Proverbs 14:34; Psalm 22:28—Job 12:23; Jeremiah 18:7,8
Righteousness exalteth a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people.
For the kingdom is the LORD’s: and he is the governor among the nations—He increaseth the nations, and destroyeth them: he enlargeth the nations, and straiteneth them again.
At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up, and to pull down, and to destroy it; if that nation, against whom I have pronounced, turn from their evil I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them.
MATTHEW HENRY (1662-1714): “Verily he is a God that judgeth in the earth,” Psalm 58:11. The Lord may be known by the judgments which He executes, and that they may be taken as earnests of a judgment to come. He is a God—not a weak man, not an angel, not a mere name, nor as the atheists suggest, a creature of men’s fear and fancy—not a deified hero, nor the sun and moon, as idolaters imagined—but God, a self-existent perfect Being; He it is that judges the earth.
JOHN HINCKLEY (1617-1695): This judging here does not refer to the judgment to come, at the last day, when there shall be a general convention of quick and dead before the Lord’s dreadful tribunal—that is not the scope of this place. ’Tis in the present tense, ο κρινων, “that now judgeth, or is now judging” the earth and the inhabitants thereof; and therefore it must be understood of a judgment on this side of the judgment of the great day; and so God judges the earth, or in the earth, three manner of ways. First, by a providential ordering and wise disposal of all the affairs of all creatures. Secondly, in relieving the oppressed and pleading the cause of the innocent. Thirdly, in overthrowing and plaguing the wicked doers.
JAMES HERVEY (1713-1758): How can the justice of God, with regard to a wicked nations, be shown, but by executing His vengeance upon them, in temporal calamities?
EDWARD PAYSON (1783-1827): This, I conceive, is too evident to require proof, for how could God be considered as the moral governor of the world, if nations and communities were exempt from His government?
JAMES HERVEY: Consider, Sirs, the very essence of political communities is temporal, purely temporal. It has no existence but in this world. Hereafter, sinners will be judged and punished, singly and in a personal capacity only. How then shall He that is Ruler among nations, maintain the dignity of His government over the kingdoms of the earth, but by inflicting national punishments for national provocations?
C. H. SPURGEON (1834-1892): There cannot be an eternal damnation of nations as nations, the destruction of men at last will be of individuals, and at the bar of God each man must be tried for himself. The punishment, therefore, of nations, is national. The guilt they incur, must receive its awful recompense in this present time state.
A. W. PINK (1886-1952): “Righteousness exalteth a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people” expresses a foundational principle and an unchanging fact. Right doing or walking according to the Divine Rule is the basic condition of national prosperity. A righteous administration of government and the public worship of God gives an ascendancy to a people over those where such things prevail not. Nothing so tends to uphold government, elevate the mind of the masses, promote industry, sobriety and equity between man and man, as does the genuine practice of piety, the preservation of the virtues and suppression of vice, as nothing more qualifies a nation for the favour of God. Righteousness is productive of health, of population, of peace and prosperity. But every kind of sin has the contrary tendency.
THOMAS SCOTT (1747-1821): The prevalence of vice and impiety is a nation’s reproach, conduces to disunion, weakness and disgrace, and exposes any people to the wrath and vengeance of God.
A. W. PINK: When sin has become a public “reproach,” then ruin is imminent.
JOHN KNOX (1514-1572): The justice of God is such, that He will not pour forth His extreme vengeance upon the wicked, until such time as their iniquity is so manifest, that their very flatterers cannot excuse it.
A. W. PINK: The Lord is here depicted as the righteous Governor of the nations, dealing with them according to their deserts. In the exercise of His unchallengeable authority the Most High is pleased to act according to the principles of goodness and equity. There is no arbitrary caprice in the infliction of punishment: “the curse causeless shall not come,” Proverbs 26:2.
ADAM CLARKE (1760-1832): “He enlargeth the nations, and straiteneth them again.” He often permits a nation to acquire an accession of territory, and afterwards shuts them up within their ancient boundaries, and often contracts even those. All these things seem to occur as natural events, and the consequences of state intrigues, and such like causes; but when Divine inspiration comes to pronounce upon them, they are shown to be the consequence of God’s acting in His judgment and mercy; for it is by Him that kings reign, Proverbs 8:15; it is He who putteth down one and raiseth up another, Daniel 2:21.
THE EDITOR: “Righteousness exalteth a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people.” The Old Testament abounds with examples of this principle in God’s governing the nation of Israel.
CHARLES BRIDGES (1794-1869): As they were a righteous or sinful nation, they were marked by corresponding exaltation or reproach.
A. W. PINK: That these principles of the Divine administration apply to the Gentiles, equally with the Jews, is unmistakably clear from the case of Nineveh, a heathen city, concerning which the Lord said “their wickedness is come up before Me,” Jonah 1:2. Unto the vast metropolis the Prophet was sent, crying, “Yet forty days and Nineveh shall be overthrown,” Jonah 3:4. But note well the sequel.
THE EDITOR: When the people of Ninveh, including its king, repented and changed their ways, “God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not,” Jonah 3:10.
JOHN CALVIN (1509-1564): Scripture wishes to distinguish the true God from all fictions, and it takes these two principles: First, God governs all things by His own hand, and retains them under His sway; and Secondly, nothing is hid from Him.
MATTHEW HENRY: The cabinet counsels of princes are before God’s eye, 2 Kings 6:11.
CHARLES BRIDGES: This is political wisdom on scriptural principles. If “righteousness exalteth a nation,” the open acknowledgment of it is the sure path to national prosperity. If it be not beneath statesmen to take lessons from the Bible, let them deeply ponder this sound political maxim—the Scripture records clearly prove this to be the rule of national conduct—not the wisdom of policy, extent of empire, splendid conquests, flourishing trade, abundant resources—but “righteousness exalteth a nation.”
WILLIAM JAY (1769-1853): Nations who depend for their protection and prosperity upon navies, armies, commerce, and forget God; they are idolaters.
THE EDITOR: Let all national leaders, and their citizens, whether to the right or left of the political spectrum, learn this Biblical wisdom, and repent of their wickedness, while a season of God’s grace remains; otherwise, national judgments inevitably must follow.
C. H. SPURGEON: For nations there is a weighing time. National sins demand national punishments. The whole history of God’s dealings with mankind proves that though a nation may go on in wickedness; it may multiply its oppressions; it may abound in bloodshed, tyranny, and war; but an hour of retribution draweth nigh. When it shall have filled up its measure of iniquity, then shall the angel of vengeance execute its doom.
