7
Tremble, O earth, at the presence of the Lord,
At the presence of the God of Jacob,
8
Who turned the rock into a pool of water,
The flint into a fountain of waters.
My Thoughts
These scriptures emphasize the awe-inspiring power of the Lord, calling the earth to tremble in His presence, acknowledging Him as the God of Jacob. The psalmist reflects on God’s miraculous acts, such as turning a rock into a pool of water, demonstrating His ability to provide for His people in desperate circumstances. Both Matthew Henry and Charles Spurgeon highlight how this scripture reveals God’s sovereignty and compassion, urging believers to praise Him for continual blessings and divine assistance throughout life’s challenges…..Bill
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Commentaries:
Matthew Henry
The psalmist asks the mountains and hills what ailed them to skip thus; and he answers for them, as for the seas, it was at the presence of the Lord, before whom, not only those mountains, but the earth itself, may well tremble (v. 7), since it has lain under a curse for man’s sin. See Ps. 104:32; Isa. 64:3, 4. He that made the hills and mountains to skip thus can, when he pleases, dissipate the strength and spirit of the proudest of his enemies and make them tremble.
That God supplied them with water out of the rock, which followed them through the dry and sandy deserts. Well, may the earth and all its inhabitants tremble before that God who turned the rock into a standing water (v. 8), and what cannot he do who did that? The same almighty power that turned waters into a rock to be a wall to Israel (Ex. 14:22) turned the rock into waters to be a well to Israel: as they were protected, so they were provided for, by miracles, standing miracles; for such was the standing water, that fountain of waters into which the rock, the flinty rock, was turned, and that rock was Christ, 1 Co. 10:4. For he is a fountain of living waters to his Israel, from whom they receive grace for grace.
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Charles Spurgeon
“Tremble, thou earth, at the presence of the Lord, at the presence of the God of Jacob.” Or “from before the Lord, the Adonai, the Master and King.” Very fitly does the Psalm call upon all nature again to feel a holy awe because its Ruler is still in its midst.
Quake when Jehovah walks abroad,
Quake earth, at sight of Israel’s God.
Let the believer feel that God is near, and he will serve the Lord with fear and rejoice with trembling. Awe is not cast out by faith, but the rather it becomes deeper and more profound. The Lord is most reverenced where he is most loved.
“Which turned the rock into a standing water,” causing a mere or lake to stand at its foot, making the wilderness a pool: so abundant was the supply of water from the rock that it remained like water in a reservoir. “The flint into a fountain of waters,” which flowed freely in streams, following the tribes in their devious marches. Behold what God can do! It seemed impossible that the flinty rock should become a fountain, but he speaks, and it is done. Not only do mountains move, but rocks yield rivers when the God of Israel wills that it should be so.
From stone and solid rock he brings
The spreading lake, the gushing springs.
“O magnify the Lord with me, and let us exalt his name together,” for he it is and he alone who doeth such wonders as these. He supplies our temporal needs from sources of the most unlikely kind and never suffers the stream of his liberality to fail. As for our spiritual necessities, they are all met by the water and the blood which gushed of old from the riven rock, Christ Jesus: therefore let us extol the Lord our God.
Our deliverance from under the yoke of sin is strikingly typified in the going up of Israel from Egypt, and so also was the victory of our Lord over the powers of death and hell. The Exodus should therefore be earnestly remembered by Christian hearts. Did not Moses on the mount of transfiguration speak to our Lord of “the exodus” which he should shortly accomplish at Jerusalem; and is it not written of the hosts above that they sing the song of Moses the servant of God, and of the Lamb? Do we not ourselves expect another coming of the Lord, when before his face heaven and earth shall flee away and there shall be no more sea? We join then with the singers around the Passover table and make their Hallel ours, for we too have been led out of bondage and guided like a flock through a desert land, wherein the Lord supplies our wants with heavenly manna and water from the Rock of ages. Praise ye the Lord.
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Enduring Word
Tremble, O earth, at the presence of the Lord: The psalmist called upon all the earth to honor Adonai in His mighty presence. The God of Jacob is more than a local deity; He is God of all the earth. (Guzik)
i. Psalm 114:7 is the first time in this psalm that God is referred to by any name or title (Lord [Adonai] and God of Jacob). Up to this point, the psalmist has asked questions: Who is it? What did it? “The author must have been having fun as he wrote, knowing the answer and knowing we know the answer too, but holding it off. What could have caused the sea to part, the river to turn back and the hills to tremble? he asks. For twelve lines he has allowed our interest to build for dramatic effect.” (Boice)
ii. Morgan linked the idea of tremble to labor pains in birth. “When Jehovah, acting as Sovereign Lord, and in His might thus convulsed Nature, it was that a nation might be born.” (Morgan)
Who turned the rock into a pool of waters: The psalmist remembered one more event which demonstrated God’s power over creation during the Exodus years – when God brought forth water for His people from the rock and the hardened flint. This assured the people of God that His mighty presence works for them, not against them. (Guzik)
i. As Psalm 113 closed with God’s compassion on the barren woman, this psalm closes with God’s compassion on thirsty Israel. His great power and might are not merely for the dividing of waters and the shaking of mountains. His majestic might brings blessings to His people one by one. (Guzik)
ii. The flint into a fountain of waters: “This is a miracle which we all need to have wrought in our experience. Our heart is flint, our eyes are dry, our souls fail to respond with tears and regrets to the love of the Pierced One, and to the indictment that charges us with His death.” (Meyer)
iii. Psalm 114 ends without giving any specific instruction to the people of God, but simply declares His great works. “He has no word of ‘moral,’ no application, counsel, warning, or encouragement to give. Whoso will can draw these. Enough for him to lift his soaring song, and to check it into silence in the midst of its full music.” (Maclaren)
iv. We again remind ourselves that Jesus probably sang this psalm together with His disciples on the night He was betrayed and arrested (Matthew 26:30 and Mark 14:26). He would grant the people of God a greater deliverance than Israel out of Egypt. In that work, all nature would be shaken (Matthew 27:45, 51). (Guzik)
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Albert Barnes
Tremble, thou earth, at the presence of the Lord … – This is at the same time an explanation of the facts referred to in the previous verses, and the statement of an important truth in regard to the power of God. The true explanation – as here implied – of what occurred to the sea, to the Jordan, to the mountains, and to the hills, was the fact that God was there; the inference from that, or the truth which followed from that, was, that before that God in whose presence the very mountains shook, and from whom the waters of the sea fled in alarm the whole earth should tremble.
