The forty second Psalm is the song of a heart that is full of conflict. As you study this Psalm you may notice how our Psalmist wavers back and forth between high confessions of theological truth and sobering cries of depression, fear, and loneliness. His heart is conflicted within him.
You might have experienced seasons like this; seasons where your heart is conflicted, in turmoil, or caught between the pain of suffering and the knowledge of God’s promises. These seasons can sometimes cause you to question your relationship with God or they might cause you to feel like you have some kind of uncurable spiritual depression that has sunk your heart to the depths of absolute despair.
What do these seasons look like for us? The sudden loss of a child. A shattered marriage. The loss of a job. The friend who betrays you and continues to seek your destruction. The health issue that becomes life threatening. The memories of the abuse you suffered years ago that come flooding back without warning. The realization that you may never find someone to spend the rest of your life with. The deep pattern of sin that seems to have a chokehold over your life. These are the seasons where your heart may become so full of conflict that you feel completely overwhelmed and without hope.
Hope is absolutely vital to our existence. Hope is the thing that gets us through the chaos of difficulty. Hope is the essence of the promise of better days. Hope is the dream of a better future. Hope is the refreshing drink of water to a soul that has been dehydrated by the sudden onset of great difficulty. In the midst of the chaos of his conflicted heart, the Psalmist preaches hope to his dried-out soul. Follow the rhythms of the Psalmist’s conflicted heart with me…
1As the deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God. 2My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God? 3My tears have been my food day and night, while they say to me all the day long, “Where is your God?” 4These things I remember, as I pour out my soul: how I would go with the throng and lead them in procession to the house of God with glad shouts and songs of praise, a multitude keeping festival. 5Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation 6and my God. My soul is cast down within me; therefore I remember you from the land of Jordan and of Hermon, from Mount Mizar. 7Deep calls to deep at the roar of your waterfalls; all your breakers and your waves have gone over me. 8By day the LORD commands his steadfast love, and at night his song is with me, a prayer to the God of my life. 9I say to God, my rock: “Why have you forgotten me? Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?” 10As with a deadly wound in my bones, my adversaries taunt me, while they say to me all the day long, “Where is your God?” 11Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God.
#1: A LONGING FOR GOD (VV. 1 – 2)
Our Psalmist begins in verses 1 – 2 by expressing his deep desire to drink from the overflowing presence of God when he says, “As the deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God?” Can you hear the longing for God in the Psalmist’s words? Can you feel how thirsty the Psalmist is?
Being thirsty is similar to being hungry. After a long hot day in the sun without water, your body begins to feel weak, your tongue begins to stick to the roof of your mouth, and your brain begins to tell you that you desperately need to drink some water. Spiritually speaking, this is where the Psalmist is at. He is spiritually dehydrated, and he needs to drink deeply from the never-ending well of the presence of the living God; he is thirsty for God – longing for God. But why? Why is the Psalmist so spiritually dehydrated?
#2: DEPRESSED BY MEMORIES OF LONG AGO (VV. 3 – 4)
In verses 3 – 4 it becomes apparent that our Psalmist is spiritually dehydrated, he is longing for God, he is thirsty for God, because he is depressed by memories of long ago and his depression is all that his heart has been feeding on day and night. He says, “My tears have been my food day and night, while they say to me all the day long, ‘Where is your God?’ These things I remember, as I pour out my soul: how I would go with the throng and lead them in procession to the house of God with glad shouts and songs of praise, a multitude keeping festival.” Even though the Psalmist has happy memories of being in God’s presence, they are memories of long ago that cause him to be depressed.
Most commentators agree that the Psalmist is writing this Psalm in the midst of exile where he is unable to worship God the way he used to do. He is unable to gather with God’s people. It feels like forever since he has sung praise songs with other believers. He remembers leading God’s people in praise and worship songs, but that memory is beginning to fade. He is having a hard time remembering the last time he heard God’s Word being preached.
And to top it all off, his enemies – most likely those responsible for his exile – are continuously taunting him with the age-old question at the end of verse 3, “Where is your God in the midst of your suffering?” When was the last time you were tempted to question God’s presence in your suffering? With this question in his mind, when hope seems like a forgotten dream of long ago, our Psalmist preaches a message of hope to his conflicted heart.
