Wednesday, January 3, 2024

The book of Psalms in the scriptures is interesting in that it's organized into five books, actually. You might find that notation pretty close to Psalm 42. It may say in your Bible, Book 2. And this is an interesting thing because the other books in the Bible that are broken up into various books, we call them 1 Samuel, 2 Samuel, 1 Kings, 2 Kings.

Let's say 1 Psalms, 2 Psalms, 3 Psalms. Why don't we do that? Because a psalm is not a chapter. We have divided up 1 and 2 Kings into various chapters. These are two scrolls of one very long story. But when we come to the book of Psalms or the Psalter, we don't have chapter 1, chapter 2.

It's Psalm 1 and Psalm 2. Even as we would open up our hymn books and we would not say turn to page chapter 43. It's simply hymn 43. Same here with the Psalter. Some of the Psalms that have been separated in history may originally have been one in the same.

And this is one instance that we have here where Psalm 42 and Psalm 43, although each one could stand on its own, they belong together. One flows into the other. As I'm saying all this, I just remember we are going to be putting away all the Christmas decorations.

And they are piled up at the front of the auditorium. So after we conclude our devotional time, if you have strong backs and an eager mind, then we'll head that direction to help put away some of the Christmas decorations.

Alright, so Ms. Carol is not on the list to do that. She'll stay here and some of us will go... There, thank you. Ms. Carol will be praying for us.

Thank you.

Okay, I just noticed that I wrote it on my paper. Announcement. So I remembered this time. So Psalm 42 and 43, I was reflecting on them and reminded by them just recently by a series of conversations and events that came through Sunday School.

But I was originally enamored with these and appreciative of these when I read a book written by Martin Lloyd-Jones called Spiritual Depression. And from that book, in that book he deals with these two psalms in particular and some other passages as well.

But there was a quote from the book. And he says, Most of your unhappiness in life is due to the fact that you are listening to yourself instead of talking to yourself. Think about that. Most of your unhappiness in life is due to the fact that you are listening to yourself instead of talking to yourself.

The main art in the matter of spiritual living is to know how to handle yourself. You have to take yourself in hand, you have to address yourself, you have to preach to yourself. And the reason he puts it that way is because that's what we find the psalmist doing in Psalm 42 and 43.

And so let's read the two psalms together. As the deer pants for the water brooks, so pants my soul for you. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God? My tears have been my food day and night, while they continually say to me, Where is your God?

When I remember these things, I pour out my soul within me. For I used to go with the multitude. I went with them to the house of God. With a voice of joy and praise. With a multitude that kept a pilgrim feast.

Why are you cast down, O my soul? And why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God, for I shall yet praise him for the help of his countenance. O my God, my soul is cast down within me. Therefore I will remember you from the land of the Jordan and from the heights of Hermon, from the hill Mizar.

Deep calls unto deep at the noise of your waterfalls. All your waves in billows have gone over me. The Lord will command his loving kindness in the daytime, and in the night his song shall be with me, a prayer to the God of my life.

I will say to God my rock, why have you forgotten me? Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy? As with a breaking of my bones, my enemies reproach me while they say to me all day long, where is your God?

Why are you cast down, O my soul? And why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God, for I shall yet praise him for the help of my countenance and my God. Vindicate me, O God, and plead my salvation. O deliver me from the deceitful and unjust man.

For you are the God of my strength. Why do you cast me off? Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy? O send out your light and your truth. Let them lead me. Let them bring me to your holy hill and to your tabernacle.

Then I will say to God my exceeding joy. And on the harp I will praise you, O God, my God. Why are you cast down, O my soul? And why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God, for I shall yet praise him for the help of my countenance and my God.

So three times we hear the psalmist address himself. He takes himself in hand. He preaches to himself. He has been listening to what his heart has to say. And what is that? Why are you cast down? His heart has been saying, things are low.

I am defeated. I am undone. There's no way out. I can't get up. Why are you disquieted within me? Why all, here's all these anxious thoughts. Here are these concerns that just don't stop. One leads into the other, and it is a snare.

