Bible verses for bullying can remind you that you are loved and seen when others are cruel. Whether the hurt comes at school, online, or at work, God promises to be your shield and the lifter of your head. Read these verses when you feel small, pray them when you are afraid, and share them with someone who is struggling.
I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvellous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well.
Psalms 139:14 (KJV)
Whatever others say, this verse reminds you that you are fearfully and wonderfully made by God.
But thou, O Lord, art a shield for me; my glory, and the lifter up of mine head.
Psalms 3:3 (KJV)
When shame weighs you down, God is your shield, your glory, and the lifter of your head.
The righteous cry, and the Lord heareth, and delivereth them out of all their troubles. The Lord is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit.
Psalms 34:17-18 (KJV)
The righteous cry and the Lord hears, drawing near to those whose hearts are broken.
Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness.
Isaiah 41:10 (KJV)
God promises to be with you, strengthen you, and hold you up when you feel afraid.
No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper; and every tongue that shall rise against thee in judgment thou shalt condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord, and their righteousness is of me, saith the Lord.
Isaiah 54:17 (KJV)
No weapon formed against God’s servants will prosper, and every tongue raised against them will be answered.
The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? the Lord is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?
Psalms 27:1 (KJV)
With the Lord as your light and strength, you can ask with confidence whom you should fear.
The name of the Lord is a strong tower: the righteous runneth into it, and is safe.
Proverbs 18:10 (KJV)
The name of the Lord is a strong tower where the righteous can run and be safe.
Be strong and of a good courage, fear not, nor be afraid of them: for the Lord thy God, he it is that doth go with thee; he will not fail thee, nor forsake thee.
Deuteronomy 31:6 (KJV)
You can be strong and courageous because God goes with you and will never forsake you.
Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.
Matthew 5:11-12 (KJV)
Jesus says those who are mocked and falsely accused for His sake are blessed and can rejoice.
But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;
Matthew 5:44 (KJV)
Praying for those who mistreat you keeps bitterness from taking root, as Jesus taught.
Not rendering evil for evil, or railing for railing: but contrariwise blessing; knowing that ye are thereunto called, that ye should inherit a blessing.
1 Peter 3:9 (KJV)
Instead of trading insult for insult, believers are called to bless, and they inherit a blessing.
Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good.
Romans 12:21 (KJV)
You do not have to be overcome by evil; you can overcome it with good.
Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you.
1 Peter 5:7 (KJV)
Every worry about school, work, or the people hurting you can be cast on God, because He cares for you.
And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.
2 Corinthians 12:9 (KJV)
When you feel weak and small, God’s grace is enough and His strength shows up in your weakness.
The Lord thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save, he will rejoice over thee with joy; he will rest in his love, he will joy over thee with singing.
Zephaniah 3:17 (KJV)
God is mighty in your midst and rejoices over you with joy, even when others reject you.
Open thy mouth for the dumb in the cause of all such as are appointed to destruction. Open thy mouth, judge righteously, and plead the cause of the poor and needy.
Proverbs 31:8-9 (KJV)
For friends and bystanders, this is a call to speak up for someone who cannot defend themselves.
Start with who God says you are. Psalms 139:14 and Zephaniah 3:17 speak truth that is louder than any insult. Try writing one of these verses on a card and reading it each morning, or saying it quietly when hurtful words replay in your mind. Psalms 3:3 and Psalms 34:17-18 are good prayers when you feel alone.
These verses do not mean you have to stay silent. God cares about justice, and asking for help is wise. Tell a parent, teacher, pastor, supervisor, or another trusted adult what is happening, and keep a record of what was said or done. If you feel anxious, low, or unsafe, talking with a counselor or doctor is a good and faithful step. Jesus’ words in Matthew 5:44 and Romans 12:21 guide your heart, not your safety plan.
If you see someone else being bullied, Proverbs 31:8-9 calls you to speak up. A kind word, sitting with someone at lunch, or reporting what you saw can make a real difference. Parents and youth leaders can read these verses with young people and pray together for courage, healing, and wisdom.
