There is a promise in Psalm 34:17 that almost sounds too bold: when God’s people cry out, He hears and He delivers. This is not a vague, spiritual sentiment—it is heaven’s guarantee that our desperate prayers are not wasted breath. The verse is tied to a specific kind of person and a specific kind of God: the righteous one who cries, and the Lord who responds with real help in real trouble. Today, God invites you not just to endure your pain, but to bring it honestly to Him, trusting that He is listening more closely than you realize.

When “Righteous” Doesn’t Feel Like You

Maybe you read that this promise is for “the righteous” and immediately disqualify yourself. You see your failures more clearly than your faith. You recall the harsh words, the hidden sins, the half‑hearted prayers, and you think, “That’s not me.” But God never intended “righteous” to describe the flawless. He intended it to describe those who belong to Him, clothed in the righteousness of His Son. “God made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:21). The promise of Psalm 34:17 rests first on Christ’s perfection, not yours.

That means your standing with God is not recalculated every morning based on yesterday’s performance. When you come in repentance and faith, you come as one declared righteous by the blood of Jesus. This doesn’t minimize holiness or obedience; it grounds them. Because you are accepted in Christ, you can honestly confess sin, turn from it, and still believe that when you cry out, God does not hold you at arm’s length. He hears you as a Father hears His child.

The God Who Actually Listens

We are used to talking more than being heard. People nod while their minds drift. Phones buzz, eyes wander, conversations half‑die. So when Scripture says, “The righteous cry out, and the LORD hears; He delivers them from all their troubles” (Psalm 34:17), we must fight the lie that this is just religious language. The living God truly bends toward His people. He commands you, “Cast all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you” (1 Peter 5:7). Your fears are not annoyances to Him; they are invitations.

Prayer, then, is not a ritual to keep God informed—it is a relationship that assumes He is already near. “Call upon Me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you will honor Me” (Psalm 50:15). When you bring your “day of trouble” to Him, you are stepping into a promise that He Himself made. You may not hear an audible voice or feel an instant change, but He is never indifferent. Heaven is not silent; it is at work, even when your world feels stuck.

Delivered, Even If Not Yet Removed

We often assume that if God hears, He will remove the trouble immediately. Sometimes He does. Doors open, diagnoses reverse, hearts soften, provision comes from nowhere. And when He does that, it is right to rejoice. But there is a deeper kind of deliverance God works while the circumstances remain. Think of Paul’s words: “We are hard pressed on all sides, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair” (2 Corinthians 4:8). God’s first rescue is often inside you—guarding your heart, strengthening your faith, anchoring your hope.

Philippians describes this inward deliverance: “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:6‑7). Sometimes the trouble remains, but the panic doesn’t. The storm keeps raging, but your soul is held. Psalm 34:17 does not promise a life free from trouble; it promises that no trouble will ever be able to silence the God who hears and delivers, in His way and in His time.

Lord, thank You that when I cry out, You truly hear and You truly act. Today, teach me to bring every trouble to You quickly, trust Your timing deeply, and walk in the peace and obedience that honor Your name.

Moses was not a fluent man. His words spoken to God must be accepted as being a sincere and fair appraisal of the facts: "O Lord, I have never been eloquent, neither in the past nor since you have spoken to your servant. I am slow of speech and tongue" (Exodus 4:10). The Lord did not try to cheer up His doubting servant by telling him that he had misjudged his ability. He allowed Moses' statement to stand unchallenged. But He said to Moses, "What about your brother Aaron the Levite? I know he can speak well." God gave Aaron an "A" in speech. He was undoubtedly an eloquent man. Yet it was the halting Moses, not the fluent Aaron, who faced Pharaoh time after time in defense of Israel; it was Moses, not the eloquent Aaron, who wrote the brilliant and beautiful story of the creation; it was Moses who penned the Book of Deuteronomy, one of the most poetical and moving books ever written. Was Aaron too fluent for God to use after all? I do not claim to know why, but whatever the reason, we have but few samples of Aaron's words in the Bible and countless pages of Moses'.

The reason back of all this is that great emotions rarely produce fluency of speech, whereas shallow feelings are sure to express themselves in many words. We tend to use words in inverse proportion to the depth of our feelings. Some of the profoundest emotions of the heart utter themselves in a chaste brevity of words, as when John tells us of Christ's sharp grief at the grave of Lazarus. He says simply, "Jesus wept." With exquisite good taste, the scholars who divided the Bible into verses allowed those two words to stand alone. Nothing more is needed to reveal the mighty depth of Christ's love for His friend.

Ye shall receive power, when the Holy Ghost is come upon you. - Acts 1:8

Power is given to us all through the gift of the Divine Spirit. The very name of that Spirit is the "Spirit of Might". Christ spoke to us about being "endued with power from on high"; the last of His promises that dropped from His lips upon earth was the promise that His followers should receive the power of the Spirit coming upon them. Wheresoever in the early histories we read of a man that was full of the Holy Ghost, we read that he was "full of power." God hath given us the "spirit of power," which is also the spirit ’’of love and of a sound mind." So the strength that we must have, if we have strength at all, is the strength of a Divine Spirit, not our own, that dwells in us, and works through us.

And there is nothing in that which need startle or surprise any man who believes in a living God at all, and in the possibility, therefore, of a connection between the Great Spirit and all the human spirits which are His children. I would maintain, in opposition to many modern conceptions, the actual supernatural character of the gift that is bestowed upon every Christian soul. My reading of the New Testament is, that as distinctly above the order of material nature as is any miracle is the gift that flows into a believing heart. There is a direct passage between God and my spirit: it lies open to His touch; all the paths of its deep things can be trodden by Him. You and I act upon one another from without; He acts upon us within. We wish one another blessings; He gives the blessings. We try to train, to educate, to incline, and dispose by the presentation of motives and the urging of reasons; He can plant in a heart by His own Divine husbandry the seed that shall blossom into immortal life. And so the Christian Church is a great, continual, supernatural community in the midst of the material world; and every believing soul, because it possesses something of the life of Jesus Christ, has been the seat of a miracle as real and true as when He said, " Lazarus, come forth!" Precisely this teaching does our Lord Himself present for our acceptance when He sets side by side, as mutually illustrative, as belonging to the same order of supernatural phenomena, the hour cometh when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God, and they that hear shall live, which is the supernatural resurrection of souls dead in sin, "and the hour cometh when all that are in the graves shall hear His voice, and shall come forth," which is the future resurrection of the body in obedience to His will.

So, Christian friend, do you set clearly before you this: that God’s purpose with you is only begun when He has forgiven you, that He forgives you for a design, that it is a means to an end, and that you have not reached the conception of the large things He intends for you unless you have risen to this great thought - He means and wishes that you should be strong with the strength of His own Divine Spirit.