July 28

So foolish was I, and ignorant: I was as a bead before thee.” Psalm lxxiii. 22.

^“vcEMEMBER, this is the confession of the man aftet God’s own heart; and, in telling us his inner life, he writes,” So foolish was I, and ignorant.” The word “fool{shy” here, means more than it signifies in ordinary language. David, in a former verse of the Psalm, writes. “I was envious of the foolish when I saw the prosperity of the wicked,” which shows that the folly he intended had sin in it. He puts himself down as being thus “foolish,” and adds a word which is to give intensity to it: “so foolish was I.” How foolish, he could not tell. It was a sinful folly, a folly which was not to be excused by frailty, but to be condemned because of its perverseness and wilful ignorance, for he had been envious of the present prosperity of the ungodly, forgetful of the dreadful end awaiting all such And are we better than David, that we should caL ourselvet. wise? Do we profess that we have attained perfection, or to have been BO chastened that the rod has taken all our wilfulness out of us? Ah, this were pride indeed! If David was foolish, how foolish should we be in our own esteem if we could but Bee ourselves! Look back, believer: think of your doubting God when he has been so faithful to you — think of your foolish outcry of, “Not so, my Father,” when He crossed Hia hands in affliction to give you the larger blessing; think of the many times when you have read His providences in the dark, misinterpreted His dispensations, and groaned out. “All these things are against me,” when they were all working together for your good! Think how often you have chosen sin because of its pleasure, when, indeed, that pleasure was a root of bitterness to you I Surely if wo know our own heart we must plead guilty to the indictment of a sinful folly; and, conscious of this “foolishness,” we must make David’s consequent resolve QW own — “Thou ihalt guid mi vfith Thy counsel.”