I used to think it was a little bit odd when a psalmist cried out to God and asked God to listen to him. After all, if God wasn\u2019t listening, why call to Him at all? But I\u2019ve come to realize that this is the most natural kind of yearning in a relational context because it is a cry for special attention and focus from the one we love. When the psalmist\u2014or we\u2014called to God with words like, \u201churry to help me. Listen to my voice when I call on you\u201d (Psalm 141:1) he wasn\u2019t asking God to do something surprising or against His nature. He was asking God to lean in and listen the way a loving father listens to a needy child. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
We see this made clear in verse 2 when David said \u201cMay my prayer be set before you as incense,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
the raising of my hands as the evening offering\u201d (v.2). His heart yearned to honor the Lord and lift Him up. And what is the request he was making? One that God was pleased to answer. David asked to be kept from evil and to be protected from temptation. He specifically mentioned sins of the heart and of the mouth, two kinds of sin that are especially insidious and difficult to overcome. And he asked that God would send godly people to correct him (v.5). <\/p>\n\n\n\n
But there is more to David\u2019s prayer than just a private request for the sake of his soul. He recognized the threat of wicked people\u2014those who seek to bring him down in one way or another. He asked God to judge and correct them too (vv.6\u20137). But there is urgency in David\u2019s prayer and maybe even fear. He sees the evil of temptation and the evil of his enemies as life threatening. We don\u2019t often take sin this seriously, but David saw the results of sin in his life and the results of sin committed against him as deadly. And he was right. Sin isn\u2019t just deadly, it also condemns us, and so we too must cry out, \u201cBut my eyes look to you, LORD, my Lord. I seek refuge in you; do not let me die.\u201d (v.8)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Here\u2019s the amazing reality that Lent points us to: God has delivered us through the work of Jesus. Jesus has delivered us from the power of sin; it no longer holds us in its sway despite our ongoing sinful inclinations. We are now able to not sin by the power of the Holy Spirit. And what is more, we are promised the eternal life that Jesus himself declared: \u201cI am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me, even if he dies, will live. Everyone who lives and believes in me will never die\u201d (John 11:25\u201326). In Christ we have the refuge of the resurrection, the permanent resolution to death.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Written by Barnabas Piper<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I used to think it was a little bit odd when a psalmist cried out to God and asked God to listen to him. After all, if God wasn\u2019t listening, why call to Him at all? But I\u2019ve come to realize that this is the most natural kind of yearning in a relational context because […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":72967,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[311],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-73426","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 140\u2013143<\/b> I used to think it was a little bit odd when a psalmist cried out to God and asked God to listen to him. After all, if God wasn\u2019t listening, why call to Him at all? But I\u2019ve come to realize that this is the most natural kind of yearning in a relational context because it is a cry for special attention and focus from the one we love. When the psalmist\u2014or we\u2014called to God with words like, \u201churry to help me. Listen to my voice when I call on you\u201d (Psalm 141:1) he wasn\u2019t asking God to do something surprising or against His nature. He was asking God to lean in and listen the way a loving father listens to a needy child.<\/p> We see this made clear in verse 2 when David said \u201cMay my prayer be set before you as incense,<\/p> the raising of my hands as the evening offering\u201d (v.2). His heart yearned to honor the Lord and lift Him up. And what is the request he was making? One that God was pleased to answer. David asked to be kept from evil and to be protected from temptation. He specifically mentioned sins of the heart and of the mouth, two kinds of sin that are especially insidious and difficult to overcome. And he asked that God would send godly people to correct him (v.5).<\/p> But there is more to David\u2019s prayer than just a private request for the sake of his soul. He recognized the threat of wicked people\u2014those who seek to bring him down in one way or another. He asked God to judge and correct them too (vv.6\u20137). But there is urgency in David\u2019s prayer and maybe even fear. He sees the evil of temptation and the evil of his enemies as life threatening. We don\u2019t often take sin this seriously, but David saw the results of sin in his life and the results of sin committed against him as deadly. And he was right. Sin isn\u2019t just deadly, it also condemns us, and so we too must cry out, \u201cBut my eyes look to you, LORD, my Lord. I seek refuge in you; do not let me die.\u201d (v.8)<\/p> Here\u2019s the amazing reality that Lent points us to: God has delivered us through the work of Jesus. Jesus has delivered us from the power of sin; it no longer holds us in its sway despite our ongoing sinful inclinations. We are now able to not sin by the power of the Holy Spirit. And what is more, we are promised the eternal life that Jesus himself declared: \u201cI am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me, even if he dies, will live. Everyone who lives and believes in me will never die\u201d (John 11:25\u201326). In Christ we have the refuge of the resurrection, the permanent resolution to death.<\/p>","share_image_height":"640","day_number":"43","scripture":"Psalm 140:1-13, Psalm 141:1-10, Psalm 142:1-7, Psalm 143:1-12","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\/73426","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\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shereadstruth.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73426"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shereadstruth.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73426\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shereadstruth.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/72967"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shereadstruth.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73426"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shereadstruth.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73426"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shereadstruth.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73426"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\r\nby Barnabas Piper<\/i>
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