Commentaries:
Adam Clarke
Be not thou far from me - In the first verse he asks, Why hast thou forsaken me? Or, as if astonished at their wickedness, Into what hands hast thou permitted me to fall? Now he prays, Be not far from me. St. Jerome observes here, that it is the humanity of our blessed Lord which speaks to his divinity. Jesus was perfect man; and as man he suffered and died. But this perfect and sinless man could not have sustained those sufferings so as to make them expiatory had he not been supported by the Divine nature. All the expressions in this Psalm that indicate any weakness as far as it relates to Christ, (and indeed it relates principally to him), are to be understood of the human nature; for, that in him God and man were united, but not confounded, the whole New Testament to me bears evidence, the manhood being a perfect man, the Godhead dwelling bodily in that manhood. Jesus, as Mans, was conceived, born, grew up, increased in wisdom, stature, and favor with God and man; hungered, thirsted, suffered, and died. Jesus, as God, knew all things, was from the beginning with God, healed the diseased, cleansed the lepers, and raised the dead; calmed the raging of the sea, and laid the tempest by a word; quickened the human nature, raised it from the dead, took it up into heaven, where as the Lamb newly slain, it ever appears in the presence of God for us. These are all Scripture facts. The man Christ Jesus could not work those miracles; the God in that man could not have suffered those sufferings. Yet one person appears to do and suffer all; here then is God manifested in the Flesh.
O my strength - The divinity being the poxver by which the humanity was sustained in this dreadful conflict.
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