Hear, O LORD, when I cry with my voice: have mercy also upon me, and answer me. When thou saidst, Seek ye my face; my heart said unto thee, Thy face, LORD, will I seek. Psa 27:7-8
Cry of Heart to Heart
Cry of Heart to Heart
“Hear, O Lord, when I cry with my voice.” - The pendulum of spirituality swings from prayer to praise. The voice which in the last verse was tuned to music is here turned to crying. As a good soldier, David knew how to handle his weapons, and found himself much at home with the weapon of “all prayer.” Note his anxiety to be heard. Pharisees care not a fig for the Lord's hearing them, so long as they are heard of men, or charm their own pride with their sounding devotions; but with a genuine man, the Lord's ear is everything. The voice may be profitably used even in private prayer; for though it is unnecessary, it is often helpful, and aids in preventing distractions. “Have mercy also upon me.” Mercy is the hope of sinners and the refuge of saints. All acceptable petitioners dwell much upon this attribute. “And answer me.” We may expect answers to prayer, and should not be easy without them any more than we should be if we had written a letter to a friend upon important business, and had received no reply.
Psa_27:8
In this verse we are taught that if we would have the Lord hear our voice, we must be careful to respond to his voice. The true heart should echo the will of God as the rocks among the Alps repeat in sweetest music the notes of the peasant's horn. Observe, that the command was in the plural, to all the saints, “Seek ye;” but the man of God turned it into the singular by a personal application, “Thy face, Lord, will I seek.” The voice of the Lord is very effectual where all other voices fail, “When thou saidst,” then my “heart,” my inmost nature was moved to an obedient reply. Note the promptness of the response - no sooner said than done; as soon as God said “seek,” the heart said, “I will seek.” Oh, for more of this holy readiness! Would to God that we were more elastic to the divine hand, more sensitive of the touch of God's Spirit. (Charles Haddon Spurgeon-Treasury of David)
Psa_27:8
In this verse we are taught that if we would have the Lord hear our voice, we must be careful to respond to his voice. The true heart should echo the will of God as the rocks among the Alps repeat in sweetest music the notes of the peasant's horn. Observe, that the command was in the plural, to all the saints, “Seek ye;” but the man of God turned it into the singular by a personal application, “Thy face, Lord, will I seek.” The voice of the Lord is very effectual where all other voices fail, “When thou saidst,” then my “heart,” my inmost nature was moved to an obedient reply. Note the promptness of the response - no sooner said than done; as soon as God said “seek,” the heart said, “I will seek.” Oh, for more of this holy readiness! Would to God that we were more elastic to the divine hand, more sensitive of the touch of God's Spirit. (Charles Haddon Spurgeon-Treasury of David)
God Calling-The Heart Responding
We have here a report of a brief dialogue between God and a devout soul. The psalmist tells us of God’s invitation and of his acceptance, and on both he builds the prayer that the face which he had been bidden to seek, and had sought, may not be hid from him.
God’s merciful call to us all. “Seek ye My face.” Have we to search for that as if it were something hidden, far off, lost, and only to be recovered by our effort? No! a thousand times. For the seeking to which God mercifully admits us is but the turning of the direction of our desires to Him, the recognition of the fact that His face is more than all else to men, the recognition that whilst there are many that say, “Who will show us any good?” and ask the question impatiently, despairingly, vainly, they that turn the seeking into a prayer, and ask, “Lord I lift Thou the light of Thy countenance upon us,” will never ask in vain. By the very make of our own spirits He calls us to Himself. You remember the old story of the Saracen woman who came to England seeking her lover, and passed through these foreign cities with no word upon her tongue that could be understood of those that heard her except the name that she sought. Ah! That is how men wander through the earth, strangers in the midst of it. They cannot translate the cry of their own hearts, but it means, “God—my soul thirsteth for Thee”: and the thirst bids us seek His face. He summons us by all the providences and events of our changeful lives. Our sorrows, by their poignancy, our joys, by their incompleteness and their transiency alike, callus to Him in whom alone the sorrows can be soothed and the joys made full and remain. Our duties, by their heaviness, call us to turn ourselves to Him, in whom alone we can find the strength to fill the role that is laid upon us, and to discharge our daily tasks. But, most of all, He summons us to Himself by Him who is the angel of His face, “the effulgence of His glory, and the express image of His person.”
