Bible Commentary

Expositor's Bible Commentary Psalm 81:1 To the chief Musician upon Gittith, A Psalm of Asaph. Sing aloud unto God our strength: make a joyful noise unto the God of Jacob. Psalm 81:1-16 THE psalmist summons priests and people to a solemn festival, commemorative of Israel’s deliverance from Egypt, and sets forth the lessons which that deliverance teaches, the learning of which is the true way of keeping the feast. There has been much discussion as to which feast is in the psalmist’s mind. That of Tabernacles has been widely accepted as intended, chiefly on the ground that the first day of the month in which it occurred was celebrated by the blowing of trumpets, as the beginning of the civil year. This practice is supposed to account for the language of Psalm 81:3 , which seems to imply trumpet blowing both at new and full moon. But, on other grounds, the Passover is more likely to be intended, as the psalm deals with the manifestations of Divine power attending the beginning of the Exodus, which followed the first Passover, as well as with those during the desert sojourn, which alone were commemorated by the feast of Tabernacles. True, we have no independent knowledge of any trumpet blowing on the first day of the Passover month ( Nisan ); but Delitzsch and others suggest that from this psalm it may be inferred "that the commencement of each month, and more especially the commencement of the month ( Nisan ), which was at the same time the commencement of the ecclesiastical year, was signalised by the blowing of horns." On the whole, the Passover is most probably the feast in question. Olshausen, followed by Cheyne, regards the psalm as made up of two fragments ( Psalm 81:1-5 a, - and Psalm 81:5-16 ). But surely the exhortations and promises of the latter portion are most relevant to the summons to the festival contained in the former part, and there could be no more natural way of preparing for the right commemoration of the deliverance than to draw out its lessons of obedience and to warn against departure from the delivering God. Definiteness as to date is unattainable. The presupposed existence of the full Temple ceremonial shows that the psalm was not written in exile, nor at a time of religious persecution. Its warning against idolatry would be needless in a post-exilic psalm, as no tendency thereto existed after the return from captivity. But beyond such general indications we cannot go. The theory that the psalm is composed of two fragments exaggerates the difference between the two parts into which it falls. These are the summons to the feast ( Psalm 81:1-5 ), and the lessons of the feast ( Psalm 81:6-16 ). Delitzsch suggests that the summons in Psalm 81:1 is addressed to the whole congregation; that in Psalm 81:2 to the Levites, the appointed singers and musicians; and that in Psalm 81:3 to the priests who are intrusted with blowing the Shophar , or horn. { Joshua 6:4 , and 2 Chronicles 20:28 } One can almost hear the tumult of joyful sounds, in which the roar of the multitude, the high-pitched notes of singers, the deeper clash of timbrels, the twanging of stringed instruments, and the hoarse blare of rams’ horns, mingle in concordant discord, grateful to Eastern ears, however unmusical to ours. The religion of Israel allowed and required exuberant joy. It sternly rejected painting and sculpture, blot abundantly employed music, the most ethereal of the arts, which stirs emotions and longings too delicate and deep for speech. Whatever differences in form have necessarily attended the progress from the worship of the Temple to that of the Church, the free play of joyful emotion should mark the latter even more than the former. Decorum is good, but not if purchased by the loss of ringing gladness. The psalmist’s summons has a meaning still. The reason for it is given in Psalm 81:4-5 a. It- i.e ., the feast (not the musical accompaniments)-is appointed by God. The psalmist employs designations for it, which are usually applied to "the word of the Lord"; statute, ordinance, testimony, being all found in Psalm 19:1-14 and Psalm 119:1-176 , with that meaning. A triple designation of the people corresponds with these triple names for the feast. Israel, Jacob, and Joseph are synonyms, the use of the last of these having probably the same force here as in the preceding psalm - namely, to express the singer’s longing for the restoration of the shattered unity of the nation. The summons to the feast is based, not only on Divine appointment, but also on Divine purpose in that appointment. It was "a testimony," a rite commemorative of a historical fact, and therefore an evidence of it to future times. There is no better proof of such a fact than a celebration of it, which originates contemporaneously and continues through generations. The feast in question was thus simultaneous with the event commemorated, as Psalm 81:5 b tells. It was God, not Israel, as is often erroneously supposed, who "went forth." For the following preposition is not "from," which might refer to the national departure, but "over" or "against," which cannot have such a reference, since Israel did not, in any sense, go "over" or "against" the land. God’s triumphant forth-putting of power over the whole land, especially in the death of the firstborn, on the night of the Passover, is meant to be remembered forever, and is at once the fact commemorated by the feast, and a reason for obeying His appointment of it. So far the thoughts and language are limpid, but Psalm 81:5 c interrupts their clear flow. Who is the speaker thus suddenly introduced? What is the "language" (lit., lip) which he "knew not"? The explanation implied by the A.V. and R.V., that the collective Israel speaks, and that the reference is, Psalm 114:1 , to the "strange language" of the Egyptians, is given by most of the older authorities, and by Ewald and Hengstenberg, but has against it the necessity for the supplement "where," and the difficulty of referring the "I" to the nation. The more usual explanation in modern times is that the speaker is the psalmist, and that the language which he hears is the voice of God, the substance of which follows in the remainder of the psalm. As in Job 4:16 Eliphaz could not discern the appearance of the mysterious form that stood before his eyes, and thus its supernatural character is suggested, so the psalmist hears an utterance of a hitherto unknown kind, which he thus implies to have been Divine. God