For You light my lamp; The Lord my God illumines 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.
- BSB For You, O LORD, light my lamp; my God lights up my darkness.
- NKJV For You will light my lamp; The Lord my God will enlighten 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 are my lamp, Yahweh. Yahweh will light up my darkness.
- Job 29:3when his lamp shone on my head, and by his light I walked through darkness,
- Isa 42:16I will bring the blind by a way that they don’t know. I will lead them in paths that they don’t know. I will make darkness light before them, and crooked places straight. I will do these things, and I will not forsake them.
- Matt 4:16the people who sat in darkness saw a great light, to those who sat in the region and shadow of death, to them light has dawned.”
- 1 Pet 2:9But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, that you may proclaim the excellence of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light:
- Luke 1:79to shine on those who sit in darkness and the shadow of death; to guide our feet into the way of peace.”
- Ps 112:4Light dawns in the darkness for the upright, gracious, merciful, and righteous.
- Prov 20:27The spirit of man is Yahweh’s lamp, searching all his innermost parts.
- Isa 62:1For Zion’s sake will I not hold my peace, and for Jerusalem’s sake I will not rest, until her righteousness shines out like the dawn, and her salvation like a burning lamp.
- Ps 132:17There I will make the horn of David to bud. I have ordained a lamp for my anointed.
- Job 18:6The light shall be dark in his tent. His lamp above him shall be put out.
- 1 Kgs 11:36To his son will I give one tribe, that David my servant may have a lamp always before me in Jerusalem, the city which I have chosen me to put my name there.
- 1 Kgs 15:4Nevertheless for David’s sake, Yahweh his God gave him a lamp in Jerusalem, to set up his son after him, and to establish Jerusalem;
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
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.