Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Psalms 102:28
The children of thy servants shall continue, and their seed shall be established before thee.
28. The eternity of God is the pledge for the permanence of His people. Even if the Psalmist and his contemporaries do not live to see the restoration of Israel, their descendants will have part in it. The verse is an echo of Isa 65:9; Isa 66:22: cp. Psa 69:35-36.
shall continue ] Lit. shall dwell, in the land once more (Isa 65:9; Psa 69:36).
before thee ] Or, in thy presence. ‘Banish them from my presence’ was the sentence pronounced upon Judah as upon Israel (Jer 7:15; Jer 15:1, &c.); but they shall be readmitted to Jehovah’s presence and restored to His favour. The prophecy of Jer 30:20 will be fulfilled.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
The children of thy servants shall continue – The descendants of those that serve and obey thee. This represents the confident expectation of the psalmist that, as God was unchangeable, all his promises toward his people would be fulfilled, even though the heavens and the earth should pass away. God was the same. His word would not fail. His promises were sure. Compare Mat 5:18; Mat 24:35. The word rendered continue, means to dwell, as in a habitation; then, to abide. It stands opposed to a wandering, nomadic life, and indicates permanency.
And their seed shall be established before thee – The word used here means properly to stand erect; then to set up, to erect, to place, to found, to make firm, as a city, Psa 107:36; the earth, Psa 24:2; the heavens, Pro 3:19. It means here that they would be firmly and permanently established: that is, the church of God would be permanent in the earth. It would not be like the generations of people that pass away. It would not be like the nomadic tribes of the desert that have no fixed habitation, and that wander from place to place. It would not be even like the heavens that might put on new forms, or wholly pass away: it would be as enduring and changeless as God himself; it would, in its proper form, endure forever. As God is eternal and unchangeable, so would the safety and welfare of his people be.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Psa 102:28
The children of Thy servants shall continue, and their seed shall be established before Thee.
Gods care for the posterity of His servants
I. How far a blessing cometh on the posterity of Gods servants.
1. Good men do convey many temporal mercies to their relations; that is the least. God cannot satisfy Himself with doing good to the persons of His children, but He must do good to their relations; all about them fare the better for their sakes. A land fareth the better for them (2Ki 2:12).
2. Where the parent is in visible covenant, the children also are in visible covenant with him as soon as born.
3. If they die in infancy, we need not trouble ourselves about their salvation. God is their God (Gen 17:1); and that is all the best of us has to show for his right to heaven.
4. If they live, and betray the corruption of their natures, there is more hope of them than of others. The grace of the covenant runneth most kindly in the channel of the covenant (Rom 11:24).
5. Among them salvation is most ordinary, though God leaveth himself a liberty to take men of an evil stock. A rose may grow upon a thorn; a slip of an ill stock may be grafted into the tree of life.
6. They are not cast off till they do even wrest themselves out of the arms of mercy. Cain excommunicated himself (Gen 4:16).
II. The reasons.
1. That He may show the riches of His grace, which reacheth not only to the persons, but to the families of those that love Him and serve Him. Grace, like a mighty river, will be pent within no banks, but overfloweth all that a man hath, all his relations.
2. Out of an indulgence to natural affection. God hath a son of His own, and He knoweth how He loveth Him, and is acquainted with the heart of a father, and he hath planted an affection in parents to their children. Love, like a river, is descensive.
III. How can we reconcile the promise with experience, since the children of the servants of the Lord are reduced to great extremities, and are as naught and bad as others? I answer, The blessing is invisible for a great measure, and we want faith to interpret this privilege, as well as any other mentioned in the covenant. Sometimes their outward portion may be small, but, however, they are a holy seed unto God. We see the providence of God by pieces; for the present they may be in their natural condition, and the blessing doth not as yet break out in effects of grace, as it doth afterwards. We must leave the Lord to His own seasons.
IV. To whom the promise will re most eminently fulfilled. There are some qualifications mentioned. All Gods servants have their blessings, but these especially; as, namely–
1. The strict, and such as dare not offend Him (Psa 103:17).
2. The just and upright. They abridge themselves of many advantages of gain which others hunt after. It is not lost (Psa 112:2).
3. The merciful and charitable (Psa 37:26). When we are urged to giving, you may object, What shall wife and children do? l answer, Give the rather; do something the more for every child, that the blessing may be entailed upon them; it is lent to the Lord, and it will be paid to your posterity: your children will not have a whit the less.
