23 The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord, and he takes delight in his way.
He will keep the feet of his holy ones, but the evil-doers will come to their end in the dark night, for by strength no man will overcome.
Keep a watch on your behaviour; let all your ways be rightly ordered.
A man may make designs for his way, but the Lord is the guide of his steps.
The Lord will keep watch over your going out and your coming in, from this time and for ever.
May he not let your foot be moved: no need of sleep has he who keeps you.
Righteousness will go before him, making a way for his footsteps.
If only my ways were ordered so that I might keep your rules!
But go on doing good and giving to others, because God is well-pleased with such offerings.
He has no delight in the strength of a horse; he takes no pleasure in the legs of a man. The Lord takes pleasure in his worshippers, and in those whose hope is in his mercy.
The uncontrolled are hated by the Lord, but those whose ways are without error are his delight
My feet have gone in his steps; I have kept in his way, without turning to one side or to the other. I have never gone against the orders of his lips; the words of his mouth have been stored up in my heart.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Psalms 37
Commentary on Psalms 37 Matthew Henry Commentary
Psalm 37
This psalm is a sermon, and an excellent useful sermon it is, calculated not (as most of the psalms) for our devotion, but for our conversation; there is nothing in it of prayer or praise, but it is all instruction; it is "Maschil-a teaching psalm;' it is an exposition of some of the hardest chapters in the book of Providence, the advancement of the wicked and the disgrace of the righteous, a solution of the difficulties that arise thereupon, and an exhortation to conduct ourselves as becomes us under such dark dispensations. The work of the prophets (and David was one) was to explain the law. Now the law of Moses had promised temporal blessings to the obedient, and denounced temporal miseries against the disobedient, which principally referred to the body of the people, the nation as a nation; for, when they came to be applied to particular persons, many instances occurred of sinners in prosperity and saints in adversity; to reconcile those instances with the word that God had spoken is the scope of the prophet in this psalm, in which,
In singing this psalm we must teach and admonish one another rightly to understand the providence of God and to accommodate ourselves to it, at all times carefully to do our duty and then patiently to leave the event with God and to believe that, how black soever things may look for the present, it shall be "well with those that fear God, that fear before him.'
A psalm of David.
Psa 37:1-6
The instructions here given are very plain; much need not be said for the exposition of them, but there is a great deal to be done for the reducing of them to practice, and there they will look best.
Psa 37:7-20
In these verses we have,
Psa 37:21-33
These verses are much to the same purport with the foregoing verses of this psalm, for it is a subject worthy to be dwelt upon. Observe here,
Psa 37:34-40
The psalmist's conclusion of this sermon (for that is the nature of this poem) is of the same purport with the whole, and inculcates the same things.