Charles H. Spurgeon on Psalms 78:65

Verses 59-72.

1. A gloomy sunset, Ps 78:59-60.

2. A baleful might, Ps 78:60-64.

3. A blessed sunrise, Ps 78:65-72. C. D.

Then the Lord awaked. Know how to understand this and similar passages in Scripture, as to the Lord's sleeping and forgetting his people, Ps 13:1 44:33 77:9. These are not to be understood as to an universal and absolute forgetting and sleep of providence; for God hath not his vacation time: he still holds the reins of government in his hand, all the world over. Neither do they infer an absolute cessation of providence in reference to that object matter which the Lord to our apprehension seems to forget, and lies dormant; for there is a promoting work of providence, which we see not, and are not so sensible of for the present, as hath been shewed. Besides, such forgetting and sleep of providence, as it is such, bespeaks the beauty of providence in the way of bringing things to pass. It is so far from inferring an interrgnum, or letting fall the sceptre of government, as that it is a glorious demonstration that God orders matters, and that wisely, whilst he seems to forget, and be as one asleep. As the night, as night, falls under the providence of God, as well as the day, for there are the ordinances of heaven for the night season, Jer 31:35: so the dark night, when as to matters the Lord seems to sleep, is part and parcel of his all wise model of government. The seventy years captivity was a long night for the church's distress; and yet thus it must be according to the ordinance of providence. Jer 29:10. Thomas Crane.