Come, my people— These verses contain the conclusion wherewith the prophet, speaking in the name of God, seals and confirms the hope of the pious—delivered in the preceding verses. He exhorts them to hide themselves, and patiently to await, amid the exercises of piety and devotion, for a short time, the completion of their promised deliverance, during the rage of a terrible persecution permitted by God, for the proving and purifying of his church; assured that God would most certainly repress and severely punish the fury of their enemies, the blood of the martyrs and confessors of the truth, which the earth might seem to have covered, being disclosed and avenged; while on the other hand, he would perfect the deliverance of his people, and increase his blessings of every kind upon them. The metaphor is taken from the raging of a mighty storm; during the continuance whereof, men fly into their houses, and shut their doors to secure themselves from its devastation.
REFLECTIONS.—1st, The work of heaven is everlasting praise, and true believers delight to begin the service upon earth. We have here the song which, in the latter day, shall be sung in the land of Judah, the church of the firstborn.
1. God hath prepared for his faithful people a city, his church; a strong city, which needs no human defences, when God himself is in the midst of her; and his salvation her walls and bulwarks. Note; They dwell in safety who have fled to Jesus, the city of refuge, and live by faith in him the Son of God who loved them, and gave himself for them.
2. He commands the gates to be opened for the admission of the righteous nation, that keepeth the word of his truth. All that in Jesus Christ the way, the truth, and the life, draw near to God, are now accepted as righteous, welcome to partake of the ordinances of his church below, and, continuing to cleave to him, shall have hereafter an entrance ministered to them abundantly, into the everlasting kingdom of our God and Saviour above.
3. The prophet exults in the security of those who thus receive and trust God's promises. Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee; peace with God, peace of conscience, peace under every provocation, peace in every trial, peace that passeth all understanding, shall the soul enjoy, which is content to trust its all in the hands of Jesus. Lord, increase our faith! increase our peace!
4. He exhorts to exercise faith at all times in the Saviour, and under all difficulties to trust in his meritorious sacrifice for pardon and acceptance, in his grace for strength, in his promises for every future blessing; and he will never disappoint our hopes, for in the Lord Jah Jehovah is everlasting strength, or the rock of ages; he is able to save to the uttermost; while fixed on him, we shall be immoveable, since the rock of ages is our foundation. Note; Had we a heart to trust God more firmly, we should certainly find cause to praise him more frequently and joyfully.
2nd, We have,
1. The humiliation of the proud, and the destruction of the lofty city, Babylon, now trod upon by those who before were oppressed by her; or of spiritual Babylon, on which the poor persecuted saints of the Most High shall trample, when it is utterly laid waste before the Lord in the latter day.
2. The regard that God shews his people. The way of the just is uprightness, a strait path of uniform and steady obedience: or, as it may be read, the way of the Lord to the just is evennesses, agreeable to his own perfections of wisdom, goodness, truth, and equity; so that they have ever cause to address him as thou most upright, whose ways of providence and grace are perfectly pure, and transcendantly excellent; thou dost weigh, or mark out, or make even, the path of the just, dost consider and approve it as good, or, removing every obstacle, enable him to walk in the paths of holiness.
3. The people of God profess their attendance on him, and desires after him. In the way of to judgments, thy word, and ordinances, or thy chastisements which we have endured, we have waited for thee, patiently expecting to see thy salvation: the desire of our soul is to thy name, and to the remembrance of thee; in the midst of our heaviest afflictions, to thee our affections go forth; we think upon thee, and derive support from the remembrance of thy grace, power, love, and faithfulness. With my soul ardently have I desired thee in the night, literally waking when others slept, or under the darkest dispensations of Providence; yea, with my spirit within me, will I seek thee early, not forgetting him in prosperity; but when the day returned, with the dawn meeting him with prayer and praise: for when thy judgments are in the earth, (those that shall be laid upon the sinners, and the followers of Antichrist) the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness, the justice of God in his judgments on others, and his afflictions on themselves; and, profiting under them, will bring forth the peaceable fruits of righteousness, in penitence, faith, patience, love and obedience. Note; (1.) They who wait for God in his ways shall assuredly meet him to their comfort. (2.) If our affections be not warm towards God, we need be jealous lest there be a rival in our hearts. (3.) The earlier in life we begin to seek God, the pleasanter shall we find his ways. (4.) Under our own corrections we must humble our souls, and from his visitations on others take warning; then, however heavy the stroke, the issue will be to us righteousness and peace.
