Online Bible 1995 March/ROM-1025.iso/olb/gill/4_200.lzh/4_201.TXT

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family, who at the close of a feast or meal, used to
take up a cup in his hands, and give thanks; see Matt.
xxvi. 27. And call upon the name of the Lord; invo-
cation of the name of the Lord takes in all worship
and service of him, public and private, external and
internal; and particularly prayer, which is calling upon
the Lord in the name of Christ, with faith and fervency,
in sincerity and truth: and the sense of the psalmist
is, that he would not only give thanks for the mercies
he had received, but continue to pray to God for
more; and this was all the return he was capable of
making.
Ver. 14. I will pay my vows unto the Lord now, in
the presence of all his people.] Make good the reso-
lutions and determinations he made in the strength of
divine grace, in the time of his troubles; that should
the Lord deliver him out of them, he would give him
all the glory, and offer thanksgiving and praise to him;
and now being delivered, this he declares he would do,
in a public way, before all the people of God, assem-
bled in the house of the Lord, as witnesses of it; see
Psal. lxvi. 13, 14.
Ver. 15. Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death
of his saints.] The Lord has his saints or sanctified
ones, who are sanctified or set apart by God the Fa-
ther from all eternity; who are sanctified in Christ,
their head and representative; who are sanctified by
his blood, shed for the expiation of their sins; who are
sanctilied by his spirit and grace, are called with an
holy calling, and have principles of holiness wrought
in them, and live holy lives and conversations. The
word ° used also signifies one that has received kind-
ness and fayour, and shews it: saints are such, who
have received spiritual blessings from the Lord; to
whom he has been kind and bountiful; and these are
· merciful and beneficent to others. Now these die as
well as others, though holy and righteous, and though
Christ  has died for them; he has indeed delivered
them from death as a punishment, he has abolished it
in this sense; and has freed them from the curse and
sting of it, but not from that itself; because it is for
their good, and it is precious in the sight of the Lord.
Saints are precious to him, living and dying; there is
something in their death, or that attends it, that is de-
lightful to him, and of high esteetn with him; as when
they are in the full exercise of grace at such a season;
when they die in faith, and have hope in their death;
and their love is drawn out unto him, and they long to
be with him: besides, they die in the Lord, and sleep
in Jesus, in union with him; with whom he is well-
pleased, and all in him; and they die unto him, ac-
cording to his will, and are resigned unto it; and so
glorify him in death, as well as in life. It is the time
of their ingathering to him; at death he comes into
his garden, and gathers his flowers, and smells a sweet
sayour in them; their very dust is precious to him,
which he takes care of and raises up at the last day.
The commonly received sense of the words is, that the
saints are so dear to the Lord, their lives are so much
set by with him, and their blood so precious to him,
that he will not easily suffer their lives to be taken
away, or their blood to be spilled; and whenever it is,
he will, sooner or later, severely revenge it; see 1 Sam.
xxvi. 21, £4. Psal. lxxii. 14. And to this sense is the
Targum," precious. befo. re th.e Lord is death sent to
"(or inflicted on) his saints; that is, by men. The
words will bear to be rendered, precious in the sight of'
the Lord is that death, or death itself, for his saints;
that very remarkable and observable death, even the
death of his son, which was not only for the good of
his saints, for their redemption, salvation, justification,
pardon, and eternal life; but in their room and stead;
and which was very acceptable unto God, of high es-
teem with him, of a sweet-smelling savour to him:
not that he took pleasure in it, simply considered; for
he that hath no pleasure in the death of him that dieth,
even of_a sinner, could have none in the death of his
son; but as hereby his justice was satisfied, his law
fulfilled, the salvation of his people procured, and his
covenant, counsels, purposes, and decrees, accom-
plished. \^htwmh\^ has a double \^h\^ in it; one at the be-
ginning, and the other at the end of the word; which
is very emphatical, and so may point at something
very remarkable; and what more so than the death
of Christ? and \^l\^ is sometimes used for substitution,
and signifies for, instead, or in the room of, another;
see Exod. iv. 16. and v. 12. Numb. x. 31. and xiv.
Prov. xxi. 18.
Ver. 16. O Lord, truly I am thy servant, I am thy
servant, &c.] Not merely by creation, and as obliged
by providential favours; but by the grace of God,
which made him a willing one: and he was so, not
nominally only, but in reality; not as those who say
Lord, Lord, but do not the will of God; whereas he
served the Lord cheerfully and willingly, in righteous-
ness and true holiness: and this he repeats for the con-
firmation of it, and to shew his heartiness in the Lord's
service, and his zealous attachment to him; and which
he mentions, not as though he thought his service me-
ritorious of any thing at the hand of God; but that
his being in this character was an obligation upon him
to serve the Lord, and him only, and might expect his
protection in it. And the son of thy handmaid; his mo-
ther was also a servant of the Lord; and had trained
him up in his infancy in the nurture and admonition
of the Lord; so that he was innred to it betlines, and
could not easily depart from it. Thou hast loosed my
bonds; the bonds of affliction and death in which he
was held; these were loosed, being delivered from
them, vet. 3, 8. and the bonds of sin, and Satan, and
the law, in whose service he had been, which was no
other than a bondage; but now was freed from the
servitude and dominion of sin, from the captivity of
Satan, and the bondage of the law; and therefore,
though a servant, yet the Lord's free man.
Vet. 17. I will offer to thee the sacrifice of thanks-
giving, &c.] For deliverance from afflictions and death;
for loosing his bonds, in every sense; for all mercies,
temporal and spiritual; see Rom. vi. 17. Such sacri-
fices are according to the wi{I of God; are well-pleasing
to him, when offered up through Christ, and in faith,
and are a glorifying of him. These are more accept-
able than all ceremonial sacrifices; and therefore the
psalmist determined to offer this, and not them. And

{o} \^wydoxl\^ quos ipse benignitate prosequitur, Junius & Tremellius;
so Musculus.