LivePrayerSermon 2578. Refusing to Be Comforted
(No. 2578)
A SERMON INTENDED FOR READING ON LORD'S-DAY, JULY 1O, 1898.
DELIVERED BY C. H. SPURGEON,
AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON, ON LORD'S-DAY EVENING, MARCH 18, 1883.
"My soul refused to be comforted." Psalm 77:2.
WHEN you meet with a person in great distress, you feel at once a desire to comfort him. That is to say, if you have an ordinarilytender heart. You cannot bear to see another in trouble without trying to minister to that diseased heart. But supposing thatthe person refuses to be comforted? Then you are foiled. What can you do? It is as though you met with a hungry man and offeredhim bread, but he rejected it. You tried to give him daintier food, but he scorned it. You asked him what he could eat, buthe altogether refused to accept any form of nourishment. Then what could you do? Your cupboard might be full and the doormight be freely opened, but if the man would not eat, you could not remove his hunger. So, if a man in trouble refuses tobe comforted, how are you to cheer and solace him? One man can lead a horse to the water, but a thousand cannot make him drinkif he will not-and when a man in trouble refuses to be comforted, then lover and friend are put far from him-and his acquaintanceinto darkness. Indeed, they soon need to be comforted, for disquietude is contagious and, sometimes, those who come to comfortanother, go away provoked by his perversity. Many a man, whose heart was full of pity, has, at last, become indignant, andso has increased the sorrow which he intended to comfort-he has grown angry with the man who willfully put aside what wasintended to encourage him.
With those few prefatory remarks, let us come to the text. "My soul refused to be comforted." Note, concerning a man in sucha case, first, possibly he may be right. Secondly, he is probably wrong. Thirdly, he may one day regret his conduct, as didAsaph, for, while he tells us that his soul refused to be comforted, he writes it down-not as an example for us to follow,but for our warning!
I. First, then, when a man's soul refuses to be comforted, POSSIBLY HE MAY BE RIGHT.
He may have a great spiritual sorrow and someone who does not at all understand his grief may proffer to him a consolationwhich is far too slight. Not knowing how deep the wound is, this foolish physician may think that it can be healed with anycommon ointment. I have known men to say to a person in deep distress things which have really aggravated him and his malady,too. "As he that takes away a garment in cold weather, and as vinegar upon nitre, so is he that singes songs to a heavy heart.""Oh," they have said, "there is really nothing the matter with you, after all!" When the arrows of God were drinking up yoursoul, they have said, "you are low-spirited." Who would not be low-spirited when he has to face an angry God? "You are verynervous," says another. "I am afraid you are going off into religious melancholy-you need cheerful society and amusement."That is poor consolation for one who feels that he is ready to die and that his soul chooses strangling rather than life!Reduced as he is to such a point of agony in his spirit, it is no wonder that the man should put away these comforters andsay with Job, "'Miserable comforters are you all.' Mine is not a sorrow that can be removed by the bowl or by the violin.Mine is not a grief that can be charmed away with your merriment, or laid to sleep by your ridicule. The wound is too deepand too severe for you to cure." The man acts rightly when he puts aside these physicians without skill, of whom it may besaid, "They have healed the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly, saying, Peace, peace, where there is no peace." Youmay send such comforters away from you, for it is right to refuse to be comforted by them. You will do well to say, with Toplady-
"If my Lord Himself reveals, No other good I want, Only Christ my wounds can heal, Or silence my complaint. He that sufferedin my stead, Shall my Physician be. I will not be comforted Till Jesus comforts me."
