to be here with you all this morning. It is good to be in the house of the Lord to sing praises to his wonderful and glorious name. I am definitely thankful to be here with you all. Thank you for the invitation. This morning, just give a little bit of introduction of the style of preacher that I am. We have a, I strive what we call expositional preaching. A lot of preachers in today's age impose on the text their own ideas, their own method, their own message, and this morning I don't want to do that. And so if you had your Bibles, if you'd raise it up, I hope you do. I hope you will read along with me. I hope you will see within Scripture the word that is given for you today. And this morning, I just wanted to let you know, I don't have a message that's been laid on my heart. I don't have a message that I completely can just... The Word of God that is saying if you will We can be discouraged. And this text here deals with depression. And, but I would encourage you to let me know. I am nervous. I don't know why, but pray for me. I'll be praying for you. I thank you for your many blessings. I thank you for this opportunity to stand before your people to preach your word and I pray that this word would not go void in the hearts of your people or even in my heart. and that we would be completely satisfied in You. Father, I pray that You be with this church. I pray that You have Your blessings upon this church as You lead and guide them through days to come. I pray that You be with them during this pandemic. I pray that You be with them in their daily lives. By the way, this morning, Father, we thank You, we praise You, we rejoice in You ultimately. Father, we love you. It is in Christ's name I pray. Amen. believer and we'll find the gospel in the place of weakness and that will drive everything home I have six points 0.6 would be the gospel in the place of weakness. But that is the direction of which I... This so- All right, so this is a song called Soul. I want to say this just briefly. We live in a day and age, not just in society, not just in a nation, but even in our churches, we are told to be strong. We're told to be strong for our faith. We're told to be strong for our family. We're told to be strong for our personal agenda. We're told to be strong for Christ. Which, by the way, we were never told to be strong for Christ. We were told to be strong in Christ, just to throw that in there. Can saved people deal with discouragement and depression? Indeed, yes, they can. And they do. I think of the Psalms of David, as we read, he's downcast. He's a man after God's own heart. We think of Job, who feared God. you as David here. This is a psalm of a weak soul for the weak soul today. And so we see that here is David... But why? Why is David... Why is David... ...weakness in his own soul? Couple things I just pulled out of the text as I read and just took note of. Thank you. He fuels that God. And then also we notice that He is also beat down by the issues of life. Notice with me in v. 7. Deep call unto deep at the noise of thy water stouts, all thy waves and thy billows are gone over me. How many of you all have been to the ocean? Raise a hand. How many of you have seen the ocean in waves? All right, if you've been to Ocean, of course you've seen it, but picture with me what David is trying to paint here. All right, just try to envision with me. Because the man of God has been left to himself. This is also why this message is for the unbeliever. Because we'll see, I'm just going to give you a little bit of a preview to know this. If you do not know Christ as your Savior and do not look to God for your hope, and we'll see that David looks to God for his hope, but you don't believe in God, then you have no hope. You are lost. And you will not have any hope apart from God. You must look to God. Whenever things seem to go against you, and I know it does, we all work a secular job, we all deal with life, family issues, whatever the case may be, all right? We will get to that place in our life. And you know what? We need something to grab onto. We need something to hope in, to trust in, to have faith in, have confidence in. And if you don't know God, what hope do you have? But here he is being beat down. He is completely beat down by the issues of life. And then we see at the end of verse 5, and I won't get into this as much right now, but we will later in the text as we go down to the message. But it says, that while thou cast down, O my soul, why are you disquieted in me? Then he says, hope thou in God. He says, hope. Beep boop! That is where he's at. The battle between the soul and mind. It's real. Depression is real, okay? We can't forsake it. We can't just run away from it. It's there. Especially, there's a lot of people who run away. You can't run. I've tried. You can't run. You want to run. You just want to become secluded from everyone else. You want to live in solitude. the back of the mind. It's real. Depression is real. Discouragement in our lives is real. But then We see, the second point I have, when we're driving in the dark, we know, Wrapping up water, and it's just completely satisfied. That's the idea that we oftentimes give, but that is not what David is facing. In context, understanding what's going on in his own soul, He's dry. But I don't think he's talking about his mouth is dry. No, no, no. His heart, his soul is dry. God because notice what he says here. He says