The limited value of self-exertion.
The great lesson of this psalm is "that without God's blessing all human efforts and human precautions are in vain; that man can never command success; that God gives and man receives." It is suggested that the psalm was written to check self-congratulation and self-reliance on the part of those who were rejoicing in their national restoration. The sentence, "so he giveth his beloved sleep," may mean—so much as others gain by hardest toil and pains God gives to his beloved even while they sleep and can do nothing. While they are slumbering he is giving. "The pious, God-fearing man attains the same end without exertion of his own." Delitzsch well summarizes the points of the psalm: "The rearing of the house which affords us protection, and the stability of the city in which we securely and peaceably dwell, the acquisition of possessions that maintain and adorn life, the begetting and rearing of sons that may contribute substantial support to the father as he grows old,—all these are things which depend upon the blessing of God, without natural preliminary conditions being able to guarantee them, well-devised arrangements to ensure them, unwearied labors to obtain them by force, or impatient care and murmuring to get them by defiance."
I. SELF-EXERTION SHOULD BE ESTIMATED. It has its value. It is not necessarily wrong. Human enterprise and energy, the impress of a man's self on his work, is required in every department of life. Human labor and watchfulness are never superfluous in their right spheres. It is no true piety to under value self-exertion. Man must everywhere be his best possible.
II. SELF-EXERTION SHOULD BE RIGHTLY ESTIMATED. It has no right to claim the first place in a man's confidence. That he must keep for dependence on God. A man may work in dependence on himself, and he may work in dependence on God. Self-exertion is only rightly estimated when it is seen as loyalty and service to God (comp. Philippians 2:12, Philippians 2:13, and illustrate by the prophet's putting his hand on the king's hand when the king drew the bow).
III. SELF-EXERTION SHOULD BE DIVINELY ESTIMATED, The question is not what men think of our energy and enterprise. It is—What does God think of it? Does he see it as a trying to push beyond him, and to be independent of him? or does he see it to be loyal and loving working with him? If the latter, then his blessing is upon the righteous.—R.T.