All right, Psalms 142. As we come to this passage tonight, this is the confession or the prayer of a caveman, a caveman. And you'll notice, how many of you got a title there under this psalm that says a prayer when he was in the cave, David? I've had people say to me, I had a man ask me a few years ago, he said, do you believe in cavemen? I said, well, yes, I'm from Tennessee. We've got caves and we've got men. I believe in cavemen. There's men in and out of those caves. Notice with me as we come to this psalm, we could title this psalm, God, Our Refuge in the Land of the Living. And as we begin reading in verse 1, again, this is believed to be a psalm of David. And David ended up in a cave on a couple of different times. He was chased or fleeing from Saul. And then at one time, years later, from his own son Absalom, he was fleeing from the throne and he was in hiding. So David spent some of his life in hiding from those who wanted to kill him, those who wanted to take his life. He says here in verse 1, and I cried unto the Lord with my voice. With my voice unto the Lord did I make my supplication. I poured out my complaint before Him. I showed before Him my trouble. When my spirit was overwhelmed within me, then Thou knewest my path. In the way wherein I walked have they privately laid a snare for me. Verse 4, I looked on the right hand, and behold, But there was no man that would know me. Refuge failed me. No man cared for my soul. I cried unto thee, O Lord, and I said, Thou art my refuge and my portion in the land of the living. For six, attend unto my crying, for I am brought very low. Deliver me from my persecutors, for they are stronger than I. Bring my soul out of prison. that I may praise Thy name, the righteous shall compass me about, for Thou shalt deal bountifully with me." Father, we thank You tonight again for Your Word. We thank You for this psalm here tonight. It's such a blessing that we can get comfort and strength from as many of the other psalms. Lord, we ask tonight Your anointing and blessing upon the reading of Your Word. We ask tonight, Lord, that You speak to our hearts. We ask tonight, Lord, that You would meet with us Father, everything that's said and done here this evening, every word that's spoken, even the hymns that we sing, we just pray, Lord, that You would receive our worship tonight. We pray, Lord, tonight that it would bring honor and glory to You and for the furtherance of Thy kingdom. Again, we love You and we appreciate, Lord, the opportunities in the middle of the week here to assemble together. For it's in Jesus Christ's name we pray. Amen. And you may be seated. The whole psalm is a prayer. It is a cave experience. And I'm going to ask you to turn to one passage so that if I make reference to this, you'll know what I'm talking about. Turn with me to 1 Samuel 22. Now, the theme of this psalm is basically desperate days for the psalmist. He ended up in a cave. Again, he was hunted down on a number of different occasions, especially by Saul, his enemy, and then once by his own son. And there were people that I believe that probably some people sat back and watched the thing take place, wondering who is going to win this battle, maybe even some of his friends. became kind of neutral. That happens sometimes when you're troubled. That happened with the Apostle Paul in 2 Timothy chapter 4, along about verse 16 through 18. As Paul was before the court systems in Rome, he said, no man stood with me. And he said, but the Lord stood with me. So sometimes, David here, if David is the writer of this psalm, we know that sometimes people will take their hands off of you. They'll back away from you just a little bit if there's problems and things brewing, and then they want to be on the winning side. And if Saul had won the battles all the way through, then they'd probably been on his side. If David had won, then they'll get on his side. There's many people that are just like that. But this small remnant that did stay with David, Now, again, this psalm is a prayer, and it is a cave experience, and we find a hurting and an aching soul. Now, many times somebody could walk in and they could say, I've got a toothache, and we might have a little compassion upon them. Say, I've got a terrible headache, or I've got a stomachache. We might have compassion on them, but we find that as we read through Psalms 142, we find a hurting and an aching soul. And sometimes we're not quite as apt to have compassion on someone that is dealing maybe with depression or hurting, their soul is hurting, and I'm going to say more about that as we get toward the end of the message here this evening. But just as you may have an aching tooth or a head, Our soul, can I get an amen from this? Our soul can also ache as well. But I want you to notice as we turn to 1 Samuel, and I'm going to be reading the first few verses in this chapter. And we see here in verse 1, it says, David therefore departed thence and escaped to the cave of Dumla. And he said, and when his brethren and all his father's house heard it, Notice they went down thither to him. Now, we see in verse 3 that he was concerned