4. Those that are tender of Gods institutions: the second commandment, that provideth for Gods instituted worship, the sanction of it speaketh of blessings and punishments in the posterity, and deservedly. (T. Manton, D.D.)
The perpetuity and establishment of Gods servants
How blessed the assurance contained in this text; and if it might be understood literally, what encouragement would it afford to godly parents. But, alas! it is a lamentable fact that not a few of Gods servants have to mourn, as Abraham once did, Oh! that Ishmael might live before God. Those who are children of God by a second birth, and consequently the posterity of Zion, shall continue for ever, and their seed be established before God.
I. The births in succession. There is no real religion in existence but that which commences with the new birth. These births, which are in constant succession, conduct to grace privileges and to a glorious inheritance.
II. The establishment of which the text speaks. The first thing which I would press upon your attention here is, that the true Church of God must continue on earth, despite all the rage. We pass on just to remark of this establishment and perpetuity that the holy seed cannot die. Observe, further, that the experience of these established ones, and their establishment too, is supernatural. Shall be established before Thee. Now, I wish to bring my own establishment,–for I claim to be an established Christian–to this test. Will it bear being brought before God? (J. Irons.)
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Psa 103:1-22
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 28. The children of thy servants shall continue] Thy Church shall be permanent, because founded on thee; it shall live throughout all the revolutions of time. And as thy followers are made partakers of the Divine nature, they shall live in union with God in the other world, deriving eternal duration from the inexhaustible Fountain of being. Nothing can be permanent but by God’s supporting and renewing influence.
ANALYSIS OF THE ONE HUNDRED AND SECOND PSALM
There are two general parts in this Psalm: –
I. A description of the calamities of the Church, under the person of an afflicted man, Ps 102:1-11.
II. The consolation afforded in these calamities, and the ground of it, Ps 102:12-28.
I. The description, c., is formed into a prayer proposed in the two first verses: –
1. “Hear my prayer.”
2. “Hide not thy face.”
In this prayer he complains, and shows his wretched state by various metaphors or figures.
1. A consumption of strength: “My days are consumed.”
2. From continual weeping: “My bones cleave to my skin.”
3. From his solitude: “Like a pelican in the wilderness.”
4. From his continual watching: “I watch, and am like a sparrow,” c.
5. From the reproach of his enemies. “Mine enemies reproach me.”
6. From his sadness: “I have eaten ashes like bread.”
All these increased, from a sense of God’s displeasure.
1. “Because of thine indignation.”
2. Because of his sufferings: “Thou hast lifted me up, and hast cast me down.”
3. And the effect produced: “My days are as a shadow.”
II. He comforts himself in the promises of God: –
1. “I am withered like grass: but thou shalt endure for ever.”
2. I shall soon be forgotten “but thy remembrance is unto all generations.”
3. Thou seemest to take no heed: but “thou wilt arise.”
He was the more confident, –
1. Because the set time to favour Zion was come.
2. This he saw more clearly from the concern with which God had filled the hearts of the people: “Thy servants take pleasure in her stones.”
3. He consoled himself in the prospect of the conversion of the heathen themselves: “So the heathen shall fear thy name.”
4. For this he gives a particular reason: Because “the Lord shall build up Zion.”
5. And he will do this, because of the prayers of the people: “He will regard the prayer,” c.
This should be done in such a manner, that, –
1. Record should be made of it: “This shall be written.”
2. And it should be a blessing to those that were unborn: “The people which shall be created shall praise the Lord.”
And for this he assigns the proper reasons.
1. “The Lord looked down from heaven.”
2. “He heard the groans of the prisoners.”
These mercies call for gratitude and obedience: –
1. They should “declare the name of the Lord.”
2. And this will take place “when the people are gathered together,” &c.
The psalmist fears that he shall not live to see this deliverance: –
1. “For he weakened my strength in the way, – he shortened my days.”
2. Yet he earnestly desires to see it: “Take me not away.”
To strengthen this petition, he pleads God’s unchangeableness and he proves God to be eternal, because he is immutable.
1. Not so the earth, for it had a beginning: “Of old thou hast laid,” c.
2. Not so the heavens for they are “the work of thy hands.”
3. Neither shall they continue: “They shall perish,” c.
But God is always the same. Every thing that is mutable acquires by its change some property, quality, form or accident, which it had not before: but God, being an infinite Spirit, and infinitely perfect, can suffer no loss, can have no addition. For as he wants nothing, nothing can be added to him as he inhabits eternity, nothing can be taken from him. In him, therefore, there is no possibility of change and, consequently, none of decay or perishing.
