much of the following is taken from charles spurgeon's Treasury of David, commentary on the psalms.
*there are 7 psalms that are called PENETENTIAL psalms.
*psalms 6, 32,38,51 are written by david concerning his sin against bathsheba and uriah recounted in
II samuel 11 (keil in his commentary on psalm 38 suggests that these a written in the following order:
psalm 6, 51, 38, 32
*psalm 102 is written by an (unknown) penitent for himself and jerusalem
*psalm 130 is written by a post exile penitent (compares with 136)
*psalm 143 (david?)
*spurgeon calls psalm 6 the first penitential psalm
and 'certainly its language will becomes the lip of a penitent,
for it expresses at once the sorrow (v3,6-7), humiliation (v2,4) and hatred (v8) of sin
which are the unfailing marks of the contrite spirit when it turns to God.
v1 O LORD, REBUKE ME NOT IN THINE ANGER,
NEITHER CHASTEN ME IN THY HOT DISPLEASURE
REBUKE ME NOT
God hath two means by which He reduceth His children to obedience
His word by which He rebukes them
and His rod, by which He chastiseth them.
the word precedes, admonishing them by his servants
whom He hath sent in all ages to call sinners to repentance
of the which david himself saith, 'let the righteous rebuke me' a. symson, 1638
'o keep up life and peace within,
if i must feel Thy chastening rod!
yet kill not me, but kill my sin,
and let me know Thou art my God.
o give my sould some sweet foretaste
of that which i shall shortly see!
let faith and love cry to the last,
:come, Lord, i trust myself with Thee!" ' richard baxter, 1615-91
v2 HAVE MERCY UPON ME, O LORD; FOR I AM WEAK
O LORD, HEAL ME; FOR MY BONES ARE VEXED.
FOR I AM WEAK...'behold what rhetoric he useth to move God to cure him, 'i am weak,
an argument from his weakness, which indeed were a weak argument to move any man to show his favour,
but is a strong argument to prevail with God.
..coming before God, the most forcible argument that ye can use is
your necessity, poverty, tears, misery, unworthiness and confessing them to Him,
it shall be an open door to furnish you with all things that He hath...A. symson
MY BONES ARE VEXED...'the Lord can make the strongest and most insensible part of man's body sensible of His wrath when He pleaseth to touch him...david dickson
v3 MY SOUL IS ALSO SORE VEXED: BUT THOU, O LORD, HOW LONG?
out of this we have three things to observe;
first, that there is an appointed time which God hath measured for the crosses of all his children,
before which time they shall not be delivered and for which they must patiently attend,
not thinking to prescribe time to God for their delivery...
next, see the impatiency of our nature in our miseries, our flesh still rebelling against the Spirit,
which oftentimes forgetteth itself so far, that it will enter into reasoning with God
thirdly, albeit the Lord delay His coming to relieve His saints,
yet hath He great cause if we could ponder it;
for when we were in the heat of our sins,
many times He cried by the mouth of His prophets and servants,
'o fools, how long will you continue in your folly?
and we would not hear
therefore when we are in the heat of our pains, thinking long, yea every day a year until we be delivered,
no wonder it is if God will not hear...
v4-5 *return, O Lord, deliver my soul: oh save me for Thy mercies sake.
*FOR IN DEATH THERE IS NO REMEMBRANCE OF THEE
IN THE GRAVE WHO SHALL GIVE THEE THANKS?
Lord, be Thou pacified and reconciled to me...
for shouldst Thou now proceed to take away my life,
as it were a most direful condition for me to die before i have propitiated Thee,
so i may well demand what increase of glory or honour will it bring unto Thee?
will it not be infinitely more glorious for Thee to spare me, till by true contrition i may regain Thy favour?
and then i may live to praise and magnify Thy mercy and Thy grace
..and then confess Thee by vital actions of all holy obedience for the future
and so demonstrate the power of Thy grace which hath wrought this change in me;
neither of which will be done by destroying me,
but only Thy just judgments manifested in Thy vengeance on sinners. henry hammond 1659
v6 I AM WEARY WITH MY GROANING
ALL THE NIGHT MAKE I MY BED TO SWIM
I WATER MY COUCH WITH MY TEARS.
7 MINE EYE IS CONSUMED BECAUSE OF GRIEF;
IT WAXETH OLD BECAUSE OF ALL MINE ENEMIES.
showers be better than dews, yet it is sufficient if God at least hath bedewed our hearts
and hath given us some sign of a penitent heart.
if we have not revers of waters to pour forth with david,
neither fountains flowing with mary magdalen,
nor as jeremy (jeremiah), desire to have a fountain in our head, to weep day and night,
nor with peter weep bitterly;
yet if we lament that we cannot lament and mourn that we cannot mourn;
yea, if we have the smallest sobs of sorrow and tears of compunction,k
if they be true and not counterfeit,
they will make us acceptable to God.
for as the woman with the bloody issue that touched the hem of Christ's garment,
was no less welcome to Christ than thomas, who put his fingers in the print of the nails;
so, God looketh not at the quantity, but the sincerity of our repentance.
my bed...the place of his sin is the place of his repentance..
when we behold the place where we have offended we should be pricked in the heart
and there again crave Him pardon.