#3: HOPING IN FUTURE SALVATION (V. 5 – 6)
In verses 5 – 6, our Psalmist interrogates his conflicted heart and then he boldly preaches exactly what his heart needs to hear when he says, “Why are you downcast, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God.” In the midst of his deep thirst for God, in the face of the depression that has been brought on from memories of long ago, in answer to the age-old question, “Where is God in the midst of your suffering?”, the Psalmist puts all the chips of his hope in his future salvation.
I do not know about you, but I find it extremely hard to get my eyes off the difficulties of this life. I find it hard to forget “what lies behind” and strain “forward to what lies ahead” and “press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus” (Phil. 3:13 – 14). I find it much easier to focus on the momentary difficulties of this present darkness that we live in.
This is why it is so vital to follow the Psalmist’s lead by interrogating my soul and preaching the hope of salvation to it. Just as soon as my heart begins to find its footing, just as soon as I begin to look upwards to the hope of eternal salvation through the shed blood, broken body, empty tomb, and promise of heaven in Christ Jesus, it is as though all the powers of Satan, Sin, and Death attempt to overwhelm my soul with an all-out, full-frontal assault.
#4: OVERWHELMED AND DESPERATE (VV. 6 – 7)
In verses 6 – 7, our Psalmist is clinging to every ounce of hope that his heart can fathom when he becomes overwhelmed with a debilitating sense that he is desperately drowning in an ocean of grief with a tiny sliver of hope that he might get out alive and back into the presence of God.
In verse 6, our Psalmist says, “O my God, my soul is cast down within me; therefore I remember you from the land of Jordan and of Hermon, from Mount Mizar”. The landmarks in this verse are places where God’s people (most likely David) found refuge in God’s presence even though he was surrounded by his enemies. Our Psalmist is desperate for refuge in God’s presence.
The Psalmist moves on after recalling the physical landmarks of refuge in God’s presence despite being utterly surrounded by his enemies, and he describes how desperately overwhelmed he feels when he says in verse 7 that “Deep calls deep at the roar of your waterfalls; all your breakers and your waves have gone over me”. He literally feels like he is drowning in an ocean of grief as the deep undercurrent of his suffering threatens to vaporize his life.
And he even refers to his suffering as something that was God’s doing – he knows that whatever comes into his life (good or bad) crosses God’s desk for approval first. Whatever God allows to come into your life is needful, whether it is painful or joyful. Job would attest to this as well as he suffered the loss of everything, he held dear in this life on account of the fact that God gave Satan permission to afflict him to test whether or not he would still glorify God in his suffering. Our Psalmist – like Job – is overwhelmed and desperate.
You know what this kind of desperation and grief feels like, right? It feels hopeless, scary, and overwhelming. What do you turn to, to keep your head above the water? What will uphold you from drowning in an ocean of grief?
#5: UPHELD BY GOD’S STEADFAST LOVE (V. 8)
The answer to that question – what will keep my head above water when I am overwhelmed with grief and desperate to stay alive – is the steadfast love of my heavenly father. The Psalmist knows this too. This is why he says in verse 8 that day by day “the LORD commands his steadfast love, and at night his song is with me, [like] a prayer to the God of my life”. The steadfast love of God is what upholds the Psalmist when the waves of grief overwhelm him.
God’s steadfast love is steadfast because it does not depend upon your behavior; you cannot earn God’s love therefore you cannot unearn God’s love either. God’s love is dependent upon his own character which is never changing; he is the same yesterday, today, and forever, therefore his love for you is never changing – it is steadfast.
This is why the apostle Paul says that he wants us to be “rooted and grounded in [the love of God in Christ Jesus]” because if we have the “strength to comprehend with all the saint what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge” then we will “be filled with all the fulness of God” when the waves of grief make us feel like we are drowning as desperate men and women (Eph. 3:18 – 19). To know the steadfast love of God in Christ Jesus is to have the best life jacket a person could ever have when the waves of the ocean of suffering and grief overwhelm our souls. Have you soaked your dehydrated heart in the presence of God’s steadfast love lately?
