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Psalm 38:2
For your arrows have pierced me, your hand presses hard on me.
1A Psalm by David, for a memorial. LORD, don’t rebuke me in your wrath, neither chasten me in your hot displeasure.
2For your arrows have pierced me, your hand presses hard on me.
3There is no soundness in my flesh because of your indignation, neither is there any health in my bones because of my sin.
4For my iniquities have gone over my head. As a heavy burden, they are too heavy for me.
Notice
Arrows that pierce and a hand that presses hard make David’s plea for mercy a prayer from someone who feels wounded by God himself.
Questions to write on. Each one opens a new entry with this verse already attached.
What is hardest for you about David addressing God as the one whose arrows have pierced him?
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Where else Scripture says this
12 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
Job 6:4For the arrows of the Almighty are within me. My spirit drinks up their poison. The terrors of God set themselves in array against me.Both speakers describe God’s arrows piercing them, using the language of weapons to express their suffering.
Psalm 32:4For day and night your hand was heavy on me. My strength was sapped in the heat of summer. Selah.Both prayers describe God’s hand as heavy upon the speaker, making distress feel like a weight borne in the body.
Psalm 45:5Your arrows are sharp. The nations fall under you, with arrows in the heart of the king’s enemies.Both passages describe arrows piercing people, though Psalm 38 concerns the praying sufferer and Psalm 45 the king’s enemies.
Lamentations 3:12He has bent his bow, and set me as a mark for the arrow.Both speakers portray themselves as targets of God’s weapons, with arrows expressing the personal force of their suffering.
Ruth 1:13would you then wait until they were grown? Would you then refrain from having husbands? No, my daughters, for it grieves me seriously for your sakes, for the …David and Naomi both describe their distress in terms of the LORD’s hand acting against them.
Job 19:21“Have pity on me. Have pity on me, you my friends, for the hand of God has touched me.Both David and Job attribute their suffering to God’s hand, while Job also asks his friends for pity.
1 Samuel 5:6But the LORD’s hand was heavy on the people of Ashdod, and he destroyed them and struck them with tumors, even Ashdod and its borders.Both texts describe the LORD’s hand as heavy, with Psalm 38 speaking of personal distress and Samuel describing harm in Ashdod.
Deuteronomy 2:15Moreover the LORD’s hand was against them, to destroy them from the middle of the camp, until they were consumed.Both passages portray the LORD’s hand acting against people, though Deuteronomy describes destruction and Psalm 38 a sufferer’s prayer.
Psalm 21:12For you will make them turn their back, when you aim drawn bows at their face.Both passages use weapons aimed at people, though Psalm 38 speaks from the wounded person’s position.
Psalm 64:7But God will shoot at them. They will be suddenly struck down with an arrow.Both passages portray God striking people with arrows, though Psalm 38’s speaker is himself the wounded one.
1 Samuel 5:11They sent therefore and gathered together all the lords of the Philistines, and they said, “Send the ark of the God of Israel away, and let it go again to its …Both texts describe God’s hand as heavy, expressing distress that reaches one praying person in the psalm and a city in Samuel.
1 Samuel 6:9Behold, if it goes up by the way of its own border to Beth Shemesh, then he has done us this great evil; but if not, then we shall know that it is not his hand …Both texts concern suffering attributed to God’s hand, though Samuel records uncertainty about whether his hand caused the harm.
Where this verse fits
Guilt and confession. feeling distant from God.
One step
Something small to carry out of this verse
Encouragement
These words do not make every illness a punishment. Here, David speaks from confessed sin and distress, and his prayer still addresses the God whose hand feels heavy.
Now put it in your words.
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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).