Bible Verses For Bullying are easier to hold onto when you know the stories behind them. The six people below were mocked, dismissed, or physically threatened, and each one shows a different way God showed up for them in it.
1 Samuel 17:28-29 describes David’s own brother Eliab snapping at him for even showing up at the battle line, accusing him of pride and asking why he had left the sheep. Moments later, Goliath looked at young David and despised him outright, according to verse 42. David was mocked first by his family and then by his enemy, within the same hour. He answered both by trusting God rather than defending his own reputation, and went on to win the fight everyone else was too afraid to take.
2 Kings 2:23-24 describes a group of young men following the prophet Elisha and jeering at him, calling him names because of his bald head. It is one of the few places in Scripture where someone is mocked for something as simple as his appearance. God took the mistreatment of His prophet seriously, even in an episode that reads almost like a modern story of being taunted on the way home.
Jeremiah 38:6 describes officials lowering the prophet Jeremiah into a muddy cistern to silence him, after Jeremiah 20:7-10 already describes him saying he had become a joke, mocked by everyone around him all day long. Jeremiah was honest with God about how much the mockery hurt, and God did not rebuke him for admitting it. His story shows that naming the pain of being mistreated is not a lack of faith.
Genesis 16:6 describes Hagar fleeing into the wilderness after harsh treatment, and Genesis 21:14-19 describes her sent away a second time with her son, left to weep alone until God met her there. Hagar was mistreated by people who had power over her and no one to defend her, yet Scripture records God hearing her directly and naming her son in a way that meant God had seen her affliction. She is proof that being overlooked by people does not mean being overlooked by God.
2 Samuel 6:16-22 describes Michal watching David dance before the Lord and despising him for it in her heart, later mocking him openly when he came home. The mockery here came from inside David’s own household, from someone who should have celebrated with him. David’s answer was simply that he would rather be humble before the Lord than respected by someone who misunderstood him.
Acts 6:8-15 describes false accusations raised against Stephen, and Acts 7:54-60 describes the crowd covering their ears, grinding their teeth, and eventually stoning him while he prayed for them. Stephen faced the most extreme form of mistreatment in the New Testament, and his final words were not bitterness but forgiveness toward the people hurting him.
David’s brothers, a crowd of taunting youths, officials who silenced Jeremiah, Hagar’s mistreatment, Michal’s mockery, and the crowd that killed Stephen were not the same kind of cruelty, but in every case God saw the person being hurt. Bible Verses For Bullying exist because this kind of pain is common, and because none of these six people were ever actually alone in it.
Lord, when I am mocked like David was by his own brothers, remind me that You see my heart, not the insult. When I am taunted like Elisha, protect my sense of who I am in You. When the words hurt like they hurt Jeremiah, let me be honest with You about the pain instead of hiding it. Like Hagar, let me know that You see me even when no one else does. Like David before Michal, let me value Your opinion of me over anyone else’s. And like Stephen, give me a heart that can forgive even the people who are hurting me. Amen.
These Bible Verses For Bullying are only as useful as the habits they become. Like David, let your identity rest in what God says about you rather than in family or peer approval. Like Elisha, remember that cruelty aimed at something as simple as your appearance says more about the person mocking you than about you. Like Jeremiah, find someone safe to be honest with about how much it hurts. Like Hagar, trust that God notices what other people overlook. Like David before Michal, do not let someone else’s misunderstanding talk you out of being who you are. Like Stephen, ask God for the strength to forgive, even slowly.
Before leaving these Bible Verses For Bullying, sit with these two questions. David faced mockery from family before he faced it from an enemy. Where does unkindness toward you tend to start closest to home? Hagar was mistreated by people with power over her, yet God met her directly. Where do you need to believe God sees you, even if no one around you does?
Psalm 139:14 is the verse people paste onto posters, and it deserves better than a poster. “I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvellous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well.” The word fearfully here carries awe, the kind you feel standing at the edge of something enormous. David is saying that his own body, the one he lives in, is a piece of workmanship that should make a person stop and stare. He wrote it, remember, as a man who had been hunted, laughed at and betrayed.
