Show me Your ways, O LORD; teach me Your paths.
Parallel translations
- WEB Show me your ways, Yahweh. Teach me your paths.
- KJV Shew me thy ways, O LORD; teach me thy paths.
- ESV Make me to know your ways, O LORD; teach me your paths.
- NKJV Show me Your ways, O Lord; Teach me Your paths.
- NASB ¶Make me know Your ways, Lord; Teach me Your paths.
- NLT Show me the right path, O Lord; point out the road for me to follow.
Scripture quotations are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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 asks God to show him his ways and teach him his paths. He desires to be led in the way of God's will.
Overview
This prayer expresses a humble longing to know and walk in God's ways, dependent on God as the teacher. It assumes that the right path is not self-evident but must be revealed by God. Believers similarly look to God, who guides his people by his Word and Spirit and supremely in Christ, who is himself the way.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 10
- Ps 86:11Teach me Your way, O LORD, that I may walk in Your truth. Give me an undivided heart, that I may fear Your name.
- Ps 143:8Let me hear Your loving devotion in the morning, for I have put my trust in You. Teach me the way I should walk, for to You I lift up my soul.
- Ps 27:11Teach me Your way, O LORD, and lead me on a level path, because of my oppressors.
- Ps 119:27Make clear to me the way of Your precepts; then I will meditate on Your wonders.
- Ps 5:8Lead me, O LORD, in Your righteousness because of my enemies; make straight Your way before me.
- Exod 33:13Now if indeed I have found favor in Your sight, please let me know Your ways, that I may know You and find favor in Your sight. Remember that this nation is Your people.”
- Jer 6:16This is what the LORD says: “Stand at the crossroads and look. Ask for the ancient paths: ‘Where is the good way?’ Then walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls. But they said, ‘We will not walk in it!’
- Isa 2:3And many peoples will come and say: “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob. He will teach us His ways so that we may walk in His paths.” For the law will go forth from Zion, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.
- Prov 8:20I walk in the way of righteousness, along the paths of justice,
- Ps 5:1For the choirmaster, to be accompanied by flutes. A Psalm of David. Give ear to my words, O LORD; consider my groaning.
Resources, by level
Commentaries & study tools
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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 25:4 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.