For You have made Your people Israel Your very own people forever; and You, Lord, have become their God.
Parallel translations
- WEB You established for yourself your people Israel to be your people forever; and you, Yahweh, became their God.
- KJV For thou hast confirmed to thyself thy people Israel to be a people unto thee for ever: and thou, LORD, art become their God.
- BSB For You have established Your people Israel as Your very own forever, and You, O LORD, have become their God.
- NASB For You have established for Yourself Your people Israel as Your own people forever, and You, Lord, have become their God.
- NLT You made Israel your very own people forever, and you, O Lord, became their God.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
David affirmed that God established Israel as His own people forever and became their God. The covenant bond is mutual and enduring.
Overview
The promise 'you shall be my people, and I will be your God' is the heart of the biblical covenant relationship. David rejoices that this bond is permanent, secured by God's faithfulness. It reaches its climax in the new covenant, where God dwells with His redeemed people forever (Revelation 21:3).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 17
- Deut 26:18Yahweh has declared today that you are a people for his own possession, as he has promised you, and that you should keep all his commandments.
- 1 Pet 2:10who in time past were no people, but now are God’s people, who had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy.
- Gen 17:7I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be a God to you and to your offspring after you.
- Jer 31:33“But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days,” says Yahweh: I will put my law in their inward parts, and in their heart will I write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people:
- Isa 12:2Behold, God is my salvation. I will trust, and will not be afraid; for Yah, Yahweh, is my strength and song; and he has become my salvation.”
- John 1:12But as many as received him, to them he gave the right to become God’s children, to those who believe in his name:
- Ps 48:14For this God is our God forever and ever. He will be our guide even to death.
- Jer 31:1“At that time,” says Yahweh, “I will be the God of all the families of Israel, and they will be my people.”
- Deut 27:9Moses and the priests the Levites spoke to all Israel, saying, “Be silence, and listen, Israel! Today you have become the people of Yahweh your God.
- Hos 1:10Yet the number of the children of Israel will be as the sand of the sea, which can’t be measured or counted; and it will come to pass that, in the place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,’ they will be called ‘sons of the living God.’
- Zech 13:9I will bring the third part into the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined, and will test them like gold is tested. They will call on my name, and I will hear them. I will say, ‘It is my people;’ and they will say, ‘Yahweh is my God.’”
- 2 Sam 7:23What one nation in the earth is like your people, even like Israel, whom God went to redeem to himself for a people, and to make himself a name, and to do great things for you, and awesome things for your land, before your people, whom you redeemed to yourself out of Egypt, from the nations and their gods?
- Exod 15:2Yah is my strength and song. He has become my salvation. This is my God, and I will praise him; my father’s God, and I will exalt him.
- Rom 9:25–26As he says also in Hosea, “I will call them ‘my people,’ which were not my people; and her ‘beloved,’ who was not beloved.”
- 1 Chr 17:22For you made your people Israel your own people forever; and you, Yahweh, became their God.
- Exod 6:7and I will take you to me for a people, and I will be to you a God; and you shall know that I am Yahweh your God, who brings you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians.
- Jer 32:38and they shall be my people, and I will be their God:
Themes, concepts, people & topics
Resources, by level
Commentaries & study tools
Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.
Sermons and teaching on this passage from across YouTube.
Clear, readable, conservative exposition — the best free place to start on any passage.
Matthew Henry, Barnes, Gill, the Pulpit Commentary, Ellicott, Cambridge, and more — stacked on one page for this exact verse.
The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).
Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
Christ at the center
God's covenant with David — a son whose throne and kingdom would last forever (7:12–16) — finds its yes in Jesus, the Son of David who reigns without end.
How 2 Samuel 7:24 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.