A Heart at RestSample

The God Who Hears (Psalm 65)

There’s something healing, something restorative, about being seen and heard. The other morning, a Monday coming off of a fun weekend packed with family time, my 2 year old son seemed off emotionally…he was more easily fussy and frustrated. Just trying to entertain him, I found some little wooden peg dolls with different emotions on their faces: happy, sad, embarrassed, and so on. I made each one “talk” and tell a little story my son could relate to about what they were feeling. When I got to the sad face, I made it say, “I’m sad because my daddy went to work today and I miss him.” To my surprise, my son burst into tears and began sobbing in my lap. Then he asked me to tell the stories over and over again, crying each time I told the sad doll’s story about missing his dad. “William,” I said, “This game seems like it’s making you really sad! Let’s be done with it!” To which William replied, “No. It’s making me feel better.” To have his feelings about missing his dad heard, acknowledged, understood - this was actually therapeutic to him.

This experience of needing to be heard is universal! As moms, how often do we long to have someone to just hear and receive the things we’re feeling: I don’t feel like I’m getting enough time to take care of myself. I feel like I’m having to sacrifice more for the kids than my spouse. I feel a constant sense of anxiety, and it’s hard feeling so little control over it.

Psalm 65 is a call to praise God, and specifically, as verse 2 states, the God who hears prayer. This Psalm beautifully lays out all the ways God hears and answers us.

We can categorize this Psalm into three ways God hears and responds to us. God hears and responds with

1. relational intimacy,
2. awesome deeds,
3. and provision.

First, the Psalmist praises God for hearing and responding with relational intimacy. In verses 2-4, the Psalmist, David, says God forgives us of our sin, chooses and brings us near, and satisfies us with the goodness of his holy house. When we come before God, he welcomes us in and answers with love. God takes away the weight of our shame through the sacrifice of Jesus. He comforts us with the assurance that he chose us, and he wants to be close to us. He meets our emptiness and longing with the goodness of his presence. Hearing all our specific feelings and requests, God responds first with what we most need: himself.

Second, the Psalmist praises God for hearing and answering with awesome deeds. As verse 5 states, “By awesome deeds you answer us with righteousness.” The passage goes on to unpack this statement, saying God reveals himself as the God of salvation; the hope of all the ends of the earth; the one who established mountains in his strength; the one who stills the roaring of seas and the chaos of people; the one who makes every day. Like the Psalmist, we can remind our hearts of the nature of the one who’s listening to us by rehearsing his awesome deeds. He is the almighty, all-powerful, creator and ruler God! This perspective gives a fresh vision through which we might view whatever it is we are bringing to the Lord.

Third, the Psalmist praises God for hearing and answering with provision. In verses 9-11, David uses agricultural language to describe God’s provisional care, but we can apply these statements metaphorically to how God responds to the work and needs of our lives: God waters and greatly enriches. God provides the fruit. God settles ridges and softens with showers. He blesses growth. He crowns with his bounty. He overflows with abundance.

David concludes the Psalm in verses 12-13 describing how creation responds to God’s care: The pastures of the wilderness overflow, the hills gird themselves with joy, the meadows clothe themselves with flocks, the valleys deck themselves with grain, they shout and sing together for joy. These verses remind us that the care God works in our lives is happening alongside his cosmic care! We can trust that God will answer us with his redeeming power, because we are part of his greater story of redemption - a story with a script still unfolding, but with an ending already known.

This we can trust:

Before God, all is heard.

Before God, all will be restored.