“A Psalm of David, when he was in the wilderness of Judah. O God, You are my God; I shall seek You earnestly; my soul thirsts for You, my flesh yearns for You, in a dry and weary land where there is no water…. Because Your lovingkindness is better than life, my lips will praise You” (Psa 63:0–1, 3).
Although we may never be forced to flee into a physical desert, life has a way of dragging us into places we do not want to be.
According to the superscription of Psalm 63, David prayed this prayer in the desert of Judah. On the basis of several verbal and thematic similarities, Frank–Lothar Hossfeld connects this psalm to the story of David fleeing from Absalom, away from the tabernacle and into the desert (2 Sam 15:13–17, 23; Hermeneia, p. 123). The sudden loss of familiar comforts forces David to consider what matters most. Cast into a physical desert, David realized how deeply he thirsted for God. Yet what pained him most was not exile from his palace, but separation from God’s presence.
Although we may never be forced to flee into a physical desert, life has a way of dragging us into places we do not want to be. We long to return to a life we once enjoyed, but for now we are compelled to endure an unfamiliar wilderness that is painfully uncomfortable. Yet it is in these desert places that God teaches us to get our priorities in order. He helps us realize that what we thirst for most is not the comforts of life, but God himself. The God–sized emptiness in our souls cannot be satisfied even by the very best things this world offers. Created in God’s image, we were made for him. Indeed, God uses the deserts of life to teach us that we shall not live on bread alone (Deut 8:3), and that his lovingkindness is better than life itself (Psa 63:3).
“For a day in Your courts is better than a thousand outside. I would rather stand at the threshold of the house of my God than dwell in the tents of wickedness” (Psa 84:10).
