Gustave Doré’s engraving of David standing crowned and bowed as he mourns Absalom

Psalm 121

One of the fifteen Songs of Ascents, which St Athanasius said to pray when you can feel yourself climbing higher.

  • 8Verses
  • 1Situation

St Athanasius, Letter to Marcellinus

When to pray it

In the 300s, St Athanasius of Alexandria wrote a letter to his friend Marcellinus about praying the Psalms. In it he matched psalms to what people go through. This is what he gave this one for.

You can feel yourself climbing: forgetting what's behind you and straining toward what's ahead.

When you sense yourself climbing higher in how you live, so that you can say with Paul, "forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead", you have the fifteen Songs of Ascents to say at every step forward.

Letter to Marcellinus

He gave all fifteen Songs of Ascents for this, Psalms 120 to 134.

8 verses, Berean Standard Bible

The whole psalm

Psalm 121

Its own heading A song of ascents.

  1. 1I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come?
  2. 2My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth.
  3. 3He will not allow your foot to slip; your Protector will not slumber.
  4. 4Behold, the Protector of Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.
  5. 5The LORD is your keeper; the LORD is the shade on your right hand.
  6. 6The sun will not strike you by day, nor the moon by night.
  7. 7The LORD will guard you from all evil; He will preserve your soul.
  8. 8The LORD will watch over your coming and going, both now and forevermore.

Psalm 121 is 120 in the Greek numbering Athanasius used, which Orthodox Bibles and some older Catholic ones still follow.

When life is good, and you want to thank Him and grow

Close to this

All 53 situations, in one guide.

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Bible text: Berean Standard Bible, public domain. Athanasius’s advice is paraphrased from his Greek.