Psalm 16 (NRSV)
Read Psalm 16 on biblegateway.com
Verse 1Protect me, O God, for in you I take refuge.
Verse 2I say to the Lord, "You are my Lord; I have no good apart from you."
Verse 3As for the holy ones in the land, they are the noble, in whom is all my delight.
Verse 4Those who choose another god multiply their sorrows; their drink offerings of blood I will not pour out or take their names upon my lips.
Verse 5The Lord is my chosen portion and my cup; you hold my lot.
Verse 6The boundary lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; I have a goodly heritage.
Verse 7I bless the Lord who gives me counsel; in the night also my heart instructs me.
Verse 8I keep the Lord always before me; because he is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.
Verse 9Therefore my heart is glad, and my soul rejoices; my body also rests secure.
Verse 10For you do not give me up to Sheol, or let your faithful one see the Pit.
Verse 11You show me the path of life. In your presence there is fullness of joy; in your right hand are pleasures forevermore.
Devotion
Trust me! Sometimes I feel like I say this more than a hundred times a day in working with, teaching, and playing with my two boys. I get lots of questions from their young forming minds—sometimes multiple questions asking the same thing. At some point, I just have to say, "trust me."
The words of Psalm 16 are words of trust. It is as if in the midst of life God has asked the psalmist to "trust me." The psalmist responds with eloquent words of radical and unconditional trust—on matters ranging from protection, to seeking wisdom, to good counsel and to physical health. But the psalmist does not stop there. In Verse 10, the psalmist expresses a trust in God that goes even beyond and through the grave, confessing that God’s presence and redemption will not be overcome by death and the grave.
"Trust me," God says to us as well. We can, indeed, in part because the psalmist gives us the words to speak and helps us know that in every moment of life, God, Immanuel, is indeed present with us.
Prayer
Faithful God, in the everyday moments of life as well as in the intense moments, remind me of the trust I can place in you, knowing that you are present with me in all the moments of life and even in the moment of death and beyond, into the final resurrection that is yet to come. Amen.