Psalms 3:4

"I cried unto the Lord with my voice." Why doth he say, "with my voice?" Surely, silent prayers are heard. Yes, but good men often find that, even in secret, they pray better aloud than they do when they utter no vocal sound. Perhaps, moreover, David would think thus:—"My cruel enemies clamour against me; they lift up their voices, and, behold, I lift up mine, and my cry outsoars them all.

cried . . . heard--Such has been my experience. The latter verb denotes a gracious hearing or answering. out of--or, "from." his holy hill--Zion (Ps 2:6).

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"I cried unto the Lord with my voice." Why doth he say, "with my voice?" Surely, silent prayers are heard. Yes, but good men often find that, even in secret, they pray better aloud than they do when they utter no vocal sound. Perhaps, moreover, David would think thus:—"My cruel enemies clamour against me; they lift up their voices, and, behold, I lift up mine, and my cry outsoars them all. They clamour, but the cry of my voice in great distress pierces the very skies, and is louder and stronger than all their tumult; for there is one in the sanctuary who hearkens to me from the seventh heaven, and he hath, heard me out of his holy hill." Answers to prayers are sweet cordials for the soul. We need not fear a frowning world while we rejoice in a prayer-hearing God. Here stands another Selah. Rest awhile, O tried believer, and change the strain to a softer air.

I cried unto the Lord with my voice - He was exposed to much danger, and therefore he had need of fervor. He heard me - Notwithstanding my enemies said, and my friends feared, that there was no help for me in my God; yet he heard me out of his holy hill. Selah: mark this, and take encouragement from it. God never forsakes those who trust in him. He never shuts out the prayer of the distressed.

I cried unto the Lord - That is, in these troubles, as he had always done in affliction. The form of the verb here is future - “I will cry” or call unto the Lord; probably, however, designed to state a general habit with him, that when troubles came he always called on the Lord. He speaks now of himself as if in the midst of the trouble; gives utterance to the feeling which he has always had in his sorrows; and says, “I will call upon the Lord,” thus declaring his purpose to make his appeal confidently to him. Thus, the language is not so much retrospective as it is indicative of the uniform state of his mind in the midst of afflictions. With my voice - Not merely mentally, but he gave utterance to the deep anguish of his soul in words. So the Saviour did in the garden of Gethsemane Mat 26:39; and so, perhaps, most persons do in deep affliction. It is natural then to cry out for help; and besides the fact that we may hope that any prayer then, though mental only, would bring relief by being answered, there is a measure of relief found by the very act of giving utterance or vent to the deep and, as it were, pent-up feelings of the soul. In calmer times we are satisfied with unuttered aspirations, with gentle ejaculations, with sweet mental communion with God; in overwhelming trials we give utterance to our feelings in the earnest language of pleading. And he heard me - Or, “then he hears me;” that is, when I call. The psalmist refers to what he had constantly found to be true, that God was a hearer of prayer. Out of his holy hill - Zion. See the notes at Psa 2:6. That was the place to which David had removed the ark, and which was regarded, therefore, as the special dwelling-place of the Most High. To him, as dwelling in Zion, prayer was accustomed to be offered, and there he was accustomed to answer prayer. […]