791 O God, nations have come into Thy inheritance, They have defiled Thy holy temple, They made Jerusalem become heaps, 2 They gave the dead bodies of Thy servants Food for the fowls of the heavens, The flesh of Thy saints For the wild beast of the earth. 3 They have shed their blood As water round about Jerusalem, And there is none burying. 4 We have been a reproach to our neighbours, A scorn and a derision to our surrounders.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on Psalm 79:1-4
Commentary on Psalm 79:1-5
(Read Psalm 79:1-5)
God is complained to: whither should children go but to a Father able and willing to help them? See what a change sin made in the holy city, when the heathen were suffered to pour in upon them. God's own people defiled it by their sins, therefore he suffered their enemies to defile it by their insolence. They desired that God would be reconciled. Those who desire God's favour as better than life, cannot but dread his wrath as worse than death. In every affliction we should first beseech the Lord to cleanse away the guilt of our sins; then he will visit us with his tender mercies.