For You, O LORD, have not forsaken those who seek You. (Psalm 9:10b)

Moses told Israel, as they prepared to enter the Promised Land, “It is the LORD your God who goes before you. He will not leave you or forsake you.” (Deuteronomy 31:6) Then, after Moses’ death, the LORD repeated these words to Joshua. “Just as was with Moses, so I will be with you. I will not leave you or forsake you.” (Joshua 1:5) We also have this promise stated a third time in a different context, Hebrews 13:5.

Yet here in Psalm 9, David invites us to scan covenant history and see that God’s promise has never faltered. Before this promise was even spoken, the LORD already made clear its truthfulness. When Abraham’s servant was sent to find a wife for Isaac, upon meeting her in answer to specific prayer, the servant declared, “…Blessed be the LORD, the God of my master Abraham, who has not forsaken his steadfast love and his faithfulness toward my master.” (Genesis 24:27)

Another example is when Jacob was on the run from Esau. Jacob had a stirring dream where the LORD spoke to him. He said, “Behold, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. For I will not leave you” (Genesis 28:15), and the LORD never did! Looking back to the patriarchs, Moses could reaffirm God’s faithful presence to help his people. And when Joshua prepared to breathe his last, it could be declared, “Not one word of all the good promises that the LORD had made to the house of Israel had failed.” (Joshua 21:45)

Several hundred years later, after David was delivered from some 15 different near-death experiences at the hands of Saul, this man of God could reassert this repeated promise, which he found to be true. God will never forsake his people. The lives of all saints bear witness of this truth, and additional examples are a barren woman like Hannah, a pagan widow from Zarephath about to starve to death, a prophet thrown into a cistern during the Babylonian siege, and a band of trembling disciples in the upper room with locked doors. In each case, we see a divine faithfulness that never quits.

It’s a joy-provoking truth that, in the annals of redemption, not a single case has been found where God abandoned one who sought him for refuge. Hence, David can confidently assert that if you trust in Yahweh’s name and seek him, he will never forsake you. The question then is, have you sought him? Are you pursuing him in prayer and directing your heart to know and serve this God of unfailing mercy? Your present days maybe be hard and uncertain, but you can count on one stubborn fact: the LORD won’t forsake those who seek him!