The Quotable Matthew Henry (continued)
God: His Attributes with fear and trembling, lest we speak amiss (De Deo etiam vera
He knew something of the beauty of the Lord, the infinite and transcendent amiableness of the divine being and perfections; his holiness is his beauty (110: 3); his goodness is his beauty (Zech. 9:17). The harmony of all his attributes is the beauty of his nature. With an eye of faith and holy love we with pleasure behold this beauty, and observe more and more in it that is amiable, that dicere periculosum est — even while affirming what is true concerning God we incur risk), so we must conclude with shame and blushing, for having spoken no better.
Job 37
Now by this he proves himself to be God. Does he thus hate proud men? Then he is holy. Will he thus punish them? Then he is the just Judge of the world. Can he thus humble them? Then he is the Lord Almighty. When he had abased proud Pharaoh, and hidden him in the sand of the Red Sea, Jethro thence inferred that doubtless the Lord is greater than all gods, for wherein the proud enemies of his Israel dealt proudly he was above them, he was too hard for them (Exod. 18:11. See Rev. 195.2), Job 40 is admirable. When with fixedness of thought, and a holy flame of devout affections, we contemplate God's _ glorious excellencies, and entertain ourselves with the tokens of his peculiar favour to us, this is that view of the beauty of the Lord which David here covets, and it is to be had in his ordinances, for there he manifests himself.
Psalm 27 'However it be, yet Thou art good.' He here acknowledges: 1. The transcendent perfections of the divine nature. Among men we have often reason to complain. There is no truth nor mercy (Hos. 4:1), no judgment nor justice (Isa. 5:7). But all these may be found in God without the least alloy. Whatever
From the excellency of the work we may easily infer the infinite perfection of its great author. From the brightness of the heavens we may collect that the Creator is light; their vastness of extent bespeaks his immensity, their height his transcendency and sovereignty, their influence upon this earth his dominion, and providence, and universal beneficence: all declare his almighty power, by which they were at first made, and continue to this day according to the ordinances that were then settled. is missing, or amiss, in the world, we are sure there is nothing missing, nothing amiss in him that governs it. He is a God of inexhaustible goodness.
Psalm 36
He would praise his power and his mercy; both should be the subject matter of his song. Power, without mercy, is to be dreaded; mercy without power, Psalm 19 is not what a man can expect
God: His Attributes in performing — truth in being much benefit from; but God's as good as thy word, mercy in being better. How praiseworthy are these in great men, much more in the great God, in whom they are in perfection! power by which he is able to help us, and his mercy by which he is inclined to help us, will justly be the everlasting praise of all the saints.
Psalm 89
Psalm 59
As he is what he is, so he is what he should be, and in every thing acts as becomes him: there is nothing wanting, nothing amiss, in God; his will is the eternal rule of equity, and he is righteous, for he does Job, when he was entering into such a temptation, fixed for his principle the omniscience of God: 'Times are not hidden from the Almighty' (Job 24:1). Jeremiah's principle is the justice of God: 'Righteous art Thou O God, when I plead with Thee', (Jer. 12:1). Habakkuk's principle is the holiness of God: 'Thou art of purer eyes than to behold iniquity' (Hab. 1:13). The psalmist's here, is the goodness of God. These are truths which cannot be shaken and which we must resolve to live and die by. Though we may not be able to reconcile all the disposals of Providence with them, we must believe they are reconcilable. Note, good thoughts of God will fortify us against many of Satan's temptations. Truly God is good. all according to it.
Psalm 119
Divine truths look fully as well when they are prayed over as when they are preached over, and much better than when they are disputed over. When we speak of God to him himself, we shall find ourselves concerned to speak with the utmost degree of both sincerity and reverence, which will be likely to make the impressions the deeper.
Psalm 139
The Lord is gracious to those that serve him; he is full of compassion to those that need him, slow to anger to those that have offended him, and of great mercy to all that seek him and sue to him. He is ready to give, and ready to forgive, more ready than we are to ask, than we are to repent.
