Ver. 23-25. I will spend mine arrows upon them— The judgments of God, enumerated in these verses, are often compared to arrows. Job 6:4.Psalms 38:2; Psalms 91:5. So Homer describes the pestilence in the Grecian camp, under the image of a deadly arrow, shot at the Greeks by Apollo; Iliad 1: ver. 51. The first of these arrows or plagues, is famine, (ver. 24.) with which they are threatened to be burnt or consumed: this was dreadfully fulfilled in their destruction by the Chaldeans, when they were so burnt with famine, that their visages were black as a coal, and their skin withered like a stick. Lamentations 4:8. What we render burning heat, is in the Margin of our Bibles, burning coals; or, as some, a burning carbuncle; a fiery, pestilential ulcer in the body. See Habakkuk 3:5. Venema inclines to their opinion, who would render it, they shall be consumed by lightning, which the original signifies in many places. Psalms 76:4; Psalms 78:48. Job 5:7. It seems to me most probable, that this first clause of the 24th verse denounces upon them the plagues of famine and its certain concomitants, pestilence and death. In the next clause, wild beasts and poisonous serpents are threatened to destroy and devour them; and, to complete their desolation, the unrelenting sword, ver. 25 is commissioned to make fearful havoc amongst them. Thus God here threatens his four sore judgments, as in Ezekiel 14:21. The sword and the famine, evil beasts, and the pestilence: See Revelation 6:8. We refer to the commentary on chap. 28: for the completion of these terrible denunciations.
REFLECTIONS.—It is the folly of sinners, that they often say, Tush, God shall not see: but his eyes run to and fro in the earth, and there is no darkness, nor shadow of death, where any of the workers of iniquity can hide themselves. We hear, therefore, the wrath of God denounced upon them, 1. In his abhorrence of them. They had once borne the character of children in profession at least; now that they act so undutifully, it is but justice to disinherit them. Note; Sin makes us odious in the sight of divine purity, and no sin can be so offensive as theirs, who make profession of religion. 2. In his hiding his face from them: not that he ceased to minute their iniquities, but he withdrew every token of his favour from them, to try whether they would seek after him; but they continued perverse and obstinate, and faithless to all their vows and engagements. Note; Their sin is greatly aggravated, who not only transgress the law they are under, but violate the covenant they once entered into. 3. As they had treated God with such contempt, he will punish them in kind, making them a prey to blind and idolatrous nations, and obliging them to serve those whom they regarded as vile and despicable: such were the Babylonians and Romans, who subdued them; and such were all those Gentiles, who, on their rejection of Christ and his gospel, were admitted into covenant with God, from which by their wickedness they were excluded. 4. Their terrible end is foretold. The fire of God shall burn up their pleasant land and goodly cities; God's bow shall be bent, and his quiver emptied with repeated strokes of judgment; the famine shall devour, the pestilence consume them; the beasts of the field and poisonous serpents shall fix their envenomed fangs upon them, whilst the sword of the enemy, merciless and drenched in blood, shall spare neither young nor old, till they are destroyed. Note; God's plagues will overtake the sinner sooner or later; at least, if not before, in the everlasting burnings of hell.