Bible Commentaries

Isaiah 19:18-25 — ourselves the sacrifice that our whole life may be a life of consecration to the living God. Oh! that our common dress might be as priestly vestment, and our ordinary meals as sacraments, and ourselves as priests unto the living God; our whole life a psalm, and our whole being a hallelujah to the Most High! Where the grace of God comes with power, it makes the worst of men become the boss, and the lowest of the low become true servants of the living God. "Can it be?" says one; "can I ever be a servant

Isaiah 51:3 — hooting of dragons and the cry of owls. Let God visit his Church, and there is sure to be thanksgiving and the voice of melody. It has been remarked that all revivals of true religion in ancient as well as modern times have been attended by revival of psalmody and song. The joy that makes the heart grateful, enlivens the spirits, and diffuses happiness, will seek and must find some tuneful strains. Not to speak of the Hebrew Psalter or of the Greek Hymnals, in Luther's day his translation of the Psalms

Lamentations 3:28-29 — all the truth to the Lord; do not entertain a thought or a feeling which you dare not tell to him. Do not imagine that you can hide anything from him, for he reads your inmost heart. Then take that heart, and lay it bare before him, and say with the psalmist, "Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts; and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting." As one of God's creatures, I could not bear to think that I had seen the glory of the midnight

Ezekiel 17:24 — angels, and to such creatures as he had formed, in order that they might reflect his honour and sing his praise. You are not ignorant, my brethren, of the fact that sin entered into the world. You know that the creation, which had been harmonious as a psalm in God's praise, voluminous and exhaustive as a book in which he revealed his own character this creation, once exceedingly fair, became foully marred. Rival instincts were produced, and rival Interests were set up. Man's will stood up against God's

1 Samuel 1:15 — heart should be heavy because I am burdened; of what use would that be to me or to anyone else? No, let us try to be cheerful that we may be lovable, even if we still remain of a sorrowful spirit. Self and our own personal woes must not be our life-psalm, nor our daily discourse. Others must be thought of, and in their joys we must try to sympathize. In Hannah’s case, too, the woman of a sorrowful spirit was a very gentle woman. Peninnah with her harsh, and haughty, and arrogant speech vexed