwithstanding all their advantages, trusting in the creature, rather than in God. To Egypt or Assyria they looked in their troubles, rather than to their heavenly Protector. Indeed, there was not any thing on which they would not rely rather than on God. But, when they were made sensible of their folly, and had discovered the real character of God, they instantly renounced all these false confidences, saying, Asshur shall not save us; we will not ride upon horses; neither will we say any more to the work of our hands, Ye are our gods: for in thee the fatherless findeth mercy. The same proneness to creature-confidence is found amongst ourselves. Who does not, at first, rely on his own wisdom to guide him, his own strength to support him, and his own goodness to procure for him acceptance with God? But in conversion we learn where alone our hope is to be placed, even in God, who worketh all our works in us, and in Christ, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption. This was the effect of conversion in St. Paul, who accounted all his former attainments to be but loss for Christ, and desired to be found in Christ, not having his own righteousness, which was of the law, but the righteousness which was of God by faith in Christ. And the same effect invariably follows from a discovery of God as reconciled to us in Christ Jesus.1 [Note: C. Simeon, Works, v. 34.]
3. Trust gradually deepens into love. The three letters G O D mean nothing, and there is no power in them to stir a mans heart. It must be the knowledge of the acts of God that brings men to love Him. And there is no way of getting that knowledge but through the faith which must precede love. For faith realizes the fact that God loves. We have known and believed the love that God hath to us. The first step is to grasp the great truth of the loving God, and through that truth to grasp the God that loves. And then, and not till then, does there spring up in a mans heart love towards Him. But it is only the faith that is set on Him who hath declared the Father unto us that gives us for our very own the grasp of the facts, which facts are the only possible fuel that can kindle love in a human heart. We love him because he first loved us, and we shall never know that He loves us unless we come to the knowledge through the road of faith. So John himself tells us when he says, We have known and believed. He puts the foundation last, We have known, because we have believed the love that God hath to us.
Students of acoustics tell us that if you have two stringed instruments in adjacent apartments, tuned to the same pitch, a note sounded on one of them will be feebly vibrated upon the other as soon as the waves of sound have reached the sensitive string. In like manner a mans heart gives off a faint, but musical, little tinkle of answering love to God when the deep note of Gods love to him, struck on the chords of heaven up yonder, reaches his poor heart.1 [Note: A. Maclaren.]
There is a Man whose tomb is guarded by love; there is a Man whose sepulchre is not only glorious, as a prophet declared, but whose sepulchre is loved. There is a Man whose ashes, after eighteen centuries, have not grown cold; who daily lives again in the thoughts of an innumerable multitude of men; who is visited in His cradle by shepherds and by kings who vie with each other in bringing to Him gold and frankincense and myrrh. There is a Man whose steps are unweariedly retrodden by a large portion of mankind, and who, although no longer present, is followed by that throng in all the scenes of His bygone pilgrimage, upon the knees of His Mother, by the borders of the lakes, to the tops of the mountains, in the byways of the valleys, under the shade of the olive trees, in the still solitude of the deserts. There is a Man, dead and buried, whose sleep and whose awaking have ever eager watchers, whose every word still vibrates and produces more than love, produces virtues fructifying in love. There is a Man who, eighteen centuries ago, was nailed to a gibbet, and whom millions of adorers daily detach from this throne of His suffering, and kneeling before Him, prostrating themselves as low as they can without shame; there, upon the earth, they kiss His bleeding feet with unspeakable ardour. There is a Man who was scourged, killed, crucified, whom an ineffable passion raises from death and infamy, and exalts to the glory of love unfailing, which finds in Him peace, honour, joy, and even ecstasy. There is a Man pursued in His sufferings and in His tomb by undying hatred, who, demanding apostles and martyrs from all posterity, finds apostles and martyrs in all generations. There is a Man, in fine, and One only, who has founded His love upon earth, and that Man is Thyself, O Jesus, who hast been pleased to baptize me, to anoint me, to consecrate me in Thy love, and whose Name alone now opens my very heart, and draws from it those accents which overpower me and raise me above myself.
