10 Will you do works of wonder for the dead? will the shades come back to give you praise? (Selah.) 11 Will the story of your mercy be given in the house of the dead? will news of your faith come to the place of destruction? 12 May there be knowledge of your wonders in the dark? or of your righteousness where memory is dead? 13 But to you did I send up my cry, O Lord; in the morning my prayer came before you. 14 Lord, why have you sent away my soul? why is your face covered from me? 15 I have been troubled and in fear of death from the time when I was young; your wrath is hard on me, and I have no strength. 16 The heat of your wrath has gone over me; I am broken by your cruel punishments. 17 They are round me all the day like water; they have made a circle about me. 18 You have sent my friends and lovers far from me; I am gone from the memory of those who are dear to me.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on Psalm 88:10-18
Commentary on Psalm 88:10-18
(Read Psalm 88:10-18)
Departed souls may declare God's faithfulness, justice, and lovingkindness; but deceased bodies can neither receive God's favours in comfort, nor return them in praise. The psalmist resolved to continue in prayer, and the more so, because deliverance did not come speedily. Though our prayers are not soon answered, yet we must not give over praying. The greater our troubles, the more earnest and serious we should be in prayer. Nothing grieves a child of God so much as losing sight of him; nor is there any thing he so much dreads as God's casting off his soul. If the sun be clouded, that darkens the earth; but if the sun should leave the earth, what a dungeon would it be! Even those designed for God's favours, may for a time suffer his terrors. See how deep those terrors wounded the psalmist. If friends are put far from us by providences, or death, we have reason to look upon it as affliction. Such was the calamitous state of a good man. But the pleas here used were peculiarly suited to Christ. And we are not to think that the holy Jesus suffered for us only at Gethsemane and on Calvary. His whole life was labour and sorrow; he was afflicted as never man was, from his youth up. He was prepared for that death of which he tasted through life. No man could share in the sufferings by which other men were to be redeemed. All forsook him, and fled. Oftentimes, blessed Jesus, do we forsake thee; but do not forsake us, O take not thy Holy Spirit from us.