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In a moment, we're going to read
from Psalm 13. Psalm 13. We just heard from
Psalm 113, but we're going to be reading from Psalm 13. This
is the Psalm of David. It's part of a cycle, the beginning
cycle of the Psalter. And in this early cycle, this
first cycle, David pours out his heart in the Psalms. It's one of the wonders of the
book of Psalms. is that it is so heartfelt. The book of Psalms is so heartfelt.
It's David or Asaph or Korah pouring out their hearts to God.
It can be very surprising and even shocking when we read these
poems, really, because they are so human. They run the gamut
of human emotions and human thoughts. Everything that comes into the
mind of David is poured out in these Psalms, or what goes through
Korah. Korah has some remarkable Psalms
where he just lays it out before the Lord. It's wonderful to see
this, because it reminds us that God knows us through and through. Nothing surprises Him. It may
surprise us what bubbles up from our dark hearts, but it doesn't
surprise the living God. And so we shouldn't hold back
when we come to God in prayer, but we should pour out our hearts
to Him. I love my Baptist friends, and
they have wonky doctrine, but when it comes to their feelings,
They're just so wonderful. They express themselves and I
love hanging out with the Baptist because they they're very comfortable
with their maybe too comfortable at times And I always joke my
background is Scottish. So I'll tell people I know I
have emotions. I'm just not sure where they
are once in a while, I find them and we'll take them out and look
at them, but But David pours out he's very Mediterranean and
He pours out His emotions. We're going to see this in a
moment. Before we do, let's gather in prayer before our Heavenly
Father and ask Him to illuminate our minds and our hearts that
we would receive His Word gladly. Gracious and Heavenly Father,
we thank You for this day of rest, the day that begins the
week. It's wonderful to begin each
new week freshly in worship before You. In the morning and in the
evening, beginning and end of the day, we come to you in worship. We praise your holy name. We
hear of your promises. We hear of your righteousness.
And we hear of your accomplishments in Jesus Christ. And we are refreshed. We are renewed in our minds and
in our hearts as we are reminded Lord of all that you have done
in Jesus Christ and that we can truly rest in Jesus Your Sabbath
is a Sabbath rest in which we come and rest from our labors
of the past week and and we rest in the Lord Father that's what
we want to do. We want to rest in you. We don't
want to live a life where we're trying to claw our way into righteousness. That was the old man, O Lord. The new man is refreshed. The
new man sees with fresh eyes what Jesus Christ has accomplished
already on the cross and in his life, that he is the righteous
one, and that we draw our strength and our hope and our love from
him. And so, Father, we pray that
you would minister to us as we open your word, and as we hear
David's own cry for help, that it would speak to us, that we
wouldn't be ashamed of our weakness and our frailty, but we would
bring it all to you, O Lord, who loves us, and who redeems
us, and who continues to sanctify us by your Holy Spirit and the
Word. This we pray in Jesus' name. Amen. So the title of the sermon is
A Godly Cry for Help. David writes under the inspiration
of the Holy Spirit, How long, O Lord, will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face
from me? How long must I take counsel
in my soul and have sorrow in my heart all the day long? How long shall my enemy be exalted
over me? Consider and answer me, O Lord,
my God. Light up my eyes, lest I sleep
the sleep of death, lest my enemies say I have prevailed over him,
lest my foes rejoice because I am shaken. But I have trusted
in your steadfast love. My heart shall rejoice in your
salvation. I will sing to the Lord because
he has dealt bountifully with me. I will sing to the Lord because
he has dealt bountifully with me." Well, this psalm records
the cry of the afflicted, the cry of the afflicted, and therefore
harmonizes with several of the preceding psalms, as I said.
This is Psalm 13, but the preceding 12 also have many heart cries
in them. Here, in Psalm 13, David rested
confidently on the royal love of the Lord. But it doesn't begin
that way. By the end, he is resting in
the Lord. But it begins with him very disrupted in his thoughts
and in his feelings and in his soul. He rests confidently in
the royal love of the Lord by the end of the psalm, even though
he finds no immediate deliverance from the oppression of the adversary,
God's enemy. And we don't know who exactly
the enemy is. Is David talking about an earthly
enemy? A human enemy? Or is he talking about an enemy
from the dark domain? Satan or one of his minions.