4. The impenitence of the wicked is observed as the prelude to their ruin. Let favour be shewed to the wicked, yet will he not learn righteousness; providential mercies are no more effectual to lead him to repentance, than judgments to drive him: in the land of uprightness, where the most plentiful knowledge of gospel-truth is diffused, and the power of gospel-grace most eminently displayed, will he deal unjustly, persist in his iniquities, in opposition to every warning of God's word and ministers, and will not behold the majesty of the Lord, acknowledge his power, providence, and goodness: nor worship, serve, and obey him, as in duty bound. Lord, when thy hand is lifted up, or thy high hand, they will not see that hand in their mercies, or in the judgments visible in the earth, and hanging over their own heads, obstinately hardened, and wilfully shutting their eyes against conviction. Note; (1.) To dwell in a land of uprightness is an inestimable mercy; and there to dwell in sin and darkness, where light and grace plentifully abound, will be aggravated guilt. (2.) Forgetfulness of God, and inattention to his word and works, are the ruin of men's souls. (3.) They who will not see are justly given up to judicial blindness.
5. Their destruction is near and sure. The judgments which they would not fear, they must feel. They shall see the prosperity of God's people, and be ashamed for their envy: the zeal thou hast for thy people, the Lord's regard for them, and his care to vindicate their wrongs, yea, fire shall devour thine enemies, the fire of present judgments, or the unquenchable fire which shall torment their bodies and souls in hell. Let the enemies of God's people hear and tremble!
3rdly. We have,
1. The church's dependance on God, ascribing to his grace alone all the good which was found in her. Lord, thou wilt ordain peace for us, whatever enemy seeks to trouble our repose; for thou also hast wrought all our works in us, or for us; whatever good is in our souls, thou, Lord, art alone the author of it; whatever good we are the instruments of communicating to others, thy grace is alone to be acknowledged; whatever blessings or comforts we receive, from thy hand alone they come.
2. The humbling confession and gracious purpose of God's people. O Lord our God, whose we are, and whom we ought and desire to serve, with shame we acknowledge other lords besides thee have had dominion over us; either this is the confession of the Jews, bewailing their captivity and idolatries, or of the church, oppressed by the persecuting powers of Antichrist; or, more generally, of every believer who laments the bondage of corruption, and earnestly longs for a deliverance from it, every vile affection being a tyrant; or of the penitent burdened under the guilt of sin, and more or less led captive by Satan. But now recovered by grace, we shall be enabled to say, by thee only, by thy grace supported, and by thy power delivered, will we make mention of thy name, cleave alone to thee as our God and guide, and ascribe to thee the praise of all our salvation.
3. They triumph over their oppressors. They are dead, they shall not live; they are deceased, they shall not rise; either the Babylonish monarchs, whose kingdom never rose from its ruins, or the enemies of the church in general, whether Pagan, Papal, or Mahomedan, who will be finally destroyed, and no more oppress the people of God, therefore, or because, thou hast visited and destroyed them, and made all their memory to perish, consigned them to eternal shame in the place of torment.
4. The great increase of the church is declared. Thou hast increased the nation, O Lord, thou hast increased the nation, either the Jewish nation by proselytes, or rather the Christian church, called the righteous nation, by numerous converts of Jews and Gentiles: and this is spoken as already done, because known of God in his infinite prescience. Thou art glorified in the salvation of thy people, and in the ruin of their enemies: thou hast removed it far unto all the ends of the earth, in a state of dispersion, from whence they are now delivered; or he had spread into every land the knowledge of his grace, and gathered a people for himself out of all nations.
