Salmi 116:12 Commento

This is a thanksgiving psalm; it is not certain whether David penned it upon any particular occasion or upon a general review of the many gracious deliverances God had wrought for him, out of six troubles and seven, which deliverances draw from him many very lively expressions of devotion, love, and gratitude; and with similar pious affections our souls should be lifted up to God in singing it. Observe, I. The great distress and danger that the psalmist was in, which almost drove him to despair (Psa 116:3, Psa 116:10, Psa 116:11). II. The application he made to God in that distress (Psa 116:4). III. The experience he had of God's goodness to him, in answer to prayer; God heard him (Psa 116:1, Psa 116:2), pitied him (Psa 116:5, Psa 116:6), delivered him (Psa 116:8). IV His care respecting the acknowledgments he should make of the goodness of God to him (Psa 116:12). 1. He will love God (Psa 116:1). 2. He will continue to call upon him (Psa 116:2, Psa 116:13, Psa 116:17). 3. He will rest in him (Psa 116:7). 4. He will walk before him (Psa 116:9). 5. He will pay his vows of thanksgiving, in which he will own the tender regard God had to him, and this publicly (Psa 116:13-15, Psa 116:17-19). Lastly, He will continue God's faithful servant to his life's end (Psa 116:16). These are such breathings of a holy soul as bespeak it very happy.

INTRODUCTION TO PSALM 116 Theodoret applies this psalm to the distresses of the Jews in the times of the Maccabees under Antiochus Epiphanes; and R. Obadiah interprets some passages in it of the Grecians of those times; but it rather seems to have been written by David on account of some troubles of his, out of which he was delivered; and refers either to the times of Saul, and the persecutions he endured from him, particularly when he was beset round about by him and his men in the wilderness of Maon, Sa1 23:26, to which he may have respect Psa 116:3. The inscription of the psalm in the Syriac version is, "the progress of the new people returning to the Christian worship, as a child to understanding: and as to the letter, it was said when Saul stayed at the door of the cave where David lay hid with his men;'' see Sa1 24:4. But since mention is made of Jerusalem, Psa 116:19, where the psalmist would praise the Lord for his deliverance, which as yet was not in his hands nor in the hands of the Israelites, but of the Jebusites; some have thought it was written on account of the conspiracy of Absalom against him, and who, hearing that Ahithophel was among the conspirators, said the words related in Psa 116:11, it is very probable it was composed after the death of Saul, and when he was settled in the kingdom, as Jarchi observes, and was delivered out of the hands of all his enemies; and very likely much about the same time as the eighteenth psalm was, which begins in the same manner, and has some expressions in it like to what are in this. David was a type of Christ, and some apply this psalm to him.

I will take the cup of salvation,.... Or "salvations" (n); not the eucharistic cup, or the cup in the Lord's supper, which the apostle calls "the cup of blessing", Co1 10:16; though some so think, and that the psalmist represents the saints under the Gospel dispensation; nor the cup of afflictions or martyrdom for the sake of Christ; being willing, under a sense of mercies received, to bear or suffer anything for his sake he should call him to; as knowing it would be a token to him of salvation, and work for his good: but rather an offering of praise for temporal salvation, and for spiritual and eternal salvation; in allusion to a master of a family, who at the close of a feast or meal, used to take up a cup in his hands, and give thanks; see Mat 26:27; and call upon the name of the Lord; invocation of the name of the Lord takes in all worship and service of him, public and private, external and internal; and particularly prayer, which is calling upon the Lord in the name of Christ, with faith and fervency, in sincerity and truth: and the sense of the psalmist is, that he would not only give thanks for the mercies he had received, but continue to pray to God for more; and this was all the return he was capable of making. (n) "salutum", Pagninus, Montanus, Vatablus, Gejerus, Michaelis; "salvationum", Musculus.