But among great men, who are loved? Among warriors? Is it Alexander? Csar? Charlemagne? Among sages? Aristotle or Plato? Who is loved among great men? Who? Name me even one; name me a single man who has died and left love upon his tomb. Mahomet is venerated by Muslims; he is not loved. No feeling of love has ever touched the heart of a Muslim repeating his maxim: God is God, and Mahomet is His prophet. One Man alone has gathered from all ages a love which never fails. Jesus Christ is the sovereign Lord of hearts as He is of minds.1 [Note: Pre Lacordaire, O.P., The Foundation of the Reign of Jesus Christ.]
O Power of Love, O wondrous mystery!
How is my dark illumined by the light,
That maketh morning of my gloomy night,
Setting my soul from Sorrows bondage free
With swift-sent revelation! yea, I see
Beyond the limitation of my sight
And senses, comprehending now, aright
To-days proportion to Eternity.
Through thee my faith in God is made more sure,
My searching eyes have pierced the misty veil;
The pain and anguish which stern Sorrow brings
Through thee become more easy to endure.
Love-strong I mount, and Heavens high summit scale;
Through thee, my soul has spread her folded wings.2 [Note: Katrina Trask.]
III.
Experience of God
1. The Psalmist is content to ground his deepest trust on experience. They that know thy name means They that know thy fame. Faith is not credulity. It is built, says the Psalmist, on the law of averageson a study of the census, Thou hast not forsaken them that seek thee. We shall never get a living faith until we get back that view. We rest our faith on the command of God; we should rest it on the name of Godon the fame of God. They that know thy name shall put their trust in theeit is experience interpreted by faith.
There are two suggestions contained in Wattss picture of Faith which we do well to recall. First, in his figure there is nothing languishing, medival, or sacerdotal. The conventional type is that of a languishing woman gazing upward, with sentimental pose of head and expression of countenance. Instead of this he has represented her as a powerful and resolute figure belonging to our common humanity, not to the cloister or the Church. And by this he reminds us that faith is the conquering principle in all walks of life. It is not merely in order to possess the things above, but also to conquer the things beneath, that faith is essential. In all the ranks of life it is ordained that we must walk by faith and not by sight. The second thought is that faith is a heroic, not a passive virtue. The characteristic act of faith is to lift up the eyes toward Heaven, but also to fight the evil things of earth. So Watts has represented her as holding the sword in her lap, and while she lets the waters wash her feet they wash away the blood of conflict. To gain faith we must fight, not meditate, not languish, and to make faith victorious we must make it the active principle of our lives.1 [Note: J. Burns, Illustrations from Art (1912), 124.]
At midnight, when yon azure fields on high
Sparkle and glow without one cloudy bar,
The radiance of some bright particular star
Attracts, perchance, and holds my watching eye.
That star may long have vanishd from the sky;
Yet still its unspent rays, borne from afar,
Come darting downwards in their golden car
Proof it once glitterd in the galaxy.
So in my heart I feel a healing ray
Sweetly transmitted from a Star divine,
Which once illumed the coasts of Palestine:
And though its beauty beams not there to-day,
I know that Star of old did truly shine,
Because its cheering radiance now is mine.2 [Note: R. Wilton.]
