“Now there was a famine in the days of David for three years, year after year. And David sought the face of the Lord.”
– 2 Samuel 21:1
Now, when I read 2 Samuel 21:1 and think about how we might pray based on it, I think about two things. One, this picture of famine for three years, year after year. Again, this is one of those places in the Bible wherein one verse we have three years summarized just like that. Three years.
God, we pray for a resolution to the suffering that we’re walking through.
Even the way this language emphasizes year after year. When we walked through trials, we often wonder, when is this going to end? When we read the Bible and we come to a verse like this, we need to pause and realize. It took us five seconds to read that verse that summarizes three years of hardship, famine, all that goes along with that.
2 Samuel 21:1 Reminds Us We Are Not Alone
To remember that when we walk through trials and it feels like they’re lasting for a long time, we are not alone. We’re not alone as God’s people in the history of God’s people who year after year after year have found themselves are waiting and hoping and longing for change. Yet, what did David do in the middle of all of this? He sought the face of the Lord.
We pray. God help us in our waiting, in trials, in challenges that seem to go on day after day after day and month after month and year after year. Help us amidst the waiting to seek your face. God, I think about some of the waiting that my family is doing right now, and some of the trials that are lasting longer than we had imagined, and certainly the longing in us for those trials to end and specifically for us to be able to bring our child who we’ve been waiting for, for year after year now, to bring this child into our home.
2 Samuel 21:1 Reminds Us to Seek God
God, I think about all the different people who are praying with me right now, and the pictures of trials that they’re walking through and waiting that they are doing. Help us to seek your face. God, we say together now, as we seek you in the waiting, we trust in you. Those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength. They will rise and soar on wings like eagles.
This Verse Leads Us to Pray for Strength
God, we pray for that kind of strength, for that kind of soaring and thriving in the middle of the waiting as we rest in you, as we rest trustfully in you, as we trust that you are working in the middle of our waiting, that you were working all things together for the good of those who love you and have been called according to your purpose. We seek your face. We pray, God, for an end to trials. God, we pray for a resolution to what we’re walking through in different ways.
Just thinking about all the different circumstances represented in our lives as we are waiting and walking through challenges and trials. God, we seek your face. We pray, do all the work you desire to do in us, through us, around us in our waiting as we trust in you. You are good. You are wise. And You are all-powerful. And you are trustworthy. So we seek your face. We want to know you more. We want to trust you more. And we want to love you with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength as you work in our waiting. We trust for our good, for others’ good, and ultimately, for your glory. In Jesus’ name, we seek your face. Amen.
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
