What does Psalm 6:2 mean?

Feeling that chastening was about to take place, David feels physically distressed. He writes, "my bones are troubled." The Hebrew word for "troubled" can mean "weak, faint, troubled, or terrified." Whatever had come between David and the Lord had taken a heavy toll on David's strength. He felt close to death; he was languishing. This might have been a literal disease, something David might have seen as a punishment from God.

David asks the Lord to be gracious to him. The only way to escape his wretched condition is to receive what he does not deserve, namely, God's grace. It is by grace alone that the Lord saves and forgives. Sin separates the sinner from the Lord, but grace erases the sin and draws the sinner to the Lord. In his letter to the Romans, Paul writes, "For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus" (Romans 3:23–24).