Interpret → Preach
For the service
John Wesley’s own Explanatory Notes Upon the Old and New Testament on the day’s readings — his verse-by-verse commentary, not a summary of it. Read the full edition ↗
first Isaiah 56:1, 6-8
- v.1My salvation — That eminent salvation by the Messiah, and in which, without this you shall have no share. Is near - So the scripture often speaks of things which are at a great distance, as if they were present or at hand, Hab. ii, 3 James v, 8, 9 Rev. xxii, 20. My righteousness - The same thing which he called salvation.
psalm Psalm 67
- v.2Thy way — The way of truth, or the true religion; the same which in the next clause is called his saving health, and both together signify the way of salvation; deal so graciously with thy people, that thereby the Gentile-world may at last be allured to join with them.
- v.4Judge — Rule them. Govern - Hebrew. lead; gently, as a shepherd doth his sheep; and not rule them with rigor, as other lords had done.
- v.6Them — When the people of the earth shall be converted to God, God will cause it to yield them abundance of all sorts of fruits. Under which one blessing, all other blessings both temporal and spiritual are comprehended. Our own - He who is Israel's God in a peculiar manner. The occasion of this psalm, seems to have been David's translation of the ark to Zion, which was managed with great solemnity and devotion. For the first words are the very same which Moses appointed for such occasions, Num. x, 35, and the following verses pursue the same matter. Thence he falls into a description of some of the glorious works of the God to whom this ark belonged. But because David knew that both himself and the ark were types of Christ, and that the church of Israel were a type of the catholick church, consisting of Jews and Gentiles, and that the legal administrations were types of those of the gospel, he therefore by the spirit of prophecy, looked through the types, to the great mysteries of Christ's resurrection and ascension, and of the special privileges of the Christian church, and of the conversion of the Gentiles, and intermixes passages, which immediately belong to these things, although the words be so ordered, that they carry a manifest allusion to the present actions, and may be applied to them, in a secondary sense. He first prays against God's enemies, and for his people, ver. 1-3. Then praises God, for his greatness and goodness, ver. 4-6. For his wonderful works, ver. 7-14. For his special presence in his church, ver. 15- 17. The ascension of Christ, and the salvation of his people, ver. 18-20. His victories over his enemies, and favours to his church, ver. 21-28. The accession of the Gentiles to the church, ver. 29- 31. An awful acknowledgment of the glory and grace of God, ver. 32-35. To the chief musician, A psalm or song of David.
second Romans 11:1-2a, 29-32
- v.1Hath God rejected his whole people — All Israel? In no wise. Now there is "a remnant" who believe, ver. 5; and hereafter "all Israel will be saved," ver. 26.
- v.2God hath not rejected that part of his people whom he foreknew — Speaking after the manner of men. For, in fact, knowing and foreknowing are the same thing with God, who knows or sees all things at once, from everlasting to everlasting. Know ye not - That in a parallel case, amidst a general apostasy, when Elijah thought the whole nation was fallen into idolatry, God "knew" there was "a remnant" of true worshippers.
gospel Matthew 15: (10-20), 21-28
- v.21Mark vii, 24.
- v.22A woman of Canaan — Canaan was also called Syrophenicia, as lying between Syria properly so called, and Phenicia, by the sea side. Cried to him - From afar, Thou Son of David - So she had some knowledge of the promised Messiah.
- v.23He answered her not a word — He sometimes tries our faith in like manner.
- v.24I am not sent — Not primarily; not yet.
- v.25Then came she — Into the house where he now was.
- v.28Thy faith — Thy reliance on the power and goodness of God.