PSALM 42:1-11 – “As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God? My tears have been my food day and night, while they say to me all the day long, “Where is your God?” These things I remember, as I pour out my soul: how I would go with the throng and lead them in procession to the house of God with glad shouts and songs of praise, a multitude keeping festival. Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God. My soul is cast down within me; therefore I remember you from the land of Jordan and of Hermon, from Mount Mizar. Deep calls to deep at the roar of your waterfalls; all your breakers and your waves have gone over me. By day the LORD commands his steadfast love, and at night his song is with me, a prayer to the God of my life. I say to God, my rock: “Why have you forgotten me? Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?” As with a deadly wound in my bones, my adversaries taunt me, while they say to me all the day long, “Where is your God?” Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God.”
THEME OF THE DAY: A CONVERSATION WITH SELF. Today’s scripture is the entirety of Psalm 42. It is a short Psalm, but I included its whole contents for two reasons.
First, the authors, the Sons of Korah, are describing the pathos of the Christian life. There are extreme emotional and spiritual swings throughout the Psalm. It opens with a healthy sign, one of the healthiest, of the maturing Christian – a deep and insatiable hunger or thirst for God – As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God? (Psalm 42:1-2). There is also the spiritual agonizing experience of feeling alone, absent from the corporate worship of God with fellow believers – “These things I remember, as I pour out my soul: how I would go with the throng and lead them in procession to the house of God with glad shouts and songs of praise, a multitude keeping festival” (Psalm 42:3-2). The Psalm continues to ride the roller coaster of emotion with the inner turmoil of the believer. This is found in verse 5 and repeated in verse 11 . . .
“Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation. … Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God” (Psalm 42:5, 11).
These verses lead to the second reason for including the entire Psalm in today’s nugget. Its main theme is in verse 5 and 11 and points us to what is the key to a stable and mature walk with the Lord – learning to talk to ourselves.
As we read those verses, to whom is the Psalmist talking? Not someone else. The conversation is with the person we are most conversant with – ourselves. However, there is a problem. We are more prone to listen to ourselves (the loud voices of emotions and circumstances) instead of speaking truth to ourselves and leading us to rise above our emotions and circumstances.
M. Lloyd-Jones in his classic book Spiritual Depression stated “the key to the Christian life is learning to talk to yourself instead of listening. To take control of oneself.” Excellent advice! And that is what the Psalmists are doing. They are taking control of themselves and speaking truth to themselves. Spend time in the Psalm and learn the art of conversing with ourselves. It is truly the key to the Christian life; speaking truth, not listening to lies, to ourselves.
PRAYER: Father, help me to control my emotions, vice being controlled by my them, by speaking Your truth to myself.
REFLECTION: Truth must be known and applied daily by renewing our minds and exercising our wills with it.