Psalm 28:1–2: “To You I will cry, O LORD my Rock: / Do not be silent to me, / Lest, if You are silent to me, / I become like those who go down to the pit. / Hear the voice of my supplications / When I cry to You, / When I lift up my hands toward Your holy sanctuary.”

February 3rd, 2024 by Pastor Ed in devotional

We have all experienced times when it seemed like God was silent and not speaking to us. You know those times, when your prayers feel as though they are bouncing off a ceiling of brass, as though God has closed the doors and isn’t taking any more requests. That’s how David felt in this psalm, which is why he began it with a cry of grief, but he then quickly shifted to thanksgiving. We find here a profound principle and practice that we need to apply in our lives.

In reality, God is constantly speaking to any who will listen, both through His creation and His word. But sometimes it may seem to us that He is not talking. When we first became believers, He seemed to speak out loud to us every day. In fact we didn’t need a lot of faith to believe because He was so obvious. But it wasn’t long before that bubble popped. It is a bubble our heavenly Father Himself pops because He wants us to learn to walk by faith and not by sight or feelings. This presents us with a dilemma. How are we to interpret the times when God is silent?

This psalm is meant to give us encouragement and to be a model of how to pray during times when God seems distant. The further we read into this psalm the more we find David purposefully turning his heart toward thanking and giving praise to God by faith and not by feeling. That is the pattern and lesson God has for all of us today. David exhorts us to wait on the Lord at the end of Psalm 27: “Wait on the Lord; / Be of good courage, / And He shall strengthen your heart; / Wait, I say, on the Lord” (27:14). Whenever it seems that God is silent, when it seems He isn’t listening or answering our prayers, we must, like David, turn our cries of grief into praise, and then wait for Him to move, to answer us, to save us. The waiting process is much easier when we spend our time worshiping our Creator, rather than wallowing in our disappointment or despair. So even though we may not feel like it, we need to thank Him for what we have. And at the very least, we need to not grumble that we aren’t getting what we want and instead be thankful that we don’t get what we deserve.

“Thank You, LORD, that You hear our cry, even when it doesn’t feel like You do. We choose to trust You.”

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Psalms 28 KJV

¹ Unto thee will I cry, O LORD my rock; be not silent to me: lest, if thou be silent to me, I become like them that go down into the pit. 

² Hear the voice of my supplications, when I cry unto thee, when I lift up my hands toward thy holy oracle. 

³ Draw me not away with the wicked, and with the workers of iniquity, which speak peace to their neighbours, but mischief is in their hearts.

⁴ Give them according to their deeds, and according to the wickedness of their endeavours: give them after the work of their hands; render to them their desert.

⁵ Because they regard not the works of the LORD, nor the operation of his hands, he shall destroy them, and not build them up.

⁶ Blessed be the LORD, because he hath heard the voice of my supplications.

⁷ The LORD is my strength and my shield; my heart trusted in him, and I am helped: therefore my heart greatly rejoiceth; and with my song will I praise him.

⁸ The LORD is their strength, and he is the saving strength of his anointed.  

⁹ Save thy people, and bless thine inheritance: feed them also, and lift them up for ever.