2. Our fathers proved the worth of their religion. One of the healthiest facts of human nature, and of human life, has ever been that spirit of reverence for the past which links generation to generation, and practically makes the race one. Perhaps this was most strongly developed among the Jews. For noble precedent, for inspiring motive, for reassurance, for guidance and strength, the Jew always appealed to his fathers. In battle he invoked the God of his fathers; in exile he sighed for the land of his fathers; in travel he carried with him the bones of his fathers; and in death he spoke of being gathered to his fathers. The destruction of that veneration for the past which binds the generations together, is equalled in point of misfortune only by that somewhat ruthless spirit which questions the testimony borne by honest men who have preceded us. What is that testimony? It is that the religion of Jesus is a grand reality and not a human dream; that the Bible contains a Divine and all-satisfying revelation of God; that it is not a fabrication or an imposture; that the heart of man is weary till it find rest in Christ; that there is such rest in Christ; that in the cross of the Crucified One there is hope for all, comfort for all, heaven for all. Some of the best literature we are familiar with to-day comes from the days of our fathers. What are we to say then to the testimony they bore? They have gonethey went all too soonlike the advance-guard of an army, across the bridge which spans the gulf. They shout back to us that the bridge is safe. What are we to say? Oh, not because they were religious will we be religious too; but surely we will go long before we speak ill of the bridge which bore them over!1 [Note: J. Thew.]
We call Him the God of our fathers; and we feel that there is some stability at the centre, while we can tell our cares to One listening at our right hand, by whom theirs are remembered and were removed; who yesterday took pity on their quaint perplexities, and smiles to-day on ours, not wiser yet, but just as bitter and as real; and who accepts their strains of happy and emancipated love, while putting into our hearts the song of exile and the plaint of aspiration.2 [Note: James Martineau.]
Yesterday I preached at Kiel (one of the parish churches of Morven). It was a strange thing to preach there. As I went to the church hardly a stone or knoll but spoke of something which was gone, and past days crowded upon me like the ghosts of Ossian, and seemed, like them, to ride even on the passing wind and along the mountain-tops. And then to preach in the same pulpit where once stood a revered grandfather and father! What a marvellous, mysterious world is this, that I, in this pulpit, the third generation, should now, by the grace of God, be keeping the truth alive on the earth, and telling how faithful has been the God of our fathers! How few faces around me did I recognize! In that seat once sat familiar facesthe faces of a happy family; they are all now, a few paces off, in a quiet grave. How soon shall their ever having existed be unknown? And it shall be so with myself!3 [Note: Memoir of Norman MacLeod, i. 111.]
3. If we have had experience of Gods goodness for ourselves, and if we really believe that He will not forsake us, we shall not forsake Him; we shall trust Him at all times. When the day is bright, and we live in the sunshine, it is easy enough to trust then. But wait until the sun is hid, the child is sick, work scarce, and we walk through the valley of pain and weariness. How do we act then? When the light goes out in our home, and those fingers whose touch was once our joy are cold and stiff, and that voice, once our inspiration, is silent, never more to be heard, save in those dreams of other days which will come to us, do we trust then? Yes, even then the child of God who knows his Fathers name, and has learned to spell the word Saviour, can and does trust. When the way is dark, and we cannot see, we shall put our hand in His, and with the poet say
Thy way, not mine, O Lord,
However dark it be!
Lead me by Thine own hand;
Choose out the path for me.
Smooth let it be or rough,
It will be still the best;
Winding or straight, it leads
Right onward to Thy rest.
I saw a picture in Birmingham which interested me a good deal. It represented a house through the window of which a beautiful figure was departing. At the other side of the picture the door was open, and a poor dejected, ragged figure was entering. There was a strong cold wind outside the door, which blew in the dead leaves, and straws, and rubbish. The picture was intended to illustrate the somewhat pithy sayingLove flies out of the window when Adversity comes in at the door. But I pick up the old Bible, and it tells me that God has not forsaken any that trust Him. Hear this sweet word: When my father and my mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up.1 [Note: C. Leach, Sermons to Working Men, 123.]
Dr. MacDonald of North Leith told some of us lately of a man who went to a distant part of the country to see a woman who was known as the woman of great faith. He found her in a humble cottage, and on asking if she was the woman of great faith, she replied, No, I am the woman of little faith in a great Saviour.2 [Note: J. Wells, Life of James Hood Wilson, 105.]
Literature
Bonar (H.), Light and Truth: Old Testament, 188.
Cook (F. C.), Church Doctrine, 215.
Hutton (R. E.), The Crown of Christ, 187.
Leach (C.), Sermons for Working Men, 112.