#6: BEING HONEST WITH GOD (VV. 9 – 10)
Something else the steadfast love of God does for us is that it enables us to be honest about our suffering, our losses, our grief, our helplessness, and our fears. Pretending like you are not drowning does not change the fact that you are in fact drowning. The phrase “fake it until you make it” is an absolute lie that is intended to get you isolated; fakers do not make it; they drown in a sea of misery because they pretend that they do not need any help.
So, while our Psalmist holds tightly to the life jacket of God’s steadfast love, he also gets really honest with God when he says in verses 9 – 10, “I 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 deadly wound in my bones, my adversaries taunt me, while they say to me all the day long, ‘Where is your God?’”
There is no fake it until you make it theology in our Psalmist’s heart. He may be conflicted over the suffering he is experiencing in light of the God he knows and loves, but he is not coming to God under false pretenses, because false pretenses pave the road to eternal separation from God.
Speaking of eternal separation, our Psalmist honestly admits that he feels completely forgotten by God and alone in his circumstances. His enemies are taunting him once again and he feels like he is about to die. Do you know what it’s like to face something so excruciatingly painful that you feel like you are all alone and you are about to die?
#7: CONFLICT CRUSHED BY HOPE (V. 11)
In those moments of feeling like the Grim Reaper is breathing down your neck, you and I need a sure and steadfast anchor for our souls to hold us steady in the midst of the storm (Heb. 6:19). There is only one thing that will crush the conflict of pain and suffering deep with our hearts and that one thing is the hope that we have in Christ Jesus.
This is why our Psalmist concludes with a crushing blow to the powers of Satan, Sin, and Death when he says in verse 11, “Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God.” Once again, the foundation of our hope is found in none other than the crucified, risen, and returning Christ! This is the only kind of true hope that will crush the conflict of suffering deep within the hallways of our hearts.
CONCLUSION…
In conclusion my friends, when your heart is conflicted within you, when your heart is wavering back and forth between high theological thoughts of God and the very real suffering you are experiencing, when you begin to wonder if your relationship with God is falling apart, or when you begin to think that you have sunk into some kind of uncurable spiritual depression, you will need a massive dose of hope for your conflicted heart.
When the sudden loss of a child tears your heart in two; when the shattered glass of your marriage cuts deeply into your soul; when the bewildering betrayal of a close friend threatens to destroy your heart and mind; when the health issue becomes a death sentence; when the trauma of your childhood leaves you curled up in a ball of grief, loneliness, and shame; when your empty home and your empty bed taunt you with lies of unworthiness; when you surrender once again to patterns of sin that replace promises of pleasure with shouts of guilt and shame; when things like these dehydrate your soul, you will need a large dose of hope for your conflicted heart.
When you and I find ourselves longing for God like a thirsty deer because of the depressing memories of what once was, when hoping in the future is difficult because we are feeling overwhelmed and desperate, when we feel like we are drowning in an ocean of grief and we just need someone to hold our heads above the water, when we have stopped faking it until we make it, we will need a kind of rock solid hope that will crush the power of Satan, Sin, and Death inside our conflicted hearts.
I can find no other place for this kind of hope than the foot of a bloody cross, the doorway of an empty tomb, and the light of the promise of heaven. Like our Psalmist, we can deliver a crushing blow to Satan, Sin, and Death by interrogating our soul and preaching a message of hope to our hearts. With the Psalmist we can proclaim, “Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God.” Hope for the conflicted heart is found in sin’s defeat at the foot of the bloody cross. Hope for the conflicted heart is found in death’s defeat at the doorway of the empty tomb. Hope for the conflicted heart is found in Satan’s defeat in light of the promise of heaven.
Hope for the conflicted heart is rooted in the message of the gospel which reminds us that because of the person and work of Jesus as our crucified, risen, and returning Savior, we look forward to praising God for all of eternity as our rescuer and our Father. Hang on to the bloody cross, the empty tomb, and the promise of heaven and you will have hope for your conflicted heart. – Amen!
1 Unless otherwise specified, all Bible references in this paper are to the English Standard Version Bible, The New Classic Reference Edition (ESV) (Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers, 2001).