about his father and mother, and he was seeking comfort for them and shelter. But notice in verse 2, there was a small group of people, over 400 people, that had rallied or at least came to the place that David was at. The Bible said here in verse 2, Notice the people that went here that ended up in the same place with David, they were in distress, in debt, or discontented. He said in verse 2, "...and everyone that was in distress, and everyone that was in debt, and everyone that was discontented gathered themselves unto him, and he became a captain over them. And there were with him about four hundred men." Now, we read about some of these men later on in the Bible. Some of them were mighty men. They were mighty warriors, and I'll make reference to that a little bit later. But notice the crowd that ganged around David. They were either distressed or in debt or discontented. And that's just about what the church is made up of. We're distressed and discontented with the things of this world and so forth, and so we rally together as David was here with the people in the cave. Now, notice as we come back to Psalms 142, and again, if we were to put an outline to this chapter, and basically the whole chapter is just a prayer, but verses 1 and 2, we see the psalmist crying out to God. He's crying out heavenward. And then in verses 3 and 4, we see the extreme circumstances that the psalmist is in. He's got persecution. He's feeling lonely or helpless here and needing the Lord. And then verses 5 through 7, we see the confidence of the psalmist, in other words, saying that God is his refuge and his portion. And this is something that we see all through the book of Psalms. You know that we've been studying this for many, many months and even a few years. And we see how some psalms will begin, but we also see how they end. And they just about always end with great confidence in the Lord. Now, as we begin here in this passage, we see in verse 1, he says, I cried unto the Lord with my voice, and with my voice unto the Lord did I make my supplication. I believe that he cried, he wasn't silent, he cried out, I mean, audibly, and praying out loud is sometimes valuable. It's sometimes a good thing, you know, to pour our heart out to the Lord, and this is exactly what we see here in this passage, to come before the throne of grace many times. During the week, I spend time in here in the sanctuary and I pray, and I just pray out loud as we would pray as we gather around on a Wednesday night. I might pray a little bit different because it's more of a private prayer between me and the Lord. But the psalmist here is just simply pouring out his heart to the Lord. The Bible tells us, and I'm not asking you to turn there, But in Romans 12, there's many other passages in the Bible that speaks of prayer, but he says in Romans 12, verse 12, "...rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation, and continuing instant in prayer." This is something that again, from Genesis to the book of Revelation, over and over again, we see the issue of continuing in prayer. In Luke 18, verse 1, the Bible says that God would have all men to pray and not to faint. And there's a parable there. And the Lord is speaking of an unjust judge and the widow woman. And the widow woman is coming before the unjust judge and she does not quit. She continues. She's persistent in her prayer. And in other words, the point is, God is not unjust. And if an unjust judge would give the widow woman answers to her request, he's saying, how much more is God willing to answer you and I? Now, this is not then a silent prayer that we're reading about. He says in verse 1 again, he says, I cried unto the Lord with my voice, and with my voice unto the Lord did I make my supplication. And you'll notice with me in verse 2 that he makes this statement. He said, I poured out my complaint. Now, the complaint here in this passage has to do with his meditations. In other words, he's laying everything out before the Lord. In other words, he's bringing everything that's involved in his life and he's laying it out before the Lord. This is not grumbling or accusations or charging God foolishly. It has nothing to do with this. But it has to do with just bearing everything that's upon his mind in the proper way before the Lord. Now, the Lord knows all about us. He knows what we need before we even know that we need it. He knows what will be taking place in our life tomorrow and the next day and next week. And so, still yet, God has commanded us and asked us to pray and showing our trust in the Lord. And so what He's doing here, He is pouring His heart out. He's pouring His complaints out before the Lord. That is His request. He's laying out... In other words, David's life at different times was complicated. I want you to think about this. His life became complicated. And he had enemies. And he became a king and so forth. And so he's talking to God about how his life is complicated. And he's talking about his persecutors. He's talking about his enemies. He talks about those that are rallied around him and how can he be a leader. He became a captain to them