Hold up my goings in Thy paths, that my footsteps slip not.
Slippery places
The blessing of sanctified affliction is that we are made to see our weakness. David here seems as a little child, ready to fall, stretching out its hand and crying to its Father, “Hold up my goings,” etc.
I. The believer’s position is often a very slippery one. Christ told us, “in the world ye shall have tribulation,” and this is part of it. We are sent into the world to glorify God’s holy law. And this we do by a life of simple faith in Jesus.
II. It is so even in the paths of God. Even in His very paths. Liberty may degenerate into licence; holy caution into legalism; activity into neglect of communion with God, and that into neglect of service. Reliance in Christ to forgetfulness of the Spirit of Christ; and even joy in affliction to an overlooking of our sin, which is the cause of it.
III. The petition. “Hold up my goings,” etc.
1. It is the very picture of helplessness. “I can do nothing, cannot stir a step, without Thee.” Oh! to be brought here. The omnipotence of weakness.
2. It is the language of faith. In Psalms 17:6 he says, “I know that Thou wilt hear me.” How simple but how strong this faith.
3. There is also the testimony of an upright conscience.
4. The memory of God’s past dealings with him. (J. H. Evans, M. A.)
The Christian praying to be upheld
We cannot ascertain at what period of his life David wrote this prayer. It was probably before his lamentable fall If so, we are ready to say he must have forgotten it after he had written it, for otherwise his fall could not have happened. But let us make this prayer our own.
I. True religion is a walking or going on is God’s paths. Think of a country with many tracks in it perhaps, but without any marked roads or paths; a country like one immense down or waste, where in the main men go hither and thither just as they will. Now this is how most men regard the world and their own condition in it. But God appears and marks out certain ways or paths in this world, and bids us inquire for them and keep to them. And this is true religion--obedience to this Divine call. It is a ceasing to live at random, to live as God dictates.
II. The prayer we have to consider. It Implies--
1. A lively apprehension of the evil consequences of falling. An ordinary man does not care, he knows nothing of the malignity of sin. If for a moment sin has disturbed him by reason of some unusual transgression, the effect has been very shallow, very transient. Not so is it with the traveller in God’s ways. He knows how evil and bitter a thing sin is.
2. A consciousness of his proneness to fall. Liability is not a word strong enough. All, even the holiest creatures, are liable to fall--witness Adam and the once holy angels--and even in the holiest places. But in us there is a direct tendency to fall.
3. A belief in the ability and willingness of God to thus hold us up. “Thou wilt hear me, O God,” so he says in the next verse. There is such a thing as dwelling, if not too frequently, yet too exclusively on our weakness and danger. This is better than ignorance of them, and much better than knowing them, to be careless about them; but it comes far short of the perfection or completeness of true religion. That sees not alone the evil in us, but also the fulness of help for us which there is in God. Let us think much of the helping hand of God.
III. The manner in which we may expect such a prayer as this to be answered.
1. By mercifully removing occasions of falling out of our way.
2. By calling the sustaining graces of His servants into exercise. This a more honourable way for us.
3. By sending such afflictions as are calculated to keep them from falling.
4. By keeping alive a spirit of prayer within us for His upholding. As long as God keeps you prayerful, humbly and earnestly prayerful, be the ground what it may that you go over, you are safe. (C. Bradley, M. A.)
The religious course of life sustained
Religion is intercourse maintained between God and us. What condescension on the part of God. They lose much who are strangers to Him. Let us observe David, and learn to pray as he prayed.
I. See his course. “My goings.” Religion does not allow a man to sit still. All religion is vain unless he is, so to speak, set a-going--unless he says, “I will walk in Thy truth.” His goings are in God’s paths.
1. Those of His commands.
2. Of His ordinances.
3. Of His dispensations.
II. His concern respecting this course. “Hold up my goings,” etc. It is the language--
1. Of conviction. He know the injury that would result from a fall or even a slip in religion.
2. Of apprehension, for he knew his footsteps were prone to slide.
3. And of weakness; he knew he could not keep himself.
4. Of confidence, for he was sure that God could and would hold him up. (W. Jay.)
How to walk without slipping
In considering the feelings that breathe in this prayer we note that they express--
I. A vehement desire to walk in God’s ways. There is a sense in which all men desire to walk in God’s ways. For they know the consequences of disobedience, how it provokes His anger and involves punishment. They dislike obedience, but they desire its rewards. Like a hireling, they labour at their task, but only for its promised hire. Could they only be assured that they could get the wages without the work they would gladly leave it alone. But those who have been pardoned through the blood of Jesus, though they have no fear of punishment, yet desire to walk in all the commandments of the Lord, doing what is well-pleasing in His sight.
II. A distressing sense of weakness is discovered and bemoaned in himself. It is “when he would do good,” i.e. when he desires, and in proportion as he desires, to do good that he is conscious of the evil present with him. If he does not much desire to walk in God’s ways he will not be much distressed at his failures. But if his desire be vehement it is far otherwise with him.
III. The cry. Of one who believes that the Lord is able and willing to hold him up. It is the cry of faith, not alone of desire. And the lesson of the whole is, that would we be upheld, our cry must be of vehement desire, of deep sense of need, and of firm faith. (W. Grant.)