Commentaries and Other Bible Study Helps - Prayer Tents - Prayer Tents

Psalm 62. God's people sing this psalm to foster confidence in his care, especially as they are faced with people who use power and wealth to oppress them. The strong temptation in such a case is either to despair or else to seek security in power and wealth rather than in God. The simplest way to follow the flow of thought in the psalm is to observe how the addressees shift: from a description of "my soul" and God (vv. 1-2), to speaking directly to and about the attackers (vv. 3-4), then back to "my soul" and God (vv. 5-7), on to exhorting the whole of the worshiping congregation (vv. 8-10), and finally back to a description of God's trustworthiness (vv. 11-12).

62:1-2 My Soul Waits for God Alone. On its surface, this section is descriptive of my soul as relying on God alone in silence, and of God, who is a rock and fortress. The words alone and only (the same word in Hb., ’ak) lay stress on God as the reliable hope, though they do not exclude all human activity: the psalm makes a contrast between God's salvation (which is received through faith and faithfulness) and the kind that comes through unjust means (cf. v. 10, "put no trust in extortion"). The description of a trusting soul is there to set an ideal for God's people: each one should aspire to this kind of quiet faith. On salvation, see note on 3:2. On shaken (62:2), see note on 16:8.