Psalms 39:10

Remove thy stroke away from me - This seems to be a figure taken from gladiators, or persons contending in single combat. One is wounded so as to be able to maintain the fight no longer: he therefore gives in, and prays his adversary to spare his life. I am conquered; I can hold the contest no longer: thou art too powerful for me. He cries what our ancestors used to term craven; the word spoken by him who was conquered in the battle ordeal, or trial by combat.

Remove thy stroke away from me - And yet this calm submission, as expressed in Psalm 39:9, does not take away the desire that the hand of God may be removed, and that the suffering that is brought upon us may cease. Perfect submission is not inconsistent with the prayer that, if it be the will of God, the calamity may be removed: Luke 22:42. On the word here rendered "stroke" - נגע nega‛ - see the notes at Psalm 38:11. It is equivalent here to chastisement, or judgment. It refers to the trial which he was then enduring, whatever it was, which had given occasion to the feelings that he says Psalm 39:1-2 he had felt bound to suppress when in the presence of the wicked, but in reference to which he had learned entirely to acquiesce Psalm 39:9. From that trial itself he now prays that he may be delivered.

I am consumed - I am wasting away. I cannot long bear up under it. I must sink down to the grave if it is not removed. See Psalm 39:13.

By the blow of thine hand - Margin, as in Hebrew: "conflict." That is, the blow which God brings on anyone when he has, as it were, a "strife" or a "conflict" with him. It is designed here to express his affliction, as if God had "struck" him.

39:10 Remove - Take off the judgment which thou hast inflicted upon me.I am - Help me before I am utterly lost.