Himself speaks, to impress the lessons of the past, and to excite the thoughts and feelings which would rightly celebrate the feast. The glad noises of song, harp, and trumpet are hushed; the psalmist is silent, to hear that dread Voice, and then with lowly lips he repeats so much of the majestic syllables as he could translate into words which it was possible for a man to utter. The inner coherence of the two parts of the psalm is, on this explanation, so obvious, that there is no need nor room for the hypothesis of two fragments having been fused into one. The Divine Voice begins with recapitulating the facts which the feast was intended to commemorate-namely, the act of emancipation from Egyptian bondage ( Psalm 81:6 ), and the miracles of the wilderness sojourn ( Psalm 81:7 ). The compulsory labour, from which God delivered the people, is described by two terms, of which the former (burden) is borrowed from Exodus, where it frequently occurs, { Exodus 1:11 ; Exodus 5:4 ; Exodus 6:6 } and the latter (basket) is by some supposed to mean the wicker work implement for carrying, which the monuments show was in use in Egypt (so LXX, etc .), and by others to mean an earthen vessel, as "an example of the work in clay in which the Israelites were engaged" (Hupfeld). The years of desert wandering are summed up, in Psalm 81:7 , as one long continuance of benefits from God. Whenever they cried to Him in their trouble, He delivered them. He spoke to them "from the secret place of thunder" ("My thunder covert, " Cheyne). That expression is generally taken to refer to the pillar of cloud, but seems more naturally to be regarded as alluding to the thick darkness, in which God was shrouded on Sinai. when He spoke His law amid thunderings and lightnings. "The proving at the waters of Meribah" is, according to the connection and in harmony with Exodus 17:6 , to be regarded as a benefit. "It was meant to serve the purpose of binding Israel still more closely to its God" (Baethgen). It is usually assumed that, in this reference to "the waters of Meribah," the two similar incidents of the miraculous supply of water-one of which occurred near the beginning of the forty years in the desert, at "Massah and Meribah," { Exodus 17:7 } and the other at "the waters of Meribah," near Kadesh, in the fortieth year - have been blended, or, as Cheyne says, "confused." But there is no need to suppose that there is any confusion, for the words of the psalm will apply to the latter miracle as well as to the former, and, if the former clause refers to the manifestations at Sinai, the selection of an incident at nearly the end of the wilderness period is natural. The whole stretch of forty years is thereby declared to have been marked by continuous Divine care. The Exodus was begun, continued, and ended amid tokens of His watchful love. The Selah bids the listener meditate on that prolonged revelation. That retrospect next becomes the foundation of a Divine exhortation to the people, which is to be regarded as spoken originally to Israel in the wilderness, as Psalm 81:11 shows. Perowne well designates these verses ( Psalm 81:8-10 ) "a discourse within a discourse." They put into words the meaning of the wilderness experience, and sum up the laws spoken on Sinai, which they in part repeat. The purpose of God’s lavish benefits was to bind Israel to Himself. "Hear, My people," reminds us of Deuteronomy 5:1 ; Deuteronomy 6:4 . "I will bear witness to thee" here means rather solemn warning to, than testifying against, the person addressed. With infinite pathos, the tone of the Divine Speaker changes from that of authority to pleading and the utterance of a yearning wish, like a sigh. "Would that thou wouldest hearken!" God desires nothing so earnestly as that; but His Divine desire is tragically and mysteriously foiled. The awful human power of resisting His voice and of making His efforts vain, the still more awful fact of the exercise of that power, were clear before the psalmist, whose daring anthropopathy teaches a deep lesson, and warns us against supposing that men have to do with an impassive Deity. That wonderful utterance of Divine wish is almost a parenthesis. It gives a moment’s glimpse into the heart of God, and then the tone of command is resumed. "In Psalm 81:9 the keynote of the revelation of the law from Sinai is given; the fundamental command, which opens the Decalogue demanded fidelity towards Jehovah, and forbade idolatry, as the sin of sins" (Delitzsch). The reason for exclusive devotion to God is based in Psalm 81:10 , as in Exodus 20:2 , the fundamental passage, on His act of deliverance, not on His sole Divinity. A theoretic Monotheism would be cold; the consciousness of benefits received from One Hand alone is the only key that will unlock a heart’s exclusive devotion and lay it at His feet. And just as the commandment to worship God alone is founded on His unaided delivering might and love, so it is followed by the promise that such exclusive adhesion to Him will secure the fulfilment of the boldest wishes, and the satisfying of the most clamant or hungry desires. "Open wide thy mouth, and I will fill it." It is folly to go to strange gods for the supply of needs, when God is able to give all that every man can wish. We may be well content to cleave to Him alone, since He alone is more than enough for each and for all. Why should they waste time and strength in seeking for supplies from many, who can find all they need in One? They who put Him to the proof, and find Him enough, will have, in their experience of His sufficiency, a charm to protect them from all vagrant desire to "go further and fare worse." The best defence against temptations to stray from God is the possession by experience, of His rich gifts that meet all desires. That great saying teaches, too, that God’s bestowals are practically measured by men’s capacity and desire. The ultimate limit of them is His own limitless grace; but the working limit in each individual is the individual’s receptivity, of which his expectancy and desire are determining factors. In Psalm 81:11-12 , the Divine Voice laments the failure of benefits and commandments and promises to win Israel to God. There is a world of baffled tenderness and almost wondering rebuke in the designation of the rebels as "My people." It would have been no cause of astonishment if other nations had not listened; but that the tribes bound by so many kindnesses should have