Psalm 73
Therefore all nations shall worship before thee, because as King of nations thou art great, thy sovereignty absolute and incontestable, thy majesty terrible and insupportable, thy power universal and irresistible, thy riches vast and inexhaustible, thy dominion boundless and unquestionable.
Psalm 145
Here is God's sufficiency for the saints: his name is a strong tower for them, in which they may take rest when they are weary and take sanctuary when they are pursued, where they
Psalm 86 'Mercy and truth shall go before thy face', to prepare thy way, as harbingers to make room for thee — mercy in promising, truth
God: His Attributes may be lifted up above their enemies and fortified against them. There is enough in God, and in the discoveries which he has made of himself to us, to make us easy at all times. The wealth laid up in this tower is enough to enrich them, to be a continual feast and a continuing treasure to them. The strength of this tower is enough to protect them; the Name of the Lord is all that whereby he has made himself known as God, and our God, not only his wrath as fire, yet there is a brightness about it; for his holiness and justice appear very illustrious in the punishment of sin and sinners: even about the devouring fire there is a brightness which glorified saints will for ever admire.
Ezekiel 1
His righteousness is conspicuous as the great mountains, and the brightness of it fills the court; but his judgments are a great deep, which we cannot fathom, his titles and attributes, but his covenant and all the promises of it; these make up a cloud which we cannot see through. The brightness discovers enough to awe and direct our consciences, but the cloud forbids us to expect the gratifying of our curiosity; for we cannot order our speech by reason of darkness. Thus (Hab. a tower, a strong tower, impenetrable, impregnable, for all God's people.
Proverbs 18
Take notice of the vastness of the heavens and the unmeasurable extent of the firmament; he must needs be a great God who manages such a great world
3:4) he had rays coming out of his hand, and yet there was the hiding of his power. Nothing is more clear than that God is, nothing more dark than what he as this is; the heavens above cannot be measured (v. 37), and yet God fills them. is. God covers himself with light, and yet, as to us, makes darkness his pavilion.
Jeremiah 31
Ezekiel 10
Though we cannot see into the fire, cannot by searching find out God to perfection, yet we see the brightness that is round about it, in the reflection of this fire from the thick cloud. Moses might see God's back parts, but not his face. We have some light
By him all goodness is to be measured; that is good which is like him, and agreeable to his mind. We in our language call him God, because he is good. In this, as in other things, our Lord Jesus was the Brightness of his glory (and_ his goodness is his glory), and the express image of his person, and therefore fitly called 'good Master', concerning the nature of God, from the _ brightness which encompasses it, though we have not an insight into it, by reason of the cloud spread upon it. Nothing is more easy than to determine that God is, nothing more difficult than to describe what he is. When God displays
Matthew 19
The Word had a being before the world had a beginning. He that was in the beginning never
God: Hts Faithfulness began, and therefore was ever — without beginning of time. are then doubly sweet and comfortable to us when we see them flowing to us from the promise (this is according to what the Lord said). As our obedience is acceptable to God when it has an eye to the pre-
John 1
Power to effect, without wisdom to contrive, and wisdom to contrive without power to effect, are alike vain and fruitcept and if we make conscience of our duty we need not question the performance of the promise. less; but both together, and both infinite, make a perfect being.
Romans 16
Joshua 11
God: His Dominion
The better God is known the more he is trusted. Those who know him to be a God of infinite wisdom will trust him further than they can see him.
Next to the Being of God there is nothing that we are more concerned to believe and consider than God's dominion, that Jehovah is God, and that this God reigns (v. 1), not only that he is King of right, and is the owner and proprietor of all persons and things, but that he is King in fact, and does direct and dispose of all the creatures and all their actions according to the counsel of his own will.
