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Psalm 138 · a question people ask

"Though I walk in the middle of trouble" (138:7). What trouble?

In the text

The psalm doesn't name it. The same verse speaks of "the wrath of my enemies" (138:7), and it doesn't say who they are. Trouble is tsarah, the word of Psalm 120's distress: "In my distress, I cried to the LORD. He answered me" (Psalm 120:1) (tap trouble). In the WEB, Psalm 138:7 speaks of what the LORD will do: "you will revive me", "You will stretch out your hand", "Your right hand will save me" (Psalm 138:7). Revive is chayah, the verb Psalm 119 prays nine times, as in "My soul is laid low in the dust. Revive me according to your word!" (Psalm 119:25) (tap revive). Psalm 138 doesn't say what the trouble was, or when the reviving came, and these notes don't say it for the psalm.

The verses

“Though I walk in the middle of trouble, you will revive me. You will stretch out your hand against the wrath of my enemies. Your right hand will save me.”
Psalm 138:7 · World English Bible
“A Song of Ascents. In my distress, I cried to the LORD. He answered me.”
Psalm 120:1 · World English Bible
“My soul is laid low in the dust. Revive me according to your word!”
Psalm 119:25 · World English Bible

From Favor's study of Psalm 138

Psalm 138: With my whole heart

Psalm 138 has one Hebrew verb for thanks three times: twice the psalmist's, then all the kings of the earth's (138:1-4). In 138:6 the LORD is high, and the WEB's the proud is a Hebrew word for high too: the lowly he sees, the proud he knows from afar. It ends on a prayer: "Don’t forsake the works of your own hands" (138:8).

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Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible, which is in the public domain. Every answer cites the verses it rests on. What we believe · All Bible questions