John Calvin Commentary Psalms 39:9

"I was dumb, I opened not my mouth; Because thou didst it." — Psalms 39:9 (ASV)

I was dumb. Here David blames himself because he had not preserved that silence which, as we have already seen, the violence of his grief forced him to break. When he says then that he was dumb, he does not mean this as a commendation of the uniform and persevering restraint which he had exercised over himself.

It is rather a correction of his error, as if, reproving his own impatience, he had spoken within himself in this way: "What are you doing? You had enjoined silence upon yourself, and now you murmur proudly against God. What will you gain by this presumption?" We have here a very profitable and instructive lesson, for nothing is better fitted to restrain the violent paroxysms of grief than the recollection that we are dealing not with a mortal man, but with God, who will always maintain His own righteousness in opposition to all that men may say against it in their murmuring complaints, and even in their outrageous accusations.

Why do the great majority of men run to such excess in their impatience? Is it not because they forget that, in doing so, they dare to plead a controversy with God? Thus, while some impute all their miseries to fortune, others to men, and still others account for them from a variety of causes which their own fancy suggests, while scarcely one in a hundred recognizes in them the hand of God, they allow themselves to indulge in bitter complaint, without ever thinking that in so doing they offend God.

David, on the contrary, in order to subdue every unholy desire and sinful excess, returns to God and resolves to keep silence, because the affliction which he is now suffering proceeded from God.

Since David, who was thus afflicted with the severest trials, nevertheless resolved to keep silence, let us learn from this that it is one of the chief exercises of our faith to humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God and to submit to His judgments without murmuring or complaint.

It is to be observed that men humbly and calmly submit themselves to God only when they are persuaded not only that He does by His almighty power whatever He pleases, but also that He is a righteous Judge. For although the wicked feel that the hand of God is upon them, yet because they charge Him with cruelty and tyranny, they do not cease to pour forth horrible blasphemies against Him.

Meanwhile, David regards the secret judgments of God with such reverence and wonder that, satisfied with His will alone, he considers it sinful to open his mouth to utter a single word against Him.