Psalm 42
New International Version
Chapter overview
Psalm 42 compares spiritual longing to a deer's thirst in dry country. Tears, taunts, remembered festivals, roaring waterfalls, and inner turmoil are repeatedly answered by the soul's call to hope and praise again.
LongingExileLamentHope
1As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God.
2My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God?
3My tears have been my food day and night, while people say to me all day long, “Where is your God?”
4These things I remember as I pour out my soul: how I used to go to the house of God under the protection of the Mighty One with shouts of joy and praise among the festive throng.
5Why, my soul, are you downcast? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God.
6My soul is downcast within me; therefore I will remember you from the land of the Jordan, the heights of Hermon—from Mount Mizar.
7Deep calls to deep in the roar of your waterfalls; all your waves and breakers have swept over me.
8By day the Lord directs his love, at night his song is with me— a prayer to the God of my life.
9I say to God my Rock, “Why have you forgotten me? Why must I go about mourning, oppressed by the enemy?”
10My bones suffer mortal agony as my foes taunt me, saying to me all day long, “Where is your God?”
11Why, my soul, are you downcast? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God.
Verses to memorize from Psalm 42
- Psalm 42:5Why, my soul, are you downcast? Why so disturbed within me? Put your…
- Psalm 42:11Why, my soul, are you downcast? Why so disturbed within me? Put your…
New International Version — Licensed through API.Bible, non-commercial use only, no derivatives. Where these translations come from.
Scripture quotations taken from The Holy Bible, New International Version® NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. Text unchanged, provided through API.Bible.