Psalmen 70:5

Look at what's actually happening in this line. David isn't praying for himself here — not directly. He's praying for a group: "alle, die dich suchen" — everyone who seeks God. He asks that they be glad, that they rejoice, and that their glad response settle into a habit: "müssen immerdar sagen" — must always be saying — "Gott ist groß!" This isn't a one-time shout of relief. It's a life shaped around repeating that sentence.

Here's what's easy to miss: this exact verse, almost word for word, already exists in Psalm 40:17 Matthew Henry. David is quoting himself — or someone is quoting David — pulling an old prayer forward into a new crisis. That matters. It tells you David didn't think a prayer expired after one use. He prayed it again because the danger was back. If you've ever reused an old prayer because you're back in the same kind of trouble, you're doing exactly what this psalm does.

Also notice where this sits in the psalm's shape. Verses 3–4 ask God to shame the enemies chasing David. Then, right in the middle of that vengeance-language, comes this burst of joy for "alle, die dich suchen" — and then, in the very next line (v.6), David turns the lens back on himself: "Ich aber bin elend und arm" — I am poor and needy. So this joyful verse is squeezed between a curse and a confession of weakness. That's the psalm's honesty: joy for others doesn't erase David's own desperation.

One place translations differ: Psalm 40:17 says "der HERR ist groß" (the LORD — using God's covenant name, YHWH), while this verse says simply "Gott ist groß." That's not carelessness — it reflects a real feature of this part of the Psalter, where God's personal name gets swapped for the more general word "God" Strong's. Different manuscript traditions and translations render it slightly differently, which is worth knowing so you don't think one version is "wrong."

This psalm sits near the end of Book II of the Psalms — a section soaked in exile, pursuit, and unanswered prayer, waiting for rescue that hasn't landed yet.

Psalm 70 carries the heading "to bring to remembrance" — a psalm meant to be prayed again, not filed away after one use Matthew Henry. Tradition places it with David, sometime in the chaos of his reign — most plausibly during Absalom's rebellion (around 970 BC), when David's own son drove him out of Jerusalem with an armed following, and David fled for his life through the wilderness with people actively hunting him down ( 2 Samuel 15–17 tells that story). Whether or not that's the exact occasion, the psalm reads like it comes from someone with real enemies at his back, not a theoretical crisis.

What's striking is that this psalm is almost a straight copy of the final verses of Psalm 40 ( Psalm 40:13–17), lifted out and repurposed as its own short prayer Jamieson-Fausset-Brown. That tells you something about how ancient Israel used these prayers — they weren't precious, untouchable texts meant to be recited once. They were tools. A man in trouble reached for language that had worked before, the way you might return to a psalm or a hymn you've prayed through a dozen crises, because the words already fit your mouth.

The "chief musician" heading (found on many psalms, including this one's twin in Psalm 40) tells you this wasn't just David's private journal — it was handed to the worship leader for use in Israel's temple or tabernacle gatherings, sung by the whole community. So a deeply personal cry for rescue became communal property, sung by people who had their own enemies, their own poverty, their own need for God to hurry. That's part of why this verse widens out from "me" to "alle, die dich suchen" — everyone who seeks God, not David alone.

The word for God here is אֱלֹהִים (ʼĕlôhîym, H430) — the general, majestic word for God, used of the one true God when the article's attached, but also (interestingly) sometimes used of judges or rulers by way of honor Strong's. Compare that to Psalm 40:17's version of this same line, which uses יְהֹוָה (Yᵉhôvâh, H3068) — the personal covenant name, the name God gave Moses at the burning bush. The swap between these two names across the "twin" psalms isn't random; it's a known pattern in this stretch of the Psalter, where scribes or editors preferred the more general "God" language. It doesn't change who's being addressed — it's still the LORD of the covenant — but it shows you these prayers were living texts, handled and reshaped over time.

Now follow the sentence one line further, because the Hebrew doesn't stop at "God is great" — it immediately keeps going into the next breath: "But I am poor and needy." The words there are worth sitting with. עָנִי (ʻânîy, H6041) means depressed — not just financially poor, but pressed down, low in spirit or circumstance Strong's. אֶבְיוֹן (ʼebyôwn, H34) means destitute — someone whose want has become part of how they feel, not just their bank balance. Then comes חוּשׁ (chûwsh, H2363) — to hurry, to be eager, almost desperate with urgency — David isn't calmly waiting; he's begging God to move fast. And אָחַר (ʼâchar, H309) means to delay, to loiter — "LORD, don't loiter." Put those together and you see the shape of David's faith: he can say "God is great" and "I am destitute, hurry up" in the very same breath. That's not contradiction. That's honesty.

There's a quiet thread here worth pulling on. This verse is about people who "seek" God and "love