Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Psalms 41:10-11 But thou, O LORD, be merciful unto me, and raise me up, that I may requite them.
Judges 6:17 And he said unto him, If now I have found grace in thy sight, then shew me a sign that thou talkest with me.
Psalms 71:20-21 Thou, which hast shewed me great and sore troubles, shalt quicken me again, and shalt bring me up again from the depths of the earth.
Psalms 71:9-13 Cast me not off in the time of old age; forsake me not when my strength faileth.
Psalms 40:1 I waited patiently for the LORD; and he inclined unto me, and heard my cry.
Micah 7:8-10 Rejoice not against me, O mine enemy: when I fall, I shall arise; when I sit in darkness, the LORD shall be a light unto me.
Psalms 109:29 Let mine adversaries be clothed with shame, and let them cover themselves with their own confusion, as with a mantle.
1 Corinthians 5:5 To deliver such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Psalms 86:8–end
David is here going on in his prayer.
I. He gives glory to God; for we ought in our prayers to praise him, ascribing kingdom, power, and glory, to him, with the most humble and reverent adorations. 1. As a being of unparalleled perfection, such a one that there is none like him nor any to be compared with him, Psa 86:8. Among the gods, the false gods, whom the heathens worshipped, the angels, the kings of the earth, among them all, there is none like unto thee, O Lord! none so wise, so mighty, so good; neither are there any works like unto thy works, which is an undeniable proof that there is none like him; his own works praise him, and the best way we have of praising him is by acknowledgin…
Show me a token for good,.... Not only one by which he might know that his sins were pardoned, and his person accepted with God, and that he should be saved; but one visible to others, even to his enemies, by which they might know that God was on his side, and would verily do him good: Kimchi interprets it of the kingdom; and his being raised to the throne of Israel was a token of the Lord's goodness to him, and showed that he had a delight in him, and meant to do him good:
that they which hate me may see it, and be ashamed; of their envy of him, their combinations and conspiracies against him, and of all their efforts to distress him, to hinder him of the kingdom, or deprive him of it, or…
Psalm 86:12-17
12. I will praise thee, O Lord my God! With all my heart: and I will glorify thy name for ever. 13. For thy mercy has been great towards me: and thou hast delivered my soul from the lower grave. [488] 14. O God! the proud have risen up against me, and a company of mighty men have sought after my soul; and they have not set thee before them. 15. And thou, O Lord! art God, merciful, ready to forgive, long-suffering, and abundant in mercy and truth. 16. Look to me, and have pity upon me: give thy strength to thy servant, and save the son of thy handmaid. 17. Make with me a sign for good: and my adversaries will see it [489] and be ashamed; for thou, O Jehovah! hast succoured and…
The Church Fathers
"Show me a sign for good" (ver. 17). What sign, but that of the Resurrection? The Lord says: "This wicked and provoking generation seeketh after a sign; and there shall no sign be given it, but the sign of the Prophet Jonah." Therefore in our Head a sign has been shown already for good; each one of us also may say, "Show me a sign for good:" because at the last trumpet, at the coming of the Lord, both "the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed." This will be a sign for good. "That they who hate me may see it, and be ashamed." In the judgment they shall be ashamed unto their destruction, who will not now be ashamed unto their healing. Now therefore let them be ashamed: let them accuse their own ways, let them keep the good way: because none of us liveth without being ashamed, unless he first be ashamed and live anew. Now God grants them the approach of a healthy shame, if they despise not the medicine of confession: but if they will not now be ashamed, then they shall be ashamed, when "their iniquities shall convince them to their face." How shall they be ashamed? When they shall say, "These are they whom we had sometimes in derision, and a parable of reproach. We fools counted their life madness: how are they numbered among the children of God! What hath pride profited us?" Then shall they say this: let them say it now, and they say it to their health. For let each one turn humbly to God, and now say, What hath my pride profited me? and hear from the Apostle, "For what glory had ye in those things of which ye are now ashamed?" Ye see that there is even now a wholesome shame while there is a place of penitence: but then one which will be late, useless, fruitless. "For Thou, Lord, hast holpen me, and comforted me." "Hast holpen me," in struggle; "and comforted me," in sorrow. For no one seeketh comfort, but he who is in misery...
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Earnest · A pledge or token — A pledge or token
Token · Prayer for tokens of mercy — Prayer for tokens of mercy
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
The situation is like that in the Psalms of the time of Saul. The writer is a persecuted one, and in constant peril of his life. He has taken Psa 86:14 out of the Elohimic Psa 54:5, and retained the Elohim as a proper name of God (cf. on the other hand Psa 86:8, Psa 86:10); he has, however, altered זרים to זרים, which here, as in Isa 13:11 (cf. however, ibid. Psa 25:5), is the alternating word to עריצים. In Psa 86:15 he supports his petition that follows by Jahve's testimony concerning Himself in Exo 34:6. The appellation given to himself by the poet in Psa 86:16 recurs in Psa 116:16 (cf. Wisd. 9:5). The poet calls himself "the son of Thy handmaid" as having been born into the relation to Hi…
God has mercy on his people (51:1); he is gracious (25:6), slow to get angry (103:8; 145:8), and filled with unfailing love and faithfulness (Hebrew khesed and ’emeth; 143:1). This verse repeats a theme first expressed in Exod 34:7; Num 14:18 (cp. Pss 103:8; 145:8; Neh 9:17; Joel 2:13; Jon 4:2).
Spurgeon's Treasury of David on Psalms 86:17
Shew me a token for good; that they which hate me may see it, and be ashamed: because thou, Lord, hast holpen me, and comforted me.
Shew to me a token for good. Let me be assured of thy mercy by being delivered out of trouble.
That they which hate me may see it, and be ashamed.
"Some token of thy favour show, Some sign which all my foes may see; And filled with blank confusion know, My comfort and my help in thee."
What bodes good to me shall make them quail and blush. Disappointed and defeated, the foes of the good man would feel ashamed of what they had designed. "Because thou, Lord, hast holpen me, and comforted me." God doth nothing by halves, those whom he helps he also consoles, an…
