Bow down thine ear - Listen to my complaint. Put thy ear to my lips, that thou mayest hear all that my feebleness is capable of uttering. We generally put our ear near to the lips of the sick and dying, that we may hear what they say. To this the text appears to allude.

Strong rock - Rocks, rocky places, or caves in the rocks, were often strong places in the land of Judea. To such natural fortifications allusions are repeatedly made by the Hebrew poetic writers.

Bow

Psalm 71:2 Deliver me in your righteousness, and cause me to escape: incline your ear to me, and save me.

Psalm 86:1 Bow down your ear, O LORD, hear me: for I am poor and needy.

Psalm 130:2 Lord, hear my voice: let your ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications.

Proverbs 22:4,5 By humility and the fear of the LORD are riches, and honor, and life...

Psalm 22:4,5 Our fathers trusted in you: they trusted, and you did deliver them...

Psalm 25:2 O my God, I trust in you: let me not be ashamed, let not my enemies triumph over me.

Psalm 71:1,2 In you, O LORD, do I put my trust: let me never be put to confusion...

Isaiah 49:23 And kings shall be your nursing fathers, and their queens your nursing mothers...

Romans 5:5 And hope makes not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given to us.

Romans 10:11 For the scripture said, Whoever believes on him shall not be ashamed.

deliver

Psalm 7:8,9 The LORD shall judge the people: judge me, O LORD, according to my righteousness, and according to my integrity that is in me...

Psalm 43:1 Judge me, O God, and plead my cause against an ungodly nation: O deliver me from the deceitful and unjust man.

Psalm 143:1,11,12 Hear my prayer, O LORD, give ear to my supplications: in your faithfulness answer me, and in your righteousness...

Daniel 9:16 O LORD, according to all your righteousness, I beseech you, let your anger and your fury be turned away from your city Jerusalem...

'Lying Vanities'
'They that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy.'--JONAH 11. 8. Jonah's refusal to obey the divine command to go to Nineveh and cry against it is best taken, not as prosaic history, but as a poetical representation of Israel's failure to obey the divine call of witnessing for God. In like manner, his being cast into the sea and swallowed by the great fish, is a poetic reproduction, for homiletical purposes, of Israel's sufferings at the hands of the heathen whom it had failed to warn. The …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

Other Fragments on the Psalms. Ii.
On Psalm xxxi. 22. Of the Triumph of the Christian Faith. The mercy of God is not so "marvellous" when it is shown in humbler cities as when it is shown in "a strong city," [1389] and for this reason "God is to be blessed." …
Hippolytus—The Extant Works and Fragments of Hippolytus

My Spirit on Thy Care
[861]Emmaus: [862]St. Michael: Louis Bourgeois, 1551; Arr. William Crotch, 1836 Psalm 31 Henry F. Lyte, 1834 My spirit on Thy care, Blest Savior, I recline; Thou wilt not leave me to despair, For Thou art love divine. In Thee I place my trust, On Thee I calmly rest; I know Thee good, I know Thee just, And count thy choice the best. Whate'er events betide, Thy will they all perform: Safe in Thy breast my head I hide, Nor fear the coming storm. Let good or ill befall, It must be good for me; Secure …
Various—The Hymnal of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the USA