We're not sure, but David is facing an enemy. The enemy seems
to be overwhelming him, and he is in despair at the beginning
of this psalm. By the end of it, though, a mere
five verses or six verses later, he is declaring the excellencies
of God as God ministers to his beloved one, David. David feels
isolated at the beginning from God and calls out to Him to be
vindicated. He again finds rest in the Lord's
unfailing love. Once again, David discovers God's
unfailing love. He begins by questioning, does
God really love me? Is basically his question. But
by the end he realizes, yes, God loves me. He always has loved
me. The structure of this afternoon's
sermon is David's perplexity, verses 1 and 2, David's petition,
prayerful petition, verses 3 and 4, and then David's praise, verses
5 and 6. We begin with the first point,
David's perplexity, the first two verses. David's perplexity.
Four times, four times, David asks the Lord in various ways,
how long? How long is this going to go
on? How long will you forget me?
Verse one. How long will you look the other
way? Again, verse one. How long must I struggle with
anguish in my soul? Verse two. And how long will
my enemy have the upper hand? Have you ever had that experience?
Life can be going very well. merrily on your way. But then
something happens. Either your health declines or
a loved one's health declines. There's a disruption in your
family or at work or in your neighborhood. It can be a physical
ailment, a spiritual ailment, a moral ailment. And suddenly
you hit a wall and then you collapse. And it's horrible. It can be
horrible. And it can last for a couple
of hours, a couple of days, a couple of weeks, a couple of months.
As a pastoral chaplain at an oxford pallet, it's a factory,
I'm ministering to 80 men, mostly men, there's some girls there
too, but it's mostly the guys that I minister to, and I hear
that often, how long? How long will this go on? Someone's
little girl's in a car accident and suffers a catastrophic injury
to her mind. How long is this going to go
on, Lord? How long will my little girl suffer? How long before
she can regain something as simple as motor skills? or speech. One moment she was speaking,
the next minute she is mute because of this catastrophic injury.
That's just one of many instances. You know, another young mother
giving birth and is overwhelmed with all kinds of mental and
emotional and moral crises all of a sudden. It's like she's
suffering a psychotic episode. How long? How long will this
go on? You ask the doctors. It could
go on forever. It might be ameliorated by medicine.
It may not. How long? How long will this
go on? Well, that's the cry of David's
heart as well. How long? The four-fold repetition
expresses agitation. deep anguish, deep anguish. There's a sense of anguish and
sorrow that closes off all other perspective. While David, it's
like he is in a pit. If you've ever been in a pit,
working in a pit, digging in a pit, those walls can be very high
and you can't see anything around you. All you see is the walls
that enclose you. That's what David is feeling. He's feeling enclosed at this
moment. The anguish is overwhelming.
And unless the Lord answers David and answers his prayer, it's
as though David is at death's door. That's how he feels. What's next? Death? You know,
one moment he is the apple of God's eye. It seems that he can
do no wrong. He's a great warrior. I mean,
he's a Renaissance man before the Renaissance came, a great
warrior. in single-hand combat with bears
and lions? I mean, what kind of guy is that? And then when he goes into the
field of battle, he's a great commander, and he has thousands
and tens of thousands of men behind him, and he is leading
the charge. They loved him. But not only
was he a great military genius, he was also a poet. He wrote
some of the best poetry in the Bible and in the world. Psalm
23, has anyone read that and not been touched by how beautiful
and profound it is? It's my go-to and many pastors'
go-to passage when I'm with someone who is sick or dying in hospital
or at home or in hospice. I read that and the person can
be agitated. And after reading it, suddenly
God ministers to them and there's a sense of peace. David wrote
that under God's inspiration. He's a great man. But here he
is in the pit of despair, wondering how long. Brothers and sisters,
you may have gone through that yourself, or you know somebody
who has gone through that. And you know, it grieves my heart,
and maybe it grieves your heart too. Oftentimes, when we go through
those moments, we cry out to the Lord, how long? Or we share
with a brother or sister, how long? I'm feeling in despair.