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John Gill
Tremble, thou earth, at the presence of the Lord,…. Or, “the earth has trembled at the presence of the Lord”; so the Syriac and Arabic versions render it; the imperative is sometimes put for the preterite or past tense, see Psalm 22:9, likewise the Septuagint and Vulgate Latin versions thus render it, “the earth is moved at the presence of the Lord”; and then the sense is by a prosopopoeia. Is it to be wondered at, that we, the sea, the river of Jordan, the mountains and hills, have fled, or have been driven back, or have skipped like rams and lambs, when the whole earth, of which we are a part, has trembled at the presence of God? who, when he does but look, the earth trembles; and when he touches the hills, they smoke, Psalm 104:32. It is at the same presence of God we have been thus moved, the power of which we have felt, even
at the presence of the God of Jacob; who brought Jacob out of Egypt, led him through the sea, and gave him the law on Sinai. This is not to be understood of the general and common presence of God, which is everywhere, and with all his creatures for this is not attended with such wonderful phenomena as here mentioned, either in the literal or mystic sense; but of the majestic, powerful, and gracious presence of God; such as he sometimes causes to attend his ministers, his word, his churches, his martyrs and confessors; and so as to strike an awe upon, and terror into, their greatest enemies, as well as to convert his own people.
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Cross References
Exodus 17:6 (KJV 1900)
6 Behold, I will stand before thee there upon the rock in Horeb; and thou shalt smite the rock, and there shall come water out of it, that the people may drink. And Moses did so in the sight of the elders of Israel.
Deuteronomy 8:15 (KJV 1900)
15 Who led thee through that great and terrible wilderness, wherein were fiery serpents, and scorpions, and drought, where there was no water; who brought thee forth water out of the rock of flint;
Exodus 17:1–7 (KJV 1900)
And all the congregation of the children of Israel journeyed from the wilderness of Sin, after their journeys, according to the commandment of the Lord, and pitched in Rephidim: and there was no water for the people to drink. 2 Wherefore the people did chide with Moses, and said, Give us water that we may drink. And Moses said unto them, Why chide ye with me? wherefore do ye tempt the Lord? 3 And the people thirsted there for water; and the people murmured against Moses, and said, Wherefore is this that thou hast brought us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our cattle with thirst? 4 And Moses cried unto the Lord, saying, What shall I do unto this people? they be almost ready to stone me. 5 And the Lord said unto Moses, Go on before the people, and take with thee of the elders of Israel; and thy rod, wherewith thou smotest the river, take in thine hand, and go. 6 Behold, I will stand before thee there upon the rock in Horeb; and thou shalt smite the rock, and there shall come water out of it, that the people may drink. And Moses did so in the sight of the elders of Israel. 7 And he called the name of the place Massah, and Meribah, because of the chiding of the children of Israel, and because they tempted the Lord, saying, Is the Lord among us, or not?
Psalm 78:15 (KJV 1900)
15 He clave the rocks in the wilderness,
And gave them drink as out of the great depths.
1 Corinthians 10:4 (KJV 1900)
4 And did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Christ.
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KJV W/Strongs Bible
114:7 Tremble 2342 8798, thou earth 776, at the presence 6440 of the Lord 113, at the presence 6440 of the God 433 of Jacob 3290;
114:8 Which turned 2015 8802 the rock 6697 [into] a standing 98 water 4325, the flint 2496 into a fountain 4599 of waters 4325.
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Geneva Bible 1560
Psalm 114:7-8
7 The (e) earth trembled at the presence of the Lord, at the presence of the God of Jaakób.
8 Which (e) turneth the rock into waterpooles, and the flint into a fountain of water.
(e) Ought then his people to be insensible, when they see his power and majesty? (e) That is, caused miraculously water to come out of the rock in most abundance, Ex. 17.6
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Closing Thoughts:
“You are worthy, O Lord, To receive glory and honor and power; For You created all things, And by Your will they exist and were created.” Rev 4:11 NKJV
Open my eyes, that I may see Wondrous things from Your law. Psalm 119:18 NKJV
Cause me to hear Your lovingkindness in the morning, For in You do I trust; Cause me to know the way in which I should walk, For I lift up my soul to You. Psalm 143:8 NKJV
Let the morning bring me word of your unfailing love, for I have put my trust in you. Show me the way I should go, for to you I entrust my life. Psalm 143:8 NIV
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