Jehovah is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abundant in loving-kindness.
Here Israel sings God's own description of Himself back to Him — the words He first spoke to Moses on the mountain, which they had proved true in their history. How can mercy and anger belong to the same God, and what does it mean that His anger is slow and not absent?
The line before this one says God made known His ways to Moses and His acts to Israel. This verse names those ways, and it echoes what God said about Himself on the mountain.
The ways of God, which He made known to Moses, will bring about the blessing of restored Israel. He showed His outward acts to Israel; to Moses He showed the principles on which He acted. These ways are now announced to the restored nation. In His ways God is merciful, gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love. That is how He revealed Himself to Moses on the mountain (Ex. 34:6-7).
So what is the difference between God's "ways" and His "acts"?
God has both "ways" and "acts." "He made known His ways to Moses, His acts to the people of Israel" (Ps. 103:7). His ways showed what He is like in Himself; His acts were more the displays of His power.
When God proclaimed His name to Moses, the words of mercy came joined to a solemn clause. The psalm quotes the mercy and stops there.
Now we have Jehovah Himself set before us: "merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love." This is exactly how He declared Himself to Moses — except that the shadow the law cast across it is removed here, the words "who will by no means clear the guilty" (Ex. 34:6-7). No, "He will not always chide, nor will He keep His anger forever." Israel has proved this in their history, and can say, "He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities." So He has shown who He is, and glorified Himself before their eyes.
"Slow to anger" can sound as if God does not mind evil much. One commentator says the opposite is true.
"Jehovah is slow to anger." Are we not all inclined to set these things against each other? But they do not really clash. The stronger God's feeling against whatever destroys His own glory, the more fitting it is that He should be slow to act on His anger — and we should be slow too, though for quite different reasons. Slowness to anger is usually the proof of moral greatness... This does not mean that slowness to feel belongs to God, or even to man; but acting on the feeling is another matter.
It matters who is singing these words. David was not describing mercy he had only heard about.
Think of David's words in Psalm 103:8: "The LORD is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love." Who knew the Lord's mercy better than David? David had been overtaken by a terrible fall, which led him to commit adultery and murder. No worse fall could have overtaken him; yet this is his testimony... Those of us who have fallen along the way learn to love these words. Mercy is what we need, and mercy is what we find in the heart of God.
This verse can be flattened into a vague sense that God is kind about everything. One writer marks the difference, and then turns it into a rule for our own ways and thoughts.
He is slow to anger, and abounding in mercy... So this is not vague goodness that deceives itself. We own the evil for what it is, and still know God in His goodness. This ought to shape our own ways and thoughts. We will still have to deal with evil, and if we go below the surface we meet it everywhere. But I ought to have gone to God about it in such a way that I bring Him back with me, according to what I have found Him to be above it all.
The same principle sets a boundary on correction. Discipline, one commentator notes, has limits that do not depend on how the person being corrected responds:
It should in its carrying out, bear the stamp of the God of all grace Who chastises "for our profit" (Heb. 12:10). He remembers how easily "the souls which he has made" (Isa. 57:16) may faint before Him.
- Revealed — this verse is not human guesswork about God. It repeats what He said of Himself to Moses, with the law's shadow lifted off it.
- Ways — Israel saw God's acts, the displays of His power. Moses learned His ways, the principles behind them, and this verse names those ways.
- Slow — His anger is slow, not shallow; delay in acting is the mark of moral greatness, not of weak feeling about evil.
- Proved — the man singing it had fallen as far as adultery and murder, so mercy here is testimony, not theory.
- Passed on — knowing God like this is not vague goodness that excuses sin. We still own the evil, and we meet it carrying the God we found above it.
He will not always chide, neither will he keep [his anger] for ever.
Psalm 103 praises God for what He is, and verse 9 sets a limit on His anger. It raises two questions: why does God contend with His people at all, and what ends that contending?
The verse sits in a section that describes God by the character He revealed to Moses. One commentator separates what Israel saw from what Moses learned.
The blessing of restored Israel will come through the ways of God that He made known to Moses. Israel saw His outward acts; God showed Moses the principles He acted on. God now declares these ways to the restored nation. In His ways God is merciful, gracious, slow to anger, and rich in mercy. This is how He revealed Himself to Moses on the mountain (Ex. 34:6-7), and He had always acted this way through the nation's long history. Because of their sins God had to chasten them, yet, "He will not always chide, nor will He keep His anger forever."
