John Calvin Commentary Psalms 30:1

"I will extol thee, O Jehovah; for thou hast raised me up, And hast not made my foes to rejoice over me." — Psalms 30:1 (ASV)

I will extol you, O Jehovah! As David had been brought, as it were, from the grave to the life-giving air, he promises to extol the name of God. It is God who lifts us up with His own hand when we have been plunged into a profound gulf; and therefore it is our duty, on our part, to sing His praises with our tongues.

By the foes who, he says, found no reason to rejoice over him, we may understand both domestic and foreign enemies. Although wicked and evil-disposed persons flattered him with servile adulation, they at the same time cherished secret hatred against him, and were ready to insult him as soon as an opportunity arose.

In the second verse, he concludes that he was preserved by the favor of God, offering as proof of this that when he was at the very point of death he directed his supplications to God alone, and that he immediately felt he had not done so in vain.

When God hears our prayers, it is proof that allows us to conclude with certainty that He is the author of our salvation and of the deliverance we obtain. As the Hebrew word רפא, rapha, signifies to heal, interpreters have been led, by this consideration, to restrict it to sickness.

But it is certain that rapha sometimes signifies to restore, or to set up again. Since it is also applied to an altar or a house when they are said to be repaired or rebuilt, it may appropriately mean any deliverance here. The life of man is in danger in many other ways than merely from disease. We also know it is a common figure of speech in the Psalms to say that David was restored to life whenever the Lord delivered him from any grievous and extreme danger.

Therefore, for amplification, he immediately adds, You have brought up my soul from the grave. He considered that he could not sufficiently express in words the magnitude of the favor God had bestowed on him unless he compared the darkness of that period to a grave and pit. David had been forced to throw himself hastily into such a hiding place to protect his life until the flame of insurrection was quenched.

As one restored to life, therefore, he proclaims that he had been marvelously delivered from present death, as if he had been restored to life after he had been dead. And assuredly, sacred history shows how completely he was overwhelmed with despair on every side.