The first paragraph below is from Psalm 138. The second paragraph consists entirely of different renderings of the verse which follows, Psalm 138:8.
Though the Lord is exalted, he looks kindly on the lowly;
the arrogant he watches from afar.
Though I walk in the midst of trouble,
Lord, you preserve my life.
You stretch out your right hand against the anger of my enemies;
and you save me.
The Lord will vindicate me;
The Lord will avenge me;
The Lord will fulfill his purpose for me;
The Lord will accomplish all that concerns me;
The Lord will do everything for me;
The Lord will work out his plans for my life;
The Lord will finish what he started for me;
The Lord is with me until the end
Those last phrases are all translations of the same verse taken from different translations of the Bible. These are all a number of different translators’ understandings of how best to express the idea that the Psalm writer included in verse eight. The idea that God will. He will.
It’s the same idea that we see in the writings of the apostle Paul when he says, “I am confident of this: that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 1:6)
It’s that idea that God doesn’t give up. He doesn’t give up on us when we keep making the same mistakes over and over again. When we wake up in the morning feeling like failures because of whatever happened last night. God doesn’t give up on the people we love who we are praying for.
Some of us have people we are praying for for one thing or another. God does not give up on them. God does not give up and he will complete the good work that he has begun. God is working, he is active. He is always working on the good thing that he began in us and in Creation.
– Ruth Wilkinson
Related verse: 1 Corinthians 1:18
He will also strengthen you to the end, so that you will be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.
In Matthew Henry’s Complete Commentary, he looks at verse 8:
The assurance we have that whatever good work God has begun in and for his people he will perform it (Psalms 138:8; Psalms 138:8): The Lord will perfect that which concerns me,
1. That which is most needful for me; and he knows best what is so. We are careful and cumbered about many things that do not concern us, but he knows what are the things that really are of consequence to us (Matthew 6:32) and he will order them for the best.
2. That which we are most concerned about. Every good man is most concerned about his duty to God and his happiness in God, that the former may be faithfully done and the latter effectually secured; and if indeed these are the things that our hearts are most upon, and concerning which we are most solicitous,* there is a good work begun in us, and he that has begun it will perfect it, we may be confident he will, Philippians 1:6.
Observe, (1.) What ground the psalmist builds this confidence upon: Thy mercy, O Lord! endures for ever. This he had made very much the matter of his praise (Psalms 13:6), and therefore he could here with the more assurance make it the matter of his hope. For, if we give God the glory of his mercy, we may take to ourselves the comfort of it. Our hopes that we shall persevere must be founded, not upon our own strength, for that will fail us, but upon the mercy of God, for that will not fail. It is well pleaded, “Lord, thy mercy endures for ever; let me be for ever a monument of it.”
(2.) What use he makes of this confidence; it does not supersede, but quicken prayer; he turns his expectation into a petition: “Forsake not, do not let go, the work of thy own hands. Lord, I am the work of thy own hands, my soul is so, do not forsake me; my concerns are so, do not lay by thy care of them.” Whatever good there is in us it is the work of God’s own hands; he works in us both to will and to do; it will fail if he forsake it; but his glory, as Jehovah, a perfecting God, is so much concerned in the progress of it to the end that we may in faith pray, “Lord, do not forsake it.” Whom he loves he loves to the end; and, as for God, his work is perfect.
*The term ‘solicitous’ means that which we are most interested in and most concerned about, or perhaps most anxious about
The verse in Matthew that Matthew Henry refers to is this:
These things dominate the thoughts of unbelievers, but your heavenly Father already knows all your needs.
It’s the verse which proceeds, “But seek first the kingdom of God…”
Christianity 201 