Oh that the salvation, &c.— David here, making a review of the 14th Psalm, in which his distress in the time of Absalom's rebellion is described, desires of God to give his people a still further and new salvation; for the word ישׁעות ieshuoth, here is in the plural number, but in Psalms 14 it is in the singular; and therefore here it may be fitly rendered a complete salvation, or deliverance. The word captivity, in the next clause, is no objection to the interpretation above given of this Psalm; for it sometimes signifies no more than a great desolation, such as was that of Job's estate and family. See Job 42:10.
REFLECTIONS.—We have here,
1. The practical atheism of the natural heart. We first leave God far above out of our sight, and then dare sin securely.
2. The universal guilt of mankind is asserted. Not some, or a few in one age or nation, but all in every age, in every nation, have come short of the glory of God.
3. The greatness of this guilt is noticed, as flowing from that deep and desperate corruption in the nature of man, which produces abominable iniquity in the practice; particularly selfishness, covetousness, oppression, and habitual neglect of prayer. Note; Sin is the abominable thing which God hates: the least spot of it, uncleansed, must eternally exclude us from his presence.
4. The folly, as well as the wickedness, of sinners is great: they live without consideration; they have no knowledge of themselves, or of God; of their guilt here, or their ruin hereafter; the god of this world hath blinded their eyes.
5. Their security will be shortly at an end, and terrors overtake the finally impenitent. They shall be in great fear, where before they laughed at danger; ruin unavoidable shall destroy them, everlasting confusion cover them, and God shall despise their impotent resistance.
6. The Psalmist concludes with an earnest wish, that God would hasten the salvation of his faithful people, rescue them from amid the world which lieth in wickedness, and cause them to rejoice in Jesus, their glorious Redeemer and Saviour. Note; (1.) Though we are all by nature formed from the same mass of corruption, they who have justifying and sanctifying faith in the blood of Jesus, are saved from the pollutions which are in the world. (2.) All sinners, of whatever rank or degree, and especially those who in the spirit of Antichrist oppose the power of true religion, and persecute its professors, will perish together, in the day when the triumphs of God's saints shall be completed. (3.) We shall assuredly join the Psalmist's prayer, if our hearts possess his hopes, and cry, Come, Lord Jesus, come quickly.