Psalms 114

When Israel went out of Egypt, the house of Jacob from a people of foreign language. Wesley: God brought them out with a high hand. Exodus is remembered as historical mercy, not myth.

Both note: redemption from bondage is God's act. The note struck is a deliverance sincerely wrought for the covenant people and held out as pattern of the greater exodus in Christ—grace that actually frees, answered by a people who walk out.

Calvin: the prophet celebrates that memorable deliverance so the faithful may be stirred to gratitude. Egypt and a strange tongue mark alienation; going out is God's initiative.

The Exodus is God's electing mercy toward His people. Wesley says as much: Israel went out; the Lord brought them.

Judah became His sanctuary, Israel His dominion. Wesley: Judah the place of His special residence; Israel His dominion. Presence and rule belong together.

God dwells among a people and reigns over them—not as a distant monarch only, but as holy nearness that invites trust and obedience.

Calvin: Judah is called His sanctuary because He chose that tribe for His habitation; Israel His dominion because He reigned over them by a peculiar right.

Sanctuary and dominion are covenant gifts of electing grace.

The sea saw it, and fled. The Jordan was driven back. Wesley alludes to the dividing of the Red Sea; Jordan's turning completes the bookends of the wilderness march.

Common confession: creation yields to the Redeemer. Arminians preach a God whose power for His people is actual in history—waters obey because He is Lord, not because nature is autonomous.

Calvin: the sea fled and Jordan was driven back—nature itself yielding to its Maker. The looking of the sea is poetic personification of obedient creation.

Providence bends the elements by secret counsel for the Church's path. Both readings hold: sea fled; Jordan turned back.

The mountains skipped like rams, the little hills like lambs. Wesley: an elegant description of the earthquake that attended the giving of the law. Sinai's trembling is joy and awe together.

Both agree: even the stable earth moves at God's word. Shared wonder; no dispute that Sinai and the journey shook the hills.

Calvin reads the skipping of mountains as creation's lively acknowledgment of its Creator's approach—imagery that startles dull hearts into praise.

Mountains do not choose; they respond. Mountains skipped like rams.

What was it, you sea, that you fled? You Jordan, that you turned back? The taunt is worship: waters have no disease but the presence of God.

Rhetorical questions catechize the congregation—remember why the waters moved. The answer is coming in v. 7.

Calvin: the prophet interrogates sea and river so that the miracle may not be ascribed to chance. The question drives the hearer to the Cause.

Inquiry that ends in God, not in secondary causes alone. What was it, you sea?

You mountains, that you skipped like rams? The interrogation continues—hills have no whimsy; they answer the Lord.

Agreed: the poetry trains memory. Classical Arminians and Reformed together refuse a deism that leaves Sinai unexplained.

Calvin keeps the same interrogative force: mountains skip because the Lord draws near. Wonder is commanded, not optional.

You mountains, that you skipped.

Tremble, you earth, at the presence of the Lord, at the presence of the God of Jacob. Wesley: tremble at the presence of the God of Jacob. Presence is personal—Jacob's God, covenant nearness.

Trembling is reverent awe before a God who sincerely claims His people. The earth is summoned; so are we.

Calvin: He summons the earth to tremble, not with a slavish dread, but with reverential awe before the God of Jacob.

Presence that is holy and particular—God of Jacob, not a generic deity. Common ground with Wesley: Tremble at His presence.

Who turned the rock into a pool of water, the flint into a spring of waters. Wesley: the same power that wrought these wonders is still engaged for His people. Meribah's mercy is not locked in the past.

Both hear: flint yields water by God's hand. Classical Arminians preach ongoing providence that can still supply the thirsty people who call on Him.

Calvin: the God who turns the flinty rock into fountains displays power that leaves no room for distrust. Water from flint is grace against nature's hardness.

The same counsel that split seas still governs provision for the Church. Both see: rock into a pool; flint into a spring.