And what happens? Oftentimes, it's very sad. The
person that we confide in, it's like they judge us because we're
going through some crisis. And there's depression. The Reformed
and Presbyterian doctrine, the best doctrine, the best systematic
theologians in the Christian world, and therefore the world. And yet we have a hard time when
it comes to the human stuff sometimes. And we're great when it comes
to the theory and theology and doctrine. But ministering to
people can be a challenge. People are messy. Human life
is messy. Even Christian life can be very,
very messy. We can get ourselves into pits. And David was in this pit of
despair. God is giving us this example
to minister to us so that we see this is part of human life. This is part also of the Christian
journey that we are on. There are times when people will
be in despair and we shouldn't judge them, necessarily. I mean, it could be secret sin.
It's true. It could be secret sin that's
bringing them there. But it could also be the mysterious
hand of God in providence. Oftentimes, mysteriously, God
uses human suffering to wear us down, to open up new doors,
to refine us, to cultivate a new spirit within us, or refresh
our old spirit. He often uses suffering for our
good. It's tremendously mysterious.
But that is the message of the book of Job. I would challenge
you to read that if you haven't already seen that. Job is all
about suffering and how God uses it for His glory, but also for
the good of His people. Oftentimes, in the 21st century,
because of medical wonders that we have, we pray the suffering
away. Dear Lord, if you can, take away
this suffering. Which is, it's normal and natural that we do
that. But sometimes, oftentimes, God does not take away the suffering.
We don't know what to do, and we button our lips because we
don't want to share it, because people might think that we lack
faith because we're suffering. Nothing could be further from
the truth. Jesus Christ suffered his entire life He was the perfect
one, the righteous one. Suffering is often used by God's
hand to refine and to refresh and to deepen. Some of our most
precious insights come from struggle. Think of it. When things are
going well, your mind kind of gets shut off and you enjoy the
pleasures of the day. But when you're in suffering,
you're forced to reflect, to look at yourself, to look at
others and to cry out to God. This is what David is doing.
He's crying out to God. He's had a very golden life. But if you'd
look at David's life before now, he wasn't a very reflective man.
He sort of had things easy. He's a great champion. But now
he's reflecting. And it's painful. It's painful. How long, O Lord? Well, David
doesn't remain in the pit. He doesn't remain feeling sorry
for himself. He's only on the pity parade
for a little while. He now, in the second point,
verses three through four, he cries out to the Lord in petition. David's petition. David makes
two requests of the Lord. First, in verse three, he prays
to the Lord, restore me. And second, which I find very
curious, verse four, do not let my enemies gloat over me. Do
not let my enemies gloat over me. Now, he's not saying to destroy
the enemies. He's saying that these are enemies
that are ranged against God's righteousness. This is not a
prayer that we can say for somebody that bugs us. You know, our neighbor
gets under our skin, so we pray this prayer. No, that would be
the wrong application. These are people who hate the Lord
and hate the Lord's people. These are people that are trying
to crush the Old Testament Church and David, who was a representative
of the Old Testament Church. And David is praying that the
enemies of God and of God's people would not prevail. This is a
proper prayer. We have to be very careful with
the imprecatory Psalms, but this is a proper prayer. When we see
in our world the enemies of God ranged against Christ. Our minds
will immediately go to different movements, different trends of
thought and behavior. There's a lot of them out there
now. The 21st century is a marvel of heresies and debauchery and
twisted philosophies. Thank you, enlightenment, for
all the bitter fruit that you have borne in our lives. And David is praying in his day,
don't let the enemies prevail over me, over, and basically
over God. We should be praying that too,
that the enemies of God would not ultimately prevail in our
lives, in the life of the church, and the life of our community.
I originally came from the United Church, and so know keenly how
the popular trends of the world, the world of flesh and the devil,
can get the better of a church Because at some point, the church
forgot to be righteous according to God's will. And the United
Church had been praying, Lord, do not let the enemies prevail
over me. Instead, they allowed, in the
United Church, the enemies to prevail over them. But David
is praying, Lord, don't let the enemies prevail over me. Restore
me. Only the Lord can bring enlightenment, true enlightenment to the mind.
And only the Lord can bring genuine relief to the sin-sick soul,
or to the soul that is depressive or in despair. Yes, medicine
is very helpful. I'm not an anti-medicine. I'm
not anti-medical. But if we think about it for
a moment, Who is the one who makes all things and who sustains
all things? It's God. And Colossians tells
us it's Jesus Christ, the Eternal Son, who makes all things, who
sustains all things, and to whom all things will be received.
