In panic I cried out, “I am cut off from the Lord!” But you heard my cry for mercy and answered my call for help.
Parallel translations
- WEB As for me, I said in my haste, “I am cut off from before your eyes.” Nevertheless you heard the voice of my petitions when I cried to you.
- KJV For I said in my haste, I am cut off from before thine eyes: nevertheless thou heardest the voice of my supplications when I cried unto thee.
- BSB In my alarm I said, “I am cut off from Your sight!” But You heard my plea for mercy when I called to You for help.
- NKJV For I said in my haste, “I am cut off from before Your eyes”; Nevertheless You heard the voice of my supplications When I cried out to You.
- NASB As for me, I said in my alarm, “I am cut off from Your eyes”; Nevertheless You heard the sound of my pleadings When I called to You for help.
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 admits he hastily thought he was cut off from God, yet God heard his pleas. It confesses weak faith met by God's faithfulness.
Overview
In alarm David assumed God had abandoned him, but his fear proved unfounded when God answered his cry. The verse honestly records a lapse of faith and God's gracious response. It comforts believers that God hears even when, in distress, they wrongly feel forgotten.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 16
- Ps 116:11I said in my haste, “All men are liars.”
- Heb 5:7He, in the days of his flesh, having offered up prayers and petitions with strong crying and tears to him who was able to save him from death, and having been heard for his godly fear,
- Jonah 2:7–9“When my soul fainted within me, I remembered Yahweh. My prayer came in to you, into your holy temple.
- Ezek 37:11Then he said to me, Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel: behold, they say, Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are clean cut off.
- Ps 88:16Your fierce wrath has gone over me. Your terrors have cut me off.
- Ps 6:9Yahweh has heard my supplication. Yahweh accepts my prayer.
- Job 35:14How much less when you say you don’t see him. The cause is before him, and you wait for him!
- 1 Sam 23:26Saul went on this side of the mountain, and David and his men on that side of the mountain; and David hurried to get away for fear of Saul; for Saul and his men surrounded David and his men to take them.
- Isa 49:14But Zion said, “Yahweh has forsaken me, and the Lord has forgotten me.”
- Jonah 2:4I said, ‘I have been banished from your sight; yet I will look again toward your holy temple.’
- Lam 3:54–55Waters flowed over my head; I said, I am cut off.
- Isa 6:5Then I said, “Woe is me! For I am undone, because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell among a people of unclean lips: for my eyes have seen the King, Yahweh of Armies!”
- Isa 38:10–12I said, “In the middle of my life I go into the gates of Sheol. I am deprived of the residue of my years.”
- 1 Sam 27:1David said in his heart, “I will now perish one day by the hand of Saul. There is nothing better for me than that I should escape into the land of the Philistines; and Saul will despair of me, to seek me any more in all the borders of Israel. So shall I escape out of his hand.”
- 2 Chr 33:11–13Therefore Yahweh brought on them the captains of the army of the king of Assyria, who took Manasseh in chains, bound him with fetters, and carried him to Babylon.
- Ps 31:17Let me not be disappointed, Yahweh, for I have called on you. Let the wicked be disappointed. Let them be silent in Sheol.
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 31:22 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.