How long, O Lord, will you look on? Rescue me from their destruction, my precious life from the lions! (Psalm 35:17 ESV). David wrote this psalm while surrounded by enemies who had repaid his kindness with betrayal. He addressed God directly, crying out with a raw and honest question. Notice what David did not ask.

Then I commanded the Levites that they should purify themselves and come and guard the gates, to keep the Sabbath day holy. Remember me, O my God, concerning this also, and spare me according to the greatness of your steadfast love (Nehemiah 13:22 ESV). Nehemiah wrote these words as a governor returning to a city

“And the people blessed all the men who willingly offered to live in Jerusalem” (Nehemiah 11:2 ESV). Nehemiah recorded how the people of Israel repopulated Jerusalem after the wall had been rebuilt. Some were chosen by lot to move into the city, while others willingly offered to live there. Jerusalem was still vulnerable, and living

“I will bless the LORD at all times; his praise shall continually be in my mouth” (Psalm 34:1 ESV). David wrote Psalm 34 after escaping from the Philistine king by pretending to be insane. He had been afraid, and his behavior was hardly heroic. Yet when David looked back on the experience, he did not

“You gave your good Spirit to instruct them and did not withhold your manna from their mouth and gave them water for their thirst” (Nehemiah 9:20 ESV). Nehemiah recorded the Levites’ prayer as they rehearsed God’s faithfulness before the assembled people of Israel. Looking back on Israel’s wilderness years, they remembered that God had not

“By the word of the LORD the heavens were made, and by the breath of his mouth all their host” (Psalm 33:6 ESV). The psalmist called God’s people to praise the LORD by reminding them of His awesome power in creation. The heavens did not come into existence through physical effort. God simply spoke, and

“This is what I mean, brothers: the appointed time has grown very short” (1 Corinthians 7:29 ESV). Writing to the believers in Corinth, Paul urged them to live with an eternal perspective. When he wrote that “the appointed time has grown very short,” he was not necessarily predicting that only a few years remained before

“Oh, how abundant is your goodness, which you have stored up for those who fear you and worked for those who take refuge in you, in the sight of the children of mankind!” (Psalm 31:19 ESV). David wrote to God’s people as one who had experienced fear, rejection, slander, and danger, yet had also experienced

“To do righteousness and justice is more acceptable to the LORD than sacrifice” (Proverbs 21:3 ESV). Solomon taught the people of Israel that God desired more than outward religious activity. He wanted lives marked by righteousness and justice. In Hebrew, these words described doing what was right, fair, equitable, and morally faithful, especially in one’s

“You are to deliver this man to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord” (1 Corinthians 5:5 ESV). First Corinthians 5:5 is one of the more difficult verses in the letter, especially because of Paul’s phrase, “deliver this man to Satan.” The