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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
We have here an exhortation to praise God; and this is always in season. Perhaps we need more stirring up to praise than to prayer, yet it ought to be as natural for us to praise God as it is for the birds to sing. Thus the Psalm begins, —
Psa_81:1. Sing aloud unto God our strength:
Yes, the strength which the Lord gives you should be spent in praising him. “Sing aloud.” Throw your whole soul into it. If the Lord makes you strong, then give your strength back to him in sacred song: “Sing aloud unto God our strength.”
Psa_81:1. Make a joyful noise unto the God of Jacob.
Other gods, such as Moloch, and Ashtaroth, are worshipped with mournful cries and sorrowful lamentations, but the God of Jacob, the God that heareth prayer, the God of salvation, the God of the covenant, is to be worshipped with joy. He is the happy God, and he loves happy worshippers: “Make a joyful noise unto the God of Jacob.” You do not need to be forced to praise him, but you will do it with alacrity and delight; the very sweetness of your song will consist in the cheerfulness of it:
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It is “a statute” that we should praise God; it is “a law” that we should make a joyful noise before him. Happy law, and happy men who are under such a law! Let us be quick to obey it, and let not the King’s statute be disregarded by any one of us.
Psa_81:5. This he ordained in Joseph for a testimony, when he went out through the land of Egypt: where I heard a language that I understood not.
God understands his people’s language, and in very truth he understands everything; but here he uses a Hebraic to show that he did not care for the speech of the Egyptians: “I heard a language that I understood not.” This sentence is like that other expression, “I never knew you.” Of course, the Lord knows everyone as a matter of acquaintance, but not as a matter of affection. He cared not for the Egyptians; they were aliens to him; he went out against the land of Egypt. It was for Joseph, and for his own people who were under the leadership of Joseph in that heathen land, that he ordained this statute that they should praise the name of Jehovah.
Psa_81:6. I removed his shoulder from the burden:
Is not that true of many of you in a spiritual sense? Oh, what a burden of sin we used to carry! How have we got rid of it? Does not the Lord here remind us of how we lost that grievous load? “I removed his shoulder from the burden.”
Psa_81:6. His hands were delivered from the pots.
We used to be busy enough with the slave’s occupation of making bricks without straw. Hard was the task when we were under legal bondage, harder still the toil when under the bondage of our own sin, slaves of our own selves: who could ever have a more tyrant master than himself? But that is all over now, and the Lord can say, “I removed his shoulder from the burden: his hands were delivered from the pots.”
Psa_81:7. Thou calledst in trouble, and I delivered thee;
What a gracious word is this! How it reminds us, in the most loving tones, of our obligations to the Lord!” Thou calledst in trouble, and I delivered thee.”
Psa_81:7. I answered thee in the secret place of thunder: I proved thee at the waters of Meribah. Selah.
A very humbling sentence this! God has often proved us, and he has often disproved us. When he has tried us, we have not endured the test as we ought to have done. We have murmured and complained, and the waters, which ought to have been waters of joy and of happy patience, have been waters of strife. “Selah “That is, “Pause,” screw up the harp-strings, lift up the heart. Such a Psalm as this is to be read by installments, with little halts on the road, for us to meditate and think upon the truth brought before us. We may well pause here when we hear the Lord reminding us of our faults and of his great mercy to us: “I delivered thee; I answered thee; I proved thee at the waters of Meribah. Selah.”
Psa_81:8. Hear, O my people, and I will testify unto thee: O Israel, if thou wilt hearken unto me;
What! Is there any question as to whether God’s people will hearken to him or not? Alas! sometimes our ears grow very heavy, we are so occupied with the cares of the world, so sleepy while passing over the Enchanted Ground, that we do not hear that dear voice to which we ought to give heed whenever it speaks: “Hear, O my people, O Israel, if thou wilt hearken unto me.”
Psa_81:9. There shall no strange god be in thee; neither shalt thou worship any strange god.
It is strange that we should ever wish to do so. Oh, that we might be wholly delivered from everything that looks like idolatry, and be enabled to cleave to the worship of the one living and true God with the serenity and certainty of faith!
Psa_81:10-11. I am the LORD thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt: open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it. But my people would not hearken to my voice; and Israel would none of me.
Oh, how plaintive is this lament! Is it not full of sorrow? “Israel would none of me.” Her own God, her own Friend, her own Benefactor, her own Husband has to cry, “Israel would none of me, — would not have my law, my promise, my guidance, myself, — Israel would none of me.”
Psa_81:12. So I gave them up —
Dreadful word! If God gives us up, even for a moment, there is no telling into what sin we may plunge; and if he were to give us up altogether, —ah, me! this were the most direful of sentences: “So I gave them up” —
Psa_81:12. Unto their own hearts’ lust: and they walked in their own counsels.
O God, save us from this awful state! This indeed is hell — to be given up of God. Pray, dear brothers and sisters, that such a terrible curse may never come upon you. Yet it is a most righteous punishment; if a man will not have God, and will give God up, what can be a more righteous retribution than that God should give him up? He does so at last with ungodly men, yet he does it very reluctantly, and he says, “How shall I give thee up?” May he never give up one of you!