my soul thirsted for God the living God two different words, two different names to describe God. That first word, when it says, my soul thirsteth for God, that first name for God is to describe God as the supreme and holy one. But then when he says, for the living God, that's another name for God, which is the word all, which means the almighty one. Two different names that David used. And then we see in the end of that he says, then when shall I come and appear before God? He longs to see the face of his God. And we'll see something is significant about the face of God, because he says, I long to be a peer before God. And then in verse 5, he says, hope thou in God, for I shall praise him for the help of his countenance. That countenance means the face or the expression of the face. So he longs to see his God, OK? The biggest issue, the biggest battle he's dealing with is that he feels that God has forsaken him, and he just wants to see God. because God is his ultimate treasure, his life, his satisfaction, his joy, and he is completely weak and he's deprived. When shall I come and appear before God? Then in verse three, he's taunted by others saying, where's thy God? My tears have been my meat day and night while they continually say unto me, where's thy God? whether uh... doesn't say we understand david has enemies because he says that inverse uh... inverse not at the end of earth not what i want because of the oppression of the enemy whether this is enemies popping him or whether this is a little soul speaking to himself a little feeling speaking to himself and saying where's my god because i would just say that when you have this place in your life and you just want to if you don't know what's going on friends and enemies making fun of him saying where's my God now when you desperately need God we're doing that as Christians to one another because I've seen it as we know a brother he's dealing with a depression and we go to him you don't believe in God if you believe in God then you wouldn't come you wouldn't you wouldn't be here in your life We oftentimes taunt our brother or sister in Christ or family member and say, where's your God now? Even though we don't mean to, maybe not, but we're ignorant of the fact that we do. But we oftentimes, we taunt, we mock. Let me tell you right now, something good to learn is not to question, hey, where's your God? But to encourage them through scripture that God is still there. and that they can hope in God. But he's taunted by the question of where is thy God? And so we see, we go to verse 5, end of verse 5, I am God, for I shall praise him for the help of his countenance. As I've already said, that word hope means to patiently trust. It means to wait and rely on God. And so here he is, he is saying, hope thou in God. With everything going on, hope in God. Look to God. Rely on God. Lean on God. Hope thou in God. But then he says, for I shall yet praise him for the help of his countenance. So he is confident. confident of deliverance from his soul pain, okay? He's saying, for I yet shall praise him. He's confident that he will come again out of this storm, out of this issue of life, whether it's here or. And that right there will lead us into the gospel later. But then we understand, I'm trying to move along, point four would be overcoming despondency. So for verses six through 10, we see how David deals with this issue, okay? First of all, I want to say, we see here in just what we just read, he's preaching to himself. Lloyd Jones in his book spiritual depression a great book. I encourage you and I've heard a couple other commentaries refer to him and I exerted the point of our thought out of his book, but He says here With regards to preaching to yourself, have you realized that most of your unhappiness in life is due to the fact that you are listening to yourself instead of talking to yourself? Take those thoughts that come to you the moment you wake up in the morning. You have not originated with them, but they are talking to you. They bring back the problems of yesterday. And somebody is talking to you. Who is talking to you? Yourself is talking to you. Now, this man's treatment here in Psalm 42 was this. Instead of allowing... no personally in worship K we see here well the thing about And then in verse six he says, I will remember God here where I'm at. But notice what he says, I had gone with the multitude, I went with the crowd, and we went to the house of God, and we sung out with praise and joy and happiness. But we kept holy. That tells you something about when we come to the house of God today. when we sing praises to God. If this was a mere, just a mere sentimental thing that we do, then why in the world is he remembering back to it? What he's saying is, I went to the house of God, I sung praises to God, I encountered God, I was worshiping God. So I'm dealing with the fact that I don't feel God. formality. It's not just a sentimental thing that we just do because it makes us feel good. No, we do because it does make us feel good. We get happiness and joy through it, but ultimately it glorifies God. I remember the time whenever I experienced God, I encountered God in worship, in church, and the services as I saw with everyone else. And that was what else he says. He said also with the multitude, it's good to not put yourself in solitude, to be left alone. I know how that is. I'm a mixture of introvert and extrovert, but I