_The sundry blessings which follow them that fear God._
A Song of degrees.
Blessed _is_ every one that feareth the LORD; that walketh in his
ways.
For thou shalt eat the labour of thine hands: happy _shalt_ thou _be_,
and _it shall be_ well with thee.
Thy wife _shall be_ as a fruitful vine by the sides of thine house:
thy children like olive-plants round about thy table.
Behold, that thus shall the man be blessed that feareth the LORD.
The LORD shall bless thee out of Zion: and thou shalt see the good of
Jerusalem all the days of thy life.
Yea, thou shalt see thy children’s children, _and_ peace upon Israel.
This is a Psalm of consolation, wherein the Psalmist extols, with the
highest praises, marriage, as a holy and godly kind of life,
instituted of God himself. The Holy Spirit here comforts and
encourages all husbands and wives with a divine consolation; and
confirms and fortifies them against all those wrong cogitations and
thoughts of human reason; which reason does not look at what good
there is in marriage, but only beholds and exaggerates what of evil
there may be in it; and thus blasphemes the glorious work of God in
the two sexes. Hence, here arises all those blasphemous sayings among
the heathen: ‘There are three great evils in life; fire, water, and
woman.’ But Solomon saith, “He that findeth a wife findeth a good
thing.”
This Psalm reminds husbands and wives that they should not look at the
labours, the troubles, the cares, or the various temptations and
trials which are to be endured in marriage; but that they should
rather keep their eyes fixed on the word and will of God; from which
they ought to hold themselves assured that marriage was not a human
invention, nor a matter casually contrived of men; but that the whole
human race were, from the beginning, created and formed of God, man
and woman, and that neither of the sexes, nor their design can or
ought to be altered or changed by men, by the devil, or any other
creature, any more than the sun and moon and their offices can or
ought to be altered or changed.
God, saith the scripture, created them male and female, and blessed
them. Marriage, therefore, is that kind of life, which, as being the
creation and institution of God, greatly pleases him. If, therefore,
thou shalt obey God herein, and shalt keep the eyes of thy faith fixed
on the good, and on the blessings of marriage; if thou shalt obey the
commandment and the call of God in taking to thyself a wife, the sexes
created of God will not be vile, but precious in thy sight: and all
the little troubles and trials of marriage shall be drowned and lost
in that divine blessedness,—the knowing that God favours husbands and
wives, and is present with them; that the joining of marriage is one
of his own works; and that he provides for, and defends those who are
joined together.
To fortify thyself, therefore, against all that blasphemy of human
reason and of the devil, by which they condemn marriage, hold thou
fixed in thine heart that heavenly word, “And the Lord made them male
and female, and said, Be fruitful and multiply.” And if thou fear the
Lord thou shalt be happy, and it shall be _well with thee_ in
marriage, even though the virulent and blaspheming mouth of the devil,
and the whole world together with him, should say it shall be _evil
with thee_!