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Psalm 39:11
When you rebuke and correct man for iniquity, you consume his wealth like a moth. Surely every man is but a breath.” Selah.
9I was mute. I didn’t open my mouth, because you did it.
10Remove your scourge away from me. I am overcome by the blow of your hand.
11When you rebuke and correct man for iniquity, you consume his wealth like a moth. Surely every man is but a breath.” Selah.
12“Hear my prayer, LORD, and give ear to my cry. Don’t be silent at my tears. For I am a stranger with you, a foreigner, as all my fathers were.
13Oh spare me, that I may recover strength, before I go away and exist no more.”
Notice
The moth makes God's correction tangible: even wealth can be eaten away, while the person who owns it is but a breath.
Questions to write on. Each one opens a new entry with this verse already attached.
What does the moth image expose about the security you seek in possessions?
Write on thisHow do you respond to the psalm's link between iniquity and God's correction?
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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 13:28though I am decaying like a rotten thing, like a garment that is moth-eaten.Both passages use moth damage to describe decay, with Job speaking of himself and the psalm speaking of wealth consumed under correction.
Psalm 39:5Behold, you have made my days hand widths. My lifetime is as nothing before you. Surely every man stands as a breath.” Selah.Both verses compare human life to a breath, setting its brevity before God.
Revelation 3:19As many as I love, I reprove and chasten. Be zealous therefore, and repent.Both passages speak of divine correction; Revelation names love as its motive and urges repentance.
Psalm 80:16It’s burned with fire. It’s cut down. They perish at your rebuke.Both passages describe God's rebuke as destructive, consuming wealth in Psalm 39 and bringing people to perish in Psalm 80.
Hebrews 12:6for whom the Lord loves, he disciplines, and chastises every son whom he receives.”Both passages describe the Lord's discipline, while Hebrews also names his love for those he receives.
Isaiah 50:9Behold, the Lord GOD will help me! Who is he who will condemn me? Behold, they will all grow old like a garment. The moths will eat them up.Both passages use moth damage to portray decay, though Isaiah applies it to those who would condemn the speaker.
Psalm 62:9Surely men of low degree are just a breath, and men of high degree are a lie. In the balances they will go up. They are together lighter than a breath.Both passages compare people to a breath, and Psalm 62 makes clear that high status offers no exemption.
1 Corinthians 11:30–32For this cause many among you are weak and sickly, and not a few sleep.Both passages confront human frailty, though the supplied Corinthians verse describes sickness and death rather than the loss of wealth.
Psalm 49:14They are appointed as a flock for Sheol. Death shall be their shepherd. The upright shall have dominion over them in the morning. Their beauty shall decay in …Both passages describe the loss of what people prize: wealth is consumed in Psalm 39, and beauty decays in Psalm 49.
Job 4:21Isn’t their tent cord plucked up within them? They die, and that without wisdom.’Both passages portray human life as fragile through a brief image: a breath in the psalm and a plucked tent cord in Job.
Job 4:19How much more those who dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is in the dust, who are crushed before the moth!Both passages bring a moth into their portrayal of human vulnerability, connecting frailty with what can be crushed or consumed.
Job 22:4Is it for your piety that he reproves you, that he enters with you into judgment?Both passages speak of God's reproof, though Job's verse asks a question while the psalm names iniquity as its cause.
Where this verse fits
Guilt and confession. job loss or money fear. death and what comes after.
One step
Something small to carry out of this verse
Encouragement
This verse does not identify the cause of every loss. Within this lament, the sufferer asks the God who corrects him to hear his tears.
Now put it in your words.
Start an entry on Psalm 39:11. Write what it stirs. Psalmlog sets your words beside Scripture and gives you one next step. Your first entry is free, no account needed.
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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).