Psalms 94:22

"And the Lord has become my refuge" [Psalm 94:22], he says. You would not seek such a refuge, if you were not in danger: but you have therefore been in danger, that you might seek for it: for He teaches us by sorrow. He causes me tribulation from the malice of the wicked: pricked with that tribulation, I begin to seek a refuge which I had ceased to seek for in that worldly prosperity. For who, that is always prosperous, and rejoices in present hopes, finds it easy to remember God? Let the hope of this life give way, and the hope of God advance; that you may say, "And the Lord has become my refuge:" may I sorrow for this end that the Lord may become my refuge! "And my God the help of my hope." For as yet the Lord is our hope, since as long as we are here, we are in hope, and not in possession. But lest we fail in hope, there is near us a provision to encourage us, and to mitigate those very evils which we suffer. For it is not said in vain, "God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that you are able: but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that you may be able to bear it:" [1 Corinthians 10:13] who will so put us into that furnace of tribulation, that the vessel may be hardened, but not broken. "And the Lord has become my refuge: and my God the help of my hope." Why then did He seem to you to be as it were unjust, in that He spares the evil? See then how the Psalm is now set right, and be thou set right together with the Psalm: for, for this reason the Psalm contained your words. What words? "Lord, how long shall the ungodly, how long shall the ungodly triumph?" The Psalm just now used your words: use therefore yourself the Psalm's words in your turn.

But the Lord is my defence,.... The defence of his church and people, of all the righteous, against those great armies of their enemies that gather together against them: the Targum, in the king's Bible is, "the Word of the Lord shall be my weapon:'' and my God is the rock of my refuge; to whom recourse is had for shelter from the enemy, and against which the gates of hell cannot prevail: both characters, rock and refuge, agree with Christ, the essential Word of the Lord.

In singing this psalm we must look abroad upon the pride of oppressors with a holy indignation, and the tears of the oppressed with a holy compassion; but, at the same time, look upwards to the righteous Judge with an entire satisfaction, and look forward, to the end of all these things, with a pleasing hope.

Let the wicked gather as they may, the psalmist is not afraid, but sweetly sings, The Lord is my defence, and my God is the rock of my refuge. Firm as a rock is Jehovah's love, and there do we betake ourselves for shelter. In him, even in him alone, we find safety, let the world rage as it may; we ask not aid from man, but are content to flee into the bosom of omnipotence.

The rock of my refuge - Alluding to those natural fortifications among rocks, which are frequent in the land of Judea.