Maclaren (A.), Expositions of Holy Scripture: Psalms 1-49, 16.
Pierson (A. T.), The Making of a Sermon, 41.
Simeon (C.), Works, v. 32.
Spurgeon (C. H.), New Park Street Pulpit, vi. (1860) 10.
Voysey, Sermons, vi. (1883) No. 7.
Webb-Peploe (H. W.), The Titles of Jehovah, 1.
Homiletic Review, New Ser., xxxviii. 414 (Behrends).
Literary Churchman, xxxv. (1889) 260 (Hardman).
Fuente: The Great Texts of the Bible
know: Psa 91:14, Exo 34:5-7, 1Ch 28:9, Pro 18:10, Joh 17:3, 2Co 4:6, 2Ti 1:12, 1Jo 2:3, 1Jo 5:20
put: Psa 5:11, Psa 57:1, Psa 146:5, Psa 146:6, Isa 26:3, Isa 26:4
hast: Psa 105:3, Psa 105:4, Isa 45:19, Isa 46:3, Isa 46:4, Isa 55:6, Isa 55:7, Jer 29:13, 2Co 1:9, 2Co 1:10
Reciprocal: Deu 3:21 – so shall 1Ch 5:20 – because 2Ch 16:8 – because Job 24:1 – they that know Psa 11:1 – In the Psa 16:1 – for Psa 20:1 – name Psa 34:22 – none Psa 36:10 – that Jer 22:16 – was not Dan 11:32 – the people Hos 5:4 – and Mar 6:54 – knew Joh 7:28 – whom 2Co 4:9 – but Gal 4:9 – ye have 2Th 1:8 – that know 1Pe 2:3 – General
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
THEY THAT KNOW GOD TRUST HIM
They that know Thy name will put their trust in Thee.
Psa 9:10
I. Christ, in the prayer recorded in St. John 17, says: I have manifested Thy name unto the men that Thou gavest me. And again, I have declared unto them Thy name, and will declare it. The manifestation of Gods name is the manifestation of God. They that know His name know Him, and they put their trust in Him. Knowledge and faith are in inseparable alliance. Unbelief and ignorance go together.
II. Do you grieve over your want of faith?Grieve over your want of knowledge. Look unto Immanuel, God manifest in the flesh. Remember His kindness towards the sons of men, His sacrifices of glory, felicity, power, rest, reputation, liberty, health, and life; remember what He has been to you individually; look at Him through His promises, invitations, and predictions, and trust in Him.
III. When any one withholds his confidence from you, you say, He does not know me.The implication of the text is, that there is everything attractive about the character of God. It is impossible to know Him without being drawn to repose all confidence in Him, and to commit all our interests to Him. To know Him is to know in Him one Who is willing to employ infinite wisdom, knowledge, power, and wealth in the utmost possible promotion of our interests. To know Him is to know that without Him we are nothingas dead men in respect to all true excellence.
Illustration
This is the first of the acrostic psalms in the Hebrew. It is a good thing to give thanks to God at all times, but not unfrequently the rush of praise for some marvellous interposition sweeps away the dam of ordinary reserve. It was as though the Psalmist had seen the enemies, which had gathered around his life, break and flee for no obvious reason but because they were confronted with the Divine Presence. So utter was their overthrow that their name was blotted out, and the enemy came to a perpetual end. God has done this so often that out of our own experience we may bid all oppressed ones take comfort. To all those who flee to Him in times of trouble God will be a high tower; only let us learn His name, His character, then trust will rise easily and naturally, and from trust we shall pass on to praise, and the declaration of His great deeds.
Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary
Psa 9:10. They that know That is, that thoroughly understand and duly consider thy name Thy infinite power and wisdom, and faithfulness and goodness. The name of God is frequently put for God. Will put their trust in thee The experience of thy faithfulness to thy people in all ages is a just ground for their confidence. Thou hast not forsaken them that seek thee That seek help and relief from thee by fervent prayer, mixed with faith or trust in thee, as is expressed in the former clause.