When was it that you were most aware of the nearness of God? Was it at the place of celebration…when you just landed that new client or when you sank the “hole in one that had eluded you all your life? Was it when you received all good feedback during your physical examination? Or, perhaps, was it in the valley of life? In the throes of trying, testing, and troubling times?
Psalm 42 is a beloved and rich text. However, I wonder if we find ourselves reading it like “busy Americans,” grabbing a “bumper sticker” phrase and moving on.
As the deer pants for the water brooks, So my soul pants for You, O God.
Psalm 42:1, NASB95
What a great statement…” God, I long for you in the same way that a deer longs for water.” Granted, the daily concerns of a deer in the wild are considerably different than our own. Something to eat, something to drink, and a place to rest top the list of average daily concerns. Of course, avoiding predators, including those in “blaze orange” sitting quietly in a stand overlooking an opening with scattered corn on the ground, is always in season. So, what makes a deer pant for water…and what is causing David to long for God…His person and presence, not merely His provision, in the same way?
It’s trouble. The deer doesn’t long for water while standing beside the lake. The deer doesn’t even consider tomorrow’s meal while standing in a field of suitable food. It is in the arid realities of trouble that we sense our need for good and long for His presence the most. Notice with me:
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 day long, “Where is your God?”
Psalm 42:2-3, NASB95
O my God, my soul is in despair within me…
Psalm 42:6, NASB95
9I will say to God my rock, “Why have You forgotten me? Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?”
10As a shattering of my bones, my adversaries revile me, While they say to me all day long, “Where is your God?”
11Why are you in despair, O my soul? And why have you become disturbed within me?
Psalm 42:9-11, NASB95
In the despair of tears, in the crushing weight of struggles and oppression, and in the crosshairs of discouraging accusations…that the Psalmist, David, cries out to God.
Now David is no stranger to God. He is no twice-a-month church attendee who answers every question in his small group with “Jesus, God, and the Bible.” Yet, the weightiness of his troubles drives him to the very doorstep of the throne room with a longing cry for God’s attention.
By the way, that is the prescribed response. When trouble arises, God calls us to run to Him! How does he do so? After all, there must be some direction more than the boasting of a religious platitude…
David rehearses to himself the times when God met him. While worshipping in the assembly of the saints (Ps 42:4). David remembers the evidence of God’s fulfilled promises and the vastness of His glory (Ps 42:6). David preaches to his own soul the truth of God’s character (Ps 42:5b, 8, 11b).
David sees the Lord as His rock…the solid and immovable foundation on which to stand and to which he is to tether his life. He sees God in this way because of His experience, but he realizes it afresh in his troubles (Ps 42:9a).
We often want to avoid troubles…but they are such precious instruments that take us to the place of despair that we would not choose for ourselves. It is in that place that we find the delight of the Divine, the peace of God’s presence, and the hope of His healing.
CH Spurgeon said, “I have learned to kiss the waves that throw me up against the Rock of Ages.” May we do likewise as we learn to thank God for the triumph that comes through the troubling times of life.
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