Send out your light and your truth. Let them lead me. Let them bring me to your holy hill and to your dwelling. Then I will go to the altar of God, to God, my exceeding joy and I will praise you with the lyre. O God, my God.
– Psalm 43:3–4
Oh, I love these verses. Psalm 42 and 43 go together and they’re linked together by a verse that may sound more familiar to you and it’s actually in Psalm 43:5. It’s also in Psalm 42. But why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God.
Psalm 43:3–4 Is a Prayer for Divine Guidance and Protection
This picture of the psalmist here speaking to his own soul, when he’s at a low point. Why are you cast down, O my soul, why are you in turmoil? Hope in God, like it is good for us when we find ourselves at low points to speak to ourselves and say to ourselves, “Hope in God.”. Remind ourselves there’s hope in God. We need that reminder and we want to speak that kind of word into others’ lives when they’re at low points. We also need to speak that word into our own lives.
And then Psalm 43:3–4 so right before this, in Psalm 43. The psalmist prays; send out your light and your truth. Let them lead me. Oh, make the connection. When you’re at a low point, when your soul is downcast, what do you need? You need light from God. It feels dark and despairing around you. You need light and you need truth. When we’re at low points in our lives, we are so susceptible to believe lies, things that are not true about ourselves, about the situation we’re in, about the world around us. Lies about God, lies about others. So send out your light and your truth, the psalmist prays, let them lead me.
Oh, isn’t that good? Don’t you want to be led by light and truth, especially when you’re walking through low times? And then the psalmist says, let them bring me to your holy hill, to your dwelling. I love the way God’s word, his truth and the light of his word, lead us to God, to this hope that Psalm 43 and 42 talk about, hope in God. The way you get to hope is by letting the light and truth of God lead you. And then verse four, the psalmist says, then I will go to the altar of God. So he’s been brought to the altar of God by his light and his truth. And he says, I will go to the altar of God, to God my exceeding joy.
Psalm 43:3–4 Portrays the Psalmist Trusting in God’s Light and Truth
That is a great phrase. God is your, my exceeding joy, which is what we so often lack at low points in our lives. So can I just pray all of this over you right now? God, I pray over every single person listening right now, Psalm 43:3–4, and especially those who are at low points for any number of reasons, just struggling, despairing in sorrow, just feeling heavy, maybe just tired, weary.
God, I pray that you would send out your light and your truth and let your light and truth lead them today. Let your light and truth bring them to your holy hill, to your dwelling, to your altar, where you are exceeding joy. God, I pray for your exceeding joy over the people who are listening to this right now, that they would find in you a joy that supersedes circumstances, that supersedes sorrow. That even in the midst of mourning, which earlier Psalm 43 had talked about in verse two, that there would be a deep, abiding joy and strength and a hope that can only come from you, for souls that feel cast down and in turmoil.
Praying for the Awan People
And God, we pray this over people who don’t know your hope, who don’t know that joy is found and light is found, and truth is found in Jesus. God, we pray for the Awan people, 6 million of them in Northern Pakistan. No known followers of Jesus. Nobody in this people group knows the hope and the joy, the exceeding joy and the light and the truth that are found in Jesus. God, we pray that that would change. We pray for the spread of the gospel to the Awan people of Pakistan, even as we praise you according to Psalm 43 and pray the Psalm over our lives. God, we pray for this psalm to become a reality in the Awan people of Pakistan, all according to your word, to you, our exceeding joy. Oh God, our God we pray in Jesus name. 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.
