I Shall Be Satisfied

“As for me, I will behold thy face in righteousness: I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with thy likeness.” (Psalm 17:15)

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More than twenty years ago, I sat in my college dorm room as a resident assistant and taught one of my first devotionals to a hall of underclassmen. I opened to Psalm 17 and gave the devotional with the title that stands at the top of this page. I was an early twenty-something with a Bible and more confidence than experience, holding a small sense of what God would carry me through in the years ahead. Two decades later, the title reads truer than it did that night. I have cried out to Him in the dark many times, and each morning I have wakened satisfied with His likeness, His face. Twenty years from now I expect those same words to be truer than they are now.

Most of us know that appetite. We cry out in the dark and wait for the light. We feel a longing that runs deeper than food and a thirst that outlasts the next drink. This week’s Scripture gathers that longing and names its fulfillment. They trace the Bible from a wrestling match in the night to a table in the wilderness, and they return again and again to one word: satisfied. We were made to wake and find our hunger satisfied in the countenance of God.

Genesis 32:22-31

Jacob spends the night alone by the river and wrestles a stranger until daybreak. He clings to the man and holds his grip: “I won’t let you go unless you bless me” (Genesis 32:26). He receives a new name, Israel, and he limps away at sunrise having seen God face to face and lived. Here the theme of satisfaction begins. The struggle happens in the dark, and the blessing comes with the morning. Jacob learns that the face he sought through a long night was God’s own face, and that seeing it marked his walk with a limp for the rest of his life. The cry in the night reaches toward the same desire Psalm 17 puts into song.

Psalm 17:1-7, 15

David prays as a man under pressure, calling on God with truthful lips and asking to be kept as the apple of God’s eye. He has cried out day and night, and he anchors the psalm on a settled hope: “I will be satisfied, when I awake, with seeing your countenance” (Psalm 17:15). More than a rescue, David asks to wake and see God. The satisfaction he waits for is the face Jacob glimpsed at the river, and it extends beyond Jacob’s life to all those who desire satisfaction in God alone.

Psalm 145:8-9, 14-21

Whose does this face look like? It is the Lord who is gracious and full of compassion, slow to anger, and rich in loving kindness (Psalm 145:8). He holds up all who are falling and steadies every empty morning: “You open your hand, and satisfy the desire of every living thing” (Psalm 145:16). The satisfaction David longs for in Psalm 17 rests on the character of God in Psalm 145. He is near to all who call on Him in truth, and His open hand meets the hunger of His creation. The waiting of the night stands on a God whose provision arrives every morning.

Isaiah 55:1-5

Hear Isaiah’s invitation and promise crying out in the marketplace: “Everyone who thirsts, come to the waters” (Isaiah 55:1). Come and buy without money and without price. Bring your hunger to food that fills, and eat what is good. God offers an everlasting covenant (promise), the steadfast love promised to David, and He enlarges the table to nations who were once strangers to Him. Satisfaction that David sought and Psalm 145 described is now extended to any who will incline the ear to his gracious invitation and come. Hunger is common to all, and therefore is the welcome.

Matthew 14:13-21

Matthew’s gospel gives the invitation a face that takes on human flesh. Jesus withdraws to grieve, the crowds follow Him, and He is moved with compassion for them. Evening comes, the people are hungry, and the disciples ask Him to send the crowd away. Jesus answers, “They don’t need to go away. You give them something to eat” (Matthew 14:16). He takes five loaves and two fish, looks up to heaven, blesses, breaks, and gives generously. They all ate and were filled, with twelve baskets left over. God who opens His hand in Psalm 145 now stands in a field and opens His hands to a hungry crowd. The countenance of God that David longed to see has come near enough to touch, and He satisfies the hungry with Himself. To look on Jesus is to behold the face Jacob saw at the river.

Romans 9:1-5

Sadly, Paul reveals the other side of this hunger. He writes with great sorrow and unceasing pain in his heart for his own people, willing even to be cut off for their sake (Romans 9:2-3). To Israel belong the covenants, the worship, the promises, and the Messiah, who is God over all, blessed forever. Paul grieves that many who were given the table have yet to come to it. His anguish shows us that satisfaction in the face of God stands offered to all and the invitation goes unanswered by many. The night continues for people we love, and more importantly, who God loves, and the invitation of Isaiah 55 requires our voices to carry it.

Conclusion

Jesus reveals the face we were made to witness, and He shows us how to reflect His countenance. Through Scripture, He appears as the compassion of God in the flesh, the host who feeds the crowd, and the covenant held out to the nations. We follow Him in three ways. We hold on through the night like Jacob, praying and waiting for God who blesses at daybreak, trusting that we will wake satisfied with His likeness. We come to the table like the thirsty in Isaiah, receiving from His open hand the food that fills. And we carry Paul’s burden into the world, telling hungry people where the food is, because Jesus put the loaves into the disciples’ hands and said, you give them something to eat. Worship that is satisfied by Christ sends us out with Bread of Life to generously share with all who will believe.

Points to Ponder

• Where are you wrestling in the night right now, and what would it look like to hold on until the blessing comes?
• Psalm 17 waits to be satisfied with God’s likeness. Name one lesser thing you have asked to satisfy you in His place.
• Jesus handed the bread to the disciples to give out. Who in your life is seated at an empty plate, waiting for someone to bring the food?

Prayer

Father, You are gracious and full of compassion, slow to anger, and rich in steadfast love. I have cried out to You in the night, and I ask again to wake and be satisfied with Your face. Feed the hunger in me that You alone satisfy. Open Your hand and fill me, then send me with bread to the hungry near me, for the sake of Jesus, who is Your likeness and my satisfaction. Amen.

“You open your hand, and satisfy the desire of every living thing.” (Psalm 145:16)