Psalm 5:8














This second strophe of the psalm is very much like the first in substance, the matter running parallel with vers. 3-7. The fundamental thought on which all is based is that of the righteousness of God. The whole prayer is framed on that conception.

I. A PRAYER FOR RIGHTEOUS DELIVERANCE AND GUIDANCE.

1. For righteous guidance. "Lead me in thy righteousness; make thy way [the right way] plain to me."

2. For righteous deliverance. The unrighteous lay in wait for him - threatened his safety. There was "no faithfulness in their mouth;" they used slander and treachery when they dared not use open violence. Their inward part, their souls. were full of evil designs and purposes. "Their throat is like an open sepulchre," which yawns for his destruction. Their speech, fair and smooth, to flatter and put him off his guard and lure him on. With them, mouth, heart, throat, and tongue are all instruments of evil; and their malice was such that he needed the care and guidance of the righteous power above.

II. A PRAYER FOR RIGHTEOUS RETRIBUTION. (Ver. 10.) Punish. "The word properly signifies such a decision and judgment as would show and manifest what sort of neighbours they are when their ungodly dispositions are disclosed and every one is made known." Show them guilty. Let them fall through or because of their own counsels. Their counsels are of such an evil nature that they must in the end ensure their destruction. By means of their transgressions thrust them away - the same thought in substance as the last. But the great argument for retribution is - they have rebelled against thee. The enemies of the psalmist are the enemies of God. God's cause and that of his people are the same. Whoso toucheth you, toucheth the apple of mine eye; "Saul, Saul, why porsecutest thou me?"

III. PRAYER FOR THE REALIZATION OF A RIGHTEOUS JOY. ("Vers. 11, 12.) This joy proceeds:

1. From the sense of refuge and defence we have in God.

2. From the love we have to God, for his goodness and righteousness.

3. From the knowledge we have that God does assuredly bless the righteous. - S.

Lead me, O Lord, in Thy righteousness.
God is addressed as a friend. Three things in David's prayer.

1. What is the rule according to which he looks for this Divine guidance? "Lead me in Thy righteousness." The righteousness here is God's faithfulness. All God's dealings with His people have been faithful.

2. Why he wishes this leading. It is that he may be divinely instructed in the right path. The Christian may sometimes be in a state of great perplexity as to the way he should go. He desires Divine guidance in the path of Christian experience, in the path of practice, and in the path of precept.

3. The motive he pleads to enforce it with God. The margin reads — "Because of my observers. Who are our observers? The world, fellow Christians, ministers, angels, and God.

(William Jay.)

Make Thy way straight before my face.
Two men aspire to be inventors of first-rate rank. The one spends all his life in study and experiment, and lights upon nothing new; but the other has some surprising discovery to put before the public every year or two. How do we explain the difference? Is it luck and nothing more? The unsuccessful inventor, with perhaps equal ingenuity, is following impracticable and unremunerative paths for a lifetime. The successful inventor knows in what direction others have toiled without profit, and scarcely ever spends a week on a misleading scent. His shrewd despair of finding anything new or remunerative in certain directions shuts him up to one golden path of fruitful research.

(Thomas G. Selby.)

People
David, Psalmist
Places
Jerusalem
Topics
Enemies, Face, Foes, Guide, Lead, Lie, O, Observing, Plain, Righteousness, Straight, Wait
Outline
1. David prays, and professes his study in prayer
4. God favors not the wicked
7. David, professing his faith, prays to God to guide him
10. to destroy his enemies
11. and to preserve the godly

Dictionary of Bible Themes
Psalm 5:8

     8128   guidance, receiving

Library
A Staircase of Three Steps
'All those that put their trust in Thee ... them also that love Thy name ... the righteous.'--PSALM v. 11, 12. I have ventured to isolate these three clauses from their context, because, if taken in their sequence, they are very significant of the true path by which men draw nigh to God and become righteous. They are all three designations of the same people, but regarded under different aspects and at different stages. There is a distinct order in them, and whether the Psalmist was fully conscious
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

Morning Hymn.
"My voice shalt thou hear in the morning, O Lord."--Psalm 5:3. "Morgen glanz der Ewigkeit." [35]Knov. von Rosenroth. transl., Jane Borthwick, 1855 Jesus, Sun of righteousness, Brightest beam of Love Divine, With the early morning rays Do Thou on our darkness shine, And dispel with purest light All our night! As on drooping herb and flower Falls the soft refreshing dew, Let Thy Spirit's grace and power All our weary souls renew; Sbowers of blessing over all Softly fall! Like the sun's reviving
Jane Borthwick—Hymns from the Land of Luther

Morning Hymns
Morning Hymns. [2] My voice shalt Thou hear in the morning, O Lord; in the morning will I direct my prayer unto Thee, and will look up. Psalm 5:3
Catherine Winkworth—Lyra Germanica: The Christian Year