5. Before their restoration, a state of great trouble is foreseen and lamented; either of the Jews groaning under their captivity, or the church, under the perilous times which precede the destruction of Antichrist. Lord, in trouble have they visited thee; this being the great use and benefit of afflictions, to bring us nearer to God, from whom prosperity is too apt to alienate our hearts: they poured out a prayer when thy chastening was upon them; for this is the constant method of all God's people, in prayer and supplications to make their requests known unto him: nor are they, alas! in general ever so earnest and importunate, as when they see his chastisements bringing to remembrance their sins. Like as a woman with child, that draweth near the time of her delivery, is in pain, and crieth out in her pangs, which are the most acute and bitter, so have we been in thy sight, O Lord, in deep distress, and crying for deliverance: we have been with child, big with hopes; we have been in pain, travailing in prayers and tears, yet disappointed, and our hopes abortive, so long is our salvation delayed: we have brought forth wind, our prayers ineffectual and unanswered; we have not wrought any deliverance in the earth, so as to regain our liberty, or, as Bishop Lowth reads it, Salvation is not wrought in the land, to deliver us from our enemies; neither have the inhabitants of the world fallen, but continue to oppress the cause of godliness and truth. Note; (1.) God may, for wise ends, long suffer his own cause and people to be oppressed by wicked men. (2.) However long or severe our trials, we must continue to pray, and not faint. (3.) If we do so, we shall assuredly not be disappointed at the last. For,
6. Christ answers his people's prayers. Thy dead men shall live; spiritually, by the power of Jesus, the dead in sin shall be quickened, and in the latter day vast additions of living souls be made to the church; or it refers to the resurrection, when the dead in Christ shall rise first, and reign with him, together with my dead body shall they arise, as the bodies of many saints did, when Jesus himself arose, Matthew 27:51-53 or as my dead body shall they arise, certainly, and as gloriously: awake, and sing, ye that dwell in the dust; awake at the gospel call, ye dead in sin; or awake from the dust of death, ye sleeping saints; arise to meet your Lord in the air, and join in songs of praise that never will have an end: for thy dew is as the dew of herbs, thy spirit as effectual to quicken the souls and bodies of the spiritually and naturally dead, as the dew causes the herb to shoot that seemed dead in the ground, during the sleep of winter, and the earth shall cast out the dead; when, at the word of Jesus, they that are in their graves shall hear and live. Note; Whatever our afflictions here may be, if we have but a part in the resurrection of the just, we need not ask or wish for more.
4thly, We have the conclusion of the former song.
1. Christ calls his people to a place of safety, when he is about to execute his wrath on the wicked. Come my people, the endearing title of property and relation, and the assurance of safety; enter thou into thy chambers, where they may be safe; as Rahab when Jericho was taken, or the Israelites when the destroying angel passed through the land; and shut thy doors about thee, to be secure and private, to pour out the voice of prayer when danger threatens: hide thyself from the impending storm under the shadow of Almighty grace, as it were for a little moment, until the indignation be overpast; the time will be momentary, for a short work will God make on the earth; his wrath, when it begins to consume the wicked, will quickly make an end of them.
2. He goes forth to execute his judgments. For behold, to the astonishment of the surprised world, the Lord cometh out of his place, in terrible majesty to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity; be they never so great, never so numerous, their iniquity will receive a just recompence of reward: the earth also shall disclose her blood, and shall no more cover her slain; the blood of saints and martyrs, from Abel to the last persecuted believer, shall then be brought to light; and, however secretly murders may have been committed, blood will cry for vengeance; or it may signify the immense carnage to be made in the battle of Armageddon, so that the earth shall not be able to drink up the blood. Revelation 14:20; Revelation 19:17-18. Note; The day is near when God will bring every secret thing into judgment. Let the guilty tremble.