He is crying unto us, “Sing, O heaven”—that is, “Sing, O Church; and rejoice, O earth. Sing, O State: sing both Church and State of Scotland.” Oh! how should we sing? Hath not the Lord forsaken and forgotten us? Nay, though it appears so, yet it is not really so. “A woman may forget her sucking child, but the Lord cannot forget his people.” The purpose of God is pregnant and about to bring forth a great deliverance unto the Church and State of Scotland. If we saw the days that our Lord is to bestow upon us in Scotland, and had a view of the ministers that shall be in it, it would make us sing. Ye think now that the ministers are gone. Indeed a great part of them are so, and the magistrates are rejected by us. We declare before sun, moon, and stars that this is the case. But the Lord hath yet ministers that shall be polished shafts in His quiver; and He will yet give us rulers, and will make out that promise: “And kings shall be thy nursing fathers;” so that if we saw the good days that are coming upon the back of these troubles, we would not get men and women kept from dancing for joy. Ye would all go home with gladness, rejoicing as if ye were frantic for joy. But you may say, “How can this be?” For there are two things to be objected against it:
We are all in a state of trial and probation, for a permanent and eternal existence in another world. The space in which we move is but short at best, and by several circumstances very much contracted; but short and contracted as it is, scenes of the most weighty and important nature are transacted upon it. Man in his present fallen condition is truly forlorn. He is appointed to endure many severe afflictions, which he can neither foresee nor prevent. In the distribution of afflictions there is no doubt but the unerring wisdom acts, nor can chance have any place in His vast dominions, where even a sparrow falleth not to the ground without Him.
In the book of Psalms, we have the record of the experiences of the believer, and the utterance of his feelings in almost every variety of interesting circumstances, and upon subjects of all others the most important. There is not a systematic enunciation of doctrinal truth, or a regular and arranged collection of precepts of conduct, but we have in a much more interesting form the substance of Christian doctrine, and duty, and privilege, brought forward as suggested by the holy Spirit, according to the peculiarities of the situation and character of the sacred writer. Thus, in the verse before us, we have not the mere statement of the truth, that the man who puts his trust in the Lord is blessed; we have it confirmed by the personal experience of the Psalmist himself, and it is breathed forth with all the sympathetic power that can be given to it by a heart overflowing with gratitude to God, and with holy zeal for his glory in the filial affiance of the children of men.
