Psalm 38:2

Verse

Verse 2. Let no one think these expressions of penitence Psalms 38:1-4 overstrained or excessive. They are the words of the Holy Spirit of God, speaking by the mouth of the man after God's own heart. If we were as repentant as David, we should bring home to ourselves his language; as it is, our affections are chilled, and therefore we do not enter into his words ... And let us observe how all the miseries are referred to their proper end. The sin is not bewailed merely on account of its ill effect on the guilty one, but on account of the despite done to God. The psalmist's first thought is the "anger" of the Lord, and his hot displeasure. It is not the "arrows" that afflict him so much as that they are God's. "Thine arrows stick fast in me, and thy hand presseth me." The reason why there is no health in his flesh is because of God's displeasure. Such is true contrition, "not the sorrow of the world which worketh death, but the sorrow that worketh repentance not to be repented of." A Commentary on the Seven Penitential Psalms. Chiefly from Ancient Sources, (by A.P.F.) 1847.

Verse 2. Thy hand presseth me sore. Not the hand of Egypt or Ashur; then it were hand for hand, a duel of some equality: hand to hand; here forces and stratagems might achieve a victory: but Thy hand. The weight of a man's blow is but weak, according to the force and pulse of his arm; as the princes of Midian answered Gideon, when he bade his son try the dint of his sword upon them; "Rise thou, and fall upon us: for as the man is, so is his strength." Judges 8:21 . But "it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God." Heb 10:31. As Homer called the hands of Jupiter ceirez aeptoi, hands whose praise could not be sufficiently spoken; which some read ceires aaptoii, hands inaccessible, irresistible for strength: all the gods in heaven could not ward a blow of Jupiter's hand. This hand never strikes but for sin; and where sin is mighty his blow is heavy. Thomas Adams.

HINTS FOR PASTORS AND LAYPERSONS

Verse 2. God sharply chasteneth many of his children, and yet for all that he loves them never a whit the less, nor withholdeth in good time his mercy from them. Thomas Wilcocks.