Bible Commentaries
Psalms 131

Verses 1-3

This is a brief psalm, but it is very full of beauty, as it sets forth the contentment of a restless soul in the will of God. It follows the last as an advance of experience, and as a sequence. Its peculiar note is not that of a natural contentment, but of a satisfaction won in spite of all contrary tendencies. The thought of weaning is the dominant one. That for which a child craves it at last comes to be content without. So the soul of the singer, which once was ambitious and restlessly attempted to walk in ways for which it was not fitted, is with Him in quietness and contentment. The secret of victory over feverish ambition is divulged in the psalmist’s appeal to Israel to hope in the Lord. That, interpreted in the light of the previous psalm, means that in the gracious sense of His forgiving love is the secret of a content which puts an end to all false ambition. Redemption truly apprehended, is more than forgiveness. It is restoration to the quiet peace of being in harmony with all the forces of the universe, because governed by the will of God.