2). He Describes the Period When He Had Been Unable to Find Rest in His Heart Because God's Hand Was On Him Giving Him No Peace (3-4).
‘When I kept silence, my bones wasted away,
Through my groaning all the day long.
For day and night your hand was heavy upon me,
My moisture was changed as with the drought of summer.' Selah.
All who truly know God will understand this experience. He had sinned, and now he could find no peace in his heart. He tried not facing up to it and keeping silent, but it did not work. He felt as though his bones were wasting away as a result of his groaning, and day and night he was conscious of God's hand weighing heavily on him, with the result that he felt drained of moisture like a man who was baking in the continually burning sun in the depths of summer. Compare Job 33:19-21, ‘he is chastened also with pain on his bed, and with continual strife in his bones, so that his life abhors bread, and his soul choice meat'.
For a similar effect on the bones see Psalms 6:2; Psalms 22:14; Proverbs 17:22. For His hand heavy on him see Psalms 38:2; Psalms 39:10. For the whole compare Hosea 7:14, ‘they have not cried to me with their heart, but they howl on their beds'. Compare also Psalms 22:15; Proverbs 17:21.