The Bitter Cup (Psalm 88)

The Bitter Cup

We are gathered here today opening ourselves up to the ravages of emotions that death and loss brings. There is a deep sense of loss that a husband, a father, grandfather, brother, friend is not with us. Death, today is reminding us that all is not right in this world.

We are here today to mourn. And we are mourning. It should not escape us that one we love is not with us.

BUT, we also come here today to find hope.

We come to find comfort.

And the good news is, the gospel offers both. GOD offers both.

This morning as we gather to remember the life of _________, as we gather and struggle against the weight of loss, looking for comfort and hope, I want to read for you from Psalm 88

I Cry Out Day and Night Before You

88 A Song. A Psalm of the Sons of Korah. To the choirmaster: according to Mahalath Leannoth. A Maskil of Heman the Ezrahite.

1 O Lord, God of my salvation;

I cry out day and night before you.

2 Let my prayer come before you;

incline your ear to my cry!

3 For my soul is full of troubles,

and my life draws near to Sheol.

4 I am counted among those who go down to the pit;

I am a man who has no strength,

5 like one set loose among the dead,

like the slain that lie in the grave,

like those whom you remember no more,

for they are cut off from your hand.

6 You have put me in the depths of the pit,

in the regions dark and deep.

7 Your wrath lies heavy upon me,

and you overwhelm me with all your waves. Selah

8 You have caused my companions to shun me;

you have made me a horror to them.

I am shut in so that I cannot escape;

9 my eye grows dim through sorrow.

Every day I call upon you, O Lord;

I spread out my hands to you.

10 Do you work wonders for the dead?

Do the departed rise up to praise you? Selah

11 Is your steadfast love declared in the grave,

or your faithfulness in Abaddon?

12 Are your wonders known in the darkness,

or your righteousness in the land of forgetfulness?

13 But I, O Lord, cry to you;

in the morning my prayer comes before you.

14 O Lord, why do you cast my soul away?

Why do you hide your face from me?

15 Afflicted and close to death from my youth up,

I suffer your terrors; I am helpless.

16 Your wrath has swept over me;

your dreadful assaults destroy me.

17 They surround me like a flood all day long;

they close in on me together.

18 You have caused my beloved and my friend to shun me;

my companions have become darkness.

Observations:

Tone is despairing and discouraging – Writer(s) (Sons of Korah) has(ve) experienced innumerable hardship and disappointment.

Feelings of abandonment by God

Perhaps even that God is displaying His anger and wrath in the negative circumstances they are experiencing.

Desires death – hates life

Psalm ends on an uncharacteristically (many end joyfully) low note. No happy ending

It ends like a Shakespearian tragedy.

Unlike many Psalms which may start sorrowful but find hope and confidence by the end – this one does not.

So you might ask, why use this passage for a funeral service?

Personalize:

Perhaps you have or do feel this way?

Perhaps you feel the immense sorrow of pain, hurt, sorrow, disappointment, and hardship of life.

Feel as though God is silent; as if God has abandoned you.

Feel as though God is angry and punishing

Feel as though God, death has stolen the one you love

Perhaps this is the final straw for you and you don’t know how much more you can take.

If this is you…

Application:

Presence of a Psalm like this reveals God cares about our feelings and our hearts.

He understands all of life is not peachy and beautiful but that dark moments do exist.

God understands and CARES about your pain and sorrow.

God cares and empathizes with your pain.

Are you looking for answers to the question, why? Do you struggle to know and understand why God allows pain and death? Do you struggle with the same dark thoughts of the writer of this Psalm?

If so…

I cannot give you hard and concrete answers that would satisfy you. God’s ways and God’s plans are often a mystery to us.

However, I can tell you he understand and appreciates.

God is the God of comfort.

We are told that God will comfort us in our times of affliction.

2 Corinthians 1

God of All Comfort

3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, 4 who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.

We all experience sorrow and pain, disappointment, and grief. But God will comfort and strengthen us. Let your comfort drive you TO Him and not away FROM Him.

If ____________ were here today, I am certain that he would want you to run towards God

Take comfort from the fact that God understands, cares, and comforts us.

Like you, I AM experiencing loss. Last year (2022), I lost both of my parents in about a 3 month window. My father after 5 weeks of struggle with lung damage due to covid, and my mother after a several year long struggle with dementia. When I think of their suffering, I am often brought to tears.

HOWEVER, when I compare that suffering to what my God, my Savior, Christ, suffered for me, their suffering, my suffering is paltry AND I am reminded that my God knows a thing or two about suffering and THUS he knows how to provide comfort and hope in the midst of it.

Know this as well, Christ Himself suffered deeply. His understanding is not merely based on knowledge, but it based upon experience.