been deaf is a sad marvel. Who should listen to "My voice" if "My people" do not? The penalty of not yielding to God is to be left unyielding. The worst punishment of sin is the prolongation and consequent intensifying of the sin. A heart that wilfully closes itself against God’s pleadings brings on itself the nemesis, that it becomes incapable of opening, as a self-torturing Hindoo fakir may clench his fist so long, that at last his muscles lose their power, and it remains shut for his lifetime. The issue of such "stubbornness" is walking in their own counsels, the practical life being regulated entirely by self-originated and God-for-getting dictates of prudence or inclination. He who will not have the Divine Guide has to grope his way as well as he can. There is no worse fate for a man than to be allowed to do as he chooses. "The ditch," sooner or later, receives the man who lets his active powers, which are in themselves blind, be led by his understanding, which he has himself blinded by forbidding it to look to the One Light of Life. In Psalm 81:13 the Divine Voice turns to address the joyous crowd of festal worshippers, exhorting them to that obedience which is the true keeping of the feast, and holding forth bright promises of the temporal blessings which, in accordance with the fundamental conditions of Israel’s prosperity, should follow thereon. The sad picture of ancient rebellion just drawn influences the language in this verse, in which "My people," "hearken," and "walk" recur. The antithesis to walking in one’s own counsels is walking in God’s ways, suppressing native stubbornness, and becoming docile to His guidance. The highest blessedness of man is to have a will submissive to God’s will, and to carry out that submission in all details of life. Self-engineered paths are always hard, and, if pursued to the end, lead into the dark. The listening heart will not lack guidance, and obedient feet will find God’s way the way of peace which steadily climbs to unfading light. The blessings attached in the psalm to such conformity with God’s will are of an external kind, as was to be expected at the Old Testament stage of revelation. They are mainly two-victory and abundance. But the precise application of Psalm 81:15 b is doubtful. Whose "time" is to "endure forever"? There is much to be said in favour of the translation "that so their time might endure forever," as Cheyne renders, and for understanding it, as he does, as referring to the enemies who yield themselves to God, in order that they "might be a never-exhausted people." But to bring in the purpose of the enemies’ submission is somewhat irrelevant, and the clause is probably best taken to promise length of days to Israel. In Psalm 81:16 the sudden change of persons in a is singular, and, according to the existing vocalisation, there is an equally sudden change of tenses, which induces Delitzsch and others to take the verse as recurring to historical retrospect. The change to the third person is probably occasioned, as Hupfeld suggests, by the preceding naming of Jehovah, or may have been due to an error. Such sudden changes are more admissible in Hebrew than with us, and are very easily accounted for, when God is represented as speaking. The momentary emergence of the psalmist’s personality would lead him to say "He," and the renewed sense of being but the echo of the Divine Voice would lead to the recurrence to the "I," in which God speaks directly. The words are best taken as in line with the other hypothetical promises in the preceding verses. The whole verse looks back to Deuteronomy 32:13-14 . "Honey from the rock" is not a natural product; but, as Hupfeld says, the parallel "oil out of the flinty rock," which follows in Deuteronomy, shows that "we are here, not on the ground of the actual, but of the ideal," and that the expression is a hyperbole for incomparable abundance. Those who hearken to God’s voice will have all desires satisfied and needs supplied. They will find furtherance in hindrances, fertility in barrenness; rocks will drop honey and stones will become bread. The Expositor's Bible Text Courtesy of BibleSupport.com . Used by Permission.

Sing aloud unto God our strength: make a joyful noise unto the God of Jacob . Psalm 81 A revelation of three great subjects Homilist. I. TRUE WORSHIP (vers 1-5) 1. True worship is the highest happiness, which consists in — (1) Right activity. Worthy of our nature. In harmony with all our faculties. (2) The highest love. (3) The sublimest hope. 2. True worship is a Divine ordinance, binding on all moral intelligences. (1) Right in itself. (2) Essential to their happiness. II. DIVINE KINDNESS (vers. 6-10). This appears in — 1. Their deliverance from thraldom. God's mercy should inspire the soul with gratitude; and gratitude is an element of worship. 2. Answering their prayer. 3. Giving them direction. III. HUMAN FOOLISHNESS (vers. 11-16). By disobedience they lost — 1. His superintending care. 2. Victory over enemies. 3. The choicest provisions. Disobedience to the Divine law is supreme folly. Sinners are fools. The Bible calls them so, and the experience of humanity proves them such. ( Homilist. ) Exhortation to sing God's praise If you begin praising God you are bound to go on. The work engrosses the heart. It deepens and broadens like a rolling river. Praise is something like an avalanche, which may begin with a snowflake on the mountain moved by the wing of a bird, but that flake binds others to it and becomes a rolling ball: this rolling ball gathers more snow about it till it is huge, immense; it crashes through a forest; it thunders down into the valley; it buries a village under its stupendous mass. Thus praise may begin with the tear of gratitude; anon the bosom swells with love; thankfulness rises to a song; it breaks forth into a shout; it mounts up to join the everlasting hallelujahs which surround the throne of God. What a mercy is it that God by His Spirit will give us greater capacities by and by than we have here! for if we continue to learn more and more of the love of Christ we shall be driven to sore straits if confined within the narrow and drowsy framework of this mortal body. ( C. H. Spurgeon . ) Blow up the trumpet in the new moon. Psalm 81:8 New-year resolutions J. W. Hardman, LL. D. The savage and the child of civilization are alike in this, that they both draw their notions of time, and measure its lapse, by the movements of the heavenly