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Psalm 31:11

Because of all my adversaries I have become utterly contemptible to my neighbors, a horror to my acquaintances. Those who saw me on the street fled from me.

9Have mercy on me, LORD, for I am in distress. My eye, my soul, and my body waste away with grief.
10For my life is spent with sorrow, my years with sighing. My strength fails because of my iniquity. My bones are wasted away.
11Because of all my adversaries I have become utterly contemptible to my neighbors, a horror to my acquaintances. Those who saw me on the street fled from me.
12I am forgotten from their hearts like a dead man. I am like broken pottery.
13For I have heard the slander of many, terror on every side, while they conspire together against me, they plot to take away my life.
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Notice

People flee at the sight of the sufferer, making an ordinary street a place where hostility from enemies becomes rejection by neighbors and acquaintances.

Questions to write on. Each one opens a new entry with this verse already attached.

How does the detail of people fleeing on the street shape your understanding of this loneliness?

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What would you want to tell God about being avoided by people who know you?

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Connect

Where else Scripture says this

11 passages readers most often link with this verse, and the thread each one shares with it.

This verse's connections, by chapterThe Bible's strongest chapter linksHover or tap a book to trace it
Psalm 69:8I have become a stranger to my brothers, an alien to my mother’s children.Both passages describe estrangement from people close to the speaker, whether neighbors and acquaintances or members of his own family.
Psalm 22:6But I am a worm, and no man; a reproach of men, and despised by the people.Both speakers describe being despised by others, with contempt shaping how they speak about themselves.
Psalm 38:11My lovers and my friends stand aloof from my plague. My kinsmen stand far away.Both passages describe people withdrawing from a sufferer, leaving him isolated even among those who know him.
Psalm 142:4Look on my right, and see; for there is no one who is concerned for me. Refuge has fled from me. No one cares for my soul.Both speakers describe isolation in distress, one through people fleeing and the other through the absence of anyone who cares.
Job 19:13“He has put my brothers far from me. My acquaintances are wholly estranged from me.Both speakers name acquaintances among those estranged from them, making rejection a loss within familiar relationships.
Matthew 26:56But all this has happened that the Scriptures of the prophets might be fulfilled.” Then all the disciples left him and fled.People flee from the sufferer in the psalm, and Jesus’ disciples leave him and flee in Matthew.
Isaiah 53:3–5He was despised and rejected by men, a man of suffering and acquainted with disease. He was despised as one from whom men hide their face; and we didn’t …Both passages describe a sufferer who is despised and shunned by those who see him.
Isaiah 49:7The LORD, the Redeemer of Israel, and his Holy One, says to him whom man despises, to him whom the nation abhors, to a servant of rulers: “Kings shall see and …Both passages name human contempt, though Isaiah also speaks of the LORD’s faithfulness and the honor that will follow.
Lamentations 1:2She weeps bitterly in the night. Her tears are on her cheeks. Among all her lovers she has no one to comfort her. All her friends have dealt treacherously with …Both passages describe distress made worse by rejection from familiar people, with friends becoming enemies in Lamentations.
Job 6:21–23For now you are nothing. You see a terror, and are afraid.Both passages describe people reacting with fear to someone in distress.
Matthew 27:39–44Those who passed by blasphemed him, wagging their headsBoth passages show a sufferer facing rejection in public, whether through people fleeing or passersby speaking abuse.
Where this verse fits

Loneliness. broken friendship. grief.

What the Bible says about loneliness →What the Bible says about grief →
One step

Something small to carry out of this verse

Ask a trusted friend for time to talk

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Encouragement

Being avoided by people who know you is a grief Scripture does not hide. Here, that rejection is spoken to YHWH within a plea for mercy.

Now put it in your words.

Start an entry on Psalm 31:11. Write what it stirs. Psalmlog sets your words beside Scripture and gives you one next step. Your first entry is free, no account needed.

Keep goingPsalm 31 · the whole chapter with its connection mapPsalms · every chapterBuild a reading plan through Psalms

Cross-reference data from OpenBible.info (CC BY). Scripture from the World English Bible (public domain). Arc diagram after Chris Harrison and Christoph Römhild (2007).