John Calvin Commentary Psalms 37:14

"The wicked have drawn out the sword, and have bent their bow, To cast down the poor and needy, To slay such as are upright in the way." — Psalms 37:14 (ASV)

The wicked draw their sword, and bend their bow. David now goes on to say that the ungodly, being armed with sword and bow, threaten the children of God with death; and he does this to meet the temptation that would otherwise overwhelm them. The promises of God do not find their place in a time of quietness and peace, but in the midst of severe and terrible conflicts.

And therefore, David now teaches us that the righteous are not deprived of that peace of which he had spoken a little before, although the wicked should threaten them with instant death. The sentence should be explained in this way: Although the wicked draw their swords and bend their bows to destroy the righteous, yet all their efforts shall return upon their own heads and shall tend to their own destruction.

But it is necessary to notice the particular terms in which the miserable condition of the righteous is described here, until God finally provides help:

1. They are called poor and needy.
2. They are compared to sheep devoted to destruction, because they have no power to withstand the violence of their enemies, but rather lie oppressed under their feet.

From this it follows that a uniform state of enjoyment here is not promised to them in this psalm. Instead, only the hope of a blessed outcome to their miseries and afflictions is set before them, to console them in these.

But as it often happens that the wicked are hated and treated with severity for their iniquity, the Psalmist adds that those who suffered in this way were those who were of upright ways; meaning by this that they were afflicted without cause.

Formerly he described them as the upright in heart, by which he commended the inward purity of the heart; but now he commends uprightness in conduct and in fulfilling every duty towards our neighbor. And thus he shows that they are unjustly persecuted, because they have done no evil to their enemies and have given them no cause of offense. Furthermore, he shows that even though provoked by injuries, they nevertheless do not turn aside from the path of duty.

In verse 15, David is not speaking of the laughter of God but is denouncing vengeance against the ungodly. This is just as we have already seen in Psalm 2:4, where although God, by tolerating the wicked, has often allowed them for a time to run to every excess of mirth and rioting, yet he finally speaks to them in his anger to overthrow them.

The sum of what is stated is that the ungodly should prevail so little that the sword they had drawn should return into their own bowels, and their bow should be broken to pieces.