Jesus Christ is the one who sustains all things. He does ordain secondary
means to help us. So He ordains that at certain
times, in certain ways, medicine, real medicine, Tylenol or Advil
or whatever, can heal us. But ultimately, behind all of
that is God ordaining it. God is the true healer. And sometimes, oftentimes, He
uses the secondary means of medicine to heal but it always ultimately
comes from God. God is the great healer. So when
we take our medicine, it's entirely appropriate to pray, Lord, use
this Tylenol. Lord, use this surgery. Lord,
use this nursing program to heal. Because God is delighted to use
secondary means that actually exalts His name. Look at God,
He uses everything. Everything in the universe is
his he is great king over all things and he is the one who
orders all things But god is the source of all genuine healing
And david feels afflicted And so david knows the true source
or the true healing of his affliction is the lord god almighty So david
prays to the lord lord restore me and don't let my enemies prevail
over me May your name be exalted. He earnestly prayed, lest he
sleep in death. See, he's worried. He doesn't
want to die in despair. He wants to be God's, and so
he prays, God, be gentle to me. Be gracious to me. And thirdly,
the third point is David's praise. Notice he goes from the pit of
despair to then turning to God and lifting his eyes from this
world up to heaven. And then the last part is praise.
So often in life, Especially when we're going through suffering,
what's the first thing that we do? We almost always turn inward. We become very subjective. Even
the most objective person, when they're in pain or suffering,
will turn inward. We suddenly become fantastic
experts in our navel. We become navel gazers. Poor
me. Look at what's happening to me.
And we intensify the suffering. Because we're thinking only of
ourselves in our immediate condition and we're not looking at God
who is eternal and who governs all things and does all things
well. When we are subjective, we are looking at the immediate
circumstances. and we're not realizing or we're
not remembering that God has eternal plans. This is so vitally
important if we're going to understand the purpose of suffering. The
purpose of suffering has eternal consequences. And when we pray
the suffering away immediately, we can lose the lesson. There's
lessons in suffering. There's lessons. We should be
praying. I'm not saying that we shouldn't pray for healing. Absolutely,
but if the healing doesn't come immediately then we should pray
Lord teach me through this suffering What you would have me do I want
to use this suffering for your glory. Please don't let me squander
this I don't want to be self-absorbed. I don't want to pity myself.
I want to use my suffering for your glory so Lord Open my mind
Help me to understand why I am suffering. Why is your hand so
heavily on me? Is there secret sin that needs
to be confessed? Or is there arrogance or pride
that needs to be broken down? Is my heart too hard and I'm
not loving and gracious? Lord, show me. Brothers and sisters,
there's been so many people who through suffering have matured.
It is wonderful and amazing. It is so mysterious. How could
suffering make a person wiser, gentler, kinder, more gracious? This is God at work in the person's
life. And this is a way that we become
Christ-like. Christ embraced suffering, not
because he was masochistic, because he was demonstrating to us a
very important lesson. We are people, creatures of flesh
and bone, nerve and sinew, and we live in a fallen world. And one of the ways that God
makes us shine is through suffering. He is buffing our souls. So David, in the third part,
gives praise to God. Verses five and six. David praises
the living God. David trusts in the Lord on failing
love and rejoices because God is good to him. He begins in
the pit of despair, and by verse 6, he is rejoicing. He's rejoicing
in spite of his suffering. He is rejoicing. David expressed
his trust in the Lord's unfailing love, that royal, loyal love
the Lord has for those who trust in Him. God is our Heavenly Father,
and He loves us. in a way that we really can't
comprehend. And yet, David realizes this
God who has called him and brought him into covenant relationship
with him, this is the same God who loves him and cares for him
and shepherds him through these moments. David no longer hears
the ridicule of his foes. As he turns from himself and
looking inward and turns to God, the foes and their cries and
their hackles fade because he's focusing on the eternal. This
light, momentary affliction is preparing for us a weight of
glory beyond all earthly comparison as we look not to the things
here and now, but to the things of eternity. That's what we need
to do. We need to have an eternal perspective,
especially on our suffering, because the truth is, I don't
