Psalm 13

For the director of music. A psalm of David.

13 How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever?

How long will you hide your face from me?

2 How long must I wrestle with my thoughts

and every day have sorrow in my heart?

How long will my enemy triumph over me?

3 Look on me and answer, O Lord my God.

Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep in death;

4 my enemy will say, “I have overcome him,”

and my foes will rejoice when I fall.

5 But I trust in your unfailing love;

my heart rejoices in your salvation.

6 I will sing to the Lord,

for he has been good to me.

The Struggle (vv 1-2)

· Feeling left alone, David cries out to the Lord. (“will you forget me forever?”, “wrestle with my thoughts”, “triumph over me”)

· Notice the “small caps” of LORD in verse 1. This is the Hebrew word Yahweh—the covenant name of God. David was not calling out to a stranger but One whom he knew very well.

· “hide” in verse 1 is the Heb
rew cathar (saw-thar’) which means “to be absent”. David is feeling like God is not there! Have you ever gone through a time in your life when God seemed like He was absent? This is David right now!

The Request (vv 3-4)

· David calls out to his Abba, his Daddy, and ask the Lord to look down on Him and answer Him.

· In verse 3, David asks for God to give “light to his eyes”

o The word “light” is owr (ore) which is a word picture of the sun breaking on the horizon.

o David is asking God to rise in his eyes like the sun rises in the morning! It’s always darkest before dawn, my brothers and sisters and even in despair, there is hope in David’s writing and there is hope for you.

The Resolve (vv 5-6)

· In spite of hardship, David writes a very powerful conjunction: “but”. That means “things are about to change!”

· David said he “trusts in” the Lord’s “unfailing love”.

· And his heart “rejoices in” His “salvation.”

· He ends by stating he will sing to the Lord because He is good.

· Is this your response in hard times? Is this what is natural in our flesh?