HOW EXCELLENT IS THY LOVINGKINDNESS

The first four verses contain a devastating description of wicked men enjoying their sin. (Verse 1 is obscure in the A.V., R.V. and J.N.D., but is clarified in the N.I.V. thus: “An oracle is within my heart concerning the sinfulness of the wicked: There is no fear of God before his eyes”.) Then follows a sublime review of certain attributes of God, i.e. His mercy, faithfulness, righteousness, judgments and lovingkindness, vv. 5-7(a). Verses 7(b)-10 depict God’s people in the enjoyment of divine resources, and verses 11, 12 provide a final glimpse of the fate of the wicked.

David likens God’s attributes to His creation: “Thy mercy, O Lord, is in the heavens; and thy faithfulness reacheth unto the clouds. Thy righteousness is like the great mountains; thy judgments are a great deep”, vv. 5, 6. Thus God’s ways are seen to possess the grandeur, the majesty and the awesomeness of His universe; enduring in its strength, abiding in its beauty, vast in its scope. If we feel diminished by these lofty and inspiring glimpses of the God of creation, so much the better. Human nature too readily exalts itself, but we are tiny creatures, insignificant in stature and even superfluous, in the sense that the everlasting God does not need us either to further His plans or to complete His joy. If (as Scripture amazingly teaches) He has chosen to confer value and dignity upon us by redeeming us from sin and making us His children, we should remember that these blessings are bestowed but not deserved.

David makes it clear that it is God’s lovingkindness, His steadfast love, which will encourage us to draw near to Him, however conscious we may rightly be of our sinfulness and our smallness: “How excellent is thy lovingkindness, 0 God! therefore the children of men put their trust under the shadow of thy wings”, v. 7. These tender words remind us of the plaintive sorrow of the Lord Jesus, “how often would I have gathered thy children together, as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings, and ye would not!”, Luke 13. 34. Men may refuse to approach Him, but those who do “shall be abundantly satisfied with the fatness of thy house; and thou shalt make them drink of the river of thy pleasures”, v. 8.

“He that cometh to me shall never hunger”, John 6. 35.