Read
Psalm 74:20
Honor your covenant, for haunts of violence fill the dark places of the earth.
18Remember this, that the enemy has mocked you, LORD. Foolish people have blasphemed your name.
19Don’t deliver the soul of your dove to wild beasts. Don’t forget the life of your poor forever.
20Honor your covenant, for haunts of violence fill the dark places of the earth.
21Don’t let the oppressed return ashamed. Let the poor and needy praise your name.
22Arise, God! Plead your own cause. Remember how the foolish man mocks you all day.
Notice
“Honor your covenant” is a plea made amid violence, where the suffering of the oppressed makes God’s pledged faithfulness a matter of urgent concern.
Questions to write on. Each one opens a new entry with this verse already attached.
What violence in the world makes this plea for God to honor his covenant urgent to you?
Write on thisHow does asking God to honor his covenant shape what you want to pray for the oppressed?
Write on thisConnect
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
Psalm 106:45He remembered for them his covenant, and repented according to the multitude of his loving kindnesses.Psalm 74 asks God to honor his covenant; Psalm 106 recounts his remembering that covenant in loving kindness.
Genesis 17:7–8I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be a God to you and …The psalm appeals to God’s covenant, while Genesis records his covenant promise to be God to Abraham and his offspring.
Hebrews 8:10“For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days,” says the Lord: “I will put my laws into their mind; I will also write …Both passages speak of God’s covenant; Hebrews describes his pledged relationship with his people and his laws written on their hearts.
2 Chronicles 36:17Therefore he brought on them the king of the Chaldeans, who killed their young men with the sword in the house of their sanctuary, and had no compassion on …Both texts name violence against people; Chronicles describes a conquest in which even the sanctuary offered no protection.
Psalm 89:28I will keep my loving kindness for him forever more. My covenant will stand firm with him.Psalm 74 pleads for God to honor his covenant; Psalm 89 declares that his covenant will stand firm.
Psalm 89:34–36I will not break my covenant, nor alter what my lips have uttered.The plea to honor the covenant shares its central concern with God’s declaration that he will neither break nor alter it.
Psalm 105:8He has remembered his covenant forever, the word which he commanded to a thousand generations,God’s covenant is central to both: Psalm 74 appeals for him to honor it, and Psalm 105 declares his enduring remembrance.
Jeremiah 33:20–26“The LORD says: ‘If you can break my covenant of the day and my covenant of the night, so that there will not be day and night in their time,Both passages speak of God’s covenant, though Jeremiah’s supplied words concern the ordered succession of day and night.
Ephesians 5:8For you were once darkness, but are now light in the Lord. Walk as children of light,Both use darkness language, though the psalm describes places filled with violence and Ephesians describes the readers’ former condition.
Ephesians 4:17–18This I say therefore, and testify in the Lord, that you no longer walk as the rest of the Gentiles also walk, in the futility of their mind,The connection is broad: both concern human conduct, with the psalm naming violence and Ephesians warning against walking in futility of mind.
Deuteronomy 12:31You shall not do so to the LORD your God; for every abomination to the LORD, which he hates, they have done to their gods; for they even burn their sons and …Both name violence: the psalm laments its spread, while Deuteronomy forbids worship practices that include burning children.
2 Chronicles 6:19Yet have respect for the prayer of your servant and to his supplication, LORD my God, to listen to the cry and to the prayer which your servant prays before …Both address God with an urgent appeal, asking him to attend to a plea brought before him.
Where this verse fits
Injustice and anger. fear for the future. waiting.
One step
Something small to carry out of this verse
Encouragement
Violence does not have to be softened in your prayers. This plea names its reach across the earth and appeals to God on the strength of his covenant.
Now put it in your words.
Start an entry on Psalm 74:20. 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 74 · 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).