3. The promising help that seems to be in other things are great hindrances to a steady fixing, by hope, on God; there are suitable frames of heart, enlargements in duties, with other the like, that have through the darkness, and the legality of our spirits been great hindrances to Israel. Not that their natural tendency is to turn us aside, but our corrupt reason getting the upper hand, and bearing the stroke in judgment, converts our minds and consciences to making wrong conclusions upon them. 4. Besides, as the mind and conscience, by reason, are and bearing the stroke in judgment oft deluded to draw these wrong conclusions upon our suitable frames of heart, to the removing of our hope from the proper object unto them, so by like reason, are we turned by unwholesome doctrines, and a carnal understanding of the Word, to the very same thing: 'cisterns, broken cisterns that can hold no water,' Israel, even God's people, are apt to make unto themselves to the forsaking of their God (Jer 2:11-13).
Thus, I have gone through the first part of the text, which consists of an exhortation to hope in the Lord. And have showed you, 1. The matter contained therein. 2. Something of the reason for the manner of the phrase. 3. And have drawn, as you see, some inferences from it.
I now come to the second part of the text, which is a reason urged to enforce the exhortation, 'Let Israel hope in the Lord.' Why? 'For with the Lord, there is mercy.' There is a reason. Let him hope, for there is mercy; let him hope in the Lord, for with him there is mercy. The reason is full and suitable. For what is the ground of despair but a conceit that sin has shut the soul out of all interest in happiness? and what is the reason for that, but a persuasion that there is no help for him in God? Besides, God could do all but show mercy, yet the belief in that ability would not be a reason sufficient to encourage the soul to hope in God. The block SIN, which cannot be removed by mercy, still lies in the way. The reason, therefore, is full and suitable, having an enforcement in it, naturally, to the exhortation. And,
First, we will discuss the reason in general, and then [Second] will come to it more precisely. 'Let Israel hope in the Lord, for with the Lord there is mercy,' mercy to be bestowed, mercy designed to be bestowed.
1. Mercy to be bestowed. This must be the meaning. What if a man has never so much gold or silver, food, or raiment: yet if he has none to communicate, what is the distressed, or those in want, the better? What if there be mercy with God, yet if he has none to bestow, what force is there in the exhortation, or what shall Israel, if he hopeth, be the better. But God has mercy to bestow, to give. 'He saith on this wise, I will give you the sure mercies of David' (Acts 13:34). And again, 'The Lord give mercy unto the house of Onesiphorus' (2 Tim 1:16). Now, God designeth mercy for his people (Dan 9:4). Hence, the mercy that God's Israel are said to be partakers of, here lies the encouragement. The Lord has mercy to give; he has not given away ALL his mercy; his mercy is not clean gone forever (Psa 77:8). He has mercy yet to give away, yet to bestow upon his Israel. 'Let Israel hope in the Lord, for with the Lord there is mercy.'
2. As there is with God mercy to be bestowed, so there is mercy designed to be bestowed or given to Israel. Some men lay by what they mean to give away and put that in a bag by itself, saying, This I design to give away, this I purpose to bestow upon the poor. Thus God; he designeth mercy for his people (Dan 9:4). Hence the mercy that God's Israel are said to be partakers of, is a mercy kept for them. And 'thou, O God, hast prepared of thy goodness for the poor,' and laid up for them (Psa 68:10). This is excellent and is true, 'Let Israel hope in the Lord, for there is with him mercy,' kept, prepared, and laid up for them! (Psa 61:7). When God designs the bestowing of mercy, we may reasonably hope to be partakers (Psa 31:19). The poor will go merrily to weddings and funerals and hope for an alms all the way they go when they come to understand that there is so much kept, prepared, and laid up for them by the bridegroom, &c. But 'He keepeth mercy for thousands!' (Exo 34:7).
3. As God has mercies to bestow, and as he has designed to bestow them, so those mercies are no fragments or the leavings of others: but mercies that are full and complete to do for thee, what thou wantest, wouldst have, or canst desire. As I may so say, God has his bags that were never yet untied, never yet broken up, but laid by him through a thousand generations for those that he commands to hope in his mercy. As Samuel kept the shoulder for Saul, and as God brake up that decreed place for the sea, so hath he set apart, and will break up his mercy for his people: mercy and grace that he gave us before we had a being, is the mercy designed for Israel (2 Tim 1:9). Whole mercies are allotted to us; however, mercy sufficient (1 Sam 9:23-24; Job 38:10). But to be a little more distinct.
[Second, mainly.] I find that the goodness of God to his people is diversely expressed in his word: sometimes by the word grace, sometimes by the word love, and sometimes by the word mercy, even as our badness against him is called iniquity, transgression, and sin. When it is expressed by that word 'grace,' it is to show that what he doth is of his princely will, royal bounty, and sovereign pleasure. When expressed by that word 'love,' it shows us that his affection was and is in what he doth shows us that his affection was and in what that and that he doth what he doth for us, with complacency and delight. But when it is set forth to us under the notion of 'mercy,' it bespeaks us to be both wretched and miserable, and his bowels and compassions yearn over us in this fearful plight. Now, the Holy Ghost chooseth—as it should seem—in this place, to present us with that goodness that is in God's heart towards us, somewhat under the term of mercy; for that, as I said before, it so presenteth us with our misery, and his pity and compassion; and because it best pleaseth us when we apprehend God in Christ as one that has the love of compassion and pity for us. Hence, we are often presented with God's goodness to us, which causes us to hope in the name of sympathy and empathy. 'In his pity he redeemed them,' and 'like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him' (Isa 63:9; Psa 103:13). 'The Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercy,' he also is gracious and 'full of compassion' (James 5:11; Psa 78:38). 'Thou, O Lord, art a God full of compassion,' and thy 'compassions fail not' (Psa 86:15, 111:4; Lam 3:22).
