Psalms 40:3

The figures for deep distress are illustrated in Jeremiah's history (Jer 38:6-12). Patience and trust manifested in distress, deliverance in answer to prayer, and the blessed effect of it in eliciting praise from God's true worshippers, teach us that Christ's suffering is our example, and His deliverance our encouragement (Heb 5:7, 8;

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And he hath put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto our God. At the passover, before his passion, our Lord sang one of the grand old Psalms of praise; but what is the music of his heart now, in the midst of his redeemed! What a song is that in which his glad heart for ever leads the chorus of the elect! Not Miriam's tabor nor Moses' triumphant hymn over Miriam's chivalry can for a moment rival that ever new and exulting song. Justice magnified and grace victorious; hell subdued and heaven glorified; death destroyed and immortality established; sin overthrown and righteousness resplendent; what a theme for a hymn in that day when our Lord drinketh the red wine new with us all in our heavenly Father's kingdom! Even on earth, and before his great passion, he foresaw the joy which was set before him, and was sustained by the prospect. Our God. The God of Jesus, the God of Israel, "my God and your God." How will we praise him, but ah! Jesus will be the chief player on our stringed instruments; he will lead the solemn hallelujah which shall go up from the sacramental host redeemed by blood. Many shall see it, and fear, and shall trust in the Lord. A multitude that no man can number shall see the griefs and triumphs of Jesus, shall tremble because of their sinful rejection of him, and then through grace shall receive faith and become trusters in Jehovah. Here is our Lord's reward. Here is the assurance which makes preachers bold and workers persevering. Reader, are you one among the many? Note the way of salvation, a sight, a fear, a trust! Do you know what these mean by possessing and practising them in your own soul? Trusting in the Lord is the evidence, nay, the essence of salvation. He who is a true believer is evidently redeemed from the dominion of sin and Satan.

‘I waited patiently for the LORD; and he inclined unto me, and heard my cry. He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings. And he hath put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto our God: many shall see it, and fear, and shall trust in the Lord.’Psalm 40:1-3. THIS PASSAGE HAS BEEN USED with great frequency as the expression of the experience of the people of God, and I think it has been very rightly so used. It is a very accurate picture of the way in which sinners are raised up from despair to hope and salvation, and of the way in which saints are brought out of deep troubles, and made to sing of divine love and power. Yet I am not certain that the first verse could be truthfully uttered by all of us; I question, indeed, whether any of us could thus speak. Could we say’I waited patiently for the Lord.’ Think ye, brethren, might it not read’I waited impatiently for the Lord,’ in the case of most of us? All the rest may stand true, but this would need to be modified. We could hardly speak in our own commendation if we considered our conduct in the matter of patience, for that is, alas, still a scarce virtue’upon the face of the earth. If we read the psalm through we shall see that it was not written exclusively to describe the experience of God’s people. Secondarily we may regard it as David’s language, but in the first instance a greater than David is here. The first Person who uttered these words was the Messiah, and that is quite clear if you read the psalm through; for we fall upon such language as this: ‘Sacrifice and offering, Thou didst not desire; mine ears hast Thou opened; burnt offering and sin offering hast Thou not required.

THIS man who talks about his song and seems to be very much struck with the fact that he has become a singer, was formerly a man of prayer. I doubt not that he was still praying while he was praising, but he began to pray before he began to praise. It is not good to go in the choir, first—we must begin our spiritual experience at the "penitent form." He who sings without having wept may have to weep, by-and-by, where he can never sing!

THIS man who talks about his song and seems to be very much struck with the fact that he has become a singer, was formerly a man of prayer. I doubt not that he was still praying while he was praising, but he began to pray before he began to praise. It is not good to go in the choir, first—we must begin our spiritual experience at the "penitent form." He who sings without having wept may have to weep, by-and-by, where he can never sing! Listen to what this man's experience had been—"I waited patiently for the Lord and He inclined unto me, and heard my cry." That is where God gets His singers—out of the place of praying and weeping! Where they learn to pray they begin to sing. Oh, yes, even in Heaven, itself, the sweetest voices that praise God and the Lamb belong to those who came out of great tribulation and washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb! Therefore are they before the Throne of God and serve Him day and night in His Temple. Do not try to get the joy of Christ without first having sorrow for sin— "The path of sorrow, and that path alone, Leads to the land where sorrow is unknown." This man, who says that God has put a new song in his mouth, began with a new prayer in his heart—"I waited patiently for the Lord and He inclined unto me, and heard my cry." Further, this man, who sings so well that he cannot help talking about it, was once in a very deplorable state where there was no singing for him, but God brought him up out of it! Hear what he says, "He brought me up, also, out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings." Nowadays people do not seem to know much about that horrible pit. I wish they did. There are more gentle, quiet conversions—and I care little how men are converted so long as they are really converted—but, after all, the old-fashioned sort of conversions wear best.

‘I waited patiently for the LORD; and he inclined unto me, and heard my cry. He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings. And he hath put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto our God: many shall see it, and fear, and shall trust in the Lord.’Psalm 40:1-3. THIS PASSAGE HAS BEEN USED with great frequency as the expression of the experience of the people of God, and I think it has been very rightly so used.

A new song - Cheerfulness and joy had long been strangers to him. He seemed to live to utter the most doleful complaints, and be a prey to suffering and wretchedness. Praise for a sense of God’s favor was a new song to him. The word is often used to signify excellence: I will sing a most excellent and eminent song. Many shalt see it - I will publish it abroad and fear-to sin against the Lord, knowing by my example what a grievous and bitter thing it is. And shall trust in the Lord - Even the worst of sinners shall not despair of mercy, being penitent, when they see that I have found favor in his sight.

And he hath put a new song in my mouth - See the notes at Psa 33:3. The idea is, that he had given a new or fresh “occasion” for praise. The deliverance was so marked, and was such an addition to former mercies, that a new expression of thanks was proper. It was an act of such surprising intervention on the part of God that the language used on former occasions, and which was adapted to express the mercies then received, would not be sufficient to convey the sense of gratitude felt for the present deliverance. As applied to the Messiah, and referring (as it was supposed in the notes at Psa 40:2) to his being raised up to glory after the depth of his sorrows, it would mean that no language hitherto employed to express gratitude to God would be adequate to the occasion, but that the language of a new song of praise would be demanded to celebrate so great an event. Even praise unto our God - “To our God;” identifying himself, as the Messiah does, with his people, and expressing the idea that the new song of praise was appropriate to them as well as to “himself,” since they would be benefited by his work, and since God was their God as well as his. Compare Joh 20:17. Many shall see it - Great numbers of the human race shall be made acquainted with the occasion which there was for such a song. And fear - Learn to reverence, to worship, to honor God, as the result of what had been done. And shall trust in the Lord - Shall confide in God; shall put their trust in him; shall become his true worshippers and friends: (a) as the effect of this merciful interposition in behalf of him who had been thus in trouble or distress, and who was enabled to triumph; (b) as the result of the work accomplished by him. The effect of the Redeemer’s sorrows, and of God’s merciful help, would be that great numbers would learn to put their trust in God, or would become his true friends. […]