Psalms 34:9

O fear the Lord - Reverence him; honor him; confide in him. Compare Psalms 31:23.

Ye his saints - His holy ones. All who profess to be his friends. This exhortation is addressed especially to the saints, or to the pious, because the speaker professed to be a friend of God, and had had personal experience of the truth of what he is here saying. It is the testimony of one child of God addressed to others, to encourage them by the result of his own experience.

For there is no want to them that fear him - All their needs will be abundantly supplied. Sooner or later all their real necessities will be met, and God will bestow upon them every needed blessing. The statement here cannot be regarded as absolutely and universally true - that is, it cannot mean that they who fear the Lord will never, in any instance, be hungry or thirsty, or destitute of raiment or of a comfortable home; but it is evidently intended to be a general affirmation, and is in accordance with the other statements which occur in the Bible about the advantages of true religion in securing temporal as well as spiritual blessings from God. Thus, in 1 Timothy 4:8, it is said, “Godliness is profitable unto all things, having promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come.” Thus, in Isaiah 33:16, it is said of the righteous man, “Bread shall be given him; his waters shall be sure.”

And so, in Psalms 37:25, David records the result of his own observation at the end of a long life, “I have been young, and now am old; yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread.” But while these statements should not be interpreted as affirming absolutely that no child of God will ever be in need of food, or drink, or raiment, or home, or friends, yet it is generally true that the needs of the righteous are supplied, often in an unexpected manner, and from an unexpected source. It is true that virtue and religion conduce to temporal prosperity; and it is almost universally true that the inmates of charity-houses and prisons are neither the pious, nor the children of the pious. These houses are the refuge, to a great extent, of the intemperate, the godless, and the profligate - or of the families of the intemperate, the godless, and the profligate; and if all such persons were to be discharged from those abodes, our almshouses and prisons would soon become tenantless. A community could most easily provide for all those who have been trained in the ways of religion, but who are reduced to poverty by fire, or by flood, or by ill health; and they would most cheerfully do it. Nothing can be more true than that if a man wished to do all that could be done in the general uncertainty of human affairs to secure prosperity, it would be an advantage to him to be a virtuous and religious man. God never blesses or prospers a sinner as such, though he often does it notwithstanding the fact that he is a sinner; but he does and will bless and prosper a righteous man as such, and because he is righteous. Compare the notes at 1 Timothy 4:8.