“Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth, may Israel now say: Many a time have they afflicted me from my youth: yet they have not prevailed against me. The plowers plowed upon my back: they made long their furrows. The Lord is righteous: he hath cut asunder the cords of the wicked. Let them all be confounded and turned back that hate Zion. Let them be as the grass upon the housetops, which withereth afore it groweth up: Wherewith the mower filleth not his hand; nor he that bindeth sheaves his bosom. Neither do they which go by say, The blessing of the Lord be upon you: we bless you in the name of the Lord.”
Is there something in your life that just won’t go away. Are there people who are constantly attacking you as a person of Faith, or really just because they like to be mean to anyone? The psalmist knows what you are going through. He says that the afflictions that Israel as a nation went through have been there since their youth. That the pains they go through are equivalent to a farmer forces his plow through the ground to break it open. They continually fight against us and try to restrict our forward progress.
“YET THEY HAVE NOT PREVAILED AGAINST ME!” This reminds me of the prayer of Paul to remove a thorn in his side. We don’t know what his issue was but he shares he prayed for it three times to be removed but it never left. Instead, God reminded him, “My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness” (2 Corinthians 12:9). It also reminds me of another passage from Paul found earlier in the same letter, “We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; 9Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed” (2 Corinthians 4:8-9). God gives grace to creation to persevere through all kinds of hardship. The call to the believer is to endure using the strength of the Lord! He will see us through.
Jeremy Kamer Ministries 