Lord, How Long?STUDIES IN THE PSALMS

Lord, How Long?

Inquirer desires relief Inquirer is calling for God’s

help Inquirer is questioning God’s

timetable Inquirer is

questioning/appealing to God’s character

Inquirer trusts relief will come/God answers that it will

They will say, “Where is the promise of his

coming? For ever since the fathers

fell asleep, all things are

continuing as they were from the beginning of

creation.” (2 Peter 3:4, ESV)

How Long? Till God avenges enemies: Psalm 6

• Desires relief 6:2, 6-7. Psalm 13:1-2

How long, O LORD? Will you forget me forever?How long will you hide your face from me?

How long must I take counsel in my souland have sorrow in my heart all the day?

How long shall my enemy be exalted over me? (Psalm 13:1-2, ESV)

How Long? Till God avenges enemies: Psalm 6

Desires relief 6:2, 6-7. Psalm 13:1-2 Call for God’s help 6:4a; Psalm 35:11-15, 17

Malicious witnesses rise up; they ask me of things that I do not know. They repay me evil for good; my soul is bereft. But I, when they were sick— I wore sackcloth; I afflicted 

myself with fasting; I prayed with head bowed on my chest. I went about as though I grieved for my friend or 

my brother; as one who laments his mother,I bowed down in mourning. But at my stumbling they 

rejoiced and gathered; they gathered together against me; wretches whom I did not know tore at me without 

ceasing; (Psalm 35:11-15, ESV)

How long, O Lord, will you look on?

Rescue me from their destruction,

my precious life from the lions! (Psalm 35:17, ESV)

How Long? Till God avenges enemies: Psalm 6

Desires relief 6:2, 6-7. Psalm 13:1-2 Call for God’s help 6:4a; Psalm 35:11-15, 17 Timetable questioned 6:3 God’s character questioned/appealed to 6:4b Trust in God/God answers 6:8-10

How Long? Till God’s judgment on sinners, Psalm 94

• Desires relief 94:4-7, 20-21• Call for God’s help 94:1-2• Timetable questioned 94:3• God’s character questioned/appealed to

94:1-2 God of vengeance94:17-10- God of peace, help, covenant love

• Trust in God/God answers 94:8-1094:22-23; Revelation 6:9-11

How long? Till God’s compassion after judgment, Psalm 89

• Desires relief 89:38-45

• Call for God’s help 89:50-51

• Timetable questioned 89:46

• God’s character questioned/appealed to (89:3-4, 19-21, 24, 30-33) 89:49

• Trust in God/God answers 89:1-2, 54

“Seek the LORD while he may be found; call upon him while he is near; let the wicked forsake his way, and the

unrighteous man his thoughts; let him return to the LORD, that he may have compassion on him, and to

our God, for he will abundantly pardon. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways

my ways, declares the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. “For as the

rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the

eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall

accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it. (Isaiah 55:6-11, ESV)

…knowing this first of all, that scoffers will

come in the last days with scoffing, following

their own sinful desires. They will say, “Where is the promise

of his coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all things

are continuing as they were from the

beginning of creation.”  (2 Peter

3:3-4, ESV)

For they deliberately overlook this fact, that the heavens existed long ago, and the earth was

formed out of water and through water by the word of God, and that by means of these the

world that then existed was deluged with water and perished. But by the same word the

heavens and earth that now exist are stored up for fire, being kept until the day of judgment

and destruction of the ungodly. (2 Peter 3:5-7, ESV)

But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a

thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens

will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works

that are done on it will be exposed.

(2 Peter 3:8-10, ESV)