From these considerations the psalmist draws this comfortable conclusion: –
1. His Church and servants shall continue also: “The children of thy servants,” – the apostles, with the patriarchs, shall dwell in thy kingdom – in the new Jerusalem.
2. “And their seed;” as many as are begotten by the Gospel, if they remain in the faith that works by love, “shall be established,” – persevere, remain, continue before thee – live in thy presence for ever. As thou art eternal, so thou wilt unite them to thyself and make them eternally happy.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Though the heavens and the earth perish, and though we thy servants pine away in our iniquities, according to thy righteous sentence and threatening, Lev 26:39, and die in captivity; yet by virtue of thy eternal and unchangeable nature and covenant, we rest assured that our children, and their children after them, shall enjoy the promised mercies, a happy restitution to and settlement in their own land, and the presence of our and their Messias, whom, being not to come till after four hundred and ninety years, we shall not live to see. The expression here used is general, not without design, partly to show that this promised blessing belongs to the Jews not upon the account of any carnal relation to Abraham, but as they are and continue to be Gods servants, from whom, if they revolt, they lose this and all their other privileges; and partly to imply that it belongs to all Gods faithful servants, and to their children, whether they be Jews or Gentiles, of whose conversion he spoke, Psa 102:22.
Before thee; in the place of thy gracious presence; either here in thy church, or hereafter in heaven, from which we are now banished. And this phrase further intimates that their happiness did not consist in the enjoyment of the outward blessings of the land of Canaan, but in the presence and fruition of God there, which he mentions as the top and upshot of all his desires and their felicities.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
The children of thy servants shall continue,…. The “servants” of the Lord are the apostles of Christ, and ministers of the word, in all successive generations, with whom Christ will be to the end of the world: their “children” are such whom they have begotten again, through the Gospel, to whom they are spiritual fathers; regenerated souls are meant; of these there will be a succession in all ages, until latter day glory takes place; these are the church’s seed, and her seed’s seed, from whom the word of the Lord, the Gospel, will never depart, Isa 59:21, or these “shall inhabit” i, as the word may be rendered, the earth, as the Targum adds; that is, the new heavens, and the new earth, when the old ones are passed away; here they shall dwell with the Lord, who is the same today, yesterday, and for ever:
and their seed shall be established before thee; the same with the children, the spiritual seed of the church and of faithful minister; these, with the church, in which they are born and brought up, shall be established in Christ; the church will be no more in an unstable and fluctuating state, but will he as a tabernacle, that shall not be taken down; yea, shall be established upon the top of the mountains, and exalted above the hills; see Isa 2:2.
i “habitabunt”, V. L. Pagninus, Montanus, Junius Tremellius, Piscator, Cocceius, Gejerus so Sept.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
28. The children of thy servants shall dwell. By these words the prophet intimates that he does not ask the preservation of the Church, because it is a part of the human race, but because God has raised it above the revolutions of the world. And undoubtedly, when He adopted us as his children, his design was to cherish us as it were in his own bosom. The inference of the inspired bard is not, therefore, far-fetched, when, amidst innumerable storms, each of which might carry us away, he hopes that the Church will have a permanent existence. It is true, that when through our own fault we become estranged from God, we are also as it were cut off from the fountain of life; but no sooner are we reconciled to Him than he begins again to pour down his blessings upon us. Whence it follows that true believers, as they are regenerated by the incorruptible seed, shall continue to live after death, because God continues unchangeably the same. By the word dwell, is to be understood an abiding and everlasting inheritance.
When it is said that the seed of God’s servants shall be established before his face, the meaning is, that it is not after the manner of the world, or according to the way in which the heavens and the earth are established, that the salvation of true believers is made steadfast, but because of the holy union which exists between them and God. By the seed and children of the godly, is to be understood not all their descendants without exception — for many who spring from them according to the flesh become degenerate — but those who do not turn aside from the faith of their parents. Successive generations are expressly pointed out, because the covenant extends even to future ages, as we shall again find in the subsequent psalm. If we firmly keep the treasure of life intrusted to us, let us not hesitate, although we may be environed with innumerable deaths, to cast the anchor of our faith in heaven, that the stability of our welfare may rest in God.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(28) Continue.Rather, dwell, i.e., in the land of Canaan. (Comp. Psa. 37:22; Psa. 69:36.)
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
28. The children of thy servants shall continue Faith has thus reached the conclusion, “Because he lives, we shall live also.” The beginning and closing of this psalm exhibit the contrast between the contemplation of affliction from the human side, and from that of faith.
