Psalm 116 explained: Thanks After Nearly Dying

Heard in a deadly crisis (vv. 1-4)

The writer loves God for one simple reason: they cried out for help and were heard, so they promise to keep praying for the rest of their life. The cords of death picture being tied up and dragged toward the grave, the shadowy place of the dead in Hebrew thought, though the text never says whether the danger was illness, enemies or despair.

Rescue and rest (vv. 5-9)

The rescue is credited to a kind and fair God who looks after the simple, meaning people too weak or naive to protect themselves. The writer then tells their own soul to settle back into rest, now kept from death, tears and stumbling and still walking in the land of the living.

Faith at the worst moment (vv. 10-11)

Verse 10 is hard to translate and versions differ, but the sense is that the writer kept trusting God even while admitting how badly they were suffering. In a panic they decided everyone is a liar, which most readers take to mean that human help had let them down.

How to repay God (vv. 12-14)

Lifting the cup of salvation probably refers to a cup raised or poured out at a thanksgiving meal at the temple, though scholars are not certain of the exact ritual. Vows were promises people made to God while in trouble, and keeping them in front of everyone was a public way of telling others about the rescue.

Precious death, freed servant (vv. 15-16)

Verse 15 is usually understood to mean that the death of God's faithful people is costly in his eyes, so he does not let it happen lightly. Calling oneself the child of God's servant woman meant belonging to God from birth, and the loosened chains point back to the rescue.

Thanks in public (vv. 17-19)

The poem ends with a thank offering, a sacrifice partly shared as a meal, given openly in the temple courts in Jerusalem. This psalm belongs to a group (Psalms 113 to 118) sung at Passover, and Christians often connect it with the hymn Jesus sang with his followers the night before he died.

Key verse: Psalm 116:1

Something to think about

When you have come through something frightening, did you feel you owed thanks to anyone, and what did you do with that feeling?