Old age can be a fearful time, especially as one becomes more and more vulnerable to the manipulations of others. This psalm is a prayer of an old person (“when I am old,” v. 9, and “when I am old and gray,” v. 18) whose devotion to God has been lifelong (“since my youth,” vv. 5, 17, “from birth,” v. 6). The bond between the speaker and God is expressed in the characteristic phrase of the individual prayer psalms, “my God” (vv. 4, 12, 22), that is, “my personal God.” The psalm also gives repeated attention to “your righteousness” (vv. 2, 15, 16, 19, 24; cf. 5:8; 31:1; 119:40; 143:1). We should not think of this as a static, moral description of being but a dynamic, characteristic action of putting things right. Its parallel expressions illustrate the point: “your salvation” (v. 15) and “yo…