Psalms for Turbulent Times - Psalm 7: O love that will not let us go

Children have been painting pictures of rainbows all over the UK as a sign of hope and loving care in our current health crisis. This rainbow sprang up over Warley Woods one summer. The picture was taken by Simon Lea Photography

O love that will not let us go


1    O Lord my God, in you I take refuge;  ♦
save me from all who pursue me, and deliver me,
2    Lest they rend me like a lion and tear me in pieces  ♦
while there is no one to help me.
3    O Lord my God, if I have done these things:  ♦
if there is any wickedness in my hands,
4    If I have repaid my friend with evil,  ♦
or plundered my enemy without a cause,
5    Then let my enemy pursue me and overtake me,  ♦
trample my life to the ground,
and lay my honour in the dust. [R]
6    Rise up, O Lord, in your wrath;
lift yourself up against the fury of my enemies.  ♦
Awaken, my God, the judgement that you have commanded.
7    Let the assembly of the peoples gather round you;  ♦
be seated high above them: O Lord, judge the nations.
8    Give judgement for me
according to my righteousness, O Lord,  ♦
and according to the innocence that is in me.
9    Let the malice of the wicked come to an end,
but establish the righteous;  ♦
for you test the mind and heart, O righteous God. [R]
10  God is my shield that is over me;  ♦
he saves the true of heart.
11  God is a righteous judge;  ♦
he is provoked all day long.
12  If they will not repent, God will whet his sword;  ♦
he has bent his bow and made it ready.
13  He has prepared the weapons of death;  ♦
he makes his arrows shafts of fire. [R]
14  Behold those who are in labour with wickedness,  ♦
who conceive evil and give birth to lies.
15  They dig a pit and make it deep  ♦
and fall into the hole that they have made for others.
16  Their mischief rebounds on their own head;  ♦
their violence falls on their own scalp.
17  I will give thanks to the Lord for his righteousness,  ♦
and I will make music to the name of the Lord Most High.


Pursuit. This is a word that stands out in today’s psalm, for me: that sense of being chased down. When our children were younger, they got a great thrill out of being chased by us, their mum and dad. Especially if we walked or ran oddly or had weirdly exaggerated expressions on our faces. And if the chasing game started in the sitting room, running round, it would escalate in fun and noise as they scampered up the stairs with us in pursuit.

But being chased down is not great fun, most of the time. It has a sinister edge. It is the stuff of nightmares. Our subconscious in sleep tries to exorcise these horrible feelings of being stuck while our pursuers seem to speed up. I reckon we all have that latent fear of being caught by some unseen enemy, whether an imagined creature or hooded human.

Yet, the Gospel, indeed the whole of Scripture, sings aloud of another pursuit; that of a love that will not let go of us. One of my favourite hymns is the Victorian composer George Matheson’s most popular pieces, O love that will not let me go. It is a pursuit which goes down into the very depth of human suffering. It's a pursuit which takes God, in the person of his Son Jesus, into the place of identifying with the neediest person's plight. It is a pursuit that does not dodge suffering but goes through it and beyond it. Christ would not let go until the work of redemption was done even as he was hounded down by false accusers who were threatened by this love. This love is our refuge, our safe person, our safe place, where racing hearts can find a calm rhythm. In the daily rhythm of morning, evening and night prayer in the Church of England, we always begin our worship by acknowledging this pursuing loving God. We say: 'O God, make speed to save us; O Lord, make haste to help us.'

In today’s psalm, we hear the prayer of an almost breathless person whose enemies are bearing down on them. It appears that he or she have been falsely accused and cry out a protestation of innocence, not unlike Job. The psalmist is so convinced of their sense of righteousness that they have the courage to stand by their convictions, even if they are overtaken by their pursuers. Even if their life is trampled out of them and their ‘soul’ or ‘glory’ (vs 5) is lies in the dust. The writer is so convinced that God’s knowledge of their righteousness is strong, that God will be roused to action on their behalf. What’s more, we see again the hyperbole of the Hebrew poet – God’s anger against unrighteousness is such that in the end it is inevitable that these enemies will be chased down. ‘Their mischief returns upon their own heads, and on their own heads their violence descends,’ he says in triumph (vs16).

So we have a pursuing God who is indignant ‘every day’ (vs11) and a God of faithful loving mercy who will not let us go when we are being chased down. This love will not run out of energy and will not be overtaken by our pursuers. I am comforted by a loving God who can out-pursue my fears. I am comforted by an indignant God who will never stop being indignant on behalf of the needy and inspires others in indignation, even when they are not given permission to speak out – like an intensive care nurse from a hospital in the north of England on Channel 4 news tonight who spoke of her sense of  pursuing fear for her colleagues who are going to put their lives on the line for others in the coming weeks as the tsunami of cases hits our shores. She called on the Government to ensure all critical care nurses and doctors are properly protected from the virus as they care for those who have been overtaken by its virulence. 


Even as we watch this unfolding battle for the lives of the vulnerable and the weak, as if a slow-motion film, may we know the loving pursuit of an indignant God who is urging us on and who will not let us go. Here is a stunning rendition of this compelling hymn: 

1.     O Love that will not let me go,
I rest my weary soul in thee;
I give thee back the life I owe,
That in thine ocean depths its flow
May richer, fuller be.

2.      O Joy that seekest me through pain,
I cannot close my heart to thee;
I trace the rainbow through the rain,
And feel the promise is not vain,
That morn shall tearless be.

3.      O Cross that liftest up my head,
I dare not ask to fly from thee;
I lay in dust life’s glory dead,
And from the ground there blossoms red
Life that shall endless be.

Psalm 7: Common Worship: Daily Prayer, material from which is included here,
is copyright © The Archbishops' Council 2005 and published by Church House Publishing.

O love that will not let me go: sung by the Westminster Chorus www.westminsterchorus.org