bodies, thus fulfilling the primaeval prophecy that the sun, moon and stars should be for ever the means of marking time. The easiest of measures, and the one which would make the deepest impression on man's mind, would be the circle of the moon's changes — the thin crescent, the half-circle, and the full orb. Next would be marked the course of the sun. This is most to be observed when the sun sets behind some cliff or precipitous range of rocks, and after a certain anniversary begins to daily sink behind the horizon beyond that point. The idea of a regular year would, when once suggested by the heavenly bodies, be aided in many lands by the altered appearance of summer and winter, and thus the prehistoric races found themselves supplied with sufficient chronology for their simple needs. But amongst those nations where the higher instincts of religion were felt there was a need for measuring the recurring periods of religious festivals. The Jewish people strictly observed the weekly festival of the Sabbath, which, by its very peculiarity of dividing time by seven days, seems to point at once to its Divine origin. But in keeping other festivals they were guided by a more complicated system to fix the feast of the Passover in connection with the Paschal Moon; and the other feasts, such as Pentecost, and that of Tabernacles, had a certain relation to the harvest season. In addition to these great feasts, it was ordained that sacrifices and offerings should be made in the Temple on the occasion of each new moon. It was also usual to summon worshippers to remember this duty by the sound of the silver trumpets echoing through the air, and blown by the sons of Aaron. In addition to the festivals observed at each new moon, there was a special day of solemn observation called the Feast of Trumpets, on the first new moon of the first month of the year — in fact, on what answered to our New Year's Day. This day was fixed with the Jews in September, and with the mediaeval Christians it was observed on the 25th of March, and by modern usage on the 1st of January. It is of little importance on what particular day the year begins. The essence of the matter is that we are entering on a new cycle of days — on a new course of the earth's journeying round its great central sun; that another milestone on the road of life is passed; that another division of our mortal existence is entered on. The words of the text seem to call on the Priesthood of the magnificent Temple of Solomon to take up their trumpets and rouse the people to the great duties of offering sacrifice and acknowledging God. There is no other instrument of music that has such a wonderful power of rousing and exhilarating the soul as the trumpet. Its shrill, wild, exulting tones have ever been valued in martial music, and that person's feelings must indeed be cold and stagnant whose enthusiasm is not awakened by the clarion's sound. When the trumpet sounds the warrior ought to prepare himself for war. The imagery of the Christian conflict has lost its power by familiar usage, but it represents a great truth — the reality and force of temptation. Each new year will bring its temptations and difficulties. We should prepare to meet them by fresh resolves and more earnest prayers. ( J. W. Hardman, LL. D. ) The new moon D. Davies. The Jews thought a good deal of the new moon. When it first appeared they took note of it at once. Indeed, six times in the year they attached such importance to the appearance of the new moon that if any one saw it, and thought he was among the first to see it, he was expected to go to Jerusalem at once and state the fact to the Sanhedrim, who sat in the "Hall of Polished Stones "to receive the information. Those who went were carefully examined and cross-examined. If they had only seen the moon through a cloud, or anything like glass, or had only seen it reflected in water, their testimony could not be accepted. It was necessary that they should see it directly and clearly in the heavens above them. If no one saw the moon before the thirtieth day there was no special note taken of the fact, because they generally reckoned the month to be thirty days long, but if the new moon appeared on the 29th day of the month, special notice was taken of it, and a fire was lit upon the summit of Mount Olivet; then men who were on the watch on other summits kindled their fires, too, in order to show that they had noted the signal, and also in order to give the signal to those on other mountain tops; and thus from one end of the land to the other it was soon known that the new moon bad appeared before the thirtieth day. The Jews rejoiced exceedingly at the appearance of every new moon. It was a new beginning, and the Jews attached a great deal of importance to beginnings — the first fruits of the harvest, the oldest child in the family, etc. They consecrated the first of everything to God, and by so doing they felt they were consecrating all the rest. The first sheaves of harvest were consecrated for the whole harvest. They gave the first to God as aa acknowledgment of His right to all the rest. And so with regard to the months, they consecrated each month to God, by specially consecrating the first day of the month. Now, we may well follow their example in presenting the first of everything to God. I should like you to feel that you ought to give the beginning of your life to God as the Jews gave the first day of every month specially to Him. It is wonderful what is done by giving the beginning: so much depends upon how we begin. If every little boy here would give his heart to the Lord Jesus just now at the beginning of life, oh, what a blessing it would be! ( D. Davies. ) Where I heard a language that I understood not. Psalm 81:5 Ignorance of the language of a community Homilist. It is by no means uncommon for men to be thrown into a community of whose language they are entirely ignorant. Now, ignorance of the language of others is of two kinds, intellectual and moral. I. INTELLECTUAL. By this we mean entire unacquaintance with the sounds, construction, and laws of the language. This kind of ignorance reminds us of two things. 