The word "chide" means to contend — to press a case against someone. One writer renders the line that way, and notes that the people who say these words have proved them in their own history.
Now we have Jehovah Himself set before us: "merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in loving-kindness." This is how He declared Himself to Moses, with only the law's dark shadow removed from it — the word that "He can by no means clear the guilty" (Ex. 34:6-7). No, "He will not always contend, nor will He keep it in mind forever." They have proved this now in their history, and can say, "He has not dealt with us according to our sins, nor repaid us according to our iniquities." So He has shown Himself, and glorified Himself before their eyes.
A God who stops being angry could be mistaken for a God who never minded. The verses that follow rule that out.
Their sins and iniquities became the occasion for showing that His mercy and grace are greater than man's sin, even "as the heaven is high above the earth." So God is not indifferent to the sins of His people. He shows mercy to His people, but He deals with them because of their sins and removes their sins "as far as the east is from the west."
God does not set the limit on His anger by how fast the person improves. He sets it by what He Himself is, and by how fragile the person is.
People often forget that discipline has its limits. Those limits do not depend on the state of heart or conscience of the person being dealt with. When it is carried out, it should bear the stamp of the God of all grace, who disciplines us "for our profit" (Heb. 12:10). He remembers how easily "the souls which he has made" (Isa. 57:16) may faint before Him. The prophets are full of similar passages about restraining grace (Ps. 103:8-10).
The same principle reaches past Israel to believers now.
This is what confirms hope, and without hope there is no power to endure and no comfort either. His judicial chastenings of Israel are measured, and they will have an end. The same is true of His righteous government of us now.
If the anger is not permanent, there is a way out from under it — and the way is confession, not self-defence.
Thanks to a merciful God, blessing is not far away when the soul bends to the rod and confesses that the punishment is just. "He will not always chide, nor will He keep His anger forever." The surest way out from under God's governmental rod is to bow low in His presence and admit openly that the discipline was fully deserved.
Some have used this line to argue that no punishment from God can ever be final. Commentators answer that these words have a particular audience, and that audience sets their scope.
But this objection is easy to answer. Even those who know little of Scripture will see that God speaks these words to Israel. He loves this people dearly. Yet He has set them aside for a time, because they were unfaithful and firmly rejected the salvation offered to them in Christ. God's word testifies that He will restore them once more to these privileges as His earthly people.
Writing on the parallel words in Isaiah 57:16, another commentator gives the reader a rule of reading rather than an argument.
Let me advise the simple reader, when a quotation is made, always to read the context before he receives a new doctrine.
- Ways — Israel saw God's acts; God showed Moses the principles behind them. Verse 9 states one of those principles.
- Contend — to chide is to press a case. God will not press His case against His people without end, and Israel's history proves it.
- Limit — God's own character fixes the boundary on discipline, not the sufferer's progress. He knows how soon we faint.
- Measured — His chastenings have an end, and the same holds in His government of believers today.
- Release — the quickest way out from under the rod is to bow and admit the correction was deserved.
He hath not dealt with us according to our sins, nor rewarded us according to our iniquities.
Psalm 103 counts up God's benefits one by one. Here the singer counts something God has not done. If He does not treat us as our sins deserve, has He simply ignored them? And how can a holy God do that?
One writer calls this line the psalm's high point, and points to what lies behind it.
Verse 10 is a climax of touching power. The soul that God has taught the meaning of the cross, as the true expression of His grace, understands it well. He had not dealt with them according to their sins. In return for their hatred, He showed them His priceless love. In Him whom the nation hated, He had found the one who could truly bear the nation's guilt (Isa. 53).
The psalm sets God's public acts beside what He explained to Moses, the leader who brought Israel out of Egypt.
God revealed His outward acts to Israel; to Moses He revealed the principles on which He acted. These ways are now declared to the restored nation. In His ways God is merciful, gracious, slow to anger, and plentiful in mercy. This is how He revealed Himself to Moses on the mountain (Ex. 34:6-7). God had always acted this way through the long history of the nation. Because of their sins God had to chasten them, yet, "He will not always chide; nor will He keep His anger forever."