Each lies next, and it becomes a net, and traps, and causes one to not be able to get up. And so the psalmist has been listening to himself, but now he takes himself in hand like we would a small child who has had something of a half of a bad day, and they make some universal statement about how life is terrible, and we take them close at hand, put them on our knee, and say, is that really so?

And we begin to address the things that they're saying to weigh whether or not that is true, to lead them to the truth. The psalmist is doing this for his own heart. We are to do this for our own soul.

We are to take ourselves in hand. We are to, first of all, I think verses 1 through 5, the very first chorus, and of course this verse stanza and the chorus that comes in verse 5 is repeated again in verse 11 and then in Psalm 43, verse 5, why are you cast down?

But the first stanza, if you will, the very first verse, the first movement of this psalm, we are encouraged to hope in God when we feel, notice that term, distant. When we feel distant from God. Do we feel distant from God?

The psalmist did. He begins with the image of a deer panting for water. This is not a deer who's had a nice run in a lush forest and thinks, oh, let me go find a bubbling creek. This is a deer that is living in a land of famine, a land cursed because of covenant unfaithfulness.

The people are estranged from God. The sky is as brass. The ground is brown and hard. And the deer is panting because there is no water. The psalmist puts himself into the same position. So pants my soul for you, oh God.

My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. There is a desire for what? He explains it, second half of verse two. When shall I come and appear before God? There is a description throughout these three movements, a longing to return to the place of worship, a longing to return to the tabernacle or the temple.

Some scholars think this is a psalm that was written after the exile or by somebody who has been estranged, like David running from Saul or being composed by the sons of Korah, a reflection upon that saga of David, cut off from the tabernacle because of Saul, as they themselves are burdened by their exile from the land, from the temple.

There is a desire to come and draw near to God, appear before God. This is language that means to come before Him in the worshipful presence of God so that I may worship Him and offer sacrifices to Him and call upon His name.

The psalmist says, My tears have been my food day and night while they continually say to me,.

Where is your God?

I don't know who the they is, but there's always a they.

Where is your God?

In other words, if your God is so great, why are you so sad? Isn't that what sometimes keeps us from perhaps talking to someone? Am I saying something bad about God because I feel this way? So the psalmist takes himself in hand.

He says,.

They continually say to me,.

Where is your God?

If your God is so great, why are you not in your land? Why are you not before Him now? Why have things turned out so poorly for you? Why do you have this trouble? Where is your God? The psalmist has suffered a knife wound, and this is the twisting of the knife.

He says,.

When I remember these things, I pour out my soul within me. Like Hannah praying before the Lord. Lips moving, no sound coming out. She was pouring out her heart within her. And what does the psalmist remember?

He remembers God's praise. He reflects on the praise that he used to offer to God.

He says,.

Where is your God?

The psalmist says, Where is my God? Oh, he's in the heavens, and he does what he pleases. He remembers the things that he's saying about God. I used to go with a multitude. I went with them to the house of God with the voice of joy and praise, with a multitude that kept a pilgrim feast.

He remembers all the things that they use and praise God for, about who He is. And thus, in remembrance of God's praise. Is he praising now? Is he singing those same songs now? He's not even singing those songs right now.

He's just remembering them. And just the remembering of them brings him to this point where he can address himself. Why are you cast down on my soul? Why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God. Okay, so I can't be at the tabernacle.

I can't have this worship service like I used to. I'm not leading the parade of praise as it was back then. But in remembrance, he may say, Hope in God. It's not over. Why are you cast down on my soul?

Why are you disquieted within me? Because I feel distant from God? Well, nonetheless, hope in God. For I shall yet praise Him. Notice the stubborn future nature of that confession. The yet is nonetheless, despite all this.

And the shall is, there's a future ahead. And it is one in which I will continue to praise. I shall yet praise Him for the help of His countenance. Remember the blessing of the Levites. May the Lord bless you and keep you.

May He cause His face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. May He lift up His countenance upon you and grant you peace. Verses six through eleven encourages us to hope in God when we feel forgotten by God.

It is a famine to feel distant from God like a thirsty person who has no water. It is a dry and weary famine to feel distant from God. In contrast, it's like drowning to feel forgotten by God. Notice the imagery the psalmist uses.

