13I shall come into Your house with burnt offerings;
         I shall pay You my vows,

14Which my lips uttered
         And my mouth spoke when I was in distress.

15I shall offer to You burnt offerings of fat beasts,
         With the smoke of rams;
         I shall make an offering of bulls with male goats.

16Come and hear, all who fear God,
         And I will tell of what He has done for my soul.

17I cried to Him with my mouth,
         And He was extolled with my tongue.

18If I regard wickedness in my heart,
         The Lord will not hear;

19But certainly God has heard;
         He has given heed to the voice of my prayer.

20Blessed be God,
         Who has not turned away my prayer
         Nor His lovingkindness from me.

Parallel Verses

New American Standard Bible (©1995)
You made men ride over our heads; We went through fire and through water, Yet You brought us out into a place of abundance.

GOD'S WORD® Translation (©1995)
You let people ride over our heads. We went through fire and water, but then you brought us out and refreshed us.

King James Bible
Thou hast caused men to ride over our heads; we went through fire and through water: but thou broughtest us out into a wealthy place.

Douay-Rheims Bible
thou hast set men over our heads. We have passed through tire and water, and thou hast brought us out into a refreshment.

Darby Bible Translation
Thou didst cause men to ride over our head; we went through fire and through water: but thou hast brought us out into abundance.

English Revised Version
Thou hast caused men to ride over our heads; we went through fire and through water; but thou broughtest us out into a wealthy place.

Webster's Bible Translation
Thou hast caused men to ride over our heads; we went through fire and through water: but thou broughtest us out into a wealthy place.

World English Bible
You allowed men to ride over our heads. We went through fire and through water, but you brought us to the place of abundance.

Young's Literal Translation
Thou hast caused man to ride at our head. We have entered into fire and into water, And Thou bringest us out to a watered place.

Cross References

1 Corinthians 3:15 If any man's work is burned up, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire.

Psalm 18:19 He brought me forth also into a broad place; He rescued me, because He delighted in me.

Psalm 60:3 You have made Your people experience hardship; You have given us wine to drink that makes us stagger.

Psalm 78:21 Therefore the LORD heard and was full of wrath; And a fire was kindled against Jacob And anger also mounted against Israel,

Isaiah 43:2 "When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; And through the rivers, they will not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be scorched, Nor will the flame burn you.

Isaiah 51:23 "I will put it into the hand of your tormentors, Who have said to you, 'Lie down that we may walk over you.' You have even made your back like the ground And like the street for those who walk over it."

Commentary

Matthew Henry's Whole Bible Commentary

Verses 8-12

In these verses the psalmist calls upon God's people in a special manner to praise him. Let all lands do it, but Israel's land particularly. Bless our God; bless him as ours, a God in covenant with us, and that takes care of us as his own. Let them make the voice of his praise to be heard (v. 8); for from whom should it be heard but from those who are his peculiar favourites and select attendants? Two things we have reason to bless God for:-

I. Common protection (v. 9): He holdeth our soul in life, that it may not drop away of itself; for, being continually in our hands, it is apt to slip through our fingers. We must own that it is the good providence of God that keeps life and soul together and his visitation that preserves our spirit. He puts our soul in life, so the word is. He that gave us our being, by a constant renewed act upholds us in our being, and his providence is a continued creation. When we are ready to faint and perish he restores our soul, and so puts it, as it were, into a new life, giving new comforts. Non est vivere, sed valere, vita-It is not existence, but happiness, that deserves the name of life. But we are apt to stumble and fall, and are exposed to many destructive accidents, killing disasters as well as killing diseases, and therefore as to these also we are guarded by the divine power. He suffers not our feet to be moved, preventing many unforeseen evils, which we ourselves were not aware of our danger from. To him we owe it that we have not, long ere this, fallen into endless ruin. He will keep the feet of his saints.

II. Special deliverance from great distress. Observe,

1. How grievous the distress and danger were, v. 11, 12. What particular trouble of the church this refers to does not appear; it might be the trouble of some private persons or families only. But, whatever it was, they were surprised with it as a bird with a snare, enclosed and entangled in it as a fish in a net; they were pressed down with it, and kept under as with a load upon their loins, v. 11. But they owned the hand of God in it. We are never in the net but God brings us into it, never under affliction but God lays it upon us. Is any thing more dangerous than fire and water? We went through both, that is, afflictions of different kinds; the end of one trouble was the beginning of another; when we had got clear of one sort of dangers we found ourselves involved in dangers of another sort. Such may be the troubles of the best of God's saints, but he has promised, When thou passest through the waters, through the fire, I will be with thee, Isa. 43:1. Yet proud and cruel men may be as dangerous as fire and water, and more so. Beware of men, Mt. 10:17. When men rose up against us, that was fire and water, and all that is threatening (Ps. 124:2, 3, 4), and that was the case here: "Thou hast caused men to ride over our heads, to trample upon us and insult over us, to hector and abuse us, nay, and to make perfect slaves of us; they have said to our souls, Bow down, that we may go over," Isa. 51:23. While it is the pleasure of good princes to rule in the hearts of their subjects it is the pride of tyrants to ride over their heads; yet the afflicted church in this also owns the hand of God: "Thou hast caused them thus to abuse us;" for the most furious oppressor has no power but what is given him from above.

