1.
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I cried unto God. Hezekiah had no other solution for
all the troubles that beset him.
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2.
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By day and by night!
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My sore ran in the night. It is difficult to tell how
this translation is justified — even though it fits the king’s
disease aptly enough. In fact the reading should probably be: My hand
(Hebrew yod) was stretched out (in prayer) in the
night (cp. AV mg., RSV).
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My soul refused to be comforted (as also Jacob at the
loss of Joseph: Gen. 37:35; cp. v. 15 here). So also Hezekiah found no comfort
(Isa. 38:10-18) until the prophet returned with his amazing message.
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3.
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Selah. Is God really the Rock of his Salvation? And so
also in v. 9. But in v. 15 the problem is a problem no longer. Passover
sacrifice had meant redemption for Israel in ancient days. And so also, surely,
in the Passover Hezekiah had reinstituted.
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6.
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I call to remembrance my song in the night. Another
allusion to Passover, the only feast celebrated at nighttime! Link with v. 5b,
thus: I call to remembrance the years of ancient times: they are my song in
the night.
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8,9.
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His mercy... his promise... his tender mercies. With
hardly an exception, these words refer to God’s covenants of promise.
(Among other passages, consider Gen. 32:10; Psa. 98:3; 89:14; Mic. 7:20; Luke
1:54,55,72.) In Hezekiah’s time they had apparently come to nought:
Assyrian invasion had almost destroyed the people as a nation; and with the king
himself sick unto death, how was the great Promise to David (2 Samuel 7) to be
maintained?
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10.
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And I said, This is my infirmity. Hezekiah’s real
infirmity was a (temporary) loss of faith — and he knew it. But of course
God — such a God! — would see him through! Verses 12-20 supply all
the necessary reassurance.
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13.
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Thy way is (made known) in the sanctuary. Psalm
73:17 again! All was darkness and uncertainty, until Hezekiah went into the
house of the Lord, and forthwith his problem was solved (Isa.
37:14-35).
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Who is so great a God as our God? Here is the right and
proper answer to the scorn and blasphemy of Rabshakeh and his royal master (Isa.
36:14,15,18-20; 37:10-14).
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18.
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The voice of thy thunder was in the heavens; the lightnings
lightened the world: the earth trembled and shook. The remembrance of God at
Sinai prepares the way for another great Theophany, in the devastation of
Sennacherib’s host: Isa. 37:36.
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20.
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Thou leddest thy people like a flock by the hand of Moses
and Aaron, and now, centuries later, again... this time by the hand of
Isaiah and Eliakim.
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1.
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Note how the pronoun “I” dominates vv. 1-12.
Thereafter there is a dramatic change. What a difference a new perspective
makes!
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2.
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In the day of trouble is the same as
“Jacob’s trouble”: v. 15; cp. Psa. 50:15; Hab. 3:16; Jer.
30:7; Isa. 63:9.
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My soul refused to be comforted. Compare Jacob (Gen.
37:35) and Rachel (Jer. 31:15). And the apostle-fishermen: “We have toiled
all night, and taken nothing!” (Luke 5:5)
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4.
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Thou holdest mine eyes waking. Remarkably, Luke 24:16
has the same phrase, about the two disciples who met the risen Jesus on the way
to Emmaus.
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5.
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I have considered the days of old, the years of ancient
times. This verse is quoting Deut. 32:7. That chapter is a prophecy of (a)
Israel apostate, (b) Israel forsaken, and finally (c) Israel restored.
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6.
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My song in the night: (1) The angels in the fields of
Bethlehem (Luke 2); (2) Paul and Silas in the Philippian jail (Acts
16).
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7-9.
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Will the Lord cast off for ever? and will he be favourable
no more? Is his mercy clean gone for ever? doth his promise fail for evermore?
Hath God forgotten to be gracious? hath he in anger shut up his tender mercies?
Here is another “torrent of questions”, like those in Psa. 74.
All of them are to be answered by appeal to the character of God:
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“And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, The
Lord, The Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in
goodness and truth. Keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and
transgression and sin” (Exod. 34:6,7).
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9.
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Hath he... shut up his tender mercies? Can it be that
God is breaking one of His own commandments?
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“If there be among you a poor man of one of thy brethren
within any of the gates in thy land which the Lord thy God giveth thee, thou
shalt not harden thine heart, nor shut thine hand from thy poor brother; but
thou shalt open thine hand wide unto him, and shalt surely lend him sufficient
for his need, in that which he wanteth” (Deut. 15:7,8).
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10.
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But I will remember the years... of the most High
(Elyon), which are without end (Psa. 102:24,27).
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11.
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Thy wonders of old. That is, vv. 15-20 (s.w. Exod.
15:11; Psa. 78:12; Isa. 25:1).
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The Lord (Yah) occurs frequently in Exod. 15 and
Psa. 118.
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13.
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Thy way, O God, is in the sanctuary. That is, it may be
seen by those who (literally, and in spirit) enter God’s sanctuary. God
leaves no footprints for worldly men to follow, but those who enter into His
holy place may discern His hidden steps (cp. v. 19c).
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15.
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Joseph is a reference to the tribes of Ephraim and
Manasseh (Psa. 80:1; 81:4,5).
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16.
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The waters saw thee — in contrast to the worldly
Egyptians, who could not “see”!
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They were afraid, literally: in travail. The
crossing of the Red Sea brought a new nation to birth (1 Cor. 10:2)!
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18.
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Thy thunder is galgal: literally, thy
rolling, or thy wheels. The primary reference is to the piling up of cumulus
clouds, and thence to the rumbling of thunder, as of chariot wheels —
i.e., the chariot of the cherubim (Ezek. 1; cp. Psa. 18:7-15; 68:16,17) when the
Lord of glory goes into violent action.
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The earth trembled and shook. At the crossing of the
Red Sea there was evidently an earthquake.
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19.
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RSV: Thy way was through the sea, thy path through the
great waters, yet thy footprints were unseen. There were no tracks when the
Glory of the Lord crossed through the waters of the Red Sea. After the waters
returned, not even the locality of the crossing was known. (Job 9:11 and 23:8,9
express a similar idea. Likewise, Prov. 30:18-20 — although the subjects
are drastically different!) Compare Hab. 3:15 — a chapter with several
close resemblances to the psalm. On a different plane also, “His ways are
past finding out”; see the context of Rom. 11:33.
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20.
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Thou leddest thy people like a flock by the hand of Moses
and Aaron. This last verse suggests that Psalm 77 is a kind of introduction
to Psalm 78. See esp. 78:70-72; also cp. 23:1,2; 95:7; 100:3; Isa. 63:11; Mic.
5:5.
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