Oh my God, my soul is cast down within me. Therefore I will remember you from the land of Jordan, the land of the Jordan, from the heights of Hermon, from the hill Mizar, from the upper heights of the source of the Jordan River itself, where the elevation is high and the terrain is rocky, where the Jordan falls like cascades into pools and then over rapids.

Deep calls into deep at the noise. You stand next to a waterfall, you hear the roar of it. It just envelops you.

He says,.

All your waves and billows have gone over me. What does that mean? The psalmist is not so much simply on the side of the waterfall where there's a nice little railing, a tourist spot to observe the power of the river.

The psalmist is in the river.

He says,.

It's your waves, it's your billows, and they have gone over me. Tumbling underneath the water, tossed along, pummeled by the currents and the plunging water.

He says,.

Your waves have gone over me. It's your billows that have gone over me. Jonah said the same thing. When God had prepared a storm and prepared a fish to overwhelm and undo his prophet. We need to combine it with verse nine that says, I will say to God, my rock, why have you forgotten me?

Why have you forgotten me? The psalmist knows that the waves are the waves of the Lord. He knows that the billows are of the Lord. He should be being tossed along, forgotten, he feels. In the overwhelming sense of God's providence, his power, his sovereign activity is just running me over like a truck.

Don't you remember me? Have you forgotten me? There's a wrestling with the providence of God. He knows, he knows verse eight and he prays verse nine. The Lord will command his loving kindness in the daytime and the night his song will be with me, a prayer to the God of my life.

I know this to be true. He's speaking truth to his soul. And at the same time, he says, verse nine, I will say to God, my rock, why have you forgotten me? Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?

How do these two things cohere? How do these things come together? As for the breaking of my bones, my enemies reproach me while they say to me all day long, where is your God? The psalmist would like to have something to say about that.

But where is my God? Well, he's the one who is.

Trucking me.

Where is my God? He's the one who is bringing me through this very difficult time. But then what does he say to himself? Notice that God is still his rock. You notice that God is the one he hopes, he hopes in the Lord, because the Lord is going to command his loving kindness in the daytime and in the night his song will not, will not abandon him.

Despite all of the troubles that he is now facing and experiencing. So verse 11, why are you cast down on my soul? And why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God, for I shall yet praise him the help of my countenance and my God.

Not just for the help of his countenance, but now he's the help of my countenance. It is the Lord's smile upon me that makes a difference in my face. In my outlook, in my perspective. And so once again, he takes himself in hand.

Now,.

He's already said much the same in verse 5. He says it again in verse 11, and he's going to say it again in the next Psalm in verse 5. Why does he have to repeat the same thing over and over again? Calvin observed these two Psalms put together that these types of things have to be applied over and over and over again.

It's not like we get it the first time we go through it. It's not like we say this once and, oh, it's all solved.

It's all fine.

But there is a repeated application of this truth, of this sermon, again and again to the soul. There has to be a repeated application of the truth. Hope in God when we feel distant, when we feel forgotten, and when we feel rejected.

Now, notice that the feeling is not the reality. Now, it's a reality that we feel this way. Just don't get those mixed up. God is not distant from us. He has given us his Son, Jesus Christ. He has not left us orphans.

He has sent us his Holy Spirit. God has not forgotten us. He would as soon forget his own Son. God has not rejected us. He has accepted us in Christ. Who is he who condemns? So, hope in God when we feel rejected by God.

Psalm 83 begins this way. Vindicate me, O God. He's tired of hearing. He's tired of hearing what they are saying.

Where is your God? Where is your God?

And, the psalmist is saying, God, will you show up and shut them up? Vindicate me, O God, against an ungodly nation. O, deliver me from the deceit of an unjust man. For you are the God of my strength.

So, he confesses this, but then you hear what he says. Why do you cast me off? In other words, why do you reject me? Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy? He knows the truth of it, but here's the feeling of it.

O, send out your light and your truth. Let them lead me. Let them bring me to your holy hill and to your tabernacle. Then I will go to the altar of God, to God my exceeding joy, and on the harp I will praise you, O God, my God.