So, too, it is equally right to refuse to be comforted when the comfort is untrue. When a man is under a sense of sin, I haveknown his friends say to him, "You should not fret; you have not been so very bad. You have been, indeed, a very good sortof fellow." One says, "I can recollect how kind you were to So-and-So and how honestly you behaved under such-and-such a temptation.You have not committed any very terrible sin-God help the world if you are a great sinner! I do not know what will becomeof the rest of us." Another says, "You have only to pray and go to a place of worship, perhaps be a little more regular inyour attention to religion and it will all come right again. You are not so bad as you think you are." Be off with you! Suchtalk as that is a lie and the man whom God has really awakened to feel his state by nature will refuse to be comforted bysuch falsehoods as those! However friendship may flatter, the man himself says, "I know that I have broken God's Law and thatI deserve His wrath." Conscience will not be quieted by all the soft speeches of officious but ignorant friends! I chargeyou, before God, if the Spirit of Truth has begun to trouble you, never drink these sweet but poisonous consolations! Neverthink that you are good, or that you can make yourself good. Refuse to be comforted in any such way. That comfort which doesnot come from truth and from God's Word, applied by the Holy Spirit, is a comfort to be rejected with scorn!
We have known others who have tried to comfort poor, mourning, repentant sinners in an unhallowed way. They have said, "Youneed to raise your spirits. I can recommend you some fine old wine which will do you a world of good." Another will say, "Youshould really mix a little more in society and shake yourself up. You should get with some happy, lively people-they wouldsoon take this melancholy out of you." Have you ever heard the story which was current in Rowland Hill's day, and which Ibelieve was true, about a certain comic actor who, at that time, carried all the sway in London and made all laugh who wentto see and hear him? The poor man, himself, suffered from depression of spirit to the very worst degree, insomuch that lifehad become a weariness to him. He went to consult a certain physician who was noted for dealing with hypochondriacs and melancholypersons. The doctor said to him, "Now, my Friend, you are evidently very low in spirits-you should go to the theater. I wentthe other night, hearing So-and-So, and he made me laugh at such a rate that I am quite sure, if you went and heard him, youwould soon get rid of all your melancholy." The patient took the doctor by the hand and said, "Doctor, I am that man. I havemade all London laugh, but my heart is breaking all the while." What said Solomon? "I said in my heart, Go to now, I willprove you with mirth, therefore enjoy pleasure. And, behold, this also is vanity. I said of laughter, It is mad. And of mirth,What does it do?" I am sure that a person who is really troubled in spirit will increase his sorrow if he attempts to cureit in that way. It is only putting more fuel on the flame. It seems such a mockery to the spirit, when it is burdened witha sense of sin, to tell it to dance and make merriment! "Can I be merry on the brink of Hell?" cries the sorrowful man. "Indanger every moment of death and certain that if death came, I should be lost, can I enjoy mirth? It cannot be!"
There was a certain king of Hungary, a pious, gracious man, who was, at one time, deeply cast down and depressed. He had abrother, a worldly courtier, who rallied him about his despondency and, as far as he dared, mocked the poor broken heart ofthe king. It was the custom in Hungary that if a man was to be suddenly executed, a trumpeter should stand under his windowand sound a blast of a certain kind-and then he was taken away to be put to death. The king sent the trumpeter, at the deadof night, to sound that blast under his brother's window. The courtier knew what it meant, so he arose at once, but he beggedthe executioner to first take him to the king-and there he stood, white as a sheet and trembling from head to foot. "Brother,"said the king, "what ails you?" "What ails me?" he said, "why, you sent your trumpeter under my window, and he sounded thedeath-blast, and I suppose that I am to die!" "Well," answered the king, "you tremble now, yet it is only because you areto die, whereas I have heard the thunder-blast of God and I stand in fear of everlasting judgment! Now, dear brother," headded, "perhaps you can sympathize with me. I only sent the trumpeter that you might be enabled to look with a little morecompassion upon me when I am in trouble before
God."
Ah, it is not laughter or mirth that will comfort the soul that has heard the voice of God saying, "You have sinned and Imust punish you. You have lived a careless, godless life, and now you must come to judgment. Can you answer for one of a thousandwhen I shall set your sins before My face? When I shall bring forth a plummet to try you and to see how you stand, how willyou endure that test?" No, no! Put aside all those hollow, unhallowed, empty comforts, and say, "My soul refuses to be comfortedin that way."
