Psalms 103:9

Psalms 103:9 , Psalms 103:13

I. In the mind of the psalmists there was nothing contradictory between faith in God as a righteous Judge and faith in God as being longsuffering and of great kindness. They did not think of God as divided between His sense of justice and His love of mercy, because they understood that mercy was never forgotten in His judgments. They felt that His judgments were the truest mercies both for themselves and for the world at large. So deep was their conviction of the blessedness of God's judgments that some of their most joyous strains are those in which they proclaim God as coming to judge the world in righteousness.

II. The text shows the fatherly character of God. He is our Father because He created and preserves us; He is our Father because He rules us by the stern yet loving discipline of His righteous judgment; He is our Father because He is full of love, and forgiveness, and tender, fatherly pity, knowing our frame and remembering that we are dust.

III. Here then is a proof of the Divine source whence the inspirations of the psalmists came. They knew God as their Father because the Spirit of adoption was speaking to their hearts.

G. Forbes, The Voice of God in the Psalms,p. 149.

References: Psalms 103:11. Sermons for Sundays, Festivals, and Fasts,1st series, p. 292.Psalms 103:12. Spurgeon, Sermons,vol. xix., No. 1108.