In other words, this is what he really hopes to be the answer to his prayer. Vindicate me. He would like to come back into the presence of the Lord in worship and in joy, giving praise to God. That's what he desires.

He needs God's light. He needs God's truth. He does not need extended reflection on personal experience and how the past failings and difficulties of various relationships and situations have bearing on my current situation now.

This is not what he needs. He does not need someone to tell him that he's justified in his sorrows and in his despair. He needs the light of the Lord. He needs the truth of the Lord to lead him to communion with the Lord.

And he says, Hope in God. Why are you cast down on my soul and why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God, for I shall yet praise him, the help of my countenance and my God. So, very often, so very often, the conundrums that we find ourselves in are those because of which we're listening to ourselves and we don't even realize that we are.

When we realize that, when we come to ourself, like the prodigal son,.

Say,.

Why am I in this pigsty? Because I've been listening to myself. I've been kind of all about myself. Then we say, You know what?

Soul?

Not like the fool who said to himself,.

Soul?

Let's build bigger barns and be about the self. But the psalmist is saying, Hey, soul. Hey, me. Back to Jonah. Do I have justification to be angry like this?

Do I have justification.

To be depressed like this and to be miserable like this? Do I have just complaint? Why are you cast down? Why are you disquieted? Hope in God. Hope in God.

Hope,.

Very particularly, is something that requires two other things. And of course, those are faith and love. We can hope in God when we set our love upon him. We think about who he is, his beauty,.

His glory,.

As the desire of our hearts, who he is as our creator and our savior, as our father, as our elder brother, as our comforter. We think about who God is and all of his goodness. And that, of course, requires faith, trusting in him as my rock, as my redeemer, as my deliverer.

Hope means that there is a direction forward. It's not just a way out, but a way up. It is an absolute confidence because of who God is that I'm not going to stay where I am right now. And I have no idea how God is going to unravel all of these disquieting troubles in my life, but I know that I can trust him with it.

I can't see, you know, I can't see half a mile down the road, but I know the very next step I take is hoping in God. And that's what God gives to us. So I hope that these two psalms are an encouragement to you.

Yes.

Yes.

So Paul says, these abide, these three, faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love. A summary of the Christian virtues. I often illustrate them in terms of a river.

If,.

When you think of a river, the first thing you think of is water. And that's like love. That's what's to fill out the entire Christian life. The most defining mark of a Christian life is love. By this, all men will know that you are my disciples by the love that you have for one another.

A new commitment I give to you as I have loved you so you are to love one another. Love is the key. But this love is shaped by faith, like the banks of a river, the shape of a river, in its depths, in its twists, in its turns.

That defining shape of this love is faith in the Christian life. A pagan conception of love is, love is love is love is love. Well, you know, tsunamis and flash floods destroy everything. The love of Christ, Christian love, is shaped by faith, by faith in who God is, who Christ is, what his word has to say, and that makes a very useful and channeled and beautiful love.

So, faith is like the shape of the river, love is the water of the river, but if you have water filling up a shape that's going nowhere, you have a pond. Hope is the direction, it is the movement of the river.

Rivers are,.

It's not just water, it's water in motion. And so hope is the idea of love shaped by faith moving in a particular direction, and that of course is to the glory of God. All the promises he's made is a direction to it.

It's not stagnant. We can't, we might not be able to see the way forward through all of our problems. We may not be able to see half a mile down the road, but we know that the very next step we take should be hoping in God, and we can do that.

So, many times the folks use the word hope, but they mean wish. Oh, I wish everything will work out. Hope is something that is a confident expectation of what is yet to come. It's not a whimsical desire for certain things to come out.

Hope is a confident expectation of what is to come. Yes, exactly.

Right.

It's a good observation. All right, well,.

Let's close with a word of prayer. Heavenly Father, we thank you for the time that you've given us in your word. I pray that it has been a blessing and an encouragement to each one of us. Please help us to apply it to our lives in a way that would be pleasing to you.

We pray these things in Jesus' name.

Amen.

And we're dismissed then.