Psalms 103:9-19

9 He will not always accuse us, and he will not be angry forever.

10 He has not punished us as our sins should be punished; he has not repaid us for the evil we have done.

11 As high as the sky is above the earth, so great is his love for those who respect him.

12 He has taken our sins away from us as far as the east is from west.

13 The Lord has mercy on those who respect him, as a father has mercy on his children.

14 He knows how we were made; he remembers that we are dust.

15 Human life is like grass; we grow like a flower in the field.

16 After the wind blows, the flower is gone, and there is no sign of where it was.

17 But the Lord's love for those who respect him continues forever and ever, and his goodness continues to their grandchildren

18 and to those who keep his agreement and who remember to obey his orders.

19 The Lord has set his throne in heaven, and his kingdom rules over everything.

Psalms 103:9-19 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO PSALM 103

\\<>\\. The Targum adds, ``spoken in prophecy,'' as doubtless it was, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Some think it was written by David, after a fit of illness, and his recovery from it, since he speaks of his diseases being healed, and his youth renewed; for which reason the Syriac interpreter suggests it was written in his old age; for he makes the subject of the psalm to be, ``concerning coldness which prevailed upon him in old age;'' but rather he wrote it when his heart was warm with a sense of the love of God, and spiritual blessings of grace flowing from thence; and in it celebrates and sings the benefits of New Testament times; and it is a psalm suitable to be sung by every believer, under a quick sense of divine favours: wherefore the above interpreter better adds, ``also an instruction and thanksgiving by men of God;'' whom the psalmist may very well be thought to personate, even in Gospel times; and much rather than the Jews in captivity, as Kimchi thinks.