and later became, well, he became the king of the nation of Israel. And so in verse 2, We see him laying everything before the Lord, and he says here in verse 2, he said, I showed before Him my trouble." Now again, this is not grumbling and so forth, but this is a legitimate bringing things before the Lord. God allows us to do that, as you would allow your children to come before you and just pour out their heart and say, look here, here's my problems, here's my needs. God allows you and I to do this, and this is what the psalmist is doing. Now, you notice when we come to verse 3, he says in this passage, he said, "...when my spirit was overwhelmed within me, then thou knewest my path, and in the way wherein I walked have they probably laid a snare for me." We've seen this word, snare, or a jinn, or a trap, showing up over and over. to destroy his life. And he says here in this passage, I want you to notice the desperation, the fear, the enemies, and so forth. And he's saying in verse 3, when my spirit was overwhelmed within me. In other words, he's about ready to explode in trying to understand what's going on in his life. and he says, my spirit was overwhelmed within me. And he says, then thou knewest my path. In other words, the Lord knew David. Now, David had these people that were surrounding him, but there were times in David's life that there were very few friends, there were very few that he could trust and count on, and even those that came and rallied around him were people that were discontented despair and they were needing some of the same help that David himself needed, and he's trying to lead them. And so we see in this psalm that he does not turn to man. He doesn't even trust in the 400 military men that he has here. And some of them turns out to be mighty men we read in the Bible. And he does not put his trust in them. And so as we read this, we see in his heart and mind, some isolation, some being forsaken, some loneliness and things of that nature. And again, he's turning to the Lord and he's putting his trust and so forth in with the Lord. Now, we go on in verse 5 and we see here how he truly is trusting in God. He says in verse 5, he said, I cried unto thee, O Lord. I said, Thou art my refuge and my portion in the land of the living. So we see here David's trust in the God of heaven. The word refuge has to do with protection. The word portion has to do with being a provider. God is our portion. He is our provider. God is our refuge. That is, He is our protection. A refuge is a place of shelter. You may want to get out of the rain or away from a storm or away from the cold or whatever. And we know what a shelter is. We know what refuge is. And the psalmist is saying, the Lord is my refuge. He's also saying in this passage, by the way, there were six cities of refuge, three on each side of Jordan. put in particular places where you could get there if you were in need and you needed to get to one of these cities of refuge in the Old Testament. And here we find the psalmist saying, God is my refuge. He's my shelter. He's my protection. And he's saying, God is my portion in the land of the living. He is my provider. You can write down Lamentations 3 and verse 24. and also Psalms 16 5. We know that the Lord Jesus Christ in John 6 48-57, the Bible speaks of Him as being our bread and being our drink. In other words, the Lord is our portion. And we see here that God... What David is doing when he said, the Lord is my refuge and the Lord is my portion, he's saying that God will keep His promises that He has made unto him. And by the way, when you read 1 Samuel 22, I believe it's verse 3, he's talking about finding a place for his parents because he knew that Saul probably would use his parents to try to draw him out And he's looking for help and so forth, and he's saying, until I know exactly what God is going to be doing in my life. He knew God was going to carry him to the throne. He knew that God was going to bless him. He knew that one day he would sit upon the throne. And of course, he's praying and simply saying, I'm waiting on the Lord. He didn't try to make this thing happen. He could have took Saul's life a number of times, but he never tried to force anything or make it happen. Now, you notice with me as we come to verse 6. He says here in verse 6, he said, Attend unto my cry, for I am brought very low, deliver me from my persecutors, for they are stronger than I." We love to boast about our strength, do we not? But David is saying, they're stronger than I. He's not pretending to be strong. And he's saying, Lord, attend unto my cry. He's saying I've been brought very low. He's been mistreated by hurtful people, by difficult people. And you write down Psalms 116, verse 6, and Psalms 7 and in verse 1. And I'm going through these because I want to give you a turn to some other references before we close tonight. But you notice in verse 6, he said, Attend unto my cry, for I am brought very low. Deliver me from my persecutors, for they, rather, are stronger than I. Verse 7, Bring my soul out of prison. We find that again, he's got some cave time. He's got this cave