Psalms 103:4

Who redeemeth thy life from destruction.

Redeemed from destruction

By destruction here he meaneth, not only the danger of being killed by his enemies, but also and especially the state of condemnation and perishing in God’s wrath, from which the man justified is redeemed by the Mediator.

1. The benefit of preservation from eternal death is given unto the man, to whom all iniquity is forgiven; for here these benefits are joined the one with the other.

2. The deliverances which are given to believers, as well bodily as spiritual, temporal as well as everlasting, do come to us in the way of redemption, made by our kind and faithful kinsman, Jesus Christ.

3. A man must be sensible of the merit of sin, and see himself in the state of perdition for sin, before he can put a right estimation upon his delivery; he must count himself a lost man till the Lord’s Redeemer deliver him.

4. The favour which God bestoweth upon a believer is not in giving unto him one or two, or some few evidences of His love and mercy, but in a constant compassing of him on every hand, in everything; so that He shall turn him about to what act He will, he is circled round about with love and mercy, supplying wants, preventing, or mitigating and seasoning, his troubles, reclaiming him from sin, and directing him in God’s way.

5. The evidences of God’s kindness and mercy to a man is not only a means to glorify God, but also a means to our respect and honour; yea, and a crown of glory on the head of the believer, in the sight of all who look upon him. (D. Dickson.)

Who crowneth thee with lovingkindness and tender mercies.--

A present crown

One Sunday morning we visited a poor old man of 97 years. He told us two gentlemen had each promised him a sovereign, if he lived to be 100. “I wish they’d give ‘em to me now,” he said. God promises us crowns in the future; but we are also crowned with lovingkindness in the present. (W. Luff.)

Divine mercy

He who hath said to us, “Thy sins be forgiven thee,” has given us a grant of all needful good in that one sentence of His love. Like the comet’s nucleus, which bears a streaming train of light behind it, so doth forgiveness draw along with it a far-reaching glory of boundless favour. Well may this blessing be set first, since it carries all the rest in its loins.

“When dreadful guilt is done away

No other fear’s we know;

That hand, which scatters pardons down,

Shall crowns of life bestow.”

(C. H. Spurgeon.)