Psalm 115:15

Ye are blessed of the LORD which made heaven and earth.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

115:9-18 It is folly to trust in dead images, but it is wisdom to trust in the living God, for he is a help and a shield to those that trust in him. Wherever there is right fear of God, there may be cheerful faith in him; those who reverence his word, may rely upon it. He is ever found faithful. The greatest need his blessing, and it shall not be denied to the meanest that fear him. God's blessing gives an increase, especially in spiritual blessings. And the Lord is to be praised: his goodness is large, for he has given the earth to the children of men for their use. The souls of the faithful, after they are delivered from the burdens of the flesh, are still praising him; but the dead body cannot praise God: death puts an end to our glorifying him in this world of trial and conflict. Others are dead, and an end is thereby put to their service, therefore we will seek to do the more for God. We will not only do it ourselves, but will engage others to do it; to praise him when we are gone. Lord, thou art the only object for faith and love. Help us to praise thee while living and when dying, that thy name may be the first and last upon our lips: and let the sweet savour of thy name refresh our souls for ever.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Ye are blessed of the Lord - Blessed in your present comforts and mercies; blessed in his promises in regard to the time to come; blessed in the prospects which are before you.

Which made heaven and earth - The true God; the great Creator of all things. It was not the blessing of a creature - man or angel - it was the blessing of the living God.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

15-17. They were not only God's peculiar people, but as living inhabitants of earth, assigned the work of His praise as monuments of divine power, wisdom, and goodness.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Who therefore can bless you indeed in spite of all your enemies curses and oppositions; and not of an impotent idol, that can do you neither good nor hurt.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

You are blessed of the Lord,.... The Arabic version reads it, "we are blessed"; with temporal and with spiritual blessings; being the beloved of the Lord, chosen of him; whose sins are pardoned, whose persons are justified by the righteousness of Christ; who are put among the children of God, and are heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ; regenerated by his Spirit, favoured with communion with God, and wrought up to some degree of conformity to Christ, and shall ever be with him.

Which made heaven and earth; and so able to bless with all kind of blessings, both heavenly and earthly; and from whom all help and assistance may be hoped for, and who may be trusted and confided in: and this, it may be, is observed to distinguish him from the idols of the Gentiles, who made not the heavens and the earth; and who are not able to bless, nor give the least relief to any of their votaries.

Geneva Study Bible

Ye are blessed of the LORD which {i} made heaven and earth.

(i) And therefore still governs and continues all things in it.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

15. The prayer is still continued, Blessed be ye of Jehovah. The designation Maker of heaven and earth is characteristic of the later Psalms (Psalm 121:2; Psalm 124:8; Psalm 134:3; Psalm 146:6). It contrasts Jehovah the omnipotent Creator with the powerless idols of the heathen (Jeremiah 10:11; and often in Isaiah 40-66). Here it also implies that He has the power to dispense the blessings of earth. Cp. also Isaiah 37:16; Psalm 96:5; Nehemiah 9:6.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 15. - Ye are the blessed of the Lord which made heaven and earth; i.e. of the true Lord and God, the Creator of all things, visible and invisible. Psalm 115:15

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The voice of consolation is continued in Psalm 115:15, but it becomes the voice of hope by being blended with the newly strengthened believing tone of the congregation. Jahve is here called the Creator of heaven and earth because the worth and magnitude of His blessing are measured thereby. He has reserved the heavens to Himself, but given the earth to men. This separation of heaven and earth is a fundamental characteristic of the post-diluvian history. The throne of God is in the heavens, and the promise, which is given to the patriarchs on behalf of all mankind, does not refer to heaven, but to the possession of the earth (Psalm 37:22). The promise is as yet limited to this present world, whereas in the New Testament this limitation is removed and the κληρονομία embraces heaven and earth. This Old Testament limitedness finds further expression in Psalm 115:17, where דּוּמה, as in Psalm 94:17, signifies the silent land of Hades. The Old Testament knows nothing of a heavenly ecclesia that praises God without intermission, consisting not merely of angels, but also of the spirits of all men who die in the faith. Nevertheless there are not wanting hints that point upwards which were even better understood by the post-exilic than by the pre-exilic church. The New Testament morn began to dawn even upon the post-exilic church. We must not therefore be astonished to find the tone of Psalm 6:6; Psalm 30:10; Psalm 88:11-13, struck up here, although the echo of those earlier Psalms here is only the dark foil of the confession which the church makes in Psalm 115:18 concerning its immortality. The church of Jahve as such does not die. That it also does not remain among the dead, in whatever degree it may die off in its existing members, the psalmist might know from Isaiah 26:19; Isaiah 25:8. But the close of the Psalm shows that such predictions which light up the life beyond only gradually became elements of the church's consciousness, and, so to speak, dogmas.