In a word, Brothers and Sisters, let me say that if your hearts are troubled on account of sin, refuse every comfort exceptthat which comes through being washed in the precious blood of Christ which can make us whiter than snow! Refuse every comfortshort of being born again and made a new creature in Jesus! Make this solemn resolve-"I will sooner die in prison than belet out except by His dear pierced hands. I will tremble before the wrath of God rather than I will dare to presume upon Hismercy. I will wait till I have looked into the dear face of Him who died for me, and have read my pardon, there, before Iwill be comforted." If you resolve not to be comforted except in that Scriptural way, you will do well.
II. But now, in the second place, with brevity, I want to show when this refusal is wrong. PROBABLY HE IS WRONG who says,"My soul refused to be comforted."
It is quite wrong if it is a temporal matter that causes your sorrow. Why do you refuse to be comforted, my Friend? "I havelost one who was very dear to me-my beloved mother." "I have lost my child," says another. "It is my husband who has beentaken away," says a third, while a fourth cries, "I have been bereaved of my dearest friend, and my soul refuses to be comforted."What, then, have you nobody left? "No, nobody." And has God done you a wrong? Did not your mother belong to Him? Was not yourchild His? He has only taken back what He lent you for a while-and because you have lost this one cistern, will you neverdrink of the fountain? Because the star is gone, will you never enjoy the sunlight? O dear Friend, I pray you, talk not so!
"Ah," says another, "but I have lost my health! I found out, but a few days ago, that I have a deadly disease which will takeme off, before long and, therefore, I refuse to be comforted." What? You will go down to your grave rebelling against God?Why should you not be sick? Better people than you have gone Home by consumption, or cancer, or by some other malady. Wouldit not be well to make your submission to God about that matter and ask that you may have a Heaven to go to, and a place ofjoy when death comes? "Ah," cries another, "but all my earthly prospects are blighted. I thought that I should get on in theworld, but now I find that I cannot, the door is locked against me. I can never be comforted." Are there no other doors? Areyou sure that what you call your prospects would have been blessings to you if you had realized them? Does not God know betterthan you do and will it not be wise for you to pluck up courage and, as the world's poet says-
"To take arms against a sea of troubles, And, by opposing, end them"?
Better far is it to act like that than to sit down in sullen gloom, or in fierce wrath against God!
"Ah," says another, "but mine is a very peculiar trouble. My love has been slighted. One whom I loved very dearly has provenfaithless and discarded me." Yes, and your heart is broken, and well it may be. But, my Friend, will you therefore refuseto love Him who never forsakes those on whom He once sets His affection? Would it not be wiser to turn the current of yourheart's love towards Him who is faithful and true, and who loves even to all eternity? That would be a wiser course of action,surely! Refuse not to be comforted, I pray you-you are only driving the dagger deeper and deeper into your wounds. You aremaking the bitter waters more bitter. All that you do in this direction is but increasing your sorrow. You are like sailorspumping the seawater into the ship instead of pumping it out! You are heaping on another burden, much heavier than God hasput there, by refusing to be comforted. Instead of doing that, think of the mercies that you still have, think of how Godcan bless your troubles to you, think of the shortness of life, think of the glories of Heaven, think of the sufferings ofyour Lord who endured much more than you are called to bear-and no longer refuse to be comforted, for, if you do, worse troublesmay come to you.
I heard a woman say to her child, as I passed her door, "If you don't leave off crying, I'll give you something to cry about."And I have known that to happen with some of the Lord's children. They have had very small troubles and they have frettedand rebelled against God until they have had a much greater sorrow-they have had something to cry about! Oh, do not refuseto be comforted, but yield yourself to God! Willingly submit to the discipline of your dear Father's hand.