need a crystal ball, and I don't need to be a prophet to know
that there are people in this congregation who are hearing
my voice who are already suffering in body, morally or mentally,
or who will enter into a season of suffering. And brothers and
sisters, if we do not learn how to suffer in a godly, biblical,
Christ-honoring way, we squander that suffering. We squander that
suffering. And yet, Scripture has so much
to say about human suffering. And there is, in a very real
way, a beauty to the suffering. Not in the suffering itself,
but what can come out of it. Look at the suffering that Jesus
endured. It resulted in His resurrection
and glory. He's demonstrating something
to us. He's demonstrating that sometimes the suffering produces
great pearls. David assured, David now assured
that his prayer has been heard, resolves to rejoice and sing
to the Lord for giving David salvation and for dealing so
bountifully with David. In the midst of his suffering,
David counts his blessings. David counts his blessings in
the midst of suffering. Brothers and sisters, we need
to take that lesson and make it our own. To count our blessings,
even and especially in the midst of sorrow. Think of Paul, who
was cast into the deepest, darkest prison, but only after he had
been beaten. Been beaten, and then thrown into prison, and
it was the deepest, darkest part of the prison, the oublié, where
people are forgotten. And what does he do there? He
sings the praises of God. He could have said, poor me,
I've been beaten, and so have my companions, and we're bloody
and bruised. And now, not only that, but we're
in the darkest, dankest part of the prison. Instead, he took
that opportunity to praise the living God. In another portion
of scripture, David says that he rejoices that he is included
in Christ's suffering, that he's numbered among those who are
worthy to suffer for the Lord. That should be us. We should
count ourselves worthy. I'm saying that as a true confession. I'm a real wimp when it comes
to pain, believe me. I'm not saying this because I'm
a warrior at suffering. I'm simply looking at scripture,
seeing this lesson, and realizing, brothers and sisters, there is
real wisdom in suffering, and we might encounter it in our
own lives. So we better learn from David and learn from Christ
as well. David's piercing cry, in conclusion, David's piercing
cry for help becomes a confident song of hope. Aside from desiring
survival for his own sake, David does not want his enemies to
overcome him because he was God's chosen king and beloved one. David wants God's name to be
exalted. And so David cries to the Lord
and the Lord is gracious and He ministers to David and he
speaks peace to his heart such that David is able to rejoice
even and especially in his suffering. Brothers and sisters, may God
grant us the grace to also rejoice in our sufferings and to count
our blessings when God's hand is heavy in mysterious providence,
heavy on us when we suffer. And may God bring forth fruit
from our suffering, and may it be for his glory and our good. Let us pray. Gracious and heavenly Father,
we thank you for this wonderful, very personal heart cry from
David, your beloved son, in earthly terms. He was the apple of your
eye, O Lord, And you granted him so many gifts in his earthly
existence. You made him a great king. You
made him a great poet. He was a leader of men. He did
many great accomplishments, Heavenly Father, and yet he was one who
suffered in his soul and in his mind. And he cried out to you,
how long, O Lord? Father, we thank you that in
the pages of Scripture, your revealed word shows us that you
ministered to him in his hour of need. And Lord, we pray that
you would minister to us in our hour of need, that when we go
through trials and temptations and tribulations, that we would
tear our eyes away from ourself and our own predicament, and
we would turn our eyes to heaven and to the heavenly throne and
to Christ, heavenly Father. Father, we thank you that he
is the risen one, that he has vanquished sin and death in the
grave, and he sits in highest heaven at your right hand, O
Lord, where he ministers to the church. Father, we pray that
Christ would minister to us, even now, that he would minister
to us, that you would fill our hearts with love and joy. that
we would rejoice, O Lord, in weal and in woe, in good times
and in bad, that we would rejoice in you, for you are the source
of all life and the source of our blessedness. This we pray
in Jesus' name. Amen.
A Godly Cry for Help
Series Guest Speakers
- DAVID'S PERPLEXITY (V. 1-2)
- DAVID'S PETITION (V.3-4)
- DAVID'S PRAISE (V. 5-6)
| Sermon ID | 7724204121592 |
| Duration | 31:26 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday Service |
| Bible Text | Psalm 13 |
| Language | English |
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