2. How gracious God's design was in bringing them into this distress and danger. See what the meaning of it is (v. 10): Thou, O God! hast proved us, and tried us. Then we are likely to get good by our afflictions, when we look upon them under this notion, for then we may see God's grace and love at the bottom of them and our own honour and benefit in the end of them. By afflictions we are proved as silver in the fire. (1.) That our graces, by being tried, may be made more evident and so we may be approved, as silver, when it is touched and marked sterling, and this will be to our praise at the appearing of Jesus Christ (1 Pt. 1:7) and perhaps in this world. Job's integrity and constancy were manifested by his afflictions. (2.) That our graces, by being exercised, may be made more strong and active, and so we may be improved, as silver when it is refined by the fire and made more clear from its dross; and this will be to our unspeakable advantage, for thus we are made partakers of God's holiness, Heb. 12:10. Public troubles are for the purifying of the church, Dan. 11:35; Rev. 2:10; Deu. 8:2.

3. How glorious the issue was at last. The troubles of the church will certainly end well; these do so, for (1.) The outlet of the trouble is happy. They are in fire and water, but they get through them: "We went through fire and water, and did not perish in the flames or floods." Whatever the troubles of the saints are, blessed be God, there is a way through them. (2.) The inlet to a better state is much more happy: Thou broughtest us out into a wealthy place, into a well-watered place (so the word is), like the gardens of the Lord, and therefore fruitful. God brings his people into trouble that their comforts afterwards may be the sweeter and that their affliction may thus yield the peaceable fruit of righteousness, which will make the poorest place in the world a wealthy place.

Calvin's Commentary

10. For thou, O God! hast proved us, thou hast tried us as silver is tried. 11. Thou broughtest us into the net, thou laidest restraint upon our loins. 12. Thou hast made man to ride over our heads, [475] we have come into fire and water, and thou hast brought us into a fruitful place. [476]

10 For thou, O God! hast proved us We may read, Though thou, O God! etc., and then the passage comes in as a qualification of what went before, and is brought forward by the Psalmist to enhance the goodness of God, who had delivered them from such severe calamities. But there is another object which I consider him to have in view, and this is the alleviation of the grief of God's people, by setting before them the comfort suggested by the words which follow. When visited with affliction, it is of great importance that we should consider it as coming from God, and as expressly intended for our good. It is in reference to this that the Psalmist speaks of their having been proved and tried. At the same time, while he adverts to God's trying his children with the view of purging away their sin, as dross is expelled from the silver by fire, he would intimate, also, that trial had been made of their patience. The figure implies that their probation had been severe; for silver is cast repeatedly into the furnace. They express themselves thankful to God, that, while proved with affliction, they had not been destroyed by it; but that their affliction was both varied and very severe, appears not only from the metaphor, but from the whole context, where they speak of having been cast into the net, being reduced to straits, men riding over their heads, and of being brought through shipwreck and conflagration. [477] The expression, laying a restraint [or chain] upon their loins, is introduced as being stronger than the one which goes before. It was not a net of thread which had been thrown over them, but rather they had been bound down with hard and insolvable fetters. The expression which follows refers to men who had shamefully tyrannised over them, and ridden them down as cattle. By fire and water are evidently meant complicated afflictions; and it is intimated that God had exercised his people with every form of calamity. They are the two elements which contribute more than any other to sustain human life, but are equally powerful for the destruction of it. It is noticeable, that the Psalmist speaks of all the cruelties which they had most unjustly suffered from the hands of their enemies, as an infliction of Divine punishment; and would guard the Lord's people against imagining that God was ignorant of what they had endured, or distracted by other things from giving attention to it. In their condition, as here described, we have that of the Church generally represented to us; and this, that when subjected to vicissitudes, and cast out of the fire into the water, by a succession of trials, there may at last be felt to be nothing new or strange in the event to strike us with alarm. The Hebrew word rvyh, revayah, which I have rendered fruitful place, means literally a well-watered land. Here it is taken metaphorically for a condition of prosperity, the people of God being represented as brought into a pleasant and fertile place, where there is abundance of pasturage. The truth conveyed is, that God, although he visit his children with temporary chastisements of a severe description, will ultimately crown them with joy and prosperity. It is a mistake to suppose that the allusion is entirely to their being settled in the land of Canaan, [478] for the psalm has not merely reference to the troubles which they underwent in the wilderness, but to the whole series of distresses to which they were subjected at the different periods of their history.

Footnotes:

[475] To ride over; signifies to insult or tyrannise over. But here the image may be taken from the trampling of war-horses in the day of battle. The cavalry, in the field of battle, pay no regard to the fallen, the dying, and the dead, but tread promiscuously upon all that come in their way, "Thou hast permitted us," says Dr Adam Clarke, "to fall under the dominion of our enemies, who have treated us as broken infantry are when the cavalry dashes among their disordered ranks, treading all under their horses' feet."

[476] "In planitiem." -- Lat. "En lieu plantureux." -- Fr.

[477] "Per naufragium et incendium transiisse." The French version reads, "Par l'eau et par le feu;" but it is important to retain the original more closely, as giving what Calvin considered to be the sense of the words in the text. Fire and water, the one of which elements consumes, while the other suffocates, is a proverbial expression, signifying, as our author afterwards states, extreme danger and complicated calamities. "When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; when thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burnt," Isaiah 43:2. See also Psalm 32:6; Ezekiel 16:6, 7; Numbers 31:23. Those things are said to come into or to pass through the fire, which abide the same, without being consumed; and which, like metals, lose only thereby their dross.

[478] Cresswell takes this view. His note on the place is, "Into a wealthy place,' literally into an irriguous region, (comp. Judges 1:15,) i.e., into a fertile country, a land of abundance, the promised land: comp. Exodus 3:8."

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