(Job 35:14); those who know him to be a God of almighty power will trust him when creature-confidence fails and they have nothing else to trust to (2 Chron. 20:12); and those who know him to be a God of infinite grace and goodness will trust him though he slay them (Job 13:15). Those who know him to be a God of inviolable truth and faithfulness' will rejoice in his word of promise, Psalm 93 and rest upon that, though the performance be deferred and intermediate providences seem
His dominion endures throughout all generations, for he himself is eternal, and his counsels to contradict it. Those who know him to be the Father of spirits, and an everlasting Father, will trust him with their souls are unchangeable and uniform; and Satan, who has set up a kingdom in opposition to him, is conquered and in a chain. as their main care and trust in him at all times, even to the end.
Psalm 145
Psalm 9
God: His Faithfulness
This is plainly taught us, that,
God had promised to drive out the nations before them (Ex. 33: 2; Ex. 34:11) and to bring them down (Deut. 9:3) and now it was done. There failed not one word of the promise. Our successes and enjoyments as sure as we may be that, 'though the sun will set tonight, it will rise again tomorrow morning, whether we live to see it or no', so sure we may be that though the kingdom of the
God: His Faithfulness
Redeemer in the world may for
If guilt and wrath be communicated, much more shall grace and love; for it is agreeable to the idea we have of the divine goodness to suppose that he should be more ready to save upon an imputed righteousness than to condemn upon an imputed guilt. a time be clouded and eclipsed by corruptions and persecutions, yet it will shine forth again, and recover its lustre, in the time appointed.
Jeremiah
God: His Goodness
Romans 5
All who have any knowledge of God and dealings with him will own that he does good, and therefore will conclude that he is good. The streams of God's goodness are so numerous, and run so full, so strong, to all the creatures, that we must conclude the fountain that is in himself to be inexhaustible. We cannot conceive how much good our God does every day, much less can we conceive how good he is. Let us acknowledge
God: His Grace
Outward judgments, though they may terrify and restrain men, cannot of themselves sanctify and renew them; the grace of God must work with these judgments. Man's nature was as sinful after the deluge as it had been before.
Genesis 8
grace shall never be wanting to those who sincerely desire to know and do their duty . . . The increase of gold lowers the value of it, but the increase of grace advances its price. The more men have of that, the more they value it. it with admiration and with holy love and thankfulness.
Psalm 119
See what is the most powerful inducement to an_ evangelical repentance, and that is a sense of the mercy of God; when God settles them in the midst of plenty, 'then shall they loathe themselves for their iniquities'. Note, the goodness of God should overcome our badness and 'lead us to repentance'. The more we see of God's readiness to receive us into favour upon our repentance, the more reason we shall see to be ashamed of ourselves that we could ever sin against so much love. That heart is hard indeed that will not be thus melted.
2 Chronicles 1
One of the quarrels God had with the Jews, when he sent them into captivity, was for mocking his messengers and misusing his prophets; and yet, when they were suffering for this sin, he favoured them with this forfeited mercy. It were ill with us if God did not-sometimes graciously thrust upon us those means of grace and salvation which we have foolishly thrust from us. In their captivity they were destitute of ordinary helps for their souls, and therefore God raised them up these
Ezekiel
God: His Mercy severity are seldom acts of policy. The throne is established by mercy. extraordinary ones; for God's children, if they be hindered in their education one way, shall have it made up another way.
2 Samuel 19
Ezekiel 1
Those that repent, and do their first works, shall rejoice, and recover their first comforts. God's mercies to his people have been ever of old (Ps. 25:6); and therefore they may hope, even then when he seems to have forsaken and forgotten them, that the mercy which was from everlasting will be to everlasting.
'He died for the ungodly'; not only helpless creatures, and therefore likely to perish, but guilty sinful creatures, and therefore deserving to perish; not only mean and worthless, but vile and obnoxious, unworthy of such favour with the holy God.