feel that more times I'm an introvert because I like time alone. I just want to get away. I just want to relax and just recollect everything and just be more, just be more, just be more self-observant and just relax. And then I can go out and I can be outgoing and I don't know, I guess you can call me a bipolar. I'm back and forth, you know, but With that being said, he remembered when he was with the multitude. For don't disclude yourself from each other. You need each other. You need, you are in need of one another. You are to encourage, you are to work. because I just was, I just was dealing some personal issues in my life and I just, I just needed time away, you know, and I just, I don't feel like I'm able to serve God because I'm weak. No, no, no friend. We know we come to God in weakness and he will be there. We can come to God and weakness and our brother will be there. We need each other. Don't leave each other. So he's remembering his past experience of God in worship with others. And that's the third thing, remember one another. Remember God. in light of all of it. But then also, we see in the 33rd thought here is in verse 6 and verse 7, when it says, deep calleth unto deep at the noise of the loudest thunder and all the waves in thy billowing are gone over to me. Yet the Lord will sustain his lovingkindness in the daytime, and in the night his song shall be with me in my prayer unto the God of my life. So if you're dealing with this, you want to overcome despondency, what David did, by the wind and by just whatever. of everything. But then he's noticing moving on. My friend, the best thing for you to do, as we have already noticed, focus on God. Look to God. The best thing to overcome despondency or to encourage another brother to overcome, as I've already said, is wait and trust in the Lord. What do you do when you come to the place of turmoil and battle? You position, you place yourself under God's love and His grace and His sovereignty. And wait and trust in Him. Waiting is one of the most excruciating things there are. I know. I'm waiting. And it's not easy to wait. Because I know, especially being independent, we want to do just like that. We just want to get it over with. Especially us men. There's a problem we want to solve. But he's saying I'm waiting and trusting in God. Then lastly, we see he overcomes despondency by preaching truth to his weak soul, remembering his encounterment, his experiences with God through worship and others. But then, lastly, we see how he closes it out. But yet he's not, by the end of this verse, by the end of the text, by the end of this passage here, it doesn't seem like he's out of it yet. He's still within him. My God, so he's fighting for faith and notice something very significant here. He changes the word and it's the same They mean the same thing why is it in English because they mean the same thing his hope is trusting and waiting and God his place and his life and he's not going to give up. He's not going to give up fighting and he's not going to give up life and he's not going to give up faith. He's going to fight faith over feelings. because in the face of God, there is salvation and satisfaction. One more thing, the gospel. So, the hope in the place of weakness, but then we see the gospel in the place of weakness. And let's turn real quickly to John 14, verse 9. I just want to throw this in there. I won't take much time. It's very clear, at least to me as I study, I was completely blessed by this. John 14, 9. It says here, you notice here, Jesus saith unto him, have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? Philip's doubting at this time. Notice the context. He's doubting. But he says, he that hath seen me hath seen the Father. And how saith thou? All right. Warmer passage, 2 Corinthians 4.4. Bringing up the gospel here. 2nd Corinthians 4. There we go. It says here, verse 4, In whom the God of this world has blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them. So the gospel in the place of weakness. We know this. Our salvation, satisfaction, is found in the face of God. But for us to see the face of God, how do we bridge this to the New Testament? It is in Christ we see the face of God. It is in God that we have this hope. It is in God. It is in Christ. So, for you to... But there is hope. There is hope in the place of weakness in all lives. Don't give up. Don't give in. Don't lose sight. Don't give in to the pain that you're feeling. Don't listen. Preach to yourself. Teach yourself. Tell yourself, hope in God. Hope in God. Fight for faith over feelings. Because in the face of God, there is satisfaction. There is salvation. Let us pray. Father, our God, we come before You this morning. We thank You. We pray You. We glorify You. You are great. You are worthy. You are holy. We love You with a holy love. And Lord, You are our first love. You loved us first, and we love You because of it. And Lord, I pray and ask that You would take this word that You have given us today Okay. you because Lord God we know we trust in you we lean on you rely on you well God I thank you once again for this opportunity thank you for your word for how beautifully is woven together and it inspires inherent and fallible we thank you and praise you I pray that you be with us as we continue on worship and as we rest and we trust and lean on you and worship you for who you are we thank you and praise you and cross me my ass amen