Psalm 69

A Plea for Deliverance from Persecution

69For the music director, according to The Lilies. Of David.^a

¹Save me, O God,

because waters have come up to my neck.^b

²I sink in the mud of the deep, and there is no foothold.

I have come to watery depths,

and the torrent floods over me.

³I am weary with my calling out; my throat is parched.

My eyes are exhausted in my waiting for my God.

⁴More numerous than the hairs of my head

are those hating me without a cause.

Those who are destroying me—my enemies wrongfully^c— are mighty.

What I did not steal, I then must restore.

⁵O God, you yourself know^d my foolishness,

and my guilty deeds are not hidden from you.

⁶Let those who wait for you not be put to shame because of me,

O Lord Yahweh of hosts.

Let those who seek you not be disgraced because of me,

O God of Israel.

⁷Because on account of you I have borne reproach;

disgrace has covered my face.

⁸I have become a stranger to my brothers

and a foreigner to my mother’s sons,

⁹because the zeal for your house^e has consumed me,

and the reproaches of those reproaching you have fallen on me.

¹⁰When I wept in the fasting of my soul,

it became reproaches for me.

¹¹When I made sackcloth my clothing,

I became for them a byword.

¹²Those sitting at the gate talk about me

as also^f the songs of the drunkards.

¹³But as for me, my prayer is to you, O Yahweh, for a favorable time,

O God, according to the abundance of your loyal love.

Answer me with the faithfulness of your salvation.

¹⁴Deliver me from the mud and do not let me sink.

Let me be delivered from those who hate me

and from the watery depths.

¹⁵Do not let the torrent of waters flood over me,

or the deep swallow me,

or the pit close its mouth over me.

¹⁶Answer me, O Yahweh, because your loyal love is good;

according to your abundant mercies, turn to me,

¹⁷and do not hide your face from your servant.

Because I am in trouble, answer me quickly.

¹⁸Draw near to my soul; redeem it.

Because of my enemies, ransom me.

¹⁹You know my reproach, my shame and my disgrace.

Fully known^g to you are all my adversaries.

²⁰Reproach has broken my heart and I am sick.

And I hoped for sympathy, but there was none,

and for comforters, but I found none.

²¹They also gave me gall for food,^h

and for my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink.

²²Let their table before them be a trap,

and their times of peace a snare.

²³Let their eyes be dark so they cannot see,

and make their loins continually tremble.

²⁴Pour out your indignation on them,

and let your burning anger overtake them.

²⁵Let their camp be desolate.

Let none dwell in their tents,

²⁶because they persecute those whom you, yourself, have struck,

and they tell of the pain of those you have wounded.

²⁷Add guilt on top of their guilt,ⁱ

and do not let them be acquitted.^j

²⁸Let them be blotted out of the book of the living,

and let them not be recorded with the righteous.

²⁹But as for me, though I am afflicted and pained,

your salvation will protect^k me, O God.

³⁰I will praise the name of God in song,

and magnify him with thanksgiving.

³¹For Yahweh it will be better than an ox or bull,

horned and hoofed.^l

³²The afflicted will see and rejoice.

O God seekers, let your heart revive,^m

³³because Yahweh hears the needy

and does not despise his own who are prisoners.

³⁴Let heavens and earth praise him,

the seas and all that moves in them,

³⁵because God will save Zion

and build the cities of Judah,

that they may dwell there and possess it.

³⁶And the offspring of his servants will inherit it,

and those who love his name will abide in it.