Psalm 62:8

Trust in him at all times; ye people, pour out your heart before him: God is a refuge for us. Selah.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Benson Commentary

Psalm 62:8. Trust in him at all times, ye people — By my example be encouraged, and learn to trust in God. Pour out your heart before him — Make known to him all the desires, cares, and griefs of your hearts freely and frequently, with confident expectation of obtaining what you want or desire from him. God is a refuge for us — Not only, my refuge, Psalm 62:7, but a refuge for us all, even as many as will flee to him, and take shelter in him.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

62:8-12 Those who have found the comfort of the ways of God themselves, will invite others into those ways; we shall never have the less for others sharing with us. the good counsel given is, to trust wholly in God. We must so trust in him at all times, as not at any time to put that trust in ourselves, or in any creature, which is to be put in him only. Trust in him to guide us when in doubt, to protect us when in danger, to supply us when in want, to strengthen us for every good word and work. We must lay out wants and our wishes before him, and then patiently submit our wills to his: this is pouring out our hearts. God is a refuge for all, even for as many as will take shelter in him. The psalmist warns against trusting in men. The multitude, those of low degree, are changeable as the wind. The rich and noble seem to have much in their power, and lavish promises; but those that depend on them, are disappointed. Weighed in the balance of Scripture, all that man can do to make us happy is lighter than vanity itself. It is hard to have riches, and not to trust in them if they increase, though by lawful and honest means; but we must take heed, lest we set our affections unduly upon them. A smiling world is the most likely to draw the heart from God, on whom alone it should be set. The consistent believer receives all from God as a trust; and he seeks to use it to his glory, as a steward who must render an account. God hath spoken as it were once for all, that power belongs to him alone. He can punish and destroy. Mercy also belongs to him; and his recompensing the imperfect services of those that believe in him, blotting out their transgressions for the Redeemer's sake, is a proof of abundant mercy, and encourages us to trust in him. Let us trust in his mercy and grace, and abound in his work, expecting mercies from him alone.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Trust in him at all times - This exhortation, addressed to all persons, in all circumstances, and at all times, is founded on the personal experience of the psalmist, and on the views which he had of the character of God, as worthy of universal confidence. David had found him worthy of such confidence; he now exhorts all others to make the same trial, and to put their trust in God in like manner. What he had found God to be, all others would find him to be. His own experience of God's goodness and mercy - of his gracious interposition in the time of trouble - had been such that he could confidently exhort all others, in similar circumstances, to make the same trial of his love.

Ye people, pour out your heart before him - All people. On the meaning of the phrase "pour out your heart," see the notes at Psalm 42:4. The idea is, that the heart becomes tender and soft, so that its feelings and desires flow out as water, and all its emotions, all its wishes, its sorrows, its troubles, are poured out before God. All that is in our hearts may be made known to God. There is not a desire which he cannot gratify; not a trouble in which he cannot relieve us; not a danger in which he cannot defend us. And, in like manner there is not a spiritual want in which he will not feel a deep interest, nor a danger to our souls from which he will not be ready to deliver us. Much more freely than to any earthly parent - to a father, or even to a mother - may we make mention of all our troubles, little or great, before God.

God is a refuge for us - For all. For one as well as another. He is the only refuge; he is all the refuge that we need.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

8. pour out your heart—give full expression to feeling (1Sa 1:15; Job 30:16; Ps 42:4).

ye people—God's people.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Trust in him at all times, ye people; by my example be encouraged, and learn to trust God.

Pour out your heart before him, i.e. make known all the desires, and cares, and griefs of your hearts to him freely and frequently, with confident expectation of obtaining what you want or desire from him.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Trust in him at all times, ye people,.... Of the house of Israel, as the Targum; or of God, as Aben Ezra; all that are Israelites indeed, and are the Lord's covenant people; these are exhorted and encouraged to trust in him; not in a creature, nor in any outward thing, in riches, wisdom, strength, birth, privileges, the law, and the works of it; in their own righteousness, in their hearts, in themselves or in others; but in the Lord only, both for temporal and spiritual blessings: the Targum is, "in his Word"; his essential Word, by whom the world was made, and who, in the fulness of time, was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and who is a proper object of trust; in him should the people of God trust; in his person for acceptance with God, in his righteousness for justification, in his blood for pardon, in his grace for supply, and in his strength for support, deliverance, and salvation, and that "at all times": there is no time excepted; there is not a moment in which the Lord is not to be trusted in: he is to be trusted in in adversity as well as in prosperity; in times of affliction, when he is present, and will not forsake; in times of temptation, when his grace is sufficient for them; and in times of darkness, when he will arise and appear unto them;