1. An abnormal condition of human society. It is natural to suppose that He who made us all of one flesh, endowed us all with social natures, and united us all to each other with tender relationships, such as parents, children, brethren, would have furnished us with a language which all could understand, and through which we could all receive and communicate the thoughts and feelings of each other. Instead of this, hundreds of languages abound, thus creating social divisions amongst the race almost innumerable. Now the Bible directs us to an event which shows that this variety of language is not an original state of things ( Genesis 11:1-9 ). 2. An enormous social inconvenience. The race, which should have been one harmonious whole, is split, through these many languages, into hostile sections, and become inaccessible to one another. "Languages shall cease." II. MORAL. Through the moral dissimilarity that exists amongst men it often happens that those who speak the very same language misunderstand one another. Put a pure Christly-minded man into the society of gamblers, mercantile speculators, and daring infidels, and he will say, "I heard a language that I understood not." The words honour, virtue, courage, love, justice, liberty, pleasure, happiness, which he might hear in these circles will not convey to him the ideas which they employed them to express. Again: imagine a thoroughly worldly and corrupt spirit transported into the heavenly regions, where all employ the language in which he was brought up, his vernacular, would he understand it? No; if he returned, he would say, "I heard a language that I understood not." Thus, wherever we go, we are constantly hearing a language we understand not. The lesson is — 1. We must get Christ's Spirit in order to understand His words. We cannot reach their deep, fathomless meaning without it. 2. That we should be thankful to the great Father for not making our destiny to depend upon the right interpretation of a language. "He that believeth on me," etc. ( Homilist. ) I answered thee in the secret place of thunder. Psalm 81:7 Answers to prayer often come mysteriously Homilist. God has a thousand "secret" ways of granting our requests. I. He may do it by a WAVE OF AIR. A man is the subject of a painful disease, that seems progressing to the utter extinction of his life; for the sake of others depending on him, he implores his Maker to restore him. A fresh breeze from heaven is let into his chamber, it not only sweeps his foul room, but heaves his lungs with a new force, oxygenizes his blood, and quickens his pulses with a new vitality. Wave after wave continues to play around him until he is able to rise from his couch and go into the open fields. God has answered him from "the secret place of thunder." II. He may do it by the BIRTH OF A THOUGHT, The good man may be enfolded in darkness, wrapped in perplexities, so utterly embarrassed by his circumstances that he knows not what step to take next. He cries to Heaven for guidance; all worldly resources have failed. A new thought springs up in his mind, solves his problems, scatters his darkness, removes his embarrassments, reveals a path to enter, safe and sunny, full of promise. He pursues it, and all is right. His prayer is answered from "the secret place of thunder." III. He may do it by the visit OF A FRIEND. As he talks, the burden of sorrow falls from his heart, and he breathes once more the free air of hope. His prayer has been answered from "the secret place of thunder." IV. He may do it by a VERSE OF SCRIPTURE. ( Homilist. ) The place of thunder T. De Witt Talmage. As there is a secret place of natural thunder, there is a secret place of moral thunder. In other words, the religious power that you see abroad in the Church and in the world has a hiding-place, and in many cases it is never discovered at all. I will use a similitude. Many years ago there was a large church. It was characterized by strange and unaccountable conversions. There were no great revivals, but individual cases of spiritual arrest and transformation. A young man sat in one of the front pews. He was a graduate of Yale, brilliant and dissolute. Everybody knew him and liked him for his geniality, but deplored his moral errantry. To please his parents he was every Sabbath morning in church. One day there was a ringing of the door-bell of the pastor of that church, and that young man, overwhelmed with repentance, implored prayer and advice, and passed into complete reformation of heart and life. All the neighbourhood was astonished, and asked, "Why was this?" His father and mother had said nothing to him about his soul's welfare. In the course of two years, though there was no general awakening in that church, many such isolated cases of unexpected and unaccountable conversions took place. The very people whom no one thought would be affected by such considerations were converted. The pastor and the officers of the church were on the look-out for the solution of this religious phenomenon. "Where is it," they said, "and who is it, and what is it?" At last the discovery was made and all was explained. A poor old Christian woman standing in the vestibule of the church one Sunday morning, trying to get her breath again before she went up-stairs to the gallery, heard the inquiry and told the secret. For years she had been in the habit of concentrating all her prayers for particular persons in that church. She would see some man or some woman present, and, though she might not know the person's name, she would pray for that person until he or she was converted to God. All her prayers were for that one person — just that one. She waited and waited for communion days to see when the candidates for membership stood up whether her prayers had been effectual. It turned out that these marvellous instances of conversion were the result of that old woman's prayers as she sat in the gallery Sabbath by Sabbath, bent and wizened and poor and unnoticed. That was the secret place of the thunder. The day will come — God hasten it-when people wilt find out the velocity, the majesty, the multipotence of prayer. O ye who are wasting your breath and wasting your brains and wasting your nerves and wasting your lungs wishing for this good and that good for the Church and the world, why do you not go into the secret place of thunder? "But," says some one, "that is a beautiful theory, yet it does not work in my case, for I am in a cloud of trouble or a cloud of sickness or a cloud of persecution or a cloud of poverty or a cloud of bereavement or a cloud of perplexity." How glad I am that you told me that. That is exactly the place to which my text refers. It was from a cloud that God answered Israel — the cloud over the chasm cut through the Red Sea — the cloud that was light to the Israelites and darkness to the Egyptians. It was from a cloud, a tremendous cloud, that God made reply. It was a cloud that was the secret place of thunder. So you cannot get away from the consolation of my text by talking that way. Let all the people under a cloud hear it. "I answered thee in the secret place of thunder." ( T. De Witt Talmage. ) Open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it. Psalm 81:10 The more morally hungry, the better fed Homilist. I. GOOD MEN ARE THE SUBJECTS OF MORAL HUNGER — a craving for the chief good, hungering and thirsting after righteousness. This implies — 1. Health. The body without appetite for food is diseased; the intellect without appetite for truth is diseased; and the soul without appetite for righteousness is diseased. 