Psa_81:13. Oh that my people had hearkened unto me, and Israel had walked in my ways:
And can we not echo that lament, and say, “Oh, that we had hearkened unto God, and that we had walked in his ways”? What a happy life would the believer enjoy if he always had an ear for God’s commandments and a foot for his ways!” Oh that my people had hearkened unto me, and Israel had walked in my ways!”
Psa_81:14-15. I should soon have subdued their enemies, and turned my hand against their adversaries. The haters of the LORD should have submitted themselves unto him; but their time should have endured for ever.
“Their time” — the time of his own people — “should have endured for ever.” They might have been always conquerors, always kings, always favored of God, always walking in the light, as God is in the light. So might it be with us if we would first hearken to God, and next, walk in his ways. The mark on the ear and the mark on the foot are two of the tokens of Christ’s sheep: “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me.” May we all have both the ear-mark and the foot-mark!
Psa_81:16. He should have fed them also with the finest of the wheat:
How sweet would gospel doctrine be if gospel precepts were observed!
When you do not enjoy the preaching of the Word, is it not because you are out of health, and your spiritual appetite is impaired: “He should have fed them also with the finest of the wheat.” When the soul lives near to God, then the Word of the Lord is sweeter than honey and the honey-comb.
Psa_81:16. And with honey out of the rock should I have satisfied thee.
You know what this “honey out of the rock” is. You have tasted it, and in days gone by you have feasted on it; perhaps you have not had much of it of late. If so, remember why this is. God will give his children bread, but he will not give them honey unless they live very near to him; you shall have the necessaries of life, but not luxuries. The high and heavenly joys of the divine life shall be denied to you if you work at a distance from your God; but if you keep close to him, you shall have the finest of the wheat, and you shall be satisfied with honey out of the rock. May the Lord bless the reading of his Word to us, and may he draw nearer to himself! Amen.
Psa_81:1. Sing aloud unto God our strength: make a joyful noise unto the God of Jacob.
In these days, the Psalm would have to be altered if they are to suit the dogmas of modern thought, for “the God of Jacob” is altogether rejected by those wondrous thinkers who think they know so much. The God of the New Testament, they say, is a very different Being from the God of the Old Testament. According to them, the Old Testament God is too stern; but the New Testament God is far softer, quite effeminate, indeed, if they rightly describe him. But we do not hesitate to say, over and over again that the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob,-the immutable and unchangeable One,-the God of Sinai, is as much our God as the God of Calvary, so we delight “to make a joyful noise unto the God of Jacob.”
Psa_81:2-6. Take a psalm, and bring hither the timbrel, the pleasant harp with the psaltery. Blow up the trumpet in the new moon, in the time appointed, on our solemn feast day. For this was a statute for Israel, and a law of the God of Jacob. This he ordained in Joseph for a testimony, when he went out through the land of Egypt: where I heard a language that I understood not. I removed his shoulder from the burden: his hands were delivered from the pots.
Child of God, have you forgotten the time of your deliverance? God has not; and here he reminds his people Israel of their deliverance out of Egypt. So he says concerning you, “I removed his shoulder from the burden: his hands were delivered from the pots.” Do you not remember the joy of that glad moment when the burden of sin was taken away from you, and the pots of your own self-salvation lay broken at your feet? Glory be to him who brought us out from that terrible house of bondage!
Psa_81:7. Thou calledst in trouble, and I delivered thee; I answered thee in the secret place of thunder: I proved thee at the waters of Meribah. Selah.
But how sadly did they stand the test! You and I, too, have not only received much mercy at the hand of God, but we also have had our testing-times. We can look back to the waters of strife with deep regret that there we failed so sadly.
Psa_81:8-10. Hear, O my people, and I will testify unto thee: O Israel, if thou wilt hearken unto me; there shall no strange god be in thee; neither shalt thou worship any strange god. I am the LORD thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt: open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it.
What a wondering verse this is! We have been so accustomed to hear the expression, “I am the Lord thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt,” followed by the law; but here it is followed by a gracious encouragement to us to pray: “Open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it.” Whatever force the law derived from that preface, this exhortation derives the same force, and no child of God ought to forget that. He who delivered you from the burden of sin bids you open your mouth wide, and he will fill it; and after your deliverance from guilt, do you not feel that you may well ask great things of such a gracious God?
Psa_81:11-15. But my people would not hearken to my voice; and Israel would none of me. So I gave them up unto their own heart lust: and they walked in their own counsels. Oh that my people had hearkened unto me, and Israel had walked in my ways! I should soon have subdued the enemies, and turned my hand against their adversaries. The haters of the LORD should have submitted themselves unto him: but their time should have endured for ever.
Alas, poor Israel! Through what sufferings and captivities didst thou go because thou wouldst not trust in the Lord, and how often some of God’s children have had to go through years of sorrow and spiritual captivity because of their lack of close walking with their God, and complete obedience to him! May we learn from the sins of others, and be helped to walk closely with our Master!
Psa_81:16. He should have fed them also with the finest of the wheat: and with honey out of the rock should I have satisfied thee.
If the Word of God does not seem to feed us as once it did, it will surely be because we have not hearkened to our Lord, or walked in his ways. May he give us grace to render complete obedience to his holy will!
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Thy faithful people bless,