as adam sinned in the garden and Christ sweat bloody tears in the garden
'examine your hearts upon your beds and convert unto the Lord;
and whereas ye have stretched forth yourselves upon your bed to devise evil things,
repent there and make them sanctuaries to God. ..symson
i water my couch with tears...now the hebrew word here used signifies properly,
to cause to swim, which is more than simply to wash.
and thus the geneva readeth it, i cause my bed every night to swim.
so that as the priest used to swim in the molten sea, (in the temple)
that they might be pure and clean, against they preformed the holy rites and services of the temple,
in like manner the princely prophet washeth his bed, yea, he swimmeth in his bed
or rather he causeth his bed to swim in tears,
as in a sea of grief and penitent sorrow for his sin...thomas playfere, 1604
v6,7..soul trouble is attended usually with great pain of body too
and so a man is wounded and distressed in every part.
there is no soundness in my flesh, because of Thine anger, says david
'the arrows of the Almighty are within me, the poison whereof drinketh up my spirit. job 6.4
sorrow of heart contracts the natural spirits, making all their motions slow and feeble
and the poor afflicted body does usually decline and waste away
and therefore, saith heman, 'my soul is full of troubles and my life draweth nigh unto the grave.
in this inward distress we find our strength decay and melt, even as wax before the fire;
for sorrow darkeneth the spirits, obscures the judgment, blinds the memory as to all pleasant things,
and beclouds the lucid part of the mind,
causing the lamp of life to burn weakly,
in this troubled condition the person cannot be without a countenance that is pale and wan and dejected
like one that is seized with strong fear and consternation.
all his motions are sluggish and no sprightliness nor activity remains.
a merry heart doth good like a medicine; but a broken spirit drieth the bones.
hence come those frequent complaints in scripture:
my moisture is turned into the drought of the summer:
i am like a bottle in the smoke;
my sould cleaveth unto the dust:
my face is foul with weeping and
on my eyelid is the shadow of death. job 16.16, 30.17,18-19
my bones are pierced in me, in the night season and my sinews take no rest;
by the great force of my disease is my garment changed.
He hath cast me into the mire and i am become like dust and ashes.
many times indeed the trouble of the soul does begin from the weakness and indisposition of the body.
long affliction, without any prospect of remedy, does, in process of time, begin to distress the soul itself...
timothy rogers on 'trouble of mind'
mine eye is consumed..that eye of his that had looked and lusted after his neighbour's wife
is now dimmed and darkened with grief and indignation
he had wept himself almost blind...john trapp
v8 DEPART FROM ME, ALL YE WORKERS OF INIQUITY;
FOR THE LORD HATH HEARD THE VOICE OF MY WEEPING.
the voice of my weeping...some may say, 'my constitution is such that i cannot weep;
i may as well go to squeeze a rock, as think to get a tear.
but if thou canst not weep for sin, canst thou grieve?
intellectual mourning is best;
there may be sorrow where there are no tears; the vessel is full though it wants vent;
it is not so much the weeping eye God respects as the broken heart;
yet i would be loath to stop their tears who can weep.
God stood looking on hezekiah's tears isaiah 38.5, 'I have seen thy tears.
david's tears made music in God's ears, ..thomas watson
v9 THE LORD HATH HEARD MY SUPPLICATION;
THE LORD WILL RECEIVE MY PRAYER.
..the psalmist three times expresses his confidence of his prayers being heard and received,
which may be either in reference to his having prayed so many times for help,
as the apostle paul did II corinthians 12.8;
and as Christ his antitype did matthew 26.39,42,44;
or to express the certainty of it,
the strength of his faith in it
and the exuberance of his joy on account of it...john gill, 1697-1771
v10 LET ALL MINE ENEMIES BE ASHAMED AND SORE VEXED;
LET THEM RETURN AND BE ASHAMED SUDDENLY
...if this were an imprecation, a malediction, yet it was medicinal
and had rationem boni, a charitable tincture and nature in it;
he wished the men no harm as men.
but it is rather praedictorium, a prophetical vehemence,
that if they will take no knowledge of God's declaring Himself in the protection of His servants.,
if they would not consider that God had heard and would hear, had rescued and would rescue His children,
but would continue their opposition against Him,
heavy judgments would certainly fall upon them;
their punishment should be certain, but the effect should be uncertain;
for God only knows whether His correction shall work upon His enemies
to their mollifying or to their obduration...
in the second word, 'let them be sore vexed',
he wishes his enemies no worse than himself had been,
for he had used the same word of himself before,
ossa turbata, my bones are vexed, and
anima turbata, my should is vexed;
and considering that david had found this vexation to be his way to God,
it was no malicious imprecation to wish that enemy the same physic that he had taken,
who was more sick of the same disease than he was.
for this is like a troubled sea after a tempest;
the danger is past, but yet the billow is great still;
the danger was in the calm, in the security or in the tempest,
by misinterpreting God's corrections to our obduration and to a remorseless stupefaction;
but when a man is come to this holy vexation, to be troubled, to be shaken
with the sense of the indignation of God,
the storm is past
..the indignation of God is blown over (note: Blessed be You for covering my sin!)
that soul is in a fair and near way of being restored to a calmness and to reposed security of conscience
that is come to this holy vexation...john donne
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