For You, O LORD, light my lamp; my God lights up my darkness.
Parallel translations
- WEB For you will light my lamp, Yahweh. My God will light up my darkness.
- KJV For thou wilt light my candle: the LORD my God will enlighten my darkness.
- NKJV For You will light my lamp; The Lord my God will enlighten my darkness.
- NASB For You light my lamp; The Lord my God illumines my darkness.
- NLT You light a lamp for me. The Lord, my God, lights up my darkness.
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 lights David's lamp and turns his darkness into light. It matters because God is the source of hope and life in times of darkness.
Overview
David rejoices that Yahweh keeps his lamp burning and illuminates his darkness. The image speaks of God preserving life, joy, and hope amid trouble. This points to Christ, the light of the world, who dispels the darkness of sin and death for his people.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 13
- 2 Sam 22:29For You, O LORD, are my lamp; the LORD lights up my darkness.
- Job 29:3when His lamp shone above my head, and by His light I walked through the darkness,
- Isa 42:16I will lead the blind by a way they did not know; I will guide them on unfamiliar paths. I will turn darkness into light before them and rough places into level ground. These things I will do for them, and I will not forsake them.
- Matt 4:16the people living in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death, a light has dawned.”
- 1 Pet 2:9But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, to proclaim the virtues of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.
- Luke 1:79to shine on those who live in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the path of peace.”
- Ps 112:4Light dawns in the darkness for the upright—for the gracious, compassionate, and righteous.
- Prov 20:27The spirit of a man is the lamp of the LORD, searching out his inmost being.
- Isa 62:1For Zion’s sake I will not keep silent, and for Jerusalem’s sake I will not keep still, until her righteousness shines like a bright light, her salvation like a blazing torch.
- Ps 132:17There I will make a horn grow for David; I have prepared a lamp for My anointed one.
- Job 18:6The light in his tent grows dark, and the lamp beside him goes out.
- 1 Kgs 11:36I will give one tribe to his son, so that My servant David will always have a lamp before Me in Jerusalem, the city where I chose to put My Name.
- 1 Kgs 15:4Nevertheless, for the sake of David, the LORD his God gave him a lamp in Jerusalem by raising up a son to succeed him and to make Jerusalem strong.
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 18:28 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.