Romans 5
Lamentations 5
The Gentiles did neither will it, nor run for it, for they 'sat in darkness' (Matt. 4:16). In darkness, therefore not willing what they knew not; 'sitting' in dark-
It is true God has determined to punish sinners; his justice calls for their punishment, and, pursuant to that, impenitent sinners will lie for ever under his wrath and curse; that is the will of his decree, his consequent will, but it is not his antecedent will, the will of his delight. Though the righteousness of his government requires that sinners die, yet the goodness of his nature objects against it. 'How shall I give thee up, Ephraim?' It is spoken here comparatively; he has not pleasure in the ruin of sinners, for he would rather they should turn from their ways and live; he is better pleased when his mercy is glorified in their salvation than when his justice is glorified in their damnation. ness, a contented posture, therefore not running to meet it, but anticipated with these invaluable blessings of goodness. Such is the method of God's_ grace towards all that partake of it, for he is found of those that sought him not (Isa. 65:1).
Romans 9
God: His Mercy
Adam was sent to a place of toil, not to a place of torment. He was sent to the ground, not to the grave, to the workhouse, not to the dungeon, to hold the plough, not to drag the chain.
Genesis 3
Ezekiel 18
If he should put to death Shimei who cursed him, those would expect the same fate who had taken up arms and _ actually levied war against him which would drive them from him, while he was endeavouring to draw them to him. Acts of Can it be imagined that a God of infinite love and mercy should limit and confine his favours to that little perverse people of the Jews, leaving all the rest of the chiidren of men
God: His Mercy in a condition eternally desperate? This would by no means agree with the idea we have of the divine goodness, for his 'tender mercies are over all his works.' his works — and on His throne of grace, to which His people may come boldly for mercy and grace; we shall then see no reason to be discouraged by the pride and power of oppressors, or any of the afflictions that attend the righteous.
Romans 3
Psalm 11
God: His Omnipotence
All things were made by the word of the Lord and by the breath of His mouth. Christ is Though the opposition given to the salvation of God's people have all imaginable disadvantages yet God can and will conquer it. Let the banks of Jordan be filled to the brink, filled till they run over, it is the. Word, the Spirit. .is «the breath, so that God the Father made the world as He rules it and redeems it, by His Son and Spirit. He spoke and He commanded (v. 9), and that was enough; there needed no more. With men, saying and doing are two things, but it is not so with God. By the Word and Spirit of God as the world was made, so was man, that as easy to Omnipotence to divide them and dry them up as if they were ever so narrow, ever so shallow. It is all one with the Lord. The God of nature, when He pleases, can change the course of nature and alter its properties, can turn fluids into solids, waters into standing rock as, on the contrary, rocks into waters, to serve his own purposes (see little world. God said, let us make man, and He breathed into him the breath of life. By the Word and Spirit the church is built, that new world, and grace wrought in the soul, that new man, that new creation. What cannot that power do which with a word made
Sweet Aenvs2.8). What. cannot God do? What will He not do for the perfecting of His people's salvation?
Joshua 3
a world!
Psalm 33
Giants are dwarfs to Omnipotence.
Joshua 11
The command God has of the most ungovernable creatures (v. 9): 'Thou rulest the raging of the sea' than which nothing
Let us by faith see God on His throne, on His throne of glory, infinitely transcending the splendour and majesty of earthly princes — on His throne of government, giving law, giving motion, and giving aim, to all the creatures — on His throne of judgment rendering to every man according to is more frightful or threatening, nor more out of the power of man to give check to; it can swell no higher, roll no further, beat no harder, continue no longer, nor do any more hurt, than God suffers it.
Psalm 89
God: His Omnipotence
God Himself glories in this instance of His power (Job 38:8), and uses it as an argument with us to fear Him (Jer. to contend with God (Ps. 56: 4), and because wicked and corrupt and unapt to comply with God. God is the creator of all, and makes what use he pleases of all. He that is the God of Israel is the God of all flesh and of the spirits of all flesh, and, if Israel were cast off, could raise up a people to his name out of some other nation. If he be the God of 5:22). This, if duly considered, would keep the world in awe of the Lord and His goodness, that the waters of the sea would soon cover the earth if God did not restrain them.