pour out your heart before him: as Hannah did, 1 Samuel 1:15; and as water is poured out, Lamentations 2:19; it means the desires of the heart, the complaints of the soul, the whole of their case which they should spread before the Lord, and make known unto him; see Psalm 102:1, title, and Psalm 142:2; the phrase denotes the abundance of the heart, and of its requests, and the freedom with which they should be made to the Lord; for through the blood and sacrifice of Christ a believer may come to the throne of grace with boldness and liberty, and there freely tell the Lord all his mind, and all that is in his heart;

God is a refuge for us; to whom the saints may have recourse in all their times of trouble, and where they find safety and plenty, Isaiah 33:16.

Selah; on this word; see Gill on Psalm 3:2.

Geneva Study Bible

Trust in him at all times; ye people, {g} pour out your heart before him: God is a refuge for us. Selah.

(g) He admonishes us of our wicked nature, which would rather hide our sorrow and bite the bridle, than utter our grief to God to obtain remedy.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

8. Render in accordance with the Massoretic punctuation, Trust ye in him at all times, O people. He exhorts his faint-hearted followers, who were in danger of being carried away by the show of power on Absalom’s side. Cp. 2 Samuel 17:2 ff for ‘people’ used of David’s adherents. It is unnecessary to follow the LXX in reading, Trust ye in him, O whole assembly of the people.

pour out your heart] Give free vent to your anxieties: make them all known to God. Cp. Psalm 42:4.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 8. - Trust in him at all times, ye people. It is characteristic of David to join the "people" with himself in all his fears and in all his hopes. Even at the worst times, God had always some faithful ones in Israel - a "remnant" (Isaiah 1:9); and men of this sort clung to David through all his perils, and were sufficiently numerous to constitute a "people" (see 2 Samuel 18:1-6). Pour out your heart before him (comp. Psalm 42:4; Psalm 142:2, etc.): God is a Refuge for us (comp. ver. 7). Psalm 62:8

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The beginning of the second group goes back and seizes upon the beginning of the first. אך is affirmative both in Psalm 62:6 and in Psalm 62:7. The poet again takes up the emotional affirmations of Psalm 62:2, Psalm 62:3, and, firm and defiant in faith, opposes them to his masked enemies. Here what he says to his soul is very similar to what he said of his soul in Psalm 62:2, inasmuch as he makes his own soul objective and exalts himself above her; and it is just in this that the secret of personality consists. He here admonishes her to that silence which in Psalm 62:2 he has already acknowledged as her own; because all spiritual existence as being living remains itself unchanged only by means of a perpetual "becoming" (mittelst steten Werdens), of continuous, self-conscious renovation. The "hope" in Psalm 62:6 is intended to be understood according to that which forms its substance, which here is nothing more nor less than salvation, Psalm 62:2. That for which he who resigns himself to God hopes, comes from God; it cannot therfore fail him, for God the Almighty One and plenteous in mercy is surety for it. David renounces all help in himself, all personal avenging of his own honour - his salvation and his honour are על־אלהים (vid., on Psalm 7:11). The rock of his strength, i.e., his strong defence, his refuge, is בּאלהים; it is where Elohim is, Elohim is it in person (בּ as in Isaiah 26:4). By עם, Psalm 62:9, the king addresses those who have reamined faithful to him, whose feeble faith he has had to chide and sustain in other instances also in the Psalms belonging to this period. The address does not suit the whole people, who had become for the most part drawn into the apostasy. Moreover it would then have been עמּי (my people). עם frequently signifies the people belonging to the retinue of a prince (Judges 3:18), or in the service of any person of rank (1 Kings 19:21), or belonging to any union of society whatever (2 Kings 4:42.). David thus names those who cleave to him; and the fact that he cannot say "my people" just shows that the people as a body had become alienated from him. But those who have remained to him of the people are not therefore to despair; but they are to pour out before God, who will know how to protect both them and their king, whatever may lie heavily upon their heart.