He raiseth up the poor out of the dust
Persons of mean extraction and in low life are sometimes raised
by him to great honour and dignity, as Saul, David, and others;
and is true of many who are spiritually poor and needy, as all
men are, but all are not sensible of it; some are, and these are
called poor "in spirit", and are pronounced "blessed", for
"theirs is the kingdom of heaven": they are raised out of a low
and mean estate, out of the dust of sin, and self-abhorrence for
it, in which they lie when convicted of it.
And lifteth the needy out of the dunghill;
which denotes a mean condition; so one born in a mean place, and
brought up in a mean manner, is sometimes represented as taken
out of a dunghill F20: and also it is expressive of a
filthy one; men by sin are not only brought into a low estate,
but into a loathsome one, and are justly abominable in the sight
of God, and yet he lifts them out of it: the phrases of "raising
up" and "lifting out" suppose them to be fallen, as men are in
Adam, fallen from a state of honour and glory, in which he was
created, into a state of sin and misery, and out of which they
cannot deliver themselves; it is Christ's work, and his only, to
raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to help or lift up his servant
Israel, ( Isaiah 49:6 ) (
Luke 1:54 ) (
1 Samuel
2:8 ) .