The verse could sound as if God shrugs at sin. The same writer reads it the other way round.
Their sins and iniquities became the occasion for showing that His mercy and grace are greater than man's sin — as high as the heavens are above the earth. So we see that God is not indifferent to the sins of His people. He shows mercy to His people, but He deals with them because of their sins, and He removes their sins "as far as the east is from the west."
If God did not repay us for our sins, the debt did not simply vanish. One writer points to the cross, where judgment on sin fell in full.
The way He worked for us showed righteousness — yes, divine righteousness. The cross is the solemn declaration of righteous judgment on sin. So much every Christian bows to and delights in; and only here was propitiation possible for us. He bore our sins so that we would not have to bear them. Since He bore them for us, we cannot bear them ourselves. "Their sins and iniquities I will remember no more" is now God's unchangeable word. It is the word of the same righteousness that the cross has so fully shown and glorified.
Israel spent forty years in the desert as the fruit of their own conduct. One writer reads this verse into that story.
If God had dealt with them as they deserved, He might at least have left them to wander alone through the desert. But — blessed for ever be His great name — He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities. His thoughts are not as our thoughts; nor are His ways as our ways.
One writer reads the psalm as Israel's future thanksgiving, and applies it to believers now too.
Israel will then fully acknowledge, as believers do today, that He has not dealt with them as they deserved. He has not punished them as their great guilt deserved (v. 10). They will be humbled, but adoring.
That guards the verse from misuse. The same writer says what forgiveness is for.
If God forgives, it is so that people may fear Him, not so that they may think lightly of their sin or of God's mercy. Grace does not lead to a careless walk; on the contrary, it teaches us to live soberly, righteously, and godly (Titus 2:12).
- Measure — The verse names a yardstick God refused to use: our own sins.
- Ways — Israel saw God's acts. God showed Moses the principles behind them, and here the people grasp what Moses knew.
- Not indifference — God is not casual about sin. Their sins became the occasion for showing mercy as high as the heavens.
- Ground — The debt was not waived; it was borne. The cross declares righteous judgment on sin, and so the sins are remembered no more.
- Response — The right reaction is worship from a humbled heart, not carelessness. God forgives so that people may fear Him.
For as the heavens are high above the earth, so great is his loving-kindness toward them that fear him.
God measures His mercy here by the height of the sky, right after saying He has not treated His people as their sins deserved. Two questions follow: how large is that mercy, and who are the people it rests on?
The comparison invites a calculation no one can finish.
How beautiful it is to hear, "For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is His steadfast love toward those who fear Him" (Ps. 103:11). Do you want to know the measure of God's mercy? Try to measure the distance to heaven. You would have some difficulty doing that. You cannot measure it.
The gap between our weakness and God's greatness could shame us. Here it does the opposite.
We need to remember the infinite difference between our own weakness and the greatness of God. Yet He shows marvellous mercy to those so far below Him. But He uses that distance only to highlight the greatness of that mercy — mercy as high as the heavens are above the earth (v. 11). He also uses the immeasurable distance between east and west to show the total and absolute removal of our transgressions (v. 12).
A verse like this can sound as though God overlooks wrongdoing. Commentators press the opposite reading.
Their sins and iniquities became the occasion for showing that His mercy and grace is greater than man's sin, even "as high as the heavens are above the earth." So God is not indifferent to the sins of His people. He shows mercy to His people, but He deals with them because of their sins and removes their sins "as far as the east is from the west."
The word "for" ties this measurement to the line before it. One writer calls that earlier line the high point of the psalm, and sees the cross in it.
Verse 10 rises to a climax of touching power. The soul that God has taught the meaning of the cross understands it well. The cross is the true expression of the grace of God. "He has not dealt with us according to our sins." He had not dealt with them according to their sins. In return for their hatred He had shown them His priceless love. In Him, whom the nation hated, He had found the One who truly bore the nation's guilt.
Earlier the psalm says God made His ways known to Moses. Mercy on this scale is part of what He showed there.
God revealed His outward acts to Israel, but to Moses He revealed the principles behind those acts. These ways are now declared to the restored nation. In His ways God is merciful, gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in mercy. This is how He revealed Himself to Moses on the mountain (Ex. 34:6-7).
The mercy has no limit, but the verse names who it rests on.