That matters if you are the kid whose ears, weight, accent, skin or stammer has become other people’s favorite target. The things you are teased about are very often the exact details a bully has chosen to attack because they are visible, not because they are flaws. Among the Bible Verses For Bullying, this one gives a different measuring stick. The crowd measures you by what is easy to mock. God, according to this psalm, measures you as something carefully made, down to the parts nobody else can see.
The last phrase is worth slowing down for: “my soul knoweth right well.” David did not just hear this once and believe it. He knew it, over time, by repeating it. Some days that knowing will arrive slowly. Say the verse out loud anyway, even if it feels a bit silly when you start.
The little heading above Psalm 3 tells us when it was written, while David fled from Absalom his son. A father driven out of his own capital by his own child, with people along the road throwing dirt and curses at him (2 Samuel 16:5-13). If anyone ever had reason to walk with his eyes on the ground, it was David that week. Yet verse 3 says, “But thou, O LORD, art a shield for me; my glory, and the lifter up of mine head.”
Think about what a lifted head means. When someone has been humiliated, the body gives it away: shoulders curled, chin down, eyes on the floor tiles. A person who is being picked on at school or work learns to make themselves smaller. This verse speaks right at that posture. God is pictured as a hand under the chin, gently raising it back up. He does not shout at the person to stop feeling shame. He simply lifts.
One of the gentlest Bible Verses For Bullying, then, is also one of the most physical. If you have been walking the hallway looking at your shoes, try reading Psalm 3:3 before you leave the house, and then lift your eyes to the first face you see. It is a small act, and it is not a pretence. It is a way of agreeing with what the verse says is true.
Psalm 34 comes with a backstory. David wrote it after pretending to be insane in front of a Philistine king, scratching on doors and drooling in his beard (1 Samuel 21:10-15), because he was terrified for his life. This is not the voice of a confident hero. It is a scared man who got away by the skin of his teeth and then wrote a song about it. So when verse 17 says, “The righteous cry, and the LORD heareth, and delivereth them out of all their troubles”, it comes from someone who knew what fear tasted like.
Verse 18 is the one many hurting people hold: “The LORD is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit.” Nigh means near. Not far above the situation, not waiting at the finish line, but near. A girl crying in a bathroom stall during lunch, or a boy sitting in a parked car outside the office dreading the walk in, is not beyond the reach of that sentence.
Be careful not to hear more than the text says. It does not promise that every trouble ends by Friday. It says God hears and that he is close to the crushed. Rescue sometimes comes through a teacher who finally acts, a new school, a friend who sits down next to you. Watch for those doors. Often they are how the verse gets answered.
Isaiah 54:17 is quoted often by people under attack. “No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper; and every tongue that shall rise against thee in judgment thou shalt condemn.” It is a bold verse, and it can lift a person’s spirits quickly. It is also easy to misuse, so it is worth asking what it was written to say.
Isaiah was speaking to a people who had been through exile, whose city had been torn down and whose future looked fragile. God promises them a rebuilt household, secure and safe from the enemies who had crushed them before. The weapon will not prosper, which means it will not achieve its final aim of wiping them out. It does not say that no weapon will ever land a blow. People in the Bible got hit, as Jeremiah and Stephen show elsewhere on this page. The promise is that the attack does not get the last word.
That is a sturdier comfort than a guarantee of no pain, because it will still be true when something hurtful does happen. The cruel text may sting, the rumor may spread, and yet the story is not over and the bully does not decide how it ends. Among the Bible Verses For Bullying, this one is best held as a promise about the ending, while you also take sensible steps today, such as telling an adult and saving what was said.
Matthew 5:44 is a difficult verse to hear when you are still hurting: “But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you.” Nobody should hurry a bullied person toward this. It comes after you are safe, and sometimes long after.