Moreover what is Written "Thou Wilt Destroy all that Speak Leasing...
35. Moreover what is written "Thou wilt destroy all that speak leasing:" [2360] one saith that no lie is here excepted, but all condemned. Another saith: Yea verily: but they who speak leasing from the heart, as we disputed above; for that man speaketh truth in his heart, who hateth the necessity of lying, which he understands as a penalty of the moral life. Another saith: All indeed will God destroy who speak leasing, but not all leasing: for there is some leasing which the Prophet was at that time
St. Augustine—On Lying

But if no Authority for Lying Can be Alleged...
9. But if no authority for lying can be alleged, neither from the ancient Books, be it because that is not a lie which is received to have been done or said in a figurative sense, or be it because good men are not challenged to imitate that which in bad men, beginning to amend, is praised in comparison with the worse; nor yet from the books of the New Testament, because Peter's correction rather than his simulation, even as his tears rather than his denial, is what we must imitate: then, as to those
St. Augustine—On Lying

A Great Deal for Me to Read Hast Thou Sent...
1. A great deal for me to read hast thou sent, my dearest brother Consentius: a great deal for me to read: to the which while I am preparing an answer, and am drawn off first by one, then by another, more urgent occupation, the year has measured out its course, and has thrust me into such straits, that I must answer in what sort I may, lest the time for sailing being now favorable, and the bearer desirous to return, I should too long detain him. Having therefore unrolled and read through all that
St. Augustine—Against Lying

On the Other Hand, those who Say that we must Never Lie...
6. On the other hand, those who say that we must never lie, plead much more strongly, using first the Divine authority, because in the very Decalogue it is written "Thou shall not bear false witness;" [2306] under which general term it comprises all lying: for whoso utters any thing bears witness to his own mind. But lest any should contend that not every lie is to be called false witness, what will he say to that which is written, "The mouth that lieth slayeth the soul:" [2307] and lest any should
St. Augustine—On Lying

What Then, if a Homicide Seek Refuge with a Christian...
22. What then, if a homicide seek refuge with a Christian, or if he see where the homicide have taken refuge, and be questioned of this matter by him who seeks, in order to bring to punishment a man, the slayer of man? Is he to tell a lie? For how does he not hide a sin by lying, when he for whom he lies has been guilty of a heinous sin? Or is it because he is not questioned concerning his sin, but about the place where he is concealed? So then to lie in order to hide a person's sin is evil; but
St. Augustine—On Lying

Since the Case is So, what is Man...
19. Since the case is so, what is man, while in this life he uses his own proper will, ere he choose and love God, but unrighteous and ungodly? "What," I say, "is man," a creature going astray from the Creator, unless his Creator "be mindful of him," [2683] and choose [2684] him freely, and love [2685] him freely? Because he is himself not able to choose or love, unless being first chosen and loved he be healed, because by choosing blindness he perceiveth not, and by loving laziness is soon wearied.
St. Augustine—On Patience

Second Sunday after Trinity Exhortation to Brotherly Love.
Text: 1 John 3, 13-18. 13 Marvel not, brethren, if the world hateth you. 14 We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brethren. He that loveth not abideth in death. 15 Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer: and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him. 16 Hereby know we love, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. 17 But whoso hath the world's goods, and beholdeth his brother in need, and shutteth
Martin Luther—Epistle Sermons, Vol. III

Question of the Division of Life into the Active and the Contemplative
I. May Life be fittingly divided into the Active and the Contemplative? S. Augustine, De Consensu Evangelistarum, I., iv. 8 " Tractatus, cxxiv. 5, in Joannem II. Is this division of Life into the Active and the Contemplative a sufficient one? S. Augustine, Of the Trinity, I., viii. 17 I May Life be fittingly divided into the Active and the Contemplative? S. Gregory the Great says[291]: "There are two kinds of lives in which Almighty God instructs us by His Sacred Word--namely, the active and
St. Thomas Aquinas—On Prayer and The Contemplative Life

Covenanting a Duty.
The exercise of Covenanting with God is enjoined by Him as the Supreme Moral Governor of all. That his Covenant should be acceded to, by men in every age and condition, is ordained as a law, sanctioned by his high authority,--recorded in his law of perpetual moral obligation on men, as a statute decreed by him, and in virtue of his underived sovereignty, promulgated by his command. "He hath commanded his covenant for ever."[171] The exercise is inculcated according to the will of God, as King and
John Cunningham—The Ordinance of Covenanting

Covenant Duties.
It is here proposed to show, that every incumbent duty ought, in suitable circumstances, to be engaged to in the exercise of Covenanting. The law and covenant of God are co-extensive; and what is enjoined in the one is confirmed in the other. The proposals of that Covenant include its promises and its duties. The former are made and fulfilled by its glorious Originator; the latter are enjoined and obligatory on man. The duties of that Covenant are God's law; and the demands of the law are all made
John Cunningham—The Ordinance of Covenanting

Psalms
The piety of the Old Testament Church is reflected with more clearness and variety in the Psalter than in any other book of the Old Testament. It constitutes the response of the Church to the divine demands of prophecy, and, in a less degree, of law; or, rather, it expresses those emotions and aspirations of the universal heart which lie deeper than any formal demand. It is the speech of the soul face to face with God. Its words are as simple and unaffected as human words can be, for it is the genius
John Edgar McFadyen—Introduction to the Old Testament

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