Psalm 104
He is with me to support me and bear me up under the burden which now presses me down. He is with me to make the word I preach answer the end he designs, though not the end I desire. He is with me as a mighty terrible one, to strike a terror upon them, and so to overcome them. Even that in God which is terrible is really comfortable to his servants that trast ain him,. for 4ty shall' be turned against those that seek to terrify his people. God's being a mighty God bespeaks him a terrible God to all those that take up arms against him or any one that, like Jeremiah, was commissioned by _ him. How terrible will the wrath of God be to those that think to daunt all about them and will themselves be daunted by nothing. The most formidable enemies that act against us appear despicable when we see the Lord for us as a mighty terrible one. (Neh. 4:14). Jeremiah speaks now with a good assurance: If the Lord be with me, my persecutors shall all flesh, he may well ask, 'Is anything too hard for me?' What cannot he do from whom all the powers of men are derived, on whom they depend, and by whom all their actions are directed and _ governed? Whatever he designs to do, whether in wrath or in mercy, nothing can hinder him nor defeat his designs.
Jeremiah 32
The king saw 'the part of the hand that wrote', but saw not the person whose hand it was, which made the thing more frightful. Note, what we _ see of God, the part of the hand that writes in the book of the creatures and the book of the scriptures (Lo, these are parts of his ways, Job. 26:14), may serve to possess us with awful thoughts concerning that of God which we do not see. If this' be» 'the finger of eGod what is His arm made bare? And what is He?
Daniel 5
God can bring great things to pass without much ado. He needs not great power and many people to effect His purposes; stumble.
Jeremiah 20 a handful will serve if He pleases. He can without any difficulty ruin any king and kingdom and I am the God of all flesh, that is, of all mankind, here called flesh because weak and unable
God: His Omnip otence and most mighty works were wrought by His Spirit; but, if the Spirit in this work is said to be the finger of the Lord, it perhaps may intimate how easily Christ did and could conquer Satan, even with the finger of God, the exerting of the divine power in a less and lower degree than in many other instances. He needed not make bare his everlasting arm; that roaring lion, when He _ pleases, is crushed, like a moth, with a touch of a finger. make no more of it than we do of rooting up a tree that cumbers the ground.
Ezekiel 17
They could not but know that God is almighty, but they would not apply that doctrine to this matter, but gave up the truth to the objections of the impossibility of it, which would all have been answered, if they had but stuck to the doctrine of God's omnipotence, to which nothing is impossible. This therefore which God hath
Luke 11 spoken once, we are concerned
God: His Omnipresence to hear twice, to hear and believe, to hear and apply — that 'power belongs to God', (Ps. 62:11; Rom. 4:19—21). The same power that made soul and body, and preserved them while they were together, can preserve the body safe, and the soul active, when they are parted, and can unite them together again; for 'behold, the Lord's arm is not shortened'. The power of God, seen In.sthe return of )the® spring (Ps. 104:30), in the reviving of the corn (John 12:24), in the restoring of an _ abject people to their prosperity (Ezek. 37:12—14), in the raising of so many to life, miraculously, both in the Old Testament and in the New, and especially in the resurrection of Christ (Eph. 1:19, 20), are all earnests of our resurrection by the same power (Phil. 3:21): 'according to the mighty working whereby he is able to subdue all things to himself.'
There is no escaping God's avenging eye, no going out of the reach of His hand; rocks and mountains will be no better shelter at last than fig-leaves were at first.
Psalm 21
No place can either include Him or exclude Him.
Jeremiah 23
God: His Omniscience
By publishing among the nations the number of his people, he thought to appear the more formidable and doubted not that if he should have any wars he should overpower his enemies with the multitudes of | his forces, trusting in an arm of flesh more than he should have done who had written so much of trusting in God only. God Judges not of sin as we do. What appears to us harmless or, at least, but a small offence may be a great sin in the eye of God who sees men's principles and is a discerner of the thoughts and Mark 12
The Spirit is the 'arm of the Lord' (Isa. 53:1). His greatest