experience. And you figure being shut up and nowhere to go and no way to get out, and the enemy's on the outside. It's got to be a pretty good-sized cave for over 400 people to be in there with him. That's a good-sized cave. And still yet, they're closed in in this cave and walls around them and no way to get out. And so he's praying from this hemmed in, cave that he's in and seeking deliverance. And he said in verse 7, he said, "...bring my soul out of the prison, that I may praise thy name. The righteous shall compass me about." Notice he wants to be in the presence of the righteous, the redeemed. He wants amen. That's who I want to be around. And if you love the Lord, you want to be with God's people. And He wants to be in the presence of friends, and those that are righteous, and those that have a love for the Lord, those who want to talk about the book, amen? And those who want to talk about the Savior, and talk about the blood, and sing about the blood, and sing about the cross, and sing about heaven and things of that nature. And then he says in this passage, he says, "...for thou shalt deal bountifully with me." Now, if you're in a cave and you've got a bunch of people with you, you become their captain, and they're all discontented, they're in debt, and they're in despair just like you are, and you're all out there together, and then you say something like in verse 7, "...for thou shalt deal bountifully with me." You have to be hanging on to the promises of God. See, prayer is not just a formula to get us out of everything, but prayer is something to get us through some things. And even after David left this cave, there was still a number of years whereby that he was hunted as an animal. And there were times when his life was threatened. And still yet, we see he's saying, I'm hanging on to the promises of God. I'm not going to turn loose of the promises of God. I'm not going to charge God. I'm not going to ask why. He's just saying, Lord, I need your help. Now, I want to give you a few other thoughts this evening. And I want you to turn with me, first of all, to 1 Thessalonians. And I'm going to be reading in chapter 5. Now, what about an aching or hurting soul? You know, we say my head hurts, my stomach hurts, my eye hurts, Amen? But what about a hurting and aching soul? Notice with me as we come to 1 Thessalonians, and I'm going to be reading in chapter 5. Notice as we come to this passage. We see here in this passage, now, we see in the Bible as well as our own experiences that there is such a thing as being emotionally disturbed, being distressed, being depressed. We see this. Depression is a common feeling among God's people. Can you say amen to that tonight? Now, we don't stay in this. We don't stay in our circumstances. But these things come upon the people of God, even those who are filled with the Spirit of God. Let me give you an example of that. Charles Spurgeon in 1866 at 32 years of age told his congregation, he said, I am depressed. I hope none of you ever go to the extreme of wretchedness as I go to. Every year he battled with depression. Now you can read his writings. Some great writings, and a man that preached many sermons to many people, put more things in print than probably any other preacher at that time, and he said, I am depressed. Now, we have a place to go when we have these problems. We have Christian friends, we have the Lord, and those kind of things. We don't have to stay in these, but these are things that come into our lives. Amen? These things come into our lives. There are circumstances and things that come into our lives. And depression is a common feeling among God's people. There is a state of sadness, feeling rejected, emotionally disturbed, grief, these kind of things that do come into our lives. But we have the Lord. As the psalmist cried out, and said, I need the Lord. I need You, Lord. Notice with me in 1 Thessalonians. We read here, I'm reading one verse, and then we're going to the book of Numbers. The Bible said in 1 Thessalonians chapter 5, reading in verse 14, it says, Now we exhort you, brethren, warn them that are unruly, comfort the... what? Do you believe that there are some that are feeble-minded? in God's church. Do you believe that? How many believe that? We have somebody walk in on crutches or a wheelchair, and we do everything we can to help them. But they're the feeble-minded. And he also says here in this passage, he says, comfort the feeble-minded, support the weak, and be patient toward all men. Do you believe that we have people in the church that are weak across our land in the first century and today? Yes. And he's saying, comfort the feeble-minded. Let me give you an example. Now, notice with me as we turn to the book of Numbers. I'm going to give you a few examples. I'm not sure I'm going to turn to all of these, but I'm going to give you them whether we do or not. Notice in Numbers chapter 11. As we go through the Bible, we find different individuals that had depression to come upon them. We find that Moses was carrying a heavy and he told God, he said, I need some help. And you know what God did? God intervened