Psalm 10:11

Verse 11. The Scripture everywhere places sin upon this root. God hath forgotten: he hideth his face; he will never see it. He hath turned his back upon the world. This was the ground of the oppression of the poor by the wicked, which he mentions, Psalms 10:9-10 . There is no sin but receives both its birth and nourishment from this bitter root. Let the notion of providence be once thrown out, or the belief of it faint, how will ambition, covetousness, neglect of God, distrust, impatience, and all other bitter gourds, grow up in a night! It is from this topic all iniquity will draw arguments to encourage itself; for nothing so much discountenances those rising corruptions, and puts them out of heart, as an actuated belief that God takes care of human affairs. Stephen Charnock.

Verse 11. He hath said in his heart, etc. "Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil." Ecclesiastes 8:11 . God forbears punishing, therefore men forbear repenting. He doth not smite upon their back by correction, therefore they do not smite upon their thigh by humiliation. Jeremiah 31:19 . The sinner thinks thus,: "God hath spared me all this while, he hath eked out patience into longsuffering; surely he will not punish." He hath said in his heart, God hath forgotten. God sometimes in infinite patience adjourns his judgments and puts off the sessions a while longer, he is not willing to punish. 2 Peter 3:9 . The bee naturally gives honey, but stings only when it is angered. The Lord would have men make their peace with him. Isaiah 27:5 . God is not like a hasty creditor that requires the debt, and will give no time for the payment; he is not only gracious, but "waits to be gracious" ( Isaiah 30:18 ); but God by his patience would bribe sinners to repentance; but alas! how is this patience abused. God's longsuffering hardens: because God stops the vials of his wrath, sinners stop the conduit of tears. Thomas Watson.

Verse 11. He hath said in his heart, God hath forgotten: he hideth his face; he will never see it. Because the Lord continues to spare them, therefore they go on to provoke him. As he adds to their lives, so they add to their lusts. What is this, but as if a man should break all his bones because there is a surgeon who is able to set them again?... Because justice seems to wink, men suppose her blind; because she delays punishment, they imagine she denies to punish them; because she does not always reprove them for their sins, they suppose she always approves of their sins, But let such know, that the silent arrow can destroy as well as the roaring cannon. Though the patience of God be lasting, yet it is not everlasting. William Secker.

Verse 11-13. The atheist denies God's ordering of sublunary matters. "Tush, doth the Lord see, or is there knowledge in the Most High?" making him a maimed Deity, without an eye of providence, or an arm of power, and at most restraining him only to matters above the clouds. But he that dares to confine the King of heaven, will soon after endeavour to depose him, and fall at last flatly to deny him. Thomas Fuller.

HINTS FOR PASTORS AND LAYPERSONS

Verse 11. Divine omniscience and the astounding presumption of sinners.