But now I will suppose that yours is a spiritual trouble and yet you refuse to be comforted. Listen to me, I pray you, fora few minutes, for I am sure that I shall describe some of you. The Gospel is meant for sinners, for guilty sinners, for Hell-deservingsinners. It is meant for persons just like you, yet you put it away from you and refuse to be comforted. It would be sucha comfort to you if you accepted it-you would have such joys as you never knew before. But no, you will not touch it, youturn aside from it. There are kind friends who, at one time, encouraged you to cast yourself upon Christ, but now you tryto avoid them, you get out of their way if you can. You feel so sad that you do not want to be cheered, you scarcely desireto be encouraged. Perhaps I speak to some who have gone so far astray that they say, "We cannot go back to the House of Prayernow." It is a horrible thing when people fall into such depths of sorrow that when they most need to come and hear, and becomforted, the devil says to them, "Don't go there any more-you will hear nothing for your comfort. The preacher will onlyconfirm your condemnation," and so he tries to keep them away from the means of Grace. "Oh," says one, "I used to delightin the Prayer Meeting, but I dare not go to it now! I feel that no prayers will ever be any blessing to me. I used to loveto hear Pastor's voice, once, and I have laughed for very joy while hearing it. But now I do not want to listen to it anylonger." No, you are refusing to be comforted.
It is also a terrible thing when Satan leads men to neglect the private means of Grace. They shut up the Bible and do notread it, being afraid that every Word should turn out to be a curse that will only make their sorrow deeper. Or, if they doread a promise, they say, "That is not for us. It may be true to everybody else, but not to us." As to private prayer, sucha man says, "I cannot pray. God would not hear me, anyway, I am such a hypocrite. I have been such a backslider, I am so false,I am so guilty. It is no use for me to try to pray." That which ought to be the channel of sweetest consolation is neglectedby those who refuse to be comforted! Some of them will even go so far as to deny the testimony of God. He says that He ismerciful-they say that He is not. God declares that there is a propitiation for sin in the blood of Christ-they say that thereis none. Jesus says, "Him that comes to Me I will in no wise cast out"-they say that He would cast them out if they came toHim. He invites them to come-they say that they cannot come. While He bids them to come near to Him and warns them that thereis nothing in their way but their own evil hearts-yet they give God the lie and reject the only Savior!
They also refuse the testimony of those of us who are God's witnesses-though this is but a small matter after refusing God'sown testimony! We come and say, "Friend, if you will believe, you shall see the Glory of God. If you will simply cast yourselfupon Christ, you shall live." Yet they do not believe us. There are some of you who would not doubt anything that I told you,I am sure that you would not-your esteem and affection would lead you to receive almost anything that I stated as fact-andyet you have put away from you, you have refused and rejected that glorious testimony which it is my life's work to tell toyou, namely, that Jesus Christ will receive you and cleanse you from every sin, if you will but come to Him just as you areand put your trust in Him! No, you refuse to be comforted. But how wicked this refusal is! What a wrong you do to our honestlove! What a wrong you do to the matchless love of God!
Do you not remember the story of the good man who wanted to teach his little girl what faith was? He went down into the cellar,took away the ladder by which he had descended, and called to his child. "Ruth," he said, "jump into my arms." It was verydark down there, so she said, "Please, father, I can't see you." Then he replied, "you do not need to see me, I can see you-jumpdown." With a merry laugh she sprang into the dark and was, in an instant, resting on her father's bosom. Now, God bids usdo just that! Can you not, by faith, take a leap in the dark, into your Heavenly Father's arms? This is what you will do ifyou are really His child-but you will not do it unless you can say, "I will trust and not be afraid."
I will tell you why people sometimes refuse to be comforted. One says, "I have been depressed such a long time." Yes, butwhen the night is long, is that any proof that the morning will not come? It looks to me to be a good argument that the daylightis not very far off. "Oh," says another, "but my depression is so deep! You cannot conceive how miserable I am." Can I not?I think I have been in that dark dungeon where you now are and in the very corner where you are hiding. But even if I couldnot fully sympathize with you, the depth of your distress is to me an argument for your comfort, for God will first help themost helpless-and where there is the most misery, there will His mercy most swiftly come. So I look upon you with great hopefulness!If you are so thoroughly broken down, the Lord will surely speak comfort to you among the very first. "Ah," says another friend,"but I am under the impression that I shall never be saved." Perhaps you are, but I am under another impression, namely, thatyou willbe saved! And I am under another impression, which I know is true-that is, if you will only cast yourself upon Christby a simple faith, you shall be saved at once! I know that impression is true because here is the seal that made it-"Comeunto Me, all you that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." These are the words of Him who cannot lie or change!Do you still refuse to be comforted?
