"Another matter: How long, O Lord, will You forget me? Forever? How long will You hide Your face from me? (Psalms 13:2) The Knesset of Israel said to the Lord: 'There is a King without a throne, a King without subjects. How long, O Lord, will You forget us?'
Man, what did you say to the prophet Samuel, who was the champion of Israel? As it is said: "And also, the Glory of Israel will not lie or have regret" (1 Samuel 15:29) and it also says: "God is not a man, that He should lie" (Numbers 23:19). Rabbi Samuel said: This verse is neither the beginning nor the end of the matter. When the Lord decrees to bring good into the world, no man is a god who can lie, but when He decrees evil, that statement is made.
Thus, when the Lord said to Abraham: "For in Isaac shall your seed be called" (Genesis 21:12), no man is a god who can lie. And when He said to him: "Take now your son" (Genesis 22:2), he said and did not do. And when He said to him: "And also the nation whom they will serve, I will judge" (Genesis 15:14), he said and did not do. And when He said: "I have surely visited you" (Exodus 3:16), no man is a god who can lie.
And when He said to him: "Let Me alone, that I may destroy them" (Deuteronomy 9:14), he said and did not do. Rabbi Berechiah said: There was a certain pious man who preached that "You shall not afflict any widow, or fatherless child" (Exodus 22:21). One widow heard him and came to him. He said to her, "Go now, and I will come after you."
She said to him, "If you had not preached to me that 'You shall not afflict any widow or fatherless child,' you would not have come to me now." Thus said the Knesset of Israel: 'Master of the Universe, we have not come to You except relying on what is written: "For the poor will not always be forgotten; the hope of the needy will not perish forever" (Psalms 9:19)."