Shout for joy, all ye that are upright of heart.
How we rejoice in the Lord
1. When our joy is a fruit of the Spirit of the Lord (Galatians 5:22).
2. When it looketh to God and acknowledgeth Him the true God, and in His Son whom He hath sent, His God reconciled, appeased, and well pleased (Romans 5:1). Our prophet here calls the righteous to rejoice upon this ground. When a man rejoiceth in God’s favour, forgiving sin, and in fellowship with God and Jesus Christ, then he rejoiceth in the Lord.
3. When it respecteth the special pledges of God’s favour, as the works of regeneration, the happy change we find in ourselves, the shining and beautiful graces of God’s Holy Spirit, with the daily increase of them: thus to rejoice in the Lord’s image renewed, is to rejoice in the Lord Himself.
4. When our joy is set upon God’s ordinances and Word, in which the Lord revealeth Himself, and communicateth Himself more freely unto us, when in them we get a faster hold of God, and grow up into further fellowship with Him, especially when His gracious promises feed our hearts, and we rejoice in His truth and faithfulness, making them good not only to others, but also to our own selves.
5. When we rejoice in the hope of eternal glory, both in soul and body (Romans 5:3). Hoping and expecting and rejoicing that we shall fully enjoy Him as He is, and drink freely of that water of life, which we have already tasted. (T. Taylor, D. D.)
All ye that are upright in heart.--
Upright in heart
If you carry a line from the circumference, to the circumference again, as a diameter, it passes the centre, it flows from the centre, it looks to the centre both ways. God is the centre; the lines above and the lines below still respect and regard the centre; whether I do any action honest in the sight of men, or any action acceptable to God, whether I do things belonging to this life or to the next, still I must pass all through the centre, and direct all to the glory of God, and keep my heart right, without variation towards Him. For as I do no good action here, merely for the interpretation of good men, though that be one good and justifiable reason of my good actions: so I must do nothing for my salvation hereafter, merely for the love I bear to mine own soul, though that also be one good and justifiable reason of that action; but the primary reason in both, as well the actions that establish a good name, as the actions that establish eternal life, must be the glory of God. (J. Donne, D. D.)
Notes of uprightness
1. That is right which is tried so to be by a right line, and stands in correspondence unto it: the right line is God’s Word, the precepts of the Lord are right (Psalms 19:8), and then the heart is upright, when it is made straight by the Word, and is squared in all things by it. Every man boasts of the rightness and goodness of his heart, that cares but a little for God’s Word.
2. A right line doth ever discover that which is crooked; a good sign of a right heart is to discover, but not without true sorrow, the crookedness and hypocrisy of it, and to labour to correct and reform it (Psalms 119:80). Let my heart be upright in Thy statutes, that I be not ashamed: a right line shames a crooked; crooked legs are ashamed to be seen: when a man fears, and is ashamed of his hypocrisy and crookedness, and ever tendeth to straightness, it is a good note of some rightness of heart.
3. Consider the things which flow from the heart: if they be single and pure, warrantable and right, then a man may know his heart is upright; for such as the fruit is, such is the tree; if thou feedest on forbidden fruit, thou art a bad tree, and thy heart far from uprightness; an upright heart suffereth not rotten speeches in the mouth, idleness in the hand, injustice in the life, drunkenness in the brain, and disorder in the course.
4. Consider the ends and aims of our actions; the upright heart aimeth directly at God’s glory in all things, but the crooked heart pro-poundeth ever some crooked end and sinister respect unto good actions; as many come to church, get knowledge, and profess religion for vain glory and vain ends; some thrust among godly persons, and into good company, not because they are good or would be good, but because they would be thought so.
5. Consider if thy heart be the same in private as it would be thought in public. Abraham walked in uprightness before God according to the commandment (Genesis 17:1), how did he reform his house, teach his family, instruct his servants, and take God with him in providing a wife for Isaac, and in all things (Genesis 24:63). Isaac was the same in the field as he was in the house; he went out into the field to pray. Daniel was the same after the dangerous law that he was before, he opened his windows thrice a day as he was accustomed. So upright was Paul in his whole course, as he knew nothing by himself’(1 Corinthians 4:4). (T. Taylor, D. D.).