If I say, I will speak thus I will give sentence for the ungodly in this manner. I should offend against the generation of thy children
By grieving, discouraging, and condemning them, and by tempting them to revolt from thee and thy service. By the generation of God's children must be understood all true believers; those who have undertaken the service of God, and entered into covenant with him; part of which covenant and profession is to believe in God's providence; which, therefore, to deny, question, or doubt of, is to break the covenant, to prevaricate, to deal perfidiously; according to the meaning of the word בגד, bagad, here rendered, offend. The reader will observe, that “the psalmist,” having particularly described the disease, “proceeds now, like a skilful physician of the soul, to prescribe a medicine for it, which is compounded of many salutary ingredients. And first, to the suggestions of nature, grace opposes the examples of the children of God, who never fell from their hope in another world, because of their sufferings in this. For a man, therefore, to distrust the divine goodness on that account, is to belie their hope, renounce their faith, and strike his name out of their list.”