"Oh," says one, "but if you knew me, Sir, you would not talk so, for I have been such a great sinner!" I think that is verylikely. "Oh, but I mean it, Sir!" I hope you do. I trust you are not adding lies to your other sins. "But, Sir, I have beensuch a sinner!" Yes, I know what you mean, and I believe it. And I will tell you something about yourself that you probablydo not believe-you are a worse sinner than you think you are. "Oh, that cannot be!" you say. But I tell you that it is-youdo not know what a sinner you are. Sin is a more horrible thing than imagination, itself, can conceive it to be. "But I deservethe hottest place in Hell," says one. Yes, but suppose that it is so, and that all you say is true? Yet, in the name of God,I tell you that "all manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men," for, "the blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleansesus from all sin." What is your sin? Have you committed falsehood, theft, fornication, murder? Is there any crime which youhave committed which I dare not mention-some secret sin which has polluted you and left you a black blot upon the face ofGod's earth? Yet come along with you, whoever you may be! If you are the sweepings of Helldom, yet come along with you, forJesus Christ is able to save to the uttermost-let me say that word again-"He is able to save to the uttermost them that comeunto God by Him."
Do not refuse to be comforted, for if you do, you will be a spiritual suicide! The man who will not eat and so dies of starvationis as much a suicide as he that puts the pistol to his head and blows out his brains. He that rejects Christ, damns himselfas surely as he that gives himself, body and soul, to the devil. He that refuses what God has provided and will not have pardonthrough the precious blood, dashes himself upon the bosses of Jehovah's buckler and fixes himself upon the point of the javelinof Divine Justice! Do not do it, I implore you! Be not among those who refuse to be comforted!
III. But now, lastly, for my time is nearly gone, YOU WILL HAVE TO REPENT OF REFUSING TO BE COMFORTED.
Possibly you will have to repent in a very terrible way. Suppose, now, that you should refuse to be comforted, and so shouldwillfully go into a yet darker and deeper dungeon of despair Suppose that your Christian friends should grow weary of you-Ihope they will not-but suppose that godly man, or that godly woman who has so long followed you up, should, at last, despairof you and leave? Where would you be, then? And suppose that because you shut your eyes to the Light of God, God should takeit away? What if you should have to move to a region where nobody will want to comfort you, where no minister will labor andtravail for your soul's salvation, where you shall sit under a dry and lifeless ministry, or perhaps under none at all-andyou shall be left to go on down, down, down? God prevent it! But if ever that should be your sad lot, I hope there may stillremain about you sufficient relics of life to make you say, "Oh, that I had been willing to be comforted when I might havebeen, and had accepted the testimony of Grace before I had passed beyond the reach of those blessed means of mercy!" But Ido not mean to dwell upon that thought, for I have something much more cheerful to say.
I hope that many here present who have refused to be comforted, will yet regret it when they shall be enjoying the fullnessof comfort. One of the things that I have sometimes said to myself, when I have been alone, has been this, "How foolish youare!" And if anybody had heard me, he would have known that I was upbraiding myself in the spirit of Christian and Hopefulwhen they were locked up in Giant Despair's castle. You remember how Bunyan tells us that the pilgrims began to pray on Saturday,about midnight, and continued in prayer till almost the break of day, when Christian called out, "What a fool am I, thus tolie in a stinking dungeon, when I may as well walk at liberty! I have a key in my bosom, called Promise, that will, I am persuaded,open any lock in Doubting Castle." So he pulled it out of his bosom, put it in the lock, opened the door of the dungeon, andthey soon were out! When they came to the outer door leading to the castle yard, the key fitted that, and they went through.Then they came to the great iron gate-the lock went horribly hard, but Christian kept working away at it and, at last, thebolt shot back, the big gate was open-and they escaped.