and helped Moses. He's carrying a heavy burden. We find that as we come to the Bible, there's a man by the name of Elijah. And Elijah just wanted to die. You know, many times when we get low, the psalmist said I was brought what? Very low. Have you ever been very low before? And many times, that I've noticed in the Scriptures, my own life and other people's life, sometimes becoming very low, and this is strange, but it happens, can be after a great victory. I mean, you can have a great victory with the Lord and in a short period of time be brought very low. You think, well, these victories, the mountaintop experience, you know, who can top that? And still yet, there's the valleys. I like what Lester Roloff said He said, when you get down in the valley, he said, just farm it. The best land is down there. And that is true. If you've ever been up in Tennessee, the best land is in the valleys. He said, just farm it while you're down there. He said, that's the best land. But we find people in the Bible that had trouble. Elijah basically had some great victories in 1 Kings chapter 18. When you get into 1 Kings chapter 19 verse 4, after these, I'm talking about great victories, I'm talking about miraculous things, I'm talking about calling fire. I mean, if you could call fire, to come down out of heaven. You'd be walking around with your chest stuck out for two years, man. And he called fire to come down out of heaven and great victories, and just one woman said, I'm going to kill you, bud. Preacher, you've had it. And he ran into the wilderness. He said, Lord, kill me. I want to die. Well, he was down. I'm going to show you what God did for him. We find that Job, Job grieved. And in Job chapter 3 and verse 11, I mean, Job came to the place that he said, I wish I'd never been born. You read about the things that come into his life. Job lost everything that he had, but his life. He even lost his health. And what did God do for Job? As we read through the book of Job, counseling, speaking to Job, these things didn't come upon Job because he was living a wicked life. Why, he's called the most righteous man on earth. And we find as we come to chapter 42, we find God coming and restoring everything that Job had and gave him even more than what he had. So there's people in the Bible that they get very low. Jeremiah, Lamentations chapter 1, if you'll read that, he's distressed. I mean, this man is a preacher and he's a prophet, and he is distressed over the circumstances that was taking place in the nation of Israel, the people that he ministered to. And we see in that passage that God came along the side and encouraged Jeremiah as we read through the book of Jeremiah. We find Jonah. The Bible tells us in Jonah 4 and verse 8, Jonah got down in the mouth. He was very low. He was literally in the mouth of the whales. in the whale. And Jonah came to his wit's end, and God saved him and delivered him and put him back on the mission field, put him back in front of the Ninevites, the priests of them. There's many, there's many. We see even the Apostle Paul. Even the Apostle Paul, he said, all men have forsook me. We read through his writings and he talks about the fears he has. You know, a lot of times we think it's not manly to talk about our fears. But the apostle Paul talked about his fears, and he talked about the things that he went through, and he kept pleading with the Lord to strengthen him. Now, notice here as we come to this passage. We read here a week or so ago in the book of Numbers, we read chapter 11, the first two verses. But I'm not coming to those two verses. We see the people complaining. and it displeased the Lord. And we see throughout this chapter, verse 4, the mixed multitude that fell a-lusting and God had to deal with them. But notice as we come to verse 10, the Bible said here, Then Moses heard the people weep throughout their families. Every man in the door of his tent, and the anger of the Lord was kindled greatly, and Moses also was displeased. And Moses said unto the Lord, Wherefore hast Thou afflicted Thy servant? And wherefore have I not found rather favor in thy sight, that thou layest the burden of all this people upon me?" Notice Moses had a heavy burden. Moses carried between one and two million people out of Egypt as a leader. And this burden became heavy upon him. And he says here in verse 12, "'Have I conceived all these people? Have I begotten them that thou shouldst say unto me, Carry them in thy bosom as a nursing father, the suckling child unto the land which thou swearest unto their fathers? Whence should I have flesh to give unto all this people? For they weep unto me, saying, Give us flesh that we may eat. And I am not able to bear all this people alone, because it is too heavy for me, if thou deal thus with me." What's the next two words? Now, he ain't going to take his life. No Christian is going to... want to take their life. But as Job said, I wish I'd just as soon never been born. And Moses said here, Lord, if You're not going to lift this burden, He said, kill me. I pray Thee out of hand. He said, if I have found favor in Thy sight, let me not see my