When Friends Fail
“ Evening, morning, and noon I cry out in distress, and he hears my voice ” —Psalm 55:17, NIV. The title given for Psalm 55 in my Bible is “Prayer for friends who betray.” As you begin to read the psalm you are struck with the depth of David’s despair as he faces the most hurtful situation of all—a friend who becomes an enemy. “ If an enemy were insulting me, I could endure it; if a foe were raising himself against me, I could hide from him. But it is you, a man like myself, my companion, my close friend, with whom I once enjoyed sweet fellowship as we walked with the throng at the house of God ” (vss. 12-14). David’s enemies were often his own children. His closest companions-in-arms and confidantes often overstepped their authority and committed acts that David repudiated. Those he trusted, feeling that their own welfare was more secure if they supported the opposition, sometimes switched sides in the political seesaw of the kingdom. The pain of that betrayal never left Dav...