Matthew Henry on 2 Samuel 7:18–end
We have here the solemn address David made to God, in answer to the gracious message God had sent him. We are not told what he said to Nathan; no doubt he received him very kindly and respectfully as God's messenger. But his answer to God he took himself, and did not send by Nathan. When ministers deliver God's message to us, it is not to them, but to God, that our hearts must reply; he understands the language of the heart, and to him we may come boldly. David had no sooner received the message than, while the impressions of it were fresh, he retired to return an answer. Observe,
I. The place he retired to: He went in before the Lord, that is, into the tabernacle where the ark was, which wa…
Read the whole note in the consoleJamieson-Fausset-Brown on 2 Samuel 7:20
what can David say more unto thee?--that is, my obligations are greater than I can express.
Next: 2 Samuel Chapter 8
Adam Clarke on 2 Samuel 7:20
What can David say more - How can I express my endless obligation to thee?
John Gill on 2 Samuel 7:24
For thou hast confirmed to thyself thy people Israel to be a people unto thee for ever,.... So long as they were obedient to him, and observed his laws and statutes, and abode by his worship and ordinances, otherwise he would write a "loammi" on them, as he has, see Hosea 1:9,
and thou, Lord, art become their God; their covenant God, they having avouched him to be their God, and he having avouched them to be his people, Deuteronomy 26:17.
Keil & Delitzsch on 2 Samuel 7:18–end
David's prayer and thanksgiving. - Sa2 7:18. King David came, i.e., went into the sanctuary erected upon Zion, and remained before Jehovah. ישׁב, remained, tarried (as in Gen 24:55; Gen 29:19, etc.), not "sat;" for the custom of sitting before the Lord in the sanctuary, as the posture assumed in prayer, cannot be deduced from Exo 17:12, where Moses is compelled to sit from simple exhaustion. David's prayer consists of two parts - thanksgiving for the promise (Sa2 7:18-24), and supplication for its fulfilment (Sa2 7:25-29). The thanksgiving consists of a confession of unworthiness of all the great things that the Lord had hitherto done for him, and which He had still further increased by this…