2. Provision. The existence of any native desire, physical, intellectual, or moral, implies a corresponding object. Goodness, like the air we breathe, is ever at hand; it encompasses our path. If we really desire it, we shall have it. II. THE MORE HUNGRY, THE BETTER FED. "Open thy mouth wide," etc. The Great Father wishes His children to have the profoundest cravings, the largest expectations; for He has an infinity of blessings which it is His happiness to bestow. The more you desire from Him, the more you shall have. ( Homilist. ) Motives to enlarged prayer B. Beddome, M. A. I. EXPLAIN THE EXHORTATION. It implies — 1. Warmth and fervency in prayer. 2. A holy fluency and copiousness of expression, so as to order our cause before Him, and fill our mouths with arguments. 3. Enlarged hope and expectation. II. CONSIDER THE IMPORT OF THE PROMISE. 1. If we open our mouths to God in prayer, He will fill them more and more with suitable petitions and arguments. 2. God will fill the mouth with abundant thanksgivings. 3. We shall be filled with those blessings we pray for, if they are calculated to promote our real good and the glory of God. III. NOTICE THE LIMITATIONS with which the promise requires to be understood. 1. Though God answers prayer, yet He will do it in His own time, and not always when we expect it. 2. He seldom answers prayer in the manner we expect. 3. He sometimes answers prayer gradually, and not all at once. 4. It is not our performance of duty, but the inviolable faithfulness of God that binds Him to the fulfilment of His promises. IV. INFERENCES. 1. It is no wonder that many continue in a destitute and hopeless state: they live without prayer, and so without supplies of mercy. 2. If God thus fills the souls of unnumbered millions, how full must He Himself be! ( B. Beddome, M. A. ) An invitation to prayer P. Prescott. I. THE BASIS OF THE INVITATION. 1. "I am the Lord" — the Lord of the whole earth. 2. I am "thy God" — thy covenant God. 3. I "brought thee out of the land of Egypt." He appeals to what He has already done on our behalf. II. THE INVITATION: "Open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it." The invitation consists of an instruction and a promise: the instruction is, "Open thy mouth wide"; the promise is, "I will fill it." 1. The instruction instructs us in two things — the manner of prayer and the measures of prayer. The manner of prayer is this — "Open thy mouth." The measure of prayer is this — "Open thy mouth wide." 2. The promise refers to both temporal and spiritual blessings. ( P. Prescott. ) God's gracious call and precious promise T. Boston, D. D. I. WHAT IT IS TO OPEN THE MOUTH OF THE SOUL WIDE TO CHRIST. 1. A sight of wants. 2. A sense of need. 3. A holy dissatisfaction with all things beside Christ. 4. The soul's removing its desires from off vanities, and fixing them on Christ for satisfaction. 5. An assumed expectation of salvation from Christ. 6. A hearty willingness to receive Christ as He offers Himself in the Gospel. II. SHOW HOW CHRIST FILLS THE SOUL SO AS NO OTHER CAN DO. "Open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it." This promise imports — 1. Such a suitableness in Him to the necessities of the soul, as is to be found in no other. 2. A sufficiency in Christ for all needs. 3. A cominunication of this suitable sufficiency unto that soul which opens its mouth wide to receive it.(1) Christ gives Himself to that soul, so that such an one might say ( Song of Solomon 2:16 ).(2) Christ gives them all good with Himself ( Romans 8:32 ; Psalm 84:11 ). 4. The soul's satisfaction upon that communication. When all the cisterns are dried up, the believer has enough, He can rejoice in the Lord, and joy in the God of his salvation ( Habakkuk 3:17 ). He can say also with Paul ( Philippians 4:18 ), "I am full"; and no wonder, for the soul having Christ, has —(1) A fulness of merit to look to ( 1 John 1:7 ).(2) A fulness of spirit in Christ to take away the power of sin ( Revelation 3:1 ).(3) A fulness of grace in Him, lodged in Him as the common storehouse of all the saints ( John 1:16 ; 1 Corinthians 1:30 ). ( T. Boston, D. D. ) Open thy mouth wide J. Thomas, M. A. I. THE ONLY SOURCE OF FULL SATISFACTION FOR HUMAN LIFE. 1. There is a recognition here of the vastness of human need. "Open thy mouth wide." Man has — and this is one of the evidences of his greatness — a vast capacity for desire. The mouth of desire in man is not satisfied though all the treasures of the earth be poured into it. 2. The words imply that man's vastest desires are not awakened until they are consciously turned God-ward. Israel will open its mouth "wider "if it turn to God than if it forsake Him. There is enough of desire for God in every man to make this world unsatisfying, but in the worldling this desire is Undeveloped and shrivelled. The life that is fixed in God expands, and its desires become richer and vaster. God fills us, not by lessening our desires, but by enriching them. 3. The words imply that nothing less than personal union with God can satisfy the life. "I will fill it." II. THE CONDITION OF RECEIVING FROM GOD. "Open thy mouth wide." Probably the figure is taken from the feeding of young birds in the nest by the parent bird. The picture is one of simple dependence and trust. Proud self-sufficiency shuts out the fulness of God. The first step to strength is to realize our own helplessness, simply to "open the mouth wide," that God may fill it. III. THE MEASURE OF RECEIVING. "Open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it "According to the capacity for reception, so is the gift. We have to recognize natural differences of