But Giant Despair heard the noise and came down. And he was just about to fall upon his poor prisoners, when he was takenwith a shaking fit-I have always been glad that the cruel old giant used to have epilepsy, so he could not catch the two pilgrims-andaway they went! I am sure that when they got out, Christian kept saying to himself, "What a fool I have been! What a foolI have been! I have been lying in that dungeon all this while, when I might have been out ever so long ago." If I ever hearyou, who have had a similar experience, cry, "What a fool I have been," I shall say, "That is quite right! You have hit thenail on the head this time," for, whenever a man doubts the mercy of God, the best thing that I can say of him is that heis a fool! I could say a far worse thing than that, but when you refuse the sweet mercy, the tender love, the overflowingforgiveness, the generous kindness of the heart of Christ, you certainly act like a fool. And then, when you come to yourright mind, I am sure that you will ask yourself, "How could I have refused so long to be comforted?"
Now, finally, when you and I get to Heaven, we shall regret that we ever refused to be comforted. "Oh," says a poor sinnerover there, "now you are drawing the long bow." Which do you mean-for myself or for you? "Why, Sir, you said, 'When you andI get to Heaven.'" Very well, which is the, "you," and which is the, "I," that you are quibbling about? Do you think thatit is such a very great wonder that Ishould get to Heaven? If you do, I altogether agree with you, for it will be a wonder,indeed! "No," you say, "I mean that it will be a wonder if Iget there." Yes, and I, too, think it will be so. You and I willbe about equal wonders if we get there-and when we are there, by the rich mercy of God, by the infinite love of Christ-andwe shallbe, you know, as surely as we are here if we will but believe in Christ-you and I will meet together, one day, inHeaven. Why should we not? I will promise to meet you there! Come, we will make a bargain of it-I am going by Christ, theWay, and if you go by Christ, the Way, we shall get to the same place! And there will be the King in His beauty. I will guaranteeyou that you will not take much notice of me, or I of you, for the sight of the King will be so ravishing! Oh, what a Countenance!Oh, what a Glory! Oh, that matchless Lover of our souls! And I believe that, then, we shall, each of us, say, "However couldI have refused to be comforted by Him when He had loved me with an everlasting love, when He had chosen me from before thefoundation of the world, when He had bought me with His precious blood, when He had sought me by His Holy Spirit, when Hehad clothed me with His righteousness, when He had taken me into the family and made me His brother and a child of God, whenHe had gone to Heaven on purpose to prepare a place for me and sent His Spirit down to earth to prepare me for the place?Yet there was a time when I refused to be comforted by Him!" I think, if we could weep in Heaven, we would certainly weepglad tears of deep and solemn regret that ever we should have stood out against Him to whom we are married. Oh, on that wondrouswedding day, when He shall consummate His love and ours, He will notsay, "You were difficult in the wooing. You refused Memany times." But I do believe that I shall say to myself, "How could I have refused Him? How could I have treated Him so terribly?"And as I look at His dear hands, still scarred, I shall say to Him, "O my Savior, I cost You Your life, Your heart's blood,and though I long refused You, yet You would have me! Oh, love unutterable! How I will love You throughout eternity!" Butwhat regret we must feel that we ever rejected Him! Do not refuse to be comforted, dear Friend-come along with you and takeat once the mercy that Jesus waits to give!
