Here we have Him who truly took this place, and (though true of Israel by Him and in His Spirit), casting from the depths His soul on the Lord, therein leading Israel into all the blessing of it. Forgiveness—this was the true hope of sinful Israel, the new ground not under the law at all; and then looking for no other hope, but waiting for Him; and so in verses 7 and 8 His Spirit fully teaches them. The place of the cry is the leading point here. The place acknowledged Christ's Spirit who had been in it, taking its place with them in it, and putting loved yet poor Israel into the place of God's thoughts, and its true comeliness in it—acknowledgment, faith, but that in merry. His, i.e., the answer of the Spirit of Christ, is in verses 7, 8.
This Psalm is the expression of Israel's heart in the now consciousness of where they were, and, "accepting the punishment of their iniquities," looking, according to the principle of mercy, as in Rom. 11, in quiet and holy humiliation of spirit. Mercy is the holy ground on which they graciously and humbly rest. "There is forgiveness with thee, that thou mightest be feared"; hence they wait for the Lord. It is the moral recognition of their misery and the cause of it, verses 1-3 thus throwing on mercy. The Lord waited for, for deliverance—His Word rested in—Himself desired.
7, 8. These verses show the blessed confidence and hope that belongs to this restoration of spirit.