capacity. As an eaglet differs from smaller birds, so men differ from men. All are not, and cannot be, Isaiahs and Pauls. But, on the other hand, a man's receptive power may have its development hindered by his own worldliness or negligence. His spiritual desires may be narrower than they ought to be. Faith, love, and hope grow larger through service. ( J. Thomas, M. A. ) Encouragements to prayer In our text we have God coming very near to His people, and coming near them to encourage them to come nearer to Him. We have the Lord speaking to them, that they may speak to Him. He opens His mouth to them, that they may open their mouths to Him. I. GOD ENCOURAGING HIS PEOPLE by saying, "Open thy mouth wide." 1. I suppose that the Lord means by this exhortation, first of all, to help us to get rid of the paralyzing influence of fear. A man, in the presence of one whom he dreads, cannot speak boldly; and if he has been guilty of some great crime, and stands before one whom he regards as his judge, he is like the man in our Lord's parable, "speechless." A man on his knees, conscious of his sin, fearing the justice of God, would very naturally be unable to speak; and to encourage him God says, "Open thy mouth; be not afraid." 2. Next, "Open thy mouth wide"; that is, speak freely in prayer to God, be not hampered in thy pleading. I have known children of God who have felt a terrible awe in the presence of the Lord. We want freedom, and liberty of access to God, when we come before the mercy-seat; and the Lord therefore encourages His people to break loose from all their shackles when He says, "Open thy mouth wide." 3. It must also mean, ask great things: "Open thy mouth wide." The greater the thing that you ask, the more sure you are to have it. With men it is, usually, the smaller the favour you crave, the more likely you are to obtain it; but with God it is the other way. There is nothing greater to ask for than Christ, and thou mayest have Christ for the asking, for God has already given Him to all who believe. 4. I think that it also means that we are to feel intense desires: "Open thy mouth." Whenever a man speaks with very great earnestness, he opens his mouth widely. 5. Exercise a great expectancy. Consider — (1) God's greatness. (2) His goodness. (3) The channel by which mercies come to thee: Christ Jesus thy Lord. (4) That the Holy Spirit is the Author of true prayer. (5) The greatness of thy wants. (6) God's exceeding great and precious promises. II. Observe GOD USING TWO GREAT ARGUMENTS. "Open thy mouth wide" — 1. Because of what God has done. Child of God, this text belongs peculiarly to you. "I am Jehovah, thy God." He has revealed Himself to thee; He has chosen thee, and thou hast chosen Him. Now, canst thou not open thy mouth wide to thine own God, to Jehovah, the great "I am" the boundless, the infinite, the Almighty God, canst thou not speak freely to Him? And then it is added, "I am Jehovah, thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt." Now, that is the greatest thing that God could do for His people, and, if He has done that, will He not do the lesser things? 2. Because of what God will do. "I will fill it." The story goes that the Shah of Persia, a strange man altogether, on one occasion said to a person who had pleased him very greatly, "Open your mouth," and when he had opened his mouth, the Shah began to fill it up with diamonds, emeralds, rubies, and all sorts of precious stones. I feel morally certain that the man opened his mouth wide. Would not you do the same if you had such an opportunity? Now, the Lord says to each of His own people, whom He has so highly favoured, "Open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it." Suppose you open your mouth wide in prayer. "I cannot," says one. Well, open your mouth, and God will fill it with prayer; and then, when you have prayed the prayer that He has given you, He will fill it with answers. God gives prayer as well as the answer to prayer. Only open your mouth, and, as it were, make a vacuum for God to fill. God loves to look for emptiness where He may stow away His grace. When you have done that, then open your mouth with praise. The praise of God is something like Mr. Bunyan 's 'Pilgrim's Progress.' He began to write, he says, and he does not know how he wrote so much; but he quaintly says, "As I pulled, it came"; and you will find it is so with the praise of God. Praise Him, and you will praise Him. If you do not praise Him, you never will praise Him. If you do not begin, you will never keep on; but once open the sluices of gratitude, and the streams will flow more and more copiously every hour. "Open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it." ( C. H. Spurgeon . ) Opening the mouth I. THE EXHORTATION. 1. Labour after a great sense of need. You are weakness itself, and emptiness itself, and a mass of sin and misery, apart from God your Father, and Christ your Redeemer, and the Spirit the indweller; and when you know this, then you will open your mouth wide. 2. Seek after an intense and vehement desire. "He that prays to God without fervour asks to be denied." 3. Ask for large things, remembering the greatness and goodness of God, and the great pleas you have to urge when you come before Him. 4. Ask for enlarged capacities. If we had more room for the Lord's gifts, we should receive more. II. THE PROMISE. "I will fill it." You might expect such a promise as that. You could not think it possible for the Lord to say, "Open your mouths for nothing." It would not be according to His usual way of procedure. He does not set His servants praying and then say somewhere behind their backs, "they shall seek My face in vain." Tantalus belongs to the heathen mythology, not to the Christian's experience. "Open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it." 1. It is a promise only made to those who do open their mouths wide. 2. It is a promise given by One who can fulfil it, and will. How? (1) With prayers. (2) With the actual blessings. (3) With praises. ( C. H. Spurgeon . ) Affluence and receptivity A. Crummell, D. D. This is a figurative expression, and it indicates that man is a creature of vast spiritual capacity. Men are rarely in full consciousness of that deep, strong, original aptitude of human nature for the things of God. For sin has so deeply impaired our nature, that atrophy and nausea have fallen upon our spiritual faculties, and our moral perceptions have become gross and