One little illustration, and I have done. I have noticed that when a dog is very hungry, he does not stand upon etiquetteThere is a butcher's shop and no invitation is given to him to enter-but he makes himself very free and in he goes! Thereis a very nice little bit of meat on the block and the butcher has not the courtesy to offer it to him, though there is nocreature that would more welcome it. So what does my friend, the dog, do? Why, he just makes a grab at it, seizes the meat,and then away he goes down the street! Now, if he can only get time to eat it, I will defy the butcher to get it away fromhim if he has taken it right into himself! I want you, poor Sinner, to be like that dog! There is the mercy of God-you donot believe that you ought to have it. Come and lay hold of it, for let me tell you this-Christ never takes away from thejaws of faith what faith once dares to seize! Take it and you have it! Believe even if you seem to have no right to believe!Commit a heavenly felony upon Divine Mercy! If the devil tells you that it is felony, come and take the mercy all the same,for he can never steal it from you! If you once get it, you have it forever. Oh, take it, then!-
"Artful doubts and reasoning be Nailed with Jesus to the tree." Come and trust Him and He is yours forever! The Lord helpyou to do it, for Jesus Christ's sake! Amen.
EXPOSITION BY C. H. SPURGEON: PSALM 77.
This "Psalm of Asaph" has a mournful tone in it. At times the writer is in the deeps, but we may be quite sure that he willend the Psalm cheerfully because he begins it with prayer. No matter what sorrow falls to your lot, if you can pray, you willrise out of it. When Jonah went to the bottoms of the mountains, in the belly of the fish, and took to praying, it was wellwith him. If you, dear troubled Soul, can but pray, you need not despair.
Verse 1. I cried unto God with my voice, even unto God with my voice; and He gave ear unto me. You see, he cried, and he criedagain-and at his second call the door of mercy was opened to him. God sometimes makes petitioners wait that they may becomemore earnest and that they may really feel the value of the thing they are seeking. So Asaph says, "I cried unto God withmy voice, even unto God with my voice." That is the way to get the blessing! You will often find, dear Friends, that it helpsyou to pray if you use your voice in prayer-there is no necessity to speak, you can pray without the use of the lips-but itoften helps your thoughts if you are able to express them aloud.
2. In the day of my trouble I sought the Lord: my sore ran in the night, and ceased not my soul refused to be comforted. Hecould not sleep, so he took to prayer. Which is the greater mercy-prayer or sleep-I cannot say. In the Psalmist's case, Isuppose that prayer, just then, was better than sleep. His trouble so pressed upon him that it gave him no respite whatever-soall through the night he continued to cry unto the Lord.
3. I remembered God, and was troubled. God is the fountain of all comfort, yet there are times when even a godly man can findno comfort in God. Asaph, perhaps, remembered the dark side of God's attributes. Justice seemed to stand over him with a drawnsword. Holiness frowned upon him. Power threatened to crush him. Truth stood up to condemn him. He could not find any comfort,even in his God.
3. I complained, and my spirit was overwhelmed. Selah. He was covered right up, like a ship that has gone down in deep water."I complained, and my spirit was overwhelmed. Selah." Whenever you see this word, "Selah," it means lift up the notes, retunethe strings of the harp, get the mind and heart ready for something in a rather different strain.
4. You hold my eyes waking: I am so troubled that I cannot speak You thought that the Psalmist was going to say, "I cannotsleep." He has given up the attempt to do that, so now he tries to talk, but utterance fails him. Shallow brooks sound asthey flow, but deep griefs are still, and a man may be so troubled in heart that he cannot speak-he can only explain his sorrowby groaning and tears.
5. 6. I have considered the days of old, the years of ancient times. I call to remembrance my song in the night. I communewith my own heart and my spirit makes diligent search. He looked back into the records of ancient history to see if God hadever forsaken a praying man. He thought upon his own experience and he remembered how, when it was night with him before,God made him to sing like a nightingale in the darkness. So he asks himself, "Has God changed? Will He give me no songs, now?Will He leave me to perish?" Thus have the best of men, in their sore troubles, had to put to themselves solemn questions,but they have not always been able to answer them.