wretchedness. And then in verse 16, God came to him and began lifting the burden. He got him some help. Turn with me please to 1 Kings, a passage I mentioned a moment ago. In 1 Kings, I'm just saying that there are times of aching souls in the hearts of men and women. And yes, even among God's people. And if we say it's weak to pour these things out before the Lord, then we might as well call Moses and David and many others just weaklings, if we're going to say that. You'll notice when we're in 1 Kings chapter 9, now here's Elijah, chapter 18 describes his great victories. And we find here in chapter 19, we see here as we come to this passage, We see here in verse 4, and we're just going to close in this passage. I gave you already Job 3.11, Lamentations 1.20, and Jonah 4 and in verse 8. So we'll close here in this text. But we find here that Jezebel had sent a message. And we see here in this passage, verse 4, it says, when a day's journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a juniper tree, and he requested for himself that he might..." What's the next word? Help me out, congregation. "...die." He said, Lord, just let me die. Have you ever felt that way? Have you ever been there? I'm not talking about taking. I'm talking about have you ever just felt, Lord, I've had enough. I can't take anymore. And here Elijah is, And he said, Lord, I'm ready to die. Now, he'd been zealous for the things of the Lord. Now, there's 7,000 people that God says in this chapter and Romans 11 that have not bowed the knee to Baal. But I'm sure Elijah's wondering where they're all at. You ever had anybody say, I'm behind you, and you look back and they're way behind you? But anyway, I'm sure Elijah's saying, where are they? But the Lord had His people. And Elijah had fought this battle alone. The people watched him. He even asked the people in chapter 18 and verse 21, he said, how long halt you between two opinions? He said, if the Lord be God, follow Him. If Baal, then follow him. And the people answered him, not a word. They watched. the showdown between Elijah and the Baal worshippers, and Ahab and Jezebel. They stood and watched this take place. Great victories. And then he's sent word that somebody's going to kill him. And you'll notice that as we come to this passage, when he requested to die, and he said in verse 4, the latter part of the verse, it is enough Now, O Lord, take my life, for I am not better than my father's." Now, I want you to notice what the Lord did. Different needs, different circumstances, the Lord ministers to different people in different ways. David needed deliverance out of the cave. God finally brought him to the throne safely. It took some years. God brought him to the throne. Moses needed this burden. You figure, you know, I mean, a congregation of a hundred people can keep you busy. But you can imagine having between one and two million in your congregation. And God says, here's what we're going to do. We're going to give you some help. Okay? We find that God came and helped. But notice what He did with Elijah. It says in verse 5, And as he lay and slept under a juniper tree, Behold, then an angel touched him and said unto him, Arise and eat. And he looked, and behold, there was a cake baking on the coals and a cruise of water at his head. And he did eat and drink and laid him down again. The angel of the Lord came again the second time and touched him and said, Arise and eat, because the journey is too great for thee. He rose, and He did eat and drink, and went into the strength of that meat forty days and forty nights unto Horeb the mount of God." Now that's quite a powerful, supersonic meal, isn't it? You know, I mean, forty days. Forty days. And the Bible said, now here's what I'm getting at, I don't really need You know the story. He's in the cave, the Lord comes to him, and basically the Lord asked him what he was doing there. The Lord knew what he was doing there. And Elijah was used to exciting things and flashing lights and miracles, and God came and spoke to him in a still, small voice in verse 12. He didn't speak to him in the wind, the earthquake and all these things, but spoke to him. Elijah said in verse 10, I'm jealous. I'm very jealous for the things of the Lord. And he was a great prophet of God. But you know what the Lord did here in this passage? The Lord gently came unto him and fed him, gave him some rest, gave him some strength, and let him go on to a cave. And then the Lord came and gently began speaking to him in a still, small voice. God wasn't through with this man. God said, Elijah, I want you to go. You've got to anoint a king. You've got to take care of this. You've got to do this. He had a man in training, Elisha. He had a man in training. God wasn't through with Elijah. And so the Lord gently come along beside of him and encouraged him, fed him, gave Him nourishment. I'm simply saying to you as we read Psalms 142, we see the cry of depression and despair. We see an aching and a hurting soul. Not injuries to the body, but we see that soul aching and hurting. And we need to be sensitive to those things. We're going to stop right here.