insensible. But the faculties are in us. The ideas of God and duty, the fitness for responsibility, the spring of the inner nature towards immortal life, the sentiment of love, with its boundless range — these inhere in the soul of every man. They may lie dormant in the inner caves of our personal existence, unused and entrusted by guilt, but they are integral qualities. Nothing — riot guilt, not neglect, not the insane denial of these Divine qualities, not even the suicide's hand, can cast out of our being these exalted powers and prerogatives. There is a section of our being "which cannot, but by annihilating, die." It is a majestic fact, and it brings with it the most awful responsibility that we are beings of a constitution akin to the Divine, and that we shall live for ever! Now, the reference of the text, in its first section, is to this quality of our nature. When God says, "Open thy mouth wide," He refers to an actual capacity in us, latent though it be, which, quickened by the Spirit, may reach up to heaven in lofty aspirations, and take in all the things of God. So, too, the other portion of the text, for it has two terms: "open thy mouth wide," is one, and "I will fill it," the other. The promise here given us is equally as significant with regard to our nature as is the command. It is a declaration that when the immortal demands of our inner being are once quickened into life, that there is but one Being in the universe who can answer and supply them. Hence the entreaty, "Open thy mouth wide," etc., because God only can fill these infinite needs of the immortal soul. What, then, is the reach you are going to make in Divine holiness? How far will you stretch forth in godly desires and aspirations? First of all, if you would attain to a lofty, grand pre-eminence of spiritual growth, fix it in your minds to be men and women of a high order of morals. Not as though the advice be given to begin with morality. God forbid! The beginning of all true soul-life is in the spiritual; but, assuming that you are spiritual, that you have repented and believed, and that, having entered upon the Christian life, led by the Spirit of grace, you are anxious to reach the stature of perfect men in Christ. Lay the foundations of your piety deep in the purest morals! But observe, next, that another stretch of the soul to high spiritual excellence is to be attained by the exercise of duty, that is, the doing of good works. Practical goodness bears somewhat the same relation to eminent piety that husbandry does to the production of good crops, or the care of the gardener to the growth of beautiful flowers. It is, under God, the actual uplifting of the soul from one degree of holiness to another. It is the cultivation of the Christian graces; and, observe, all true cultivation tends to growth and expansion. By doing good to others for Christ's sake, we expand our own being; we multiply the force of our sympathies and affections; we reduplicate the power of our loving energy. And so it will follow that obedience to the text will show itself, in the purposed rise of the soul to a high spirituality. This topic is left for the last, because it is the most important; it is the very base of all spiritual acquisition. In the domain of the spirit, spiritual things, spiritual aims, spiritual efforts, spiritual longings, are the foremost of all things. So much, then, for the ideal or principle descriptive of what is spiritual life. And now we can turn to the evidence that is to be found in ourselves that we have this principle implanted in us. That evidence discovers itself in those characteristic spiritual acts of the soul, into which, as sons of God, the saints are led by the Spirit of God. And here the whole field of saintly life lies spread out before us, so that we cannot err. All of its rich productiveness is the fruit of the Spirit. It brings, to our sight, in exceeding brilliancy, the faith and prayerful mightiness of Abraham; the calm meditativeness of Isaac; the crystal purity of Joseph; the serene and unspotted godliness of Samuel; the burning flames of Elijah; the calm constancy of David; the stern self-sacrifice and zealous fervour of the Baptisit; the fiery ardour of holy Paul; the loveliness of St. John the Divine. The sum of what has been advanced may be stated as enforcing these two lessons. 1. That you must avoid as though it were death, the idea of spiritual finality, in the attainments of grace. Never think you have enough of God and God's Spirit. Never be satisfied with any successes you have reached in holin

81:1-7 All the worship we can render to the Lord is beneath his excellences, and our obligations to him, especially in our redemption from sin and wrath. What God had done on Israel's behalf, was kept in remembrance by public solemnities. To make a deliverance appear more gracious, more glorious, it is good to observe all that makes the trouble we are delivered from appear more grievous. We ought never to forget the base and ruinous drudgery to which Satan, our oppressor, brought us. But when, in distress of conscience, we are led to cry for deliverance, the Lord answers our prayers, and sets us at liberty. Convictions of sin, and trials by affliction, prove his regard to his people. If the Jews, on their solemn feast-days, were thus to call to mind their redemption out of Egypt, much more ought we, on the Christian sabbath, to call to mind a more glorious redemption, wrought out for us by our Lord Jesus Christ, from worse bondage. 81:8-16 We cannot look for too little from the creature, nor too much from the Creator. We may have enough from God, if we pray for it in faith. All the wickedness of the world is owing to man's wilfulness. People are not religious, because they will not be so. God is not the Author of their sin, he leaves them to the lusts of their own hearts, and the counsels of their own heads; if they do not well, the blame must be upon themselves. The Lord is unwilling that any should perish. What enemies sinners are to themselves! It is sin that makes our troubles long, and our salvation slow. Upon the same conditions of faith and obedience, do Christians hold those spiritual and eternal good things, which the pleasant fields and fertile hills of Canaan showed forth. Christ is the Bread of life; he is the Rock of salvation, and his promises are as honey to pious minds. But those who reject him as their Lord and Master, must also lose him as their Saviour and their reward.