"What," he asks, "what reward shall I give unto the Lord, for all the benefits that He has returned unto me?" [Psalm 116:12]. He says not, for all the benefits that He has done unto me but "for all the benefits that He has returned unto me." What deeds then on the man's part had preceded, that all the benefits of God were not said to be given, but returned? What had preceded, on the man's part, save sins? God therefore repays good for evil, while unto Him men repay evil for good; for such was the return of those who said, "This is the heir: come, let us kill him." [Matthew 21:38]

I am certainly obliged to love the Redeemer, and I know what he said to Peter: "Peter, do you love me? Feed my sheep." This was said once, said again, said a third time. Love was being questioned and toil commanded, because where the love is greater, the toil is less. "What shall I pay back to the Lord for all that he has paid back for me?" If I say that what I am paying back is my herding his sheep, even here it is "not I who am doing it but the grace of God with me." So when can I be found to be paying him back, since he gets in first every time? And yet, because we love freely, because we are herding his sheep, we look for a reward.How shall this be? How can "I love freely and that's why I'm herding sheep" be consistent with "I request a reward, because I'm herding sheep"? This could not possibly happen; in no way at all could a reward be sought from one who is loved freely, unless the reward were the very one who is being loved. I mean, if what we are paying back for his having redeemed us is our herding his sheep, what are we paying back for his having made us shepherds? Being bad shepherds, you see—which God preserve us from—is something we are by our own badness; whereas good shepherds—which God grant we may be—is something we can be only by his grace.

Christ loved you before you existed; he created you; he predestined you before the foundation of the world; once created through the agency of your father and mother, he has reared you. It is not your parents, you see, who made you, though they hand on to you their family characteristics. He loved you, he created you, he reared you, he gave himself up for you, he listened to insults for you, he endured wounds for you, he redeemed you with his blood. Aren't you overwhelmed, and won't you say, "What shall I give back to the Lord for all that he has given to me?" What will you give back to the Lord for all that he has given to you? Listen to his saying, "Whoever has loved father or mother more than me is not worthy of me." Listen to him saying it, fear the menace contained in it, love the promise implied in it.What have you given back to the Lord for all that he has given to you? So, all right, you have already given something back, eh? Well, what have you given back? Have you saved him as he has saved you? Have you opened up eternal life for him, as he has done for you? Have you created him, as he did you? Did you make him the Lord as he made you a person? Have you given anything back to him that does not come back to you? If you look frankly at the truth of the matter, you have not given him anything.… "For what do you have that you have not received?" Why don't you find something you can give back to the Lord? Give him back yourself, give him back what he has made. Give him back yourself, not what is yours, his creation, not your perversion.

For it is absurd, the height of stupidity, no, of extreme insanity, for those only to sing the praises of the pilot who ride the rough waves and are borne on the breakers and who pass their lives in great misfortune, while those who are situated outside the range of fire, as the proverb has it, being spectators rather than contestants, hurl their blasphemous taunts at the ringmaster when they cannot pelt him literally. That those who cultivate virtue praise the God of the universe not merely when they are borne on favorable winds, but even when they are struggling with billow and storm, can be perceived from the exclamation of the blessed David, a man who spent a lifetime in warfare and struggle with countless misfortunes: “What shall I render to the Lord for all the things that he has rendered to me?”

After invoking others to unite in praise, the writer celebrates God's protecting and delivering care towards him, and then represents himself and the people of God as entering the sanctuary and uniting in solemn praise, with prayer for a continued blessing. Whether composed by David on his accession to power, or by some later writer in memory of the restoration from Babylon, its tone is joyful and trusting, and, in describing the fortune and destiny of the Jewish Church and its visible head, it is typically prophetical of the Christian Church and her greater and invisible Head. (Psa. 118:1-29) The trine repetitions are emphatic (compare Psa 118:10-12, Psa 118:15-16; Psa 115:12-13). Let . . . say--Oh! that Israel may say. now--as in Psa 115:2; so in Psa 118:3-4. After "now say" supply "give thanks." that his mercy--or, "for His mercy."

These are modes of expressing acts of worship (compare Psa 116:4; Psa 50:14; Jon 2:9).