But the mercy of Jehovah is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear Him, the obedient ones. So everything is traced to His goodness, and to His faithfulness too, which flow from the very nature and name of Jehovah — yet it comes to the obedient ones, the godly remnant.
Another rendering shows the force of the word:
His loving-kindness is mighty over those who fear Him.
The psalm does not end in wonder. It ends in a claim on the heart.
Higher and higher the soul climbs, scaling this mercy which, after all, is beyond all measure. You have redeemed my life from destruction, fed me, cared for me, guarded me; but, after all, I cannot measure it. … Since His mercy is like this, it lays one practical claim on the heart: "Bless His holy name."
- Cause. God had not treated His people as their sins deserved. This verse gives the size of that mercy.
- Measure. God sets His mercy beside the sky, a measure no one can take.
- Reach. This mercy rests on those who fear Him, the obedient ones, and it runs from everlasting to everlasting.
- Holiness. Mercy greater than sin is not blindness to sin. God removes transgressions; He does not ignore them.
- Response. Mercy this high lays one practical claim on the heart — bless His holy name.
As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us.
This psalm measures God's mercy with nothing a person can pace out — the height of the sky, and the distance from east to west. So what did God move that far away, and how could He do it?
One writer follows the song as it climbs. The singer lists what God has done for him, then admits he cannot measure the mercy behind it all.
In Psalm 103 David is tracing up to the root of things. Higher and higher the soul climbs, scaling, as it were, this mercy, which after all is beyond all measure. You have redeemed my life from destruction, fed me, cared for me, guarded me. But after all, I cannot measure it: "As far as the east is from the west." Man's widest span would be a poor ruler for that mercy, which is from everlasting to everlasting.
Mercy this wide could sound like God shrugging off what was done. One writer says it is the opposite.
Their sins and iniquities had become the occasion of showing that His mercy and grace is greater than man's sin, even "as the heaven is high above the earth." So we see that God is not indifferent to the sins of His people. He shows mercy to His people. But He deals with them because of their sins, and He removes those sins "as far as the east is from the west."
If the sins moved, someone moved them. One writer says who took the sins away, and on whom God laid them.
God alone could separate sins from us and lay them on Another. This He did to the praise of the glory of His grace. One day Israel will celebrate this goodness of Jehovah in triumph. They will bless Jehovah because He forgives all their iniquities and heals all their diseases. And they will add, "As far as the east is from the west, so far does He remove our transgressions from us." They will see that Jehovah took their sins from them and laid them upon Christ, and that He was wounded and bruised for them.
One writer reads the verse alongside the day of atonement and its two goats. Each goat showed a different side of one act.
The two goats on the day of atonement give the double aspect of the one act. In the one we see God's glory maintained; in the other, sins put away. The one is as perfect as the other. We are as perfectly forgiven as God is perfectly glorified by the death of Christ… How many of the sins of Israel did the scapegoat bear away? "All." Precious word! Not one left behind. And where did he bear them? "Into a land not inhabited" — a land where they could never be found, because there was no one there to look for them.
The sins are gone, and that clears the way for something better.
The guilty one is released, forgiven… The forgiveness of sins includes another thought. Redemption by Christ brings us into a new state. The whole guilty past is forgiven and removed from us, so nothing hinders the enjoyment of what redemption brings us into.
Knowing your sins are that far off changes how honestly you can look at them. One writer pictures a man whose debts someone else has paid.
When we see our transgressions completely "blotted out," we have no interest in making our sinfulness look smaller… But if someone in great kindness had paid my debts for me, I could go and look through all my books. And if I found that I had owed a thousand pounds instead of a hundred, it would only deepen my sense of the greatness and value of the love that had paid it all for me. So it would increase my gratitude and joy.
- Distance measured. No human span can measure God's mercy, so the psalm reaches for the sky's height and the gap from east to west.
- Distance earned. God did not wave sin away. He separated sins from His people and laid them on Christ, who was wounded for them.
- Distance pictured. The live goat carried all the sins to a land with no inhabitants — a place where no one could ever go looking for them.
- Distance shared. The believer is forgiven as perfectly as the death of Christ glorified God. One act, two sides.
- Distance enjoyed. The whole guilty past is gone, so nothing blocks the new state redemption brings. A cleared conscience stops shrinking its debts and turns to gratitude and joy.