"For You come to meet him with the blessings of goodness." (Psalm 21:3)
The reader will notice that in quoting from Psalm 21:3, we have rendered it, "You come to meet him," instead of, "You prevent him," which is archaic, and conveys no meaning to the ordinary reader. The literal meaning of "prevent" is to go before, and this is the sense in which it was formerly used; but it has now lost that meaning in our language, and means to hinder, to stop, since one who would stop another goes before him to shut off his way.
God's Word, however, has not changed, but means the same that it always did, and so should be translated by words that convey the original sense. God is before us, and He comes to meet us, bringing the blessings of His goodness. That is what we are told in the 21st Psalm; but in the familiar 23rd Psalm we read that: "goodness and mercy shall follow [literally, "run after"] us all the days of our life.
So we cannot turn round without encountering the goodness of the Lord. He comes to meet us with His goodness; and if we in our stubbornness turn round to avoid Him, lo, we meet His goodness running after us. "Oh that men would praise the Lord for His goodness!" (Psalm 107:8)
Who is there that does not know that some, at least, of his friends esteem him more highly than he deserves? Everyone has certainly had credit at some times and in some quarters for possessing abilities that he is conscious of lacking, or of having had a greater part in the accomplishment of some good end than he really had. Yet we do not try to correct all these mistaken ideas; we know that it would be impossible to have everybody estimate us exactly at our true value. We are content that our friends should think very well of us, even though we may not be seeking vain glory. (Galatians 5:26)
Why, then, should we complain when we receive less credit than is our due? Why, when we are under-estimated, and we are charged with mistakes or errors of which we are not guilty, or another is given praise for a good thing which we did, should we be so anxious for "justice" to be done? Why should we in this case be so desirous that everybody should know exactly how things really stand? Why not take the undeserved blame as a necessary offset to that undeserved credit? Thus the balance is preserved. "What? shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?" (Job 2:10)
So true is it that God is "not far from every one of us: For in Him we live, and move, and have our being," (Acts 17:27-28) that it is exceeding strange that more people do not "feel after Him and find Him." (Acts 17:27)
It was a heathen poet that gave expression to the Christian truth, "We are also His offspring," (Acts 17:28) and another one of the same class recently said that: "What is cohesive power in a block of marble is intelligence in man."
This also is Gospel truth, for the cohesive power in marble is the Spirit of God; yet men who assent to it will refuse to be as passive in relation to it as is the marble, which is the only way that they can be as perfect as men as the marble is as marble.--Present Truth, November 21, 1901--Psalm 21:3.