---
title: Psalms 51:11
url: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/psalms-51-11/
markdown: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/psalms-51-11.md
type: verse
perspective: Protestant (historic Nicene) response to Jehovah's Witness teaching
reference: Psalms 51:11
testament: OT
section: Poetry
index: https://jw-apologetics.app/llms.txt
---

# Psalms 51:11

## Text (Berean Standard Bible)

> Cast me not away from Your presence; take not Your Holy Spirit from me.

## NWT Wording of the Key Phrase

- NWT (2013 revision): "Do not cast me out from your presence; And do not take your holy spirit away from me."

## JW Usage

JWs read David's plea — "do not take your holy spirit away from me" — as evidence that the holy spirit can be withdrawn from a servant of Jehovah, fitting their pneumatology of the spirit as active force conditionally present. The verse is sometimes applied to baptised members under reproof to warn that personal sin can interrupt the spirit's blessing.

## Protestant Usage

David's prayer reflects the Old Covenant Spirit-economy — the Spirit came on selected leaders for empowering tasks (1 Samuel 16:13-14) and could be withdrawn (1 Samuel 16:14, immediately after the Spirit comes on David, the same Spirit departs from Saul). Jesus expressly inaugurates a different mode in John 14:16- 17 — "He will be with you forever... He abides with you and will be in you". Pentecost inaugurates a new arrangement in which the Spirit is given as the seal and pledge of the believer's inheritance (Ephesians 1:13-14) — sealed for the day of redemption, not until the next slip-up. Paul's letters never threaten Spirit-withdrawal as discipline; they warn against grieving (Ephesians 4:30) and quenching (1 Thessalonians 5:19) — language that treats the Spirit as a present person being mistreated, not a fluid that drains away. The "sin blocks the spirit from the household" framing borrows David's Old Covenant prayer and applies it to a New Covenant reality the prayer was never written for.

## Arguments Using This Verse

- [Sin Doesn't Block the Spirit from the Household — The Seal That Stays](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/sin-blocks-holy-spirit-household.md) — Ephesians 1:13-14 — Sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise [Holy Spirit]