A friend of mine once told me about a very powerful moment in his life (interestingly, I had more than one person tell me similar stories, which testifies, I think, to the universality of the experience). Some months after losing a parent, he was driving one day, alone in his car, listening to the radio, when a song came on that reminded him of his parent. Music becomes a marker in our lives, and when we hear certain songs we are taken back in time to a special event or to a memory of someone important to us. Listening to the song, the sense of loss suddenly became overwhelming to him. He stopped his car in the middle of the road (fortunately, he was driving along a country road where there was no traffic) got out of the car, and started yelling at God, banging his fist on the car while doing so. My friend was angry with God, wondering why his loved one had to experience so much suffering and eventually, death.
Some people would be troubled at such a showing of emotion, especially emotion directed so pointedly at God. When we read through the Bible, however, we find such emotional displays to be rather common, especially in the psalms. It is to the psalms that we turn this morning, to the 42ndpsalm, as we consider the topic When Life Is Tough, God Is Still Good.
1 As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God.
2 My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God?
3 My tears have been my food day and night, while people say to me all day long, “Where is your God?”
4 These things I remember as I pour out my soul: how I used to go to the house of God under the protection of the Mighty Onewith shouts of joy and praise among the festive throng.
5 Why, my soul, are you downcast? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God.
6 My soul is downcast within me; therefore I will remember you from the land of the Jordan, the heights of Hermon—from Mount Mizar.
7 Deep calls to deep in the roar of your waterfalls; all your waves and breakers have swept over me.
8 By day the Lord directs his love, at night his song is with me—a prayer to the God of my life.
9 I say to God my Rock, “Why have you forgotten me? Why must I go about mourning, oppressed by the enemy?”
10 My bones suffer mortal agony as my foes taunt me, saying to me all day long, “Where is your God?”
11 Why, my soul, are you downcast? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God.
Let me say this at the outset – life is not always easy. I doubt you are surprised at that statement. I’m sure no one is sitting there right now thinking, Wait, what? I had no idea! My life is completely wonderful! Is it really true that life is not always easy? Yes, it is true that life is not always easy; in fact, life is very often not easy, but let me add this – When Life Is Tough, God Is Still Good. As I read through this psalm, I wrote down a list of four dynamics expressed by the psalmist, and I want to speak about each of them this morning –
1. Discouragement.
One of the most amazing passages of Scripture, to me, is John 11:21. Jesus and his disciples are traveling to Bethany, to the home of Lazarus and his sisters, Mary and Martha. As Jesus and his disciples are traveling, they receive word that Lazarus has died. John says that when Martha heard that Jesus was coming to visit them, she went out to meet him. It may be unwise to try and read between the lines of Scripture, but I get the impression that Martha had a few things on her mind to tell Jesus. I picture her coming to Jesus with that lookabout her. Do you know what I mean when I mention the look? Martha was hurt, and she very plainly expressed her hurt to Jesus. She approached Jesus and tells him, very pointedly, Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. There’s a lot of emotion in that statement, and one of them is discouragement. Martha is hurt. Martha is grieving. And Martha knew Jesus could have done something, but he didn’t. Now, it is important to note that Jesus was about to do something, and do something pretty amazing, but Martha did not realize this at the time.
Even Jesus faced discouragement. Have you ever thought about the reality that Jesus sometimes became discouraged? In John 6:53-69 we read of a time when many of the followers of Jesus turned away from him. 53 Jesus said to them, “Very truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. 54 Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day. 55 For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. 56 Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in them. 57 Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me. 58 This is the bread that came down from heaven. Your ancestors ate manna and died, but whoever feeds on this bread will live forever.” 59 He said this while teaching in the synagogue in Capernaum. 60 On hearing it, many of his disciples said, “This is a hard teaching. Who can accept it?” 61 Aware that his disciples were grumbling about this, Jesus said to them, “Does this offend you? 62 Then what if you see the Son of Man ascend to where he was before! 63 The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you—they are full of the Spiritand life. 64 Yet there are some of you who do not believe.” For Jesus had known from the beginning which of them did not believe and who would betray him. 65 He went on to say, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless the Father has enabled them.” 66 From this time many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him.
