3 And what has He accomplished for you? What has He done for you? “He brought me up also out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings”. He has given us great blessings already: and still He is our debtor; but let him who has this part of the debt repaid already, believe that the rest will be also, seeing that he ought to have believed even before he received anything. Our Lord has employed facts themselves to persuade us, that He is a faithful promiser, a liberal giver.
What then has He already done? “He has brought me out of a horrible pit.” What horrible pit is that? It is the depth of iniquity, from the lusts of the flesh, for this is meant by “the miry clay.” Whence has He brought you out? Out of a certain deep, out of which you cried out in another Psalm, “Out of the deep have I called unto You, O Lord.” And those who are already “crying out of the deep,” are not absolutely in the lowest deep: the very act of crying is already lifting them up.
There are some deeper in the deep, who do not even perceive themselves to be in the deep. Such are those who are proud despisers, not pious entreaters for pardon; not tearful criers for mercy: but such as Scripture thus describes. “The sinner when he comes into the depth of evil despises.” For he is deeper in the deep, who is not satisfied with being a sinner, unless instead of confessing he even defends his sins. But he who has already “cried out of the deep,” has already lifted up his head in order that he might “cry out of the deep,” has been heard already, and has been “brought out of the horrible pit, and out of the mire and clay.”
He already has faith, which he had not before; he has hope, which he was before without; he now walks in Christ, who before used to go astray in the devil. For on that account it is that he says, “He has set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings.” Now “that Rock was Christ.” Supposing that we are “upon the rock,” and that our “goings are ordered,” still it is necessary that we continue to walk; that we advance to something farther. For what did the Apostle Paul say when now upon the Rock, when his “goings had now been established”?
“Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect: Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended.” What then has been done for you, if you have not apprehended? On what account do you return thanks, saying, “But I have obtained mercy”? Because his goings are now established, because he now walks on the Rock?...Therefore, when he was saying, “I press forward toward the prize of my high calling,” because “his feet were now set on the Rock,” and “his goings were ordered,” because he was now walking on the right way, he had something to return thanks for; something to ask for still; returning thanks for what he had received already, while he was claiming that which still remained due.
For what things already received was he giving thanks? For the remission of sins, for the illumination of faith; for the strong support of hope, for the fire of charity. But in what respects had he still a claim of debt on the Lord? “Henceforth,” he says, “there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness.” There is therefore something due me still. What is it that is due? “A crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at that day.” He was at first a loving Father to “bring him forth from the horrible pit;” to forgive his sins, to rescue him from “the mire and clay;” hereafter he will be a “righteous Judge,” requiting to him walking rightly, what He promised; to him (I say), unto whom He had at the first granted that power to walk rightly.
He then as a “righteous Judge” will repay; but whom will he repay? “He that endures unto the end, the same shall be saved.”
Source: The Enarrations, or Expositions, on the Psalms (New Advent)