The devout soul’s response. The psalmist takes the general invitation and converts it into an individual one, to which he responds. God’s “ye” is met by his “I.” The psalmist makes no hesitation or delay—“When Thou said...
my heart said to Thee.” The psalmist gathers himself together in a concentrated resolve of a fixed determination—“Thy face will I seek.” That is how we ought to respond. Make the general invitation thy very own. God summons all, because He summons each. Again, the psalmist “made haste, and delayed not, but made haste” to respond to the merciful summons. Ah! how many of us, in how many different ways, fall into the snare “by and by “I” not now”; and all these days that slip away whilst we hesitate gather themselves together to be our accusers hereafter. It is poor courtesy to show to a merciful invitation from a bountiful host to say, “After I have looked to the oxen I have bought, and tested them, and measured the field that I have acquired; after I have drunk the sweetness of wedded life with the wife that I have married, then I will come. But, for the present, I pray thee, have me excused.” And that is what we all are doing, more or less. The psalmist gathered himself together in a fixed resolve, and said, “I will!” That is what we have to do. A languid seeker will not find; an earnest one will not fail to find.
A prayer built upon both the invitation and the acceptance. “Hide not Thy face far from me.” That prayer implies that God will not contradict Himself. His promises are commandments. If He bids us seek He binds Himself to show. His veracity, His unchangeableness, are pledged to this, that no man who yields to His invitation will be baulked of his desire.
(A. Maclaren, D. D.)
God’s merciful call to us all. “Seek ye My face.” Have we to search for that as if it were something hidden, far off, lost, and only to be recovered by our effort? No! a thousand times. For the seeking to which God mercifully admits us is but the turning of the direction of our desires to Him, the recognition of the fact that His face is more than all else to men, the recognition that whilst there are many that say, “Who will show us any good?” and ask the question impatiently, despairingly, vainly, they that turn the seeking into a prayer, and ask, “Lord I lift Thou the light of Thy countenance upon us,” will never ask in vain. By the very make of our own spirits He calls us to Himself. You remember the old story of the Saracen woman who came to England seeking her lover, and passed through these foreign cities with no word upon her tongue that could be understood of those that heard her except the name that she sought. Ah! That is how men wander through the earth, strangers in the midst of it. They cannot translate the cry of their own hearts, but it means, “God—my soul thirsteth for Thee”: and the thirst bids us seek His face. He summons us by all the providences and events of our changeful lives. Our sorrows, by their poignancy, our joys, by their incompleteness and their transiency alike, callus to Him in whom alone the sorrows can be soothed and the joys made full and remain. Our duties, by their heaviness, call us to turn ourselves to Him, in whom alone we can find the strength to fill the role that is laid upon us, and to discharge our daily tasks. But, most of all, He summons us to Himself by Him who is the angel of His face, “the effulgence of His glory, and the express image of His person.”
The devout soul’s response. The psalmist takes the general invitation and converts it into an individual one, to which he responds. God’s “ye” is met by his “I.” The psalmist makes no hesitation or delay—“When Thou said...
my heart said to Thee.” The psalmist gathers himself together in a concentrated resolve of a fixed determination—“Thy face will I seek.” That is how we ought to respond. Make the general invitation thy very own. God summons all, because He summons each. Again, the psalmist “made haste, and delayed not, but made haste” to respond to the merciful summons. Ah! how many of us, in how many different ways, fall into the snare “by and by “I” not now”; and all these days that slip away whilst we hesitate gather themselves together to be our accusers hereafter. It is poor courtesy to show to a merciful invitation from a bountiful host to say, “After I have looked to the oxen I have bought, and tested them, and measured the field that I have acquired; after I have drunk the sweetness of wedded life with the wife that I have married, then I will come. But, for the present, I pray thee, have me excused.” And that is what we all are doing, more or less. The psalmist gathered himself together in a fixed resolve, and said, “I will!” That is what we have to do. A languid seeker will not find; an earnest one will not fail to find.
A prayer built upon both the invitation and the acceptance. “Hide not Thy face far from me.” That prayer implies that God will not contradict Himself. His promises are commandments. If He bids us seek He binds Himself to show. His veracity, His unchangeableness, are pledged to this, that no man who yields to His invitation will be baulked of his desire.
(A. Maclaren, D. D.)
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