The feeding of the 5,000 had taken place a short time before this moment, but now were gone. Jesus was alone with the twelve. The big, adoring crowds had dissipated. It would be easy for the disciples to think, what just happened? Everything was going great and now everyone is gone. Jesus, what has happened? What went wrong? And it has to be tough for Jesus, to see the crowds turn away. At that moment, alone with just the twelve, Jesus turns to them and asks, 67 “You do not want to leave too, do you?” Jesus asked the Twelve.68 Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.69 We have come to believe and to know that you are the Holy One of God.”
God bless Peter. In that moment, Peter had one of his shining moments. Peter is not always perfectly there, but neither are we. In that moment, however, Peter was a great encourager. Let us be encouragers also, because discouragement is really tough. Discouragement is like a vortex or a black hole that draws us further and further in, and the further it draws us in, the more difficult it is to pull ourselves out. This is where Martha found herself, and where the psalmist was as well. Neither of them, unfortunately, could see at the moment what God was going to do for them. God was not about to leave them in the hole or the valley or the vortex or the black hole of discouragement. God doesn’t leave us in the hole or the valley or the vortex or the black hole of discouragement either. I’m can’t say that we can avoid discouragement, but I can say that God does not leave us there. While we wonder where God is and while we wonder when God will lift us out of that discouragement, God is already at work to bring us back into the light of encouragement. We don’t stay forever, thankfully, in discouragement.
2. Depression.
In this psalm we find not only discouragement, but I think depression as well. Depression is very real, and very common. Depression is not something that is the fault of the person, it’s not something a person can snap out of, and it is not something you are imagining. There are millions of people in this country struggling with major depression, and millions more who struggle with other levels.
There is, also, unfortunately, a stigma that remains about depression. When we have a physical problem, we do not hesitate to go quickly to the doctor. I have a problem with my right knee. A few years ago I tore the meniscus in that knee and ended up at the doctor. The doctor told me I would eventually have to have surgery to take care of it but that cortisone shots would help me put the surgery off for a while. Now, I don’t like shots, but I like surgery even less, so I opted for a cortisone shot. To help you understand how much I dislike shots, I’ll tell you about getting a shot over at the hospital a few years ago. I was at the hospital for a meeting, and at the end of the meeting a representative of the hospital told us, while we have you all here, we’ll go ahead and give you your flu shot. When it came time for me to receive my shot, I did what I normally do when I am nervous – I made a joke (or attempted to make a joke). I told the nurse, you need to be careful. The last time I got a flu shot the needle went all the way through my arm, into my side, and punctured one of my lungs. She stopped, looked up at me, and then walked away, saying as she went that someone else can give him a shot. I’m not dealing with him. So, when I was at the doctor’s office to receive a cortisone shot, I was as bit nervous. A nurse put some numbing medication on my knee and said, we’ll let that sit for about 15 or 20 minutes, so it will get good and numb. I had never before had to receive numbing medication before a shot, so I knew this one would not be pleasant. When she left the room and closed the door, I was certain I heard the door lock – from the outside. As much as I dislike shots, I was happy to receive one in order to take away the pain in my knee, and I think we are all this way. We might not like some of the unpleasantness involved in the medical treatment we receive, but we go to the doctor without hesitation when we are in need of treatment.
When it comes to our emotional and psychological health, however, we react differently. Unfortunately, there is a stigma that remains attached to other kinds of treatments we need, such as emotional and psychological treatments. Even in conversation, we struggle with this. We will speak freely of our medical issues, but of our emotional and psychological struggles. For all of our emphasis on honesty and transparency, these days, we are not always honest and transparent about what we are dealing with, are we? We quickly answer, when someone asks how we are doing, with a resounding great! But that’s not always true, is it? Someone asked me recently how I was doing and I said I was doing well. They stood and looked at me a moment, with a very serious look, and asked are you really? I appreciated that they pushed me for a truthful answer.
Maybe the difficulty is that we often feel as though we must put on the appearance that everything is in perfect order in our lives and that we are doing well, even when we are not. Isn’t that what a good church-going person is supposed to do? Aren’t we supposed to have it all together? Aren’t we supposed to be people who are the epitome of togetherness? Don’t we tell ourselves we should be the perfect role model of what others can be? That kind of thinking can do a lot of damage, because no one can live up to all that perfection. But what might people think if we revealed what is really going on? What might people think if we opened up and said, you know, my life is not as together as it looks, or as I have led others to believe.