Continue Hebrew, dwell, that is, in the full expression, “dwell in the land,” as Psa 37:29; Psa 69:36.The application to Christ of Psa 102:25-27, in the first chapter of the epistle to the Hebrews, is, as above stated, according to a common practice, or law, in Messianic quotations, whereby what is said of Jehovah in the Old Testament is sometimes applied to Christ in the New. See on Psa 102:25.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Psa 102:28. The children of thy servants Let the sins of thy servants be settled, and their seed be established before thee. This is a concluding prayer that their posterity might be settled in Jerusalem for ever: Before thee, or in thy presence, belongs in common to both clauses.
REFLECTIONS.1st, This psalm is a prayer of the afflicted, and such are many of the people of God at times; when he is overwhelmed, and poureth out his complaint before the Lord, as he is invited freely to do, assured that the compassionate bosom of his God can be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; he will hear his cry, and will help him; and this inestimable privilege the child of God fails not to improve, and therefore lodges all his complaints with the Father of mercies and the God of all consolation. This the afflicted Psalmist did, and in his own case directs us how to act when under the like pressure.
He directs his prayer to God, intreating kind regard and a speedy answer, because his necessities were urgent. Note; (1.) Outward troubles are made light, when God comforts the soul with internal consolations. (2.) If God suffers his people to be reduced very low, it is with a design to exercise their faith, and excite their more importunate prayers.
2nd, Many and great are the troubles of the righteous, but out of all the Lord delivereth them: and herein the Psalmist expresses his own confidence, and that of all the faithful in Zion.
1. The Lord Jesus is an everlasting Saviour; for to him are the words addressed (Heb 1:10-12.). Thou, O Lord, shalt endure for ever. However long continued the afflictions of his faithful ones may be, they shall outlive and overcome them, because he endureth for ever. The stability of his mediatorial kingdom, and his fidelity in the constant discharge of his trust, as our ceaseless Advocate and almighty King, ensure to faithful souls the victory at last: and thy remembrance unto all generations; seeing he shall be exalted to eternity in the praises of his faithful people, for all the great salvation begun, continued, and completed by him, for them, and in them.
2. There is an appointed time for the continuance and removal of the afflictions of Zion; and faith, which knows it certain, brings it near: and it may be hastened by prayer. The set time is come, because the deliverance is as sure as if it were already accomplished: and this may have respect to the seventy years of the Babylonish captivity, or to the period of the church’s calamity under the persecutions of Antichrist; or more generally to the case of every suffering saint of God, who is called to trust and wait in patient hope for the salvation of God.
3. This will issue to the glory of God, and the great comfort of his people. For thy servants take pleasure in her stones, and favour the dust thereof. Though the temple lay in ruins, the pious Jews loved the place, and respected the very dust: how great must their delight then be, to see these stones revived from the rubbish, and growing into a holy temple? And thus the ministers of the gospel, in all the desolations of the church, long for the glorious day of restitution; and whenever the Lord puts it into the hearts of his people to pray for, and labour to serve the interests of his Zion, it is a gracious sign that the promised mercy is at hand. Herein also God will be abundantly glorified; his saints will admire and adore him for the grace manifested in that great day; and the heathen, struck with reverence at the sight of God’s interposition in behalf of his people, shall be converted unto him, and the kings of the earth behold his glory, and yield themselves up to his service.
4. The prayers of the righteous shall be answered. They are frequently destitute of human help and comfort, but not the less dear to the Lord: he will not despise those whom man despiseth; but, as the contrite heart is his delight, they shall be accepted by him, and receive from him a rich supply of every want.
5. The record of this mercy shewn to Zion at the humble prayer of God’s people, will encourage the faith, and excite the praises of succeeding generations of the righteous, created anew in Christ Jesus. Note; The past experience of God’s care of his people should ever encourage our confidence of the like protection.
