Today’s Passage: Psalm 86
This psalm carries a simple heading: a prayer of David. In it he calls himself poor and needy, and he calls his God kind and forgiving. He asks to be taught the LORD’s way, and he asks for an undivided heart. Then, near the end, he does something quiet and remarkable. He takes God’s own name and speaks it back to Him, the very words God had once given to Moses. David does not reach for a new description of God to fit his trouble. He reaches for the old one, the name God had already spoken, and he leans his real need against it.
As you read, hold this: Give me an undivided heart.
Context A prayer of David
The heading over this psalm is a rare one. It calls the psalm a prayer, rather than the more common “Psalm of David.” The Hebrew word is tefillah, a request addressed directly to God. And this heading is not a label added on later: it is part of the text itself.
Psalm 86:1-7 (BSB)
A prayer of David.
¹ Incline Your ear, O LORD, and answer me, for I am poor and needy. ² Preserve my soul, for I am godly. You are my God; save Your servant who trusts in You. ³ Be merciful to me, O Lord, for I call to You all day long. ⁴ Bring joy to Your servant, for to You, O Lord, I lift up my soul. ⁵ For You, O Lord, are kind and forgiving, rich in loving devotion to all who call on You. ⁶ Hear my prayer, O LORD, and attend to my plea for mercy. ⁷ In the day of my distress I call on You, because You answer me.
Notice how David lays it out. He is poor and needy, and God is kind and forgiving, rich in loving devotion. When he says he calls on God, he adds the reason at once: because You answer me. That is not a hopeful guess. It is a track record, something he has learned by living it.
Psalm 86:8-10 (BSB)
⁸ O Lord, there is none like You among the gods, nor any works like Yours. ⁹ All the nations You have made will come and bow before You, O Lord, and they will glorify Your name. ¹⁰ For You are great and perform wonders; You alone are God.
There is none like Him among the gods, and no works like His. All the nations are ones He has made, and one day all of them will come and bow before Him. He alone is God.
Psalm 86:11-13 (BSB)
¹¹ Teach me Your way, O LORD, that I may walk in Your truth. Give me an undivided heart, that I may fear Your name. ¹² I will praise You, O Lord my God, with all my heart; I will glorify Your name forever. ¹³ For great is Your loving devotion to me; You have delivered me from the depths of Sheol.
Here is the heart of the psalm. Teach me Your way, David prays, and give me an yachad, pronounced yah-KHED. Strong's H3161, to unite, make one, join together. It means to unite, to make one. Applied here to the heart, the prayer is not for more devotion stacked on top of a split life. It is for scattered loyalties to be gathered into one single direction, so that the fear of His name is no longer left competing against some second master. heart. Then, in the very next breath, comes the vow: I will praise You with all my heart. The request and the promise sit side by side, the asking and the answering held together. And underneath them both is the reason he can ask at all, for great is God’s loving devotion to him, the devotion that has already delivered him from the depths of Sheol.
Psalm 86:14-15 (BSB)
¹⁴ The arrogant rise against me, O God; a band of ruthless men seeks my life; they have no regard for You. ¹⁵ But You, O Lord, are a compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in loving devotion and faithfulness.
The arrogant have no regard for God at all. But You, David answers back, and with that turn he reaches for the oldest name of all.
Study notes God's own words, spoken back
Verse 15 is not something David invented. It is the very line God once spoke to Moses.
"The LORD, the LORD God, is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in loving devotion and faithfulness." Exodus 34:6 (BSB)
It was said on a real day, on a real mountain. David does not mint a fresh name for God to fit his own distress. He simply takes up the one God had already spoken.
Psalm 86:16-17 (BSB)
¹⁶ Turn to me and have mercy; grant Your strength to Your servant; save the son of Your maidservant. ¹⁷ Show me a sign of Your goodness, that my enemies may see and be ashamed; for You, O LORD, have helped me and comforted me.
Turn to me, he prays. Have mercy. Grant strength. And then he ends the psalm not on a fear but on a memory, that You have helped me, and You have comforted me.
Give me an undivided heart.