Tuesday, June 23, 2026
Psalm 6
O Lord, do not rebuke me in your anger or discipline me in your wrath. 2 Be gracious to me, O Lord, for I am languishing; O Lord, heal me, for my bones are shaking with terror. 3 My soul also is struck with terror, while you, O Lord—how long?
4 Turn, O Lord, save my life; deliver me for the sake of your steadfast love. 5 For in death there is no remembrance of you; in Sheol who can give you praise?
6 I am weary with my moaning; every night I flood my bed with tears; I drench my couch with my weeping. 7 My eyes waste away because of grief; they grow weak because of all my foes.
8 Depart from me, all you workers of evil, for the Lord has heard the sound of my weeping. 9 The Lord has heard my supplication; the Lord accepts my prayer. 10 All my enemies shall be ashamed and struck with terror; they shall turn back and in a moment be put to shame.
There is a beautiful documentary by REI called The Life We Have that features a man named Rob Shaver, who has lived with stage-four cancer for nearly twenty years. There is a poignant moment in the film when he fulfills a dream: he shares his story and his love for music in a live concert performance. (You can watch the film here; the concert begins at 19:00.)
The song he sings is the heartrending ballad from Les Misérables: “Bring Him Home.” Through the lens of Rob’s story, you can hear the song for what it is—a prayer. It’s a plea for help offered with depth, tenderness, and honest longing as he continues to live with his diagnosis.
Rob isn’t the only person who has prayed this way. In Psalm 6, David cries out to God for deliverance in the face of grave illness. What stands out about this prayer is David’s honesty about what hurts. He names the physical reality of suffering, and he also gives voice to the emotional anguish that comes with it. He is “weary with moaning,” and he “drenches [his] couch with tears” each night. This is the kind of prayer many people with chronic illness—or any long season of pain—have prayed.
And yet Psalm 6 does not end in despair. It ends in trust: David believes God hears him, and that deliverance will come.
Two realities are worth naming. First, there may be years—perhaps even decades—between David’s tears in verse 6–7 and his confidence in verse 8–10. Don’t let the closeness of the lines on the page trick you into thinking prayer always produces quick, predictable resolution. Second, David models the difference between those who have Someone to trust and those who have nowhere to turn. He is not pretending everything is fine; he is placing his pain into the hands of the One who can hold it.
We, too, are people who can trust that God is at work in our lives, in our dying, and beyond our death. We are “fearfully and wonderfully made” in God’s eyes. So however broken our lives may feel, they still carry eternal purpose and unshakable worth.
So if you are struggling today, name that struggle. God can handle your honesty. Then keep praying—both the lament and the trust—believing that even in your pain, your life has value in the eyes of God.
– Pr. Jason
God, thank you for being big enough to hold both my lament and my hope. Amen.
