For He remembered His holy promise to Abraham His servant.
Parallel translations
- WEB For he remembered his holy word, and Abraham, his servant.
- KJV For he remembered his holy promise, and Abraham his servant.
- NKJV For He remembered His holy promise, And Abraham His servant.
- NASB For He remembered His holy word With His servant Abraham;
- NLT For he remembered his sacred promise to his servant Abraham.
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
God acted because He remembered His holy promise to Abraham His servant. It matters because all His mighty deeds flowed from His covenant faithfulness.
Overview
The psalmist roots the entire Exodus in God's remembering His covenant with Abraham (Genesis 15:13-14). God did not act arbitrarily but in keeping with His sworn word. His faithfulness to that ancient promise undergirds the whole story of redemption, which finds its goal in Christ, Abraham's promised offspring.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 11
- Exod 2:24So God heard their groaning, and He remembered His covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
- Luke 1:72–73to show mercy to our fathers and to remember His holy covenant,
- Luke 1:54–55He has helped His servant Israel, remembering to be merciful,
- Gen 12:7Then the LORD appeared to Abram and said, “I will give this land to your offspring.” So Abram built an altar there to the LORD, who had appeared to him.
- Exod 32:13Remember Your servants Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, to whom You swore by Your very self when You declared, ‘I will make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky, and I will give your descendants all this land that I have promised, and it shall be their inheritance forever.’”
- Mic 7:20You will show faithfulness to Jacob and loving devotion to Abraham, as You swore to our fathers from the days of old.
- Gen 13:14–17After Lot had departed, the LORD said to Abram, “Now lift up your eyes from the place where you are, and look to the north and south and east and west,
- Ps 105:8–11He remembers His covenant forever, the word He ordained for a thousand generations—
- Gen 15:13–14Then the LORD said to Abram, “Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not their own, and they will be enslaved and mistreated four hundred years.
- Deut 9:27Remember Your servants Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Overlook the stubbornness of this people and the wickedness of their sin.
- Deut 9:5It is not because of your righteousness or uprightness of heart that you are going in to possess their land, but it is because of their wickedness that the LORD your God is driving out these nations before you, to keep the promise He swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
The Psalms are Christ's own prayer book and a gallery of his portraits — the suffering one of Psalm 22, the risen Lord of Psalm 16, the priest-king of Psalm 110, the Son to whom the nations are given.
How Psalms 105:42 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.