The psalmist sure does put it out there, saying in verse three that my tears have been my food day and night, while people say to me all day long, “Where is your God?” Being open like that is scary because it means we are vulnerable, and it is really tough to be vulnerable. It is tough to be vulnerable and it is tough to see when someone else is vulnerable. We feel uncomfortable, and don’t always know what to say or what to do. Here is an important point – when you are in that moment, do not allow the opinions of others or the fear of those opinions keep you from getting help. Depression is very real, and it is very difficult, and pervasive to the point that I would say every one of us here today knows someone with depression.
3. Doubt.
This psalm is interesting because this is not a skeptic charging that God is absent; this is a person of belief and faith expressing the concern that God is absent. This is a psalm that combines doubt and faith at the same time, which seems contradictory. In verse 9 the psalmist saysI say to God my Rock, "Why have you forgotten me?” How does one feel forgotten by God but in the same sentence refer to God as my Rock? It’s similar to the father who brings his son to Jesus to be healed, in Mark chapter 9. Jesus says to the father, in response to the father’s plea for help, “Everything is possible for one who believes.” Immediately the boy’s father exclaimed, “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!”(Mark 9:24). Isn’t that an odd response? It seems contradictory to say I do believe, help me overcome my unbelief, but that is what struggle does to us – it allows doubt to creep into our hearts and minds. We are not alone when it comes to asking where God is. On the cross Jesus quoted the 22ndpsalm, which opens with the difficult words my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? It’s hard to hear those words coming from Jesus, isn’t it?
Let me say something important here – doubt about God and God’s presence with us is not a sign of losing your faith; it is a sign of being human. I want to emphasize that point – doubt about God and God’s presence with us is not a sign of losing faith; it is a sign of being human. We find this mixture of doubt and belief all through the Scriptures, and especially in the psalms. People have too often been told, and too many have believed, that doubt is wrong. I think many people believe it is wrong to ask difficult questions of God. Doubt is not an expression of uncertain or a shaky faith, but an example of healthy faith, because healthy faith is not afraid to entertain difficult questions, it is not afraid to ask difficult questions, and it is not afraid of uncertainty. On the contrary, it is a less secure faith that is afraid to ask questions, afraid of challenging points of view, and insists on absolute certainty.
This psalm, psalm 42, demonstrates that it is legitimate to ask questions of God. All through Scripture we find people asking questions of God. We find people expressing doubt that God is present. This is part of the beauty of the psalms, and all of Scripture, as we find the expression of the full range of human emotion. We are emotional creatures, and there is nothing inherently wrong with expressing those emotions. But our feelings are not an adequate measure of truth about God. Just because we feel that God is absent does not mean that he is absent. Just because doubt at times creeps into our lives, it doesn’t mean that God is not present in our lives.
4. Faith.
There are three negative dynamics I have mentioned so far, and one positive. What is important to remember is this – not all are equal. There are three negatives, but they are outdone by the one positive offaith. I struggled a bit to find the right word for this final point. I thought about triumph, determination, and some others, but most of the words I came up with just didn’t seem right. The word that finally came to me was faith. Faithis the right word because all the other words that came to mind fit within the framework of faith.
The psalmist came to what we often call a crossroadsmoment in life; those moments when we know we have come to a moment of great decision. It’s a moment of which way am I going to go? Am I going to give up? Or am I going to keep going, even though I feel as though I don’t have the faith? What will we do? The situation for the psalmist came down to a choice – was he going to hold on to his faith or was he going to abandon faith? He made his choice for faith, but also recognized there was still a tough road ahead. Faith is not a guarantee that things will always be easy. In fact, those who claim that faith means we will be forever immune from the difficulties and challenges of life do us no favors and they also present an erroneous vision of faith. So, the psalmist ends the psalm on a note of optimism, but one that is also tempered with some realism – why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God (verse 11). Life is not always easy. Life can be very, very difficult, and the difficulties that visit us in life can wear us down and can even bring us to the point where we consider abandoning faith.
Going back to my friend, whom I told you about at the beginning of this message; in spite of the fact that he argued with God and pounded on his car in anger, his outburst was not about losing faith, but expressing faith, although in a way that is much different from how we generally do so. I think what he did that day was actually saving his faith.
God never abandons us. In spite of how difficult life may be and in spite of our doubts and questions, we can affirm that God is ever with us. The psalmist, in the midst of life’s terrible difficulties, says put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God. After all of his questions, after all of his doubts, after all of his suffering he is able to make a great affirmation of faith, to remind us that When Life Is Tough, God Is Still Good.
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