Still, there is something the verse does that people overlook. Praying for the person who wounds you changes who they are in your imagination. Before, they were a monster who lives in your head and ruins your Sunday evenings. After a few honest prayers, they become a person, someone with a home you cannot see, perhaps one where nobody is gentle with them. That does not excuse a single thing they did. It just takes away some of their size. Romans 12:21 says, “Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good”, and the first place that happens is inside you, where bitterness would otherwise take root.
Please hear what the verse is not asking. It is not asking you to stay near someone who keeps harming you, or to pretend nothing happened, or to hand over your lunch money with a smile. Loving an enemy and keeping a boundary can happen on the same day. Peter said the same in 1 Peter 3:9 when he told believers not to render evil for evil. Choosing not to retaliate is different from choosing to be a target.
Paul wrote 2 Corinthians 12:9 after begging God three times to remove something painful that he calls a thorn in the flesh. The answer he got was not removal. It was this: “My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness.” Paul does not tell us what the thorn was, and that is probably kind to the rest of us, because it leaves room for whatever your own thorn happens to be.
Plenty of people being bullied feel ashamed of how weak they seem. They cannot talk their way out, cannot fight back, cannot stop crying in front of the others. The Bible does not tell them to become tougher before God will help. It says the opposite: the place where you feel weakest is exactly where his help can be seen most clearly. One of the quieter Bible Verses For Bullying, it permits a person to be tired and scared without being a failure.
Pair that with 1 Peter 5:7, which says to cast all your care upon him, “for he careth for you.” Casting is a throwing motion. It suggests handing the weight over, again and again, rather than carrying it politely. If the heaviness is turning into constant dread, trouble sleeping or a feeling that nothing will ever change, please talk to a doctor, school counselor or someone trained to help. Asking for that help is not a lack of faith. It is the kind of practical care God often uses.
Many people open a page like this because someone they love is being hurt. A mother notices her son stops eating dinner. A teacher sees the same name scribbled on a locker. A friend watches a group chat go sour. Proverbs 31:8-9 speaks to all of them: “Open thy mouth for the dumb in the cause of all such as are appointed to destruction. Open thy mouth, judge righteously, and plead the cause of the poor and needy.”
Notice the verb. Open. The verse is not asking for eloquence, only for the willingness to speak up on behalf of someone whose own voice has been silenced by fear. In practice that can look quite ordinary: asking a child a gentle, direct question and then actually waiting for the answer, writing down dates and details, calling the school and following up when nothing changes, sitting next to the one who is alone. Bible Verses For Bullying are meant to move us into those ordinary acts, not just comfort us from a distance.
Deuteronomy 31:6 belongs here too. Moses told a frightened people, “Be strong and of a good courage, fear not, nor be afraid of them: for the LORD thy God, he it is that doth go with thee; he will not fail thee, nor forsake thee.” A hurting child walking into school on Monday can hear that, and so can the adult who has to stand up to a difficult principal or boss on their behalf. You are not doing it by yourself.
Readers interested in bullying often continue with Bible Verses For Comfort and Strength, Bible Verses For Raising Children, Bible Verses For Love and Relationships, Bible Verses About Peace and Strength, Bible Verses For Provision, Bible Verses About Strength and Hope, Bible Verses About Walking by Faith, Bible Verses For God Giving Strength, Bible Verses About Discipleship, Bible Verses About Christian Living and Bible Verses About Protection from Evil.
Helpful free resources for further study include Bible Gateway, Bible Hub and Bible Study Tools.
Start with who God says you are. Psalms 139:14 and Zephaniah 3:17 speak truth that is louder than any insult. Try writing one of these verses on a card and reading it each morning, or saying it quietly when hurtful words replay in your mind.
This page brings together 7 King James Version references about bullying, drawn from 5 different books of the Bible.
These bullying verses are drawn from books including Psalms, Zephaniah, Matthew, Romans, Proverbs.
Yes. The verses about bullying gathered here include passages from both the Old Testament and the New Testament, such as Psalms 139:14 and Matthew 5:44.
Psalms 139:14 is one of the verses about bullying referenced in this collection, alongside Zephaniah 3:17.