7-9. Will the Lord cast me off forever? And will He be favorable no more? Is His mercy clean gone forever? Does His promisefail forevermore? Has God forgotten to be gracious? Has He in anger shut up His tender mercies? Selah. If you are a childof God, yet never had to ask these questions, you ought to be very grateful. But if you have to ask them, be very thankfulthat Asaph asked them before you! And believe that as he had a comfortable answer to them, so shall you. It is always a comfortwhen you can see the footprints of another man in the mire and the slough, for if that man passed through unharmed, so mayyou, for his God shall also be your Helper. But only think of this inspired Psalmist, this sweet singer of Israel, being sotroubled and broken in spirit that he says, "Has God forgotten to be gracious? Has He in anger shut up His tender mercies?"
10. And I said, This is my infirmity. "This is a trouble appointed to me, I must bear it." Or, "This is because of the weaknessof my faith. God has not changed-it is I who has changed. 'This is my infirmity.'"
10. But I will remember the years of the right hand of the most High. ' 'I will remember what God has done with that righthand of His. I will remember when I used to sit at His right hand-
"'What peaceful hours I then enjoyed! How sweet their memory still!
But now I find an aching void The world can never fill.'"
It is a good thing to make a record of your experiences when they are sweet. You may need that record, one of these days.I do not believe in always keeping a diary, for one is apt to put down more than may be true, but there are times of specialmercy when I would say, "Write that down for a memorial and keep it by you, for the day may come when that record will ministercomfort to you."
11, 12. I will remember the works of the LORD: surely I will remember Your wonders of old. I will meditate also on all Yourwork. "I will not have any more of my works-I will meditate on Your work. I will get to You, my God, and think of what Youhave done; especially of Your works of Grace, how brightly they shine! I will meditate also on all your work."
12, 13. And talk of Your doings. Your way, O God, is in the sanctuary. Or, "is in holiness." God's way is sometimes in thesea, but it is always a holy way. God never deals with His people, or with any of His creatures unjustly or unrighteously."I cannot trace God," Luther once said, "but I can trust Him." And from that saying of his we have coined the phrase, "Totrust Him when you cannot trace Him." When you are unable to see God's footprints because He rides upon the storm, yet stillsay, " Your way, O God, is in holiness."
13, 14. Who is so great a God as our God? You are the God that does wonders: You have declared Your strength among the people.See how the Psalmist comforts himself with what God had done-and he went right back to the Red Sea for his illustration! Somehow,God's people in the olden times always liked to sing the Song of Moses. By a kind of instinct, they thought of the Red Sea,as if to remember the redemption that God worked out for His people when He destroyed Pharaoh and all his host. Let us gothere, too, and think of the Red Sea of our Savior's blood where all our sins were drowned!
15-17. You have with Your arm redeemed Your people, the sons of Jacob and Joseph. Selah. The waters saw You, O God, the waterssaw You; they were afraid: the depths also were troubled. The clouds poured out water: the skies sent out a sound: Your arrowsalso went abroad. I suppose that there was a storm at the time of the passage of the Red Sea, so that the deep-mouthed thunderspoke to the quaking heart of Pharaoh, while the flashing lightning set the heavens on flame and made Egypt's chivalry trembleas the horse and his rider went down into the sea.
18, 19. The voice of Your thunder was in the Heaven: the lightning lighted the world: the earth trembled and shook. Your wayis in the sea. Where you cannot see His footprints, "in the sea," where there seems to be no way at all, there God makes ahighway! Are you in such trouble, dear Friend, that you cannot see the possibility of escape? Remember this verse-" Your wayis in the sea."
19, 20. And Your path in the great waters, and Your footsteps are not known. You led Your people like a flock by the handof Moses and Aaron. There the Psalm stops, just when you thought there was more to be said. The Holy Spirit knows how to leaveoff-and He closes abruptly with a sublimity seldom equaled. God's people need to know no more than this, that God is leadingthem! Asaph does not say that Moses and Aaron led them- "You led Yourpeople." Moses and Aaron were only the Lord's servantsand under-shepherds-"You led Your people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron." May He always be our Leader! Amen.