Voices and influences
Matthew Henry
The Chester nonconformist who rose before dawn for ten years to write a whole-Bible commentary plain enough for a farming family to read at the table.
Summary
This site quotes Matthew Henry 7,276 times across 66 books, and lists 2 works.
- Lived 1662 to 1714, Welsh.
- Quoted here most in Psalms: 748 of 7,276.
Matthew Henry
- Lived
- 1662 to 1714
- Nation
- Welsh
- Tradition
- Puritan
- Body
- Presbyterian
5 of 7,276 quotations
Own words
Quoted in full, because Matthew Henry died in 1714 and these works are out of copyright. Each citation below names its edition and its year. A citation naming a modernised text means that edition makes its own editorial changes, and that edition's terms are not in this site's record.
When things are at the worst they will begin to mend; and he will give them to see the glorious perfection of their deliverance; for, as for God, his work is perfect.
Commentary on the Whole Bible, 1710
The rest of the quotation
He that in the beginning finished the heavens and the earth, and all the hosts of both, will finish all the blessings of both to his people. When he begins in ways of mercy he will make an end.
Jeremiah 29:11 For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, to give you a future and a hope. BSB
(2.) We must love mercy; we must delight in it, as our God does, must be glad of an opportunity to do good, and do it cheerfully.
Commentary on the Whole Bible, 1710
The rest of the quotation
Justice is put before mercy, for we must not give that in alms which is wrongfully got, or with which our debts should be paid.
Micah 6:8 He has shown you, O man, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you but to act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God? BSB
Though all are sinners, yet some are greater sinners than others. The men of Sodom were sinners of the first magnitude, sinners before the Lord, that is, impudent daring sinners; they were so to a proverb.
Commentary on the Whole Bible, 1710
Genesis 13:13 But the men of Sodom were wicked, sinning greatly against the LORD. BSB
Note, Some sins, and the sins of some sinners, cry aloud to heaven for vengeance. The iniquity of Sodom was crying iniquity, that is, it was so very provoking that it even urged God to punish.
Commentary on the Whole Bible, 1710
Genesis 18:20 Then the LORD said, “The outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is great. Because their sin is so grievous, BSB
It is justice, as well as wisdom, to do thus, in perptuam rei memoriam--that the circumstance may be perpetually remembered.
Commentary on the Whole Bible, 1710
Genesis 21:30 He replied, “You are to accept the seven ewe lambs from my hand as my witness that I dug this well.” BSB
Influence, on the record
This site quotes Matthew Henry 7,276 times across 66 books.
This site’s own count of what it does with the voice
The life, in order
The life told as one accountfrom this site's record
Matthew Henry was born on October 18, 1662, at Broad Oak in Flintshire, on the Welsh border — a few months after the Act of Uniformity threw his father out of the Church of England. Philip Henry was one of roughly two thousand ministers ejected in 1662 for refusing to conform. He lost his living, kept preaching where he could, and taught his children at home. Matthew was a sickly boy who is said to have been reading Bible chapters aloud with comment at three years old. He grew up in a house where family worship happened twice a day and where nonconformity had a price attached to it. He studied under Thomas Doolittle at an academy for dissenters, then went to London in 1685 to read law at Gray's Inn — a sensible career for a man whose religion barred him from the universities. He gave it up. In 1687, at twenty-four, he was privately ordained and went to Chester as minister of a Presbyterian congregation. He stayed twenty-five years. He preached twice on Sunday, catechized the children, lectured on weeknights, visited constantly, and preached in the surrounding villages and in the county jail. The congregation grew to some hundreds of communicants and built a chapel in Crook Street. He began the commentary in November 1704. His method was ordinary and brutal: rise at four or five in the morning and write before the day's work, then take up the evening after it. He wrote for the family table — for a farmer reading aloud to his household, not for a scholar. The result is not technical. It is the text explained clause by clause and then pressed home, with a gift for the memorable line that has kept it quoted for three hundred years. In 1712 he moved, reluctantly, to a congregation at Mare Street, Hackney, in London. On June 22, 1714, riding back toward Hackney after preaching in Chester, he was thrown from his horse near Nantwich. He died that night at Tarporley, aged fifty-one. He had finished through the end of Acts. Thirteen fellow ministers completed Romans through Revelation from his notes and papers, and the whole Exposition of the Old and New Testaments was published in six volumes. It has never gone out of print. Its readers make the case for it better than any summary can. George Whitefield read it through four times, the last time on his knees. Spurgeon told his students in Commenting and Commentaries that every minister ought to read it entirely and carefully through at least once. John Wesley abridged it for his people. It sits on more shelves, in more languages, than any other commentary written in English. Sources: Matthew Henry, An Exposition of the Old and New Testaments; J. B. Williams, Memoirs of the Life, Character and Writings of the Rev. Matthew Henry; C. H. Spurgeon, Commenting and Commentaries; Diaries and Letters of Philip Henry, ed. Matthew Henry Lee.
