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Lord for I can now, in an especial manner, give testimony unto this, that there is mercy with him suited unto your relief. Yea, whatever your distress be, the redemption that is with him is so bounteous, plenteous, and unsearchable, that the undoubted issue of your performance of this duty will be, that you shall be delivered from the guilt of all your sins and the perplexities of all your troubles.

GENERAL SCOPE OF THE WHOLE PSALM.

THE design of the Holy Ghost in this psalm is to express, in the experience of the psalmist and the working of his faith, the state and condition of a soul greatly in itself perplexed, relieved on the account of grace, and acting itself towards God and his saints suitably to the discovery of that grace unto him ;—a great design, and full of great instruction.

And this general prospect gives us the parts and scope of the whole psalm; for we have,—

I. The state and condition of the soul therein represented, with his deportment in and under that state and condition, in verses 1, 2:

"Out of the depths have I cried unto thee, O LORD. Lord, hear my voice; let thine ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications."

II. His inquiry after relief. And therein are two things that present themselves unto him; the one whereof, which first offers the consideration of itself to him in his distress, he deprecates, verse 3:"If thou, LORD, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand?"

The other he closeth withal, and finds relief in it and supportment by it, verse 4:—

"But there is forgiveness with thee, that thou mayest be feared." Upon this, his discovery and fixing on relief, there is the acting of his faith and the deportment of his whole person:

1. Towards God, verses 5, 6:

"I wait for the LORD, my soul doth wait, and in his word do I hope. My soul waiteth for the Lord more than they that watch for the morning I say, more than they that watch for the morning." 2. Towards the saints, verses 7, 8:

"Let Israel hope in the LORD: for with the LORD there is mercy, and with him is plenteous redemption. And he shall redeem Israel from all his iniquities."

All which parts, and the various concernments of them, must be opened severally.

And this also gives an account of what is my design from and upon the words of this psalm,-namely, to declare the perplexed entanglements which may befall a gracious soul, such a one as this psalmist was, with the nature and proper workings of faith in such a condition; principally aiming at what it is that gives a soul relief and supportment in, and afterward deliverance from, such a perplexed

estate.

The Lord in mercy dispose of these meditations in such a way and manner as that both he that writes and they that read may be made partakers of the benefit, relief, and consolation intended for his saints in this psalm by the Holy Ghost!

VERSES FIRST AND SECOND.

The state and condition of the soul represented in the psalm-The two first verses opened.

THE state and condition of the soul here represented as the basis on which the process of the psalm is built, with its deportment, or the general acting of its faith in that state, is expressed in the two first verses:

"Out of the depths have I cried unto thee, O LORD. Lord, hear my voice: let thine ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications."

I. The present state of the soul under consideration is included in that expression, "Out of the depths."

Some of the ancients, as Chrysostom, suppose this expression to relate unto the depths of the heart of the psalmist: Τί ἐστιν ἐκ βαθέων not from the mouth or tongue only, ἀλλ' ἀπὸ καρδίας βαθυτάτης, "but from the depth and bottom of the heart;" i auruv rãs diavolas Tv Bálpwv," from the deepest recesses of the mind.” τῶν βάθρων,

And, indeed, the word is used to express the depths of the hearts of men, but utterly in another sense: Ps. Ixiv. 6, "The heart is deep."

But the obvious sense of the place, and the constant use of the word, will not admit of this interpretation: "E profundis;" from Py, "profundus fuit," is Dpy in the plural number, "profunditates," or "depths." It is commonly used for valleys, or any deep places whatever, but especially of waters. Valleys and deep places, because

of their darkness and solitariness, are accounted places of horror, helplessness, and trouble: Ps. xxiii. 4, "Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death;" that is, in the extremity of danger and trouble.

The moral use of the word, as expressing the state and condition of the souls of men, is metaphorical. These depths, then, are difficulties or pressures, attended with fear, horror, danger, and trouble. And they are of two sorts:

1. Providential, in respect of outward distresses, calamities, and afflictions: Ps. lxix. 1, 2, "Save me, O God; for the waters are come in unto my soul. I stick in the mire of the deep, and there is no standing. I am come, Dp, into the depths of waters, and the flood overflows me." It is trouble, and the extremity of it, that the psalmist complains of, and which he thus expresseth. He was brought by it into a condition like unto a man ready to be drowned, being cast into the bottom of deep and miry waters, where he had no firm foundation to stand upon, nor ability to come out; as he farther explains himself, verse 15.

2. There are internal depths,-depths of conscience upon the account of sin: Ps. lxxxviii. 6, "Thou hast laid me in the lowest pit, in darkness, in the deeps." What he intends by this expression, the psalmist declares in the next words, verse 7, "Thy wrath lieth hard upon me." Sense of God's wrath upon his conscience upon the account of sin, was the deep he was cast into. So, verse 15, speaking of the same matter, saith he, "I suffer thy terrors;" and verse 16, “Thy fierce wrath goeth over me;" which he calls water, waves, and deeps, according to the metaphor before opened.