6. Even the groans of the poor prisoners doomed to death he hears, rescues them from ruin, and magnifies thereby his mercy. He hath looked down from the height of his sanctuary: from heaven did the Lord behold the earth, and all that was done under the sun, with an eye of especial regard to his believing people, particularly when suffering for his name’s sake, under the power of oppressors: To hear the groaning of the prisoner, bound for the testimony of God, and the faith of Jesus, as multitudes have been, and some still continue to be, under the power of the anti-christian tyranny: To loose those that are appointed to death; either to rescue them from the death of the body, or to save the souls of those who were tied and bound with the chain of their sins, and in their own fears apprehended themselves exposed to the eternal death of body and soul in hell; but who under deep conviction of their lost estate, groaning in bitterness, cry and are heard, pardoned through the blood of Jesus, and saved by almighty grace: To declare the name of the Lord in Zion, and his praise in Jerusalem; as the captives released from Babylon did, and as the church of God, delivered from the yoke of Antichrist, will do; and which is now daily done by every poor sinner rescued from the bondage of corruption, and the jaws of hell; whose heart, big with thankfulness, adores the wonders of redeeming love, and ascribes the praise of all to Jesus his Lord; when the people are gathered together, and the kingdoms, to serve the Lord, which will be most eminently the case, when the Lord Jesus in the latter day shall take to himself his great power, and reign; and those who are the subjects of his happy government shall with exultation rejoice in his kingdom and glory.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
REFLECTIONS
READER, I know not what soul exercises or afflictions your heart may be wounded with; but I venture to believe, that the truest relief under all, is to view Christ in his unequalled sorrows. Poring over ourselves, or over our own sorrows, and magnifying them, will never bring comfort. But if I see Jesus with the eye of faith, in the tribulated path; if I mark his footsteps, and he calls to me, and leads me by the way of the footsteps of his flock, where he feeds his kids, beside the shepherds tents; I shall feel comfort. They had an eye unto him, and were lightened: and their faces were not ashamed. He, whose bread was ashes, and whose drink was mingled with tears, will turn my water into wine; make my very crosses sweet, and cause my tears to become like the spiced juice of the pomegranate. May the Lord the Holy Ghost so glorify the Lord Jesus to our view; cause us, in our sorrows, as well as in our joys, to be always looking to Him, living upon Him, walking with Him, and making Him our all in all, in every state!
And, Reader, do not let us overlook the blessedness this psalm contains of a sure victory, and happy issue, to all our exercises. They that sow in tears, shall reap in joy. Jesus’s unchangeable love, everlasting righteousness, and all the covenant engagements of Jehovah in, and to Him, makes all sure and fixed. Though all things are changing, fluctuating, dying, perishing here below; – though in ourselves, in our friends, in our houses, in the church, in the world; all like a vesture are folding up, and hastening to decay; yet Jesus lives: and, in that, all is secure: for he hath said, Because I live, ye shall live also. Hail, holy, great, almighty Saviour! Thou art he whom the Father loveth, and hath given all things into thine hands. Eternally secure in thee, we are screened from every danger: thy children shall continue, and thy seed shall be established before thee. And when heart, and strength, and all shall fail, thou art, and wilt be, the strength of our heart, and our portion forever.
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Psa 102:28 The children of thy servants shall continue, and their seed shall be established before thee.
Ver. 28. The children of thy servants shall continue ] By virtue of the covenant, and that union with thee which is the ground of communion. If it could be said of Caesar, that he held nothing to be his own that he did not communicate to his friends, how much more of Christ! Propterea bene semper sperandum, etiamsi omnia ruant. The Church is immortal and immutable.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
children = sons.
shall continue = shall dwell [in the Land].
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
The children: Psa 22:30, Psa 22:31, Psa 45:16, Psa 45:17, Psa 69:35, Psa 69:36, Isa 53:10, Isa 59:20, Isa 59:21, Isa 65:22, Isa 66:22
their seed: Psa 90:16, Psa 90:17
Reciprocal: Psa 81:15 – time Psa 112:2 – General Psa 132:12 – their children Pro 13:22 – leaveth Isa 14:32 – the Lord Jer 30:20 – children Jer 31:36 – those Zec 10:7 – yea Heb 13:8 – General
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Psa 102:28. The children of thy servants shall continue Though the heavens and the earth perish, and though we, thy servants, pine away in our iniquities, according to thy righteous sentence and threatening, Lev 26:39, and die in captivity; yet, by virtue of thy eternal and unchangeable nature, and thy promises made to Abraham and his seed, we rest assured that our children, and their children after them, shall enjoy the promised mercies, even a happy restoration to and settlement in their own land, and the presence of our and their Messiah. And their seed shall be established before thee In the place of thy gracious presence, either here in thy church, or hereafter in heaven. Perhaps this expression, before thee, might be intended further to intimate, that their happiness did not consist in the enjoyment of the outward blessings of the land of Canaan, but in the presence and fruition of God there, which he mentions as the consummation of their desires and felicities.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
102:28 The children of thy servants shall continue, and their seed shall {s} be established before thee.
(s) Seeing you have chosen your Church out of the world, and joined it to you, it cannot but continue forever: for you are everlasting.