2 works
How to read this voice
An Exposition of the Old and New Testaments
1710
Not quoted on this site yet
Directions for Daily Communion with God
1712
Not quoted on this site yet
Their whole shelf sits at Matthew Henry Commentary (CCEL) and Blue Letter Bible - Matthew Henry.
7,276 quotations across 66 books
Where this voice is quoted
“Now when this people or a prophet or priest asks you, ‘What is the burden of the LORD?’ you are to say to them, ‘What burden?
“The sin here charged upon them is bantering God's prophets and dialect they used, and jesting with sacred things. They asked, What is the burden of the Lord?”
But if you claim, ‘This is the burden of the LORD,’ then this is what the LORD says: Because you have said, ‘This is the burden of the LORD,’ and…
“This was the word that gave great offence to God, that, whenever they spoke of the word of the Lord, they called it, in scorn and derision, the burden of the Lord.”
“This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: ‘Like these good figs, so I regard as good the exiles from Judah, whom I have sent away from this…
“By their afflictions they were convinced of sin, humbled under the hand of God, weaned from the world, made serious, taught to pray, and turned from their iniquity; particularly they were cured of their inclination to idolatry; and thus it was good for them that…”
I will keep My eyes on them for good and will return them to this land.
“Their captivity was to square the rough stones and make them fit for his building, to prune up the young trees and make them fit for his planting. (6.)”
I will give them a heart to know Me, that I am the LORD.
“Note, Those that have backslidden from God, if they do in sincerity return to him, are admitted as freely as any to all the privileges and comforts of the everlasting covenant, which is herein well-ordered, that every transgression in the covenant does not throw us…”
behold, I will summon all the families of the north, declares the LORD, and I will send for My servant Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, whom I will bring against this…
“The fixing of time during which the captivity should last would be of great use, not only for the confirmation of the prophecy, when the event (which in this particular could by no human sagacity be foreseen) should exactly answer the prediction, but for the…”
If they refuse to take the cup from your hand and drink it, you are to tell them that this is what the LORD of Hosts says: ‘You most certainly…
“That the burden of the word of the Lord will at last become the burden of his judgments. Isaiah had prophesied long since against most of these nations ( ch. xiii. , &c.) and now at length all his prophecies will have their complete fulfilling.”
This is what the LORD of Hosts says: “Behold! Disaster is spreading from nation to nation; a mighty storm is rising from the ends of the earth.”
“The Chaldean army shall be like a hurricane raised in the north, but thence carried on with incredible fierceness and swiftness, bearing down all before it. It is like the whirlwind out of which God answered Job, which was exceedingly terrible, Job xxxvii.”
“This is what the LORD says: Stand in the courtyard of the house of the LORD and speak all the words I have commanded you to speak to all the…
“He must assure them that if they would repent of their sins, and turn from them, though they were in imminent danger of ruin and desolating judgments were just at the door, yet a stop should be put to them, and God would proceed no…”
Then the priests and prophets said to the officials and all the people, “This man is worthy of death, for he has prophesied against this city, as you have heard…
“For the prophets prophesied falsely, and the priests bore rule by their means, ch. v. 31 . Observe, When Jeremiah is indicted before the princes the stress of his accusation is laid upon what he said concerning the city, because they thought the princes would…”
But know for certain that if you put me to death, you will bring innocent blood upon yourselves, upon this city, and upon its residents; for truly the LORD has…
“They might think that killing the prophet would help to defeat the prophecy, but they would prove wretchedly deceived; it would but add to their guilt and aggravate their ruin.”