And these are the deeps that are here principally intended. "Clamat sub molibus et fluctibus iniquitatem suarum," says Austin on the place;" He cries out under the weight and waves of his sins."

This the ensuing psalm makes evident. Desiring to be delivered from these depths out of which he cried, he deals with God wholly about mercy and forgiveness; and it is sin alone from which forgiveness is a deliverance. The doctrine, also, that he preacheth upon his delivery is that of mercy, grace, and redemption, as is manifest from the close of the psalm; and what we have deliverance by is most upon our hearts when we are delivered.

It is true, indeed, that these deeps do oftentimes concur; as David speaks, "Deep calleth unto deep," Ps. xlii. 7. The deeps of affliction awaken the conscience to a deep sense of sin. But sin is the disease, affliction only a symptom of it: and in attending a cure, the disease itself is principally to be heeded; the symptom will follow or depart of itself.

Many interpreters think that this was now David's condition. By

great trouble and distress he was greatly minded of sin; and we must not, therefore, wholly pass over that intendment of the word, though we are chiefly to respect that which he himself, in this address unto God, did principally regard.

This, in general, is the state and condition of the soul managed in this psalm, and is as the key to the ensuing discourse, or the hinge on which it turns. As to my intendment from the psalm, that which ariseth from hence may be comprised in these two propositions:—

1. Gracious souls, after much communion with God, may be brought into inextricable depths and entanglements on the account of sin; for such the psalmist here expresseth his own condition to have been, and such he was.

2. The inward root of outward distresses is principally to be attended in all pressing trials;-sin, in afflictions.

Gracious souls may be brought into depths on the account of sin-What those depths are.

BEFORE I proceed at all in the farther opening of the words, they having all of them respect unto the proposition first laid down, I shall explain and confirm the truth contained in it; that so it may be understood what we say, and whereof we do affirm, in the whole process of our discourse.

It is a sad truth that we have proposed unto consideration. He that hears it ought to tremble in himself, that he may rest in the day of trouble. It speaks out the apostle's advice, Rom. xi. 20, "Be not high-minded, but fear;" and that also, 1 Cor. x. 12, "Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall." When Peter had learned this truth by woful experience, after all his boldness and frowardness, he gives this counsel to all saints, "That they would pass the time of their sojourning here in fear," 1 Pet. i. 17; knowing how near, in our greatest peace and serenity, evil and danger may lie at the door.

Some few instances of the many that are left on record, wherein this truth is exemplified, may be mentioned: Gen. vi. 9, "Noah was a just man, perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God." He did so a long season, and that in an evil time, amidst all sorts of temptations, "when all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth," verse 12. This put an eminency upon his obedience, and doubtless rendered the communion which he had with God, in walking before him, most sweet and precious to him. He was a gracious soul, upon

333 the redoubled testimony of God himself. But we know what befell this holy person. He that shall read the story that is recorded of him, Gen. ix. 20-27, will easily grant that he was brought into inextricable distress on the account of sin. His own drunkenness, verse 21, with the consequent of it, gives scandal unto and provokes the unnatural lust of his son, verse 22; and this leads him to the devoting of that son and his posterity unto destruction, verses 24, 25: all which, joined with the sense of God's just indignation, from whom he had newly received that tremendously miraculous deliverance, must needs overwhelm him with sorrow and anxiety of spirit.

The matter is more clear in David. Under the Old Testament none loved God more than he; none was loved of God more than he. The paths of faith and love wherein he walked are unto the most of us like the way of an eagle in the air,-too high and hard for us. Yet to this very day do the cries of this man after God's own heart sound in our ears. Sometimes he complains of broken bones, sometimes of drowning depths, sometimes of waves and water-spouts, sometimes of wounds and diseases, sometimes of wrath and the sorrows of hell; everywhere of his sins, the burden and trouble of them. Some of the occasions of his depths, darkness, entanglements, and distresses, we all know. As no man had more grace than he, so none is a greater instance of the power of sin, and the effects of its guilt upon the conscience, than he. But instances of this kind are obvious, and occur to the thoughts of all, so that they need not be repeated. I shall, then, show,

First, What in particular is intended by the depths and entanglements on the account of sin, whereinto gracious souls, after much communion with God, may be cast.

Secondly, Whence it comes to pass that so they may be, and that oftentimes so they are.

For the first, some or all of these things following do concur to the depths complained of :

1. Loss of the wonted sense of the love of God, which the soul did formerly enjoy. There is a twofold sense of the love of God, whereof believers in this world may be made partakers. There is the transient acting of the heart by the Holy Ghost with ravishing, unspeakable joys, in apprehension of God's love, and our relation unto him in Christ. This, or the immediate effect of it, is called Joy unspeakable and full of glory," 1 Pet. i. 8. The Holy Ghost shining into the heart, with a clear evidence of the soul's interest in all gospel mercies, causeth it to leap for joy, to exult and triumph in the Lord, as being for a season carried above all sense and thought of sin, self-temptation, or trouble. But as God gives the bread of his house unto all his children, so these dainties and high cordials he

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