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God’s Steadfast Love Endures

I am one who has seen affliction

under the rod of God’s wrath;

he has driven and brought me

into darkness without any light;

against me alone he turns his hand,

again and again, all day long.

He has made my flesh and my skin waste away,

and broken my bones;

he has besieged and enveloped me

with bitterness and tribulation;

he has made me sit in darkness

like the dead of long ago.

He has walled me about so that I cannot escape;

he has put heavy chains on me;

though I call and cry for help,

he shuts out my prayer;

he has blocked my ways with hewn stones,

he has made my paths crooked.

He is a bear lying in wait for me,

a lion in hiding;

he led me off my way and tore me to pieces;

he has made me desolate;

he bent his bow and set me

as a mark for his arrow.

He shot into my vitals

the arrows of his quiver;

I have become the laughingstock of all my people,

the object of their taunt-songs all day long.

He has filled me with bitterness,

he has sated me with wormwood.

He has made my teeth grind on gravel,

and made me cower in ashes;

my soul is bereft of peace;

I have forgotten what happiness is;

so I say, “Gone is my glory,

and all that I had hoped for from the L ord.”

The thought of my affliction and my homelessness

is wormwood and gall!

My soul continually thinks of it

and is bowed down within me.

But this I call to mind,

and therefore I have hope:

The steadfast love of the L ord never ceases,

his mercies never come to an end;

they are new every morning;

great is your faithfulness.

“The L ord is my portion,” says my soul,

“therefore I will hope in him.”

The L ord is good to those who wait for him,

to the soul that seeks him.

It is good that one should wait quietly

for the salvation of the L ord.

It is good for one to bear

the yoke in youth,

to sit alone in silence

when the Lord has imposed it,

to put one’s mouth to the dust

(there may yet be hope),

to give one’s cheek to the smiter,

and be filled with insults.

For the Lord will not

reject forever.

Although he causes grief, he will have compassion

according to the abundance of his steadfast love;

for he does not willingly afflict

or grieve anyone.

When all the prisoners of the land

are crushed under foot,

when human rights are perverted

in the presence of the Most High,

when one’s case is subverted

—does the Lord not see it?

Who can command and have it done,

if the Lord has not ordained it?

Is it not from the mouth of the Most High

that good and bad come?

Why should any who draw breath complain

about the punishment of their sins?

Let us test and examine our ways,

and return to the L ord.

Let us lift up our hearts as well as our hands

to God in heaven.

We have transgressed and rebelled,

and you have not forgiven.

You have wrapped yourself with anger and pursued us,

killing without pity;

you have wrapped yourself with a cloud

so that no prayer can pass through.

You have made us filth and rubbish

among the peoples.

All our enemies

have opened their mouths against us;

panic and pitfall have come upon us,

devastation and destruction.

My eyes flow with rivers of tears

because of the destruction of my people.

My eyes will flow without ceasing,

without respite,

until the L ord from heaven

looks down and sees.

My eyes cause me grief

at the fate of all the young women in my city.

Those who were my enemies without cause

have hunted me like a bird;

they flung me alive into a pit

and hurled stones on me;

water closed over my head;

I said, “I am lost.”

I called on your name, O L ord,

from the depths of the pit;

you heard my plea, “Do not close your ear

to my cry for help, but give me relief!”

You came near when I called on you;

you said, “Do not fear!”

You have taken up my cause, O Lord,

you have redeemed my life.

You have seen the wrong done to me, O L ord;

judge my cause.

You have seen all their malice,

all their plots against me.

You have heard their taunts, O L ord,

all their plots against me.

The whispers and murmurs of my assailants

are against me all day long.

Whether they sit or rise—see,

I am the object of their taunt-songs.

Pay them back for their deeds, O L ord,

according to the work of their hands!

Give them anguish of heart;

your curse be on them!

Pursue them in anger and destroy them

from under the L ord’s heavens.

New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

The Prophet intimates in this verse that we cannot stand firm in adversities, except we be content with God alone and his favor; for as soon as we depart from him, any adversity that may happen to us will cause our faith to fail. It is then the only true foundation of patience and hope to trust in God alone; and this is the case when we are persuaded that his favor is sufficient for our perfect safety. In this sense it is that David calls God his portion. (Psalm 16:5.) But there is in the words an implied contrast, for most men seek their happiness apart from God. All desire to be happy, but as the thoughts of men wander here and there, there is nothing more difficult than so to fix all our hopes in God so as to disregard all other things.

This then is the doctrine which the Prophet now handles, when he says, that those alone could hope, that is, persevere in hope and patience, who have so received God as their portion as to be satisfied with him alone, and to seek nothing else besides him. But he speaks emphatically, that his soul had thus said. Even the unbelieving are ashamed to deny what we have stated, that the whole of our salvation and happiness is found in God alone. Then the unbelieving also confess that God is the fountain of all blessings, and that they ought to acquiesce in him; but with the mouth only they confess this, while they believe nothing less. This then is the reason why the Prophet ascribes what he says to his soul, as though he had said, that lie did not boast, like hypocrites, that God was his portion, but that of this lie had a thorough conviction. My soul has said, that is, I am fully convinced that God is my portion; therefore will I hope in him. We now understand the meaning of this passage.

It remains for us to make an application of this doctrine. That we may not then fail in adversities, let us bear in mind this truth, that all our thoughts will ever wander and go astray, until we are fully persuaded that God alone is sufficient for us, so that lie may become alone our heritage. For all who are not satisfied with God alone, are immediately seized with impatience, whenever famine oppresses them, or sword threatens them, or any other grievous calamity. And for this reason Paul also says,

“If God be for us, who can be against us? I am persuaded that neither famine, nor nakedness, nor sword, nor death, nor life, can separate me from the love of God, which is in Christ.”
(Romans 8:31, 35-39.)

Then Paul lays hold of the paternal favor of God as a ground of solid confidence; for the words in Christ sufficiently show that those are mistaken interpreters who take this love passively, as though he had said, that the faithful would never cease to love God, though he exercised them with many afflictions. But Paul meant that the faithful ought so to fix their minds on God alone, that whatever might happen, they would not yet cease to glory in him. Why? because God is their life in death, their light in darkness, their rest in war and tumult, their abundance in penury and want. It is in the same sense our Prophet now says, when lie intimates that none hope in God but those who build on his paternal favor alone, so that they seek nothing else but to have him propitious to them. It afterwards follows, —