There is no soundness in my flesh because of Thine anger.

--He proceedeth to exaggerate and amplify the greatness of his grief from the universality thereof; that his sickness was not laid on any one part of his body, but upon his whole flesh, and upon all his bones. His flesh is his exterior part, his bones his interior. Albeit the ulcers and wounds of his flesh were very sensible to him, and more horrible in the eyes of men who beheld them (as that of Job and Lazarus), which he might have apprehended deeply when as by them he was made contemptible in the eyes of men: yet his inward pain, which was more felt than seen, maketh him thus pitifully to cry. Wherein we have these things to consider.

1. That as all members agreed together to the performance of his filthy lust, so every one of them receiveth a deserved punishment. And it is good for man that he should be thus chastised in this world for a little time, rather than that he should be reserved for everlasting darkness, where every member shall receive eternal pain for their sin. For as sin pleaseth nature, so doth it destroy and consume nature.

2. He setteth forth the cause of those punishments, even God’s wrath, because of his sin. For when those two meet together, they are as fire and flax; God’s wrath as fire, will soon devour the stubble of our sins.

3. Observe that David maketh not God’s wrath the only cause of his miseries and heavy sickness; for that were to charge God of unrighteousness; but he justifieth God, when he acknowledgeth that his own sin was the cause of all his evils. And surely we can never give sufficient honour to God, except we free Him of all imputations of unjust dealing, and acknowledge ourselves to be the cause of our own miseries. (A. Symson.)

Continues after advertising
Continues after advertising