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When Kindness Gets Repaid with Cruelty.

Psalm 35 — When the people you fasted for throw a party at your downfall

8 min read

Key Takeaways

David fasted for these people when they were sick, mourned for them like family — and they threw a party the moment he stumbled.

This psalm gives you permission to bring raw, unfiltered pain to God without cleaning up your emotions first.
The prayer doesn't start clean, but it ends in worship — and that's the most honest kind of faith there is.

📢 Chapter 35 — When Kindness Gets Repaid with Cruelty ⚔️

isn't being diplomatic here. He isn't asking politely. He's bringing raw, unfiltered pain to God — the kind that comes from being betrayed by people he genuinely cared about. People he fasted for when they were sick. People he mourned over like family. And now they're celebrating his downfall.

What comes out is a that moves between fury and grief and , sometimes in the same breath. If you've ever been blindsided by someone you trusted, this is going to feel uncomfortably familiar.

Inside this Chapter

Hope Anger Faith Grief Prayer Justice Rejection Suffering

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God, Suit Up ⚔️

opened with warrior language. He wasn't asking God to comfort him — he was asking God to fight:

"Go to war for me, Lord — fight the people who are fighting me!

Pick up your shield. Grab your armor. Rise up and come to my defense!

Draw your spear and block the path of everyone chasing me. Say to my soul directly: 'I am your salvation.'"

There's something striking about this. David was a warrior himself — he'd fought giants, armies, wild animals. But this wasn't a battle he could win with a sword. Sometimes the fight isn't physical. It's relational, reputational, emotional. And the only thing left to do is ask the one person who actually has the authority to step in.

Scatter Them Like Dust 🌬️

didn't hold back on what he wanted God to do to the people coming after him:

"Let the people hunting me down be humiliated and disgraced. Let everyone scheming against me be stopped cold — turned around with nothing to show for it.

Make them like chaff in the wind — with your angel driving them away.

Make their path pitch-dark and slippery, with your angel right behind them."

This is the kind of most people feel guilty for praying. We've been taught to keep it polite, keep it measured. But David didn't edit himself before coming to God. He brought the full weight of what he was feeling — the frustration, the desire for , the urgency — and put it all on the table. That's not a lack of . That's what faith sounds like when it's under real pressure.

The Trap That Catches Its Maker 🕸️

described what his enemies had been doing behind the scenes — and then asked God to let their own schemes become their undoing:

"They set a trap for me for no reason. They dug a pit to destroy me — and I'd done nothing to deserve it.

Let ruin catch them by surprise. Let the very net they hid be the one that catches them. Let them fall into their own pit — straight to their destruction.

Then my soul will celebrate in the Lord. Everything in me will be glad because of his rescue."

And then David said something that belongs on repeat:

"Every bone in my body will say: 'Lord, who is like you? You rescue the powerless from the people who overpower them — the poor and needy from the ones who exploit them.'"

That last line is worth sitting with. David wasn't just asking for personal payback. He was pointing to something bigger — the character of a God who consistently sides with the person who has no leverage. The one who can't fight back. The one everyone else has already written off.

I Was the One Who Mourned for Them 💔

This is the emotional center of the . And it's where laid out the full, devastating contrast:

"Hostile witnesses stepped forward, accusing me of things I knew nothing about. They paid me back with cruelty for every kindness I'd ever shown them. My soul feels completely stripped.

But when they were the ones hurting? I put on sackcloth. I fasted until it hurt. I prayed face-down on the ground. I walked around grieving like I'd lost my closest friend, my own brother. Like someone mourning his mother — that's how deeply I carried their pain.

But the moment I stumbled? They threw a party. They gathered together against me — people I didn't even recognize piled on, tearing me apart without stopping. Like mockers at a banquet, grinding their teeth at me."

Let that contrast sink in. When they were hurting, David showed up. He grieved. He fasted. He prayed. And when David was the one hurting? They laughed. They celebrated. They invited strangers to join in the mockery.

If you've ever invested deeply in someone — been there for them at their lowest, carried their pain like it was your own — and then watched them turn on you the moment you needed something? This passage isn't ancient history. It's your story. And David's honesty here gives you permission to bring that kind of pain to God without cleaning it up first.

How Long Are You Going to Watch This? 😤

voice cracked with urgency here. He wasn't questioning God's goodness — he was questioning God's timing:

"How long, Lord? How long are you going to just watch this happen? Rescue me from their destruction — save my life from these lions!

I will praise you in front of everyone. In the great assembly, I will thank you publicly.

Don't let people who are wrongfully against me gloat. Don't let the ones who hate me for no reason exchange knowing looks.

They don't speak peace — not even close. They target quiet, peaceful people and carefully craft lies against them. They open their mouths wide and mock me: 'Ha! We saw it all with our own eyes!'"

There's a detail here that's easy to miss. The people David was up against weren't just openly hostile. They were strategic. Calculated. They "devised words of deceit" specifically against people "who are quiet in the land" — people who weren't looking for conflict. It's the ancient version of someone building a false narrative behind your back while you're just trying to live your life. The group chat you're not in. The story being shaped without your voice in the room.

You Saw Everything 👁️

pivoted from describing what his enemies saw to reminding God of what God saw:

"You've seen everything, Lord — don't stay silent! Don't be far from me!

Wake up! Rise up and fight for my cause — my God and my Lord!

Vindicate me according to your righteousness. Don't let them gloat over me. Don't let them think, 'This is exactly what we wanted.' Don't let them say, 'We've swallowed him whole.'

Let everyone who celebrated my suffering be completely put to shame. Let the ones who made themselves big at my expense be clothed in disgrace."

"You've seen everything." Four words that change the entire dynamic. David's enemies thought they were getting away with it. They thought no one noticed the manipulation, the false accusations, the knowing looks they exchanged when they thought no one was watching. But David knew something they didn't: there is a witness to every conversation, every scheme, every smirk. And that witness is the .

The Last Word Belongs to the Faithful 🎉

After all that pain, all the pleading, all the raw honesty — ended somewhere beautiful:

"But the people who believed I was in the right? Let them shout for joy. Let them celebrate. Let them keep saying, forever: 'The Lord is great — he genuinely delights in the well-being of his servant!'

And my tongue will tell of your righteousness. I will praise you all day long."

That's where this lands. Not in bitterness. Not in revenge fantasies. In . David moved through fury, grief, confusion, and desperation — and came out on the other side still talking to God. Still trusting. Still praising. The didn't start , but it ended in exactly the right place. And sometimes that's the most honest kind of there is — not the kind that never wavers, but the kind that wrestles its way back to trust every single time.