There have been a few seasons in my adult life when it felt like I could not find steady ground. Work insecurity, financial hardship, loved ones managing devastating medical diagnoses, and myriad other issues marked every footfall. Do you know that feeling? When rest seems impossible not because of physical weariness but because of the sheer weight of all you are carrying?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That posture marks David\u2019s cry in Psalm 17. He wrote of \u201cdeadly enemies that surround me\u201d (Psalm 17:9) who \u201cadvance against me\u201d and are \u201cdetermined to throw me to the ground\u201d (v.11). David\u2019s prayer here is a deep cry for justice as he appealed to his character and his faithfulness to God. In verse 1, he wrote, \u201clisten to my prayer\u2014 from lips free of deceit.\u201d David reminded the Lord that he had sought to follow Him well, but David did not rely on his own works so that the Lord would save him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Rather, the prayer hinges on verses 6\u20137. David said: \u201cI call on you, God, because you will answer me; listen closely to me; hear what I say. Display the wonders of your faithful love, Savior of all who seek refuge from those who rebel against your right hand.\u201d In this prayer we see two primary pillars that David stood on as he felt oppressed on every side by his enemies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
First, David appealed to the Lord\u2019s faithfulness to hear: \u201cI call on you, God, because you will answer me\u201d (v.6). This appears throughout the psalms as a consistent phrase of David\u2019s because he could trace through his life story the times he had seen the Lord hear and respond to him. David\u2019s plea is personal, rooted in his own experience of God always hearing, always caring for him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Second, David called upon the \u201cfaithful love\u201d of the Lord. The Hebrew word he used here is hesed, a word often used to describe the unfailing faithfulness of God. This specific word is used in Scripture for the love God showed to Abraham and Joseph, the love David showed to Jonathan and Mephibosheth, the love that appears more than one hundred times in the psalms, the love Boaz showed to Ruth and Naomi, and on and on. In Exodus 34, when God revealed himself to Moses, He used the word hesed<\/em> when He said, \u201cThe LORD\u2014the LORD is a compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger and abounding in faithful love and truth\u201d (Exodus 34:6).<\/p>\n\n\n\n David\u2019s prayer for mercy and deliverance was not based on his actions or emotions; rather, it was deeply rooted in his knowledge of God\u2019s character (His hesed<\/em>) and His faithfulness to hear. As we pray throughout this Lenten season, may we remember to pray to the Lord who is faithful to love us in every circumstance. He is the Savior of all who seek refuge.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" There have been a few seasons in my adult life when it felt like I could not find steady ground. Work insecurity, financial hardship, loved ones managing devastating medical diagnoses, and myriad other issues marked every footfall. Do you know that feeling? When rest seems impossible not because of physical weariness but because of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":54,"featured_media":72970,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[311],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-73283","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lent2026"],"acf":{"hero_background_image":false,"related_plans":[73254],"weekly_truth":false,"grace_day":false,"share_text":"#SheReadsTruth","devotional_text":"Psalms 17\u201318<\/b> There have been a few seasons in my adult life when it felt like I could not find steady ground. Work insecurity, financial hardship, loved ones managing devastating medical diagnoses, and myriad other issues marked every footfall. Do you know that feeling? When rest seems impossible not because of physical weariness but because of the sheer weight of all you are carrying?<\/p> That posture marks David\u2019s cry in Psalm 17. He wrote of \u201cdeadly enemies that surround me\u201d (Psalm 17:9) who \u201cadvance against me\u201d and are \u201cdetermined to throw me to the ground\u201d (v.11). David\u2019s prayer here is a deep cry for justice as he appealed to his character and his faithfulness to God. In verse 1, he wrote, \u201clisten to my prayer\u2014 from lips free of deceit.\u201d David reminded the Lord that he had sought to follow Him well, but David did not rely on his own works so that the Lord would save him.<\/p> Rather, the prayer hinges on verses 6\u20137. David said: \u201cI call on you, God, because you will answer me; listen closely to me; hear what I say. Display the wonders of your faithful love, Savior of all who seek refuge from those who rebel against your right hand.\u201d In this prayer we see two primary pillars that David stood on as he felt oppressed on every side by his enemies.<\/p> First, David appealed to the Lord\u2019s faithfulness to hear: \u201cI call on you, God, because you will answer me\u201d (v.6). This appears throughout the psalms as a consistent phrase of David\u2019s because he could trace through his life story the times he had seen the Lord hear and respond to him. David\u2019s plea is personal, rooted in his own experience of God always hearing, always caring for him.<\/p> Second, David called upon the \u201cfaithful love\u201d of the Lord. The Hebrew word he used here is hesed, a word often used to describe the unfailing faithfulness of God. This specific word is used in Scripture for the love God showed to Abraham and Joseph, the love David showed to Jonathan and Mephibosheth, the love that appears more than one hundred times in the psalms, the love Boaz showed to Ruth and Naomi, and on and on. In Exodus 34, when God revealed himself to Moses, He used the word hesed<\/em> when He said, \u201cThe LORD\u2014the LORD is a compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger and abounding in faithful love and truth\u201d (Exodus 34:6).<\/p> David\u2019s prayer for mercy and deliverance was not based on his actions or emotions; rather, it was deeply rooted in his knowledge of God\u2019s character (His hesed<\/em>) and His faithfulness to hear. As we pray throughout this Lenten season, may we remember to pray to the Lord who is faithful to love us in every circumstance. He is the Savior of all who seek refuge.<\/p>","share_image_height":"640","day_number":"4","scripture":"Psalm 17:1-15, Psalm 18:1-50","available":true,"ad_banner_name":"","ad_banner_image":false,"ad_banner_url":"","songs":"","key_verse":"","key_verse_reference":"","background_image":false,"background_color":"#FBF7F3","scripture_references":false,"share_image":false,"author_name":"","author_bio":"","guest_social_media":false,"show_ad":true,"ad_override":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shereadstruth.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73283","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shereadstruth.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shereadstruth.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shereadstruth.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/54"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shereadstruth.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73283"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shereadstruth.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73283\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shereadstruth.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/72970"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shereadstruth.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73283"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shereadstruth.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73283"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shereadstruth.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\r\nby Melanie Rainer<\/i>
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