King Jehoiakim and all his mighty men and officials heard his words, and the king sought to put him to death.
“Note, There are many that have much grace, but they have little courage, that are very honest, but withal very timorous. His execution notwithstanding.”
Nevertheless, Ahikam son of Shaphan supported Jeremiah, so he was not handed over to the people to be put to death.
“It is here left upon record, as it were, by way of appeal to the judgment of impartial men in all ages, whether Jeremiah was worthy to die for delivering such a message as this from God, and whether his persecutors were not very wicked…”
This is what the LORD said to me: “Make for yourself a yoke out of leather straps and put it on your neck.
“We find him with one on, ch. xxviii. Hereby he intimated that he advised them to nothing but what he was resolved to do himself; for he was not one of those that bind heavy burdens on others, which they themselves will not touch with…”
But as for you, do not listen to your prophets, your diviners, your interpreters of dreams, your mediums, or your sorcerers who declare, ‘You will not serve the king of…
“Particular prophecies against these nations that bordered on Israel severally, the ruin of which is here foretold in the general, we shall meet with, ch. xlviii. and xlix., and Ezek. xxv. , which had the same accomplishment with this here.”
And to Zedekiah king of Judah I spoke the same message: “Put your necks under the yoke of the king of Babylon; serve him and his people, and live!
“And is it not much more our wisdom to submit to the sweet and easy yoke of our rightful Lord and Master Jesus Christ, that we may secure the lives of our souls?”
If they are indeed prophets and the word of the LORD is with them, let them now plead with the LORD of Hosts that the articles remaining in the house…
“Note, Prophets must be praying men; by being much in prayer they must make it to appear that they keep up a correspondence with heaven. We cannot think that those do, as prophets, ever hear thence, who do not frequently by prayer send thither.”
which Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon did not take when he carried Jeconiah son of Jehoiakim king of Judah into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon, along with all the nobles of…
“This was grievous to them above any thing; for the temple was their pride and confidence, and the stripping of that was too plain an indication of that which the true prophet told them, that their God had departed from them.”
“This is what the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: ‘I have broken the yoke of the king of Babylon.
“Now, upon the reading of this sham prophecy, and comparing it with the messages that God sent by the true prophets, we may observe what a vast difference there is between them.”
Then the prophet Jeremiah replied to the prophet Hananiah in the presence of the priests and all the people who were standing in the house of the LORD. “Amen!”
“Though, as a faithful prophet, he foresaw and foretold the destruction of Jerusalem, yet, as a faithful Israelite, he prayed earnestly for the preservation of it, in obedience to that command, Pray for the peace of Jerusalem.”
Therefore this is what the LORD says: ‘I am about to remove you from the face of the earth.
“(2.) The judgment given against him is, " I will cast thee off from the face of the earth, as unworthy to live upon it; thou shalt be buried in it.”
This is the text of the letter that Jeremiah the prophet sent from Jerusalem to the surviving elders among the exiles and to the priests, the prophets, and all the…
“The word of God written is as truly given by inspiration of God as his word spoken was; and this was the proper way of spreading the knowledge of God's will among his children scattered abroad.”
“Build houses and settle down. Plant gardens and eat their produce. Take wives and have sons and daughters.
“If the earth be the Lord's, then, wherever a child of God goes, he does not go off his Father's ground. Patria est ubicunque bene est--That place is our country in which we are well off.”
Seek the prosperity of the city to which I have sent you as exiles. Pray to the LORD on its behalf, for if it prospers, you too will prosper.”
“And, if they were to pray for and seek the peace of the land of their captivity, much more reason have we to pray for the welfare of the land of our nativity, where we are a free people under a good government, that in…”
For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, to give you a future and a hope.
“When things are at the worst they will begin to mend; and he will give them to see the glorious perfection of their deliverance; for, as for God, his work is perfect.”