Matthew 26

Jesus Prays in Gethsemane

36 Then Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to his disciples, “Sit here, while I go over there and pray.” 37 And taking with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, he began to be sorrowful and troubled. 38 Then he said to them, “My soul is very sorrowful, even to death; remain here, and watch with me.” 39 And going a little farther he fell on his face and prayed, saying, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will.”

After this….

He would be so grieved, he sweat great drops of blood the text tells us.

His disciples revealed lack of devotion by falling asleep when they were supposed to be watching and praying

Jesus is arrested

Jesus is abandoned by his disciples

Jesus is denied by those closest to him

He is set up and placed on an illegal trial with fake charges of crime. He had never sinned, never done wrong.

He is beaten by a cat of nine tails until he was unrecognizable

He was mocked, spit upon, and humiliated

He was nailed to a cross and died an excruciating death

He bore the guilt for sins He never committed

His Father in Heaven, God, poured His wrath on Jesus for those sins He did not commit

Jesus died, enduring abandonment, rejection, loneliness, pain, sorrow, guilt, and wrath along with incredible physical pain for the sins of a human race that did all these treacherous acts to Him.

Jesus understood pain, sorrow, loss, sadness far better than any of us.

Having understood that, he understands your pain and sorrow this morning.

Hebrews 2:14 – NLT

14 Because God’s children are human beings—made of flesh and blood—the Son also became flesh and blood. For only as a human being could he die, and only by dying could he break the power of the devil, who had* the power of death. 15 Only in this way could he set free all who have lived their lives as slaves to the fear of dying.

16 We also know that the Son did not come to help angels; he came to help the descendants of Abraham. 17 Therefore, it was necessary for him to be made in every respect like us, his brothers and sisters,* so that he could be our merciful and faithful High Priest before God. Then he could offer a sacrifice that would take away the sins of the people. 18 Since he himself has gone through suffering and testing, he is able to help us when we are being tested.

Jesus understands, he was made like us in every way. He understands your sorrow, anger, fear, and every other experience you could imagine up.

Why did Christ endure this?

It was not SIMPLY so he could understand and appreciate your trials and provide comfort. Sure this is true and a clear benefit of His own suffering, but it was not the primary reason.

So why? What was the primary reason?

Because our sin, our disobedience, our rebellion against God and His laws destroyed the relationship we were created to enjoy between God and man. God loved us and wanted us to be restored to a right relationship to Him and so He Himself provided a perfect payment for our sins because we had not ability to supply it ourselves.

Jesus endured this bitter cup of pain, sorrow, and death FOR YOU and FOR ME. All we must do to receive the forgiveness and new life He has to offer is to acknowledge our sinfulness before our creator God, repent of that sin, and trust in Jesus sacrifice alone for the forgiveness of sin.

OPTION 1 – An Unbeliever or unknown

Jesus drank from the bitter cup, endured sorrow and agony that we cannot even begin to imagine, so that He could restore us to relationship with Himself; so that we could know the joy of being in relationship with God again. And this is possible if we only recognize before God our sin and repent (turn away) from our sin and ask for His forgiveness. Then we can know God and live for God and he becomes for us joy, peace, comfort, and love.

In the midst of our own bitter cup, we can find joy, peace, comfort, and security. It does requires us to repent and put our faith in Him, turning from our sin, but when we do, no bitter cup is too bitter for God to comfort and guide us through.

Let me encourage you this morning, turn to God. Put your faith in Him. Repent of your sins and trust in a God who is so loving He sent his only son to die for us so that we could know Him.

I am certain that this would be __________ last desire for you. I am certain that even now, beyond death, he/she would want you to know this truth and find peace in God!

If you want to know more about what God has done for us and how you can know God and find the joy and peace that comes from the forgiveness and new life he offers through his Jesus, please see me.

May ___________ life and now her death, point you to God and cause you to seek Him. You won’t be disappointed.

SKIP TO BOTTOM

OPTION 2 – A Believer

_____________ did this. She trusted Christ, she trusted God, and her greatest wish and desire for the loved ones in her life (all of you gathered here today) to know the joy of what Christ endured the bitter cup to obtain for us!

______________ is alive today. She is not dead but alive and at home in heaven with her heavenly father whom she loves so very much. Please take this opportunity honor the life she lived and come to know and learn more of the God she loved so dearly. Let your sorrow and your grief drive you to God, the God of comfort; the god of understanding. If you are believer already, let God’s comfort envelope you. If you are not a believer, let your sorrow and pain draw you to a God who sent His son to die for your sin so that you might be restored to a right relationship with Him.

We would love to introduce you to Him. Please take time see me or Pastor Jeff today if you would like to learn more.

__________________ greatest desire is for you to know the Savior and friend she had come to know in her life.

So I leave you with this critical message today, on ____________________ remembrance service.

Jesus, understands the sorrow, pain, and heartache of life. Don’t think in your grief that God cannot understand. He can and does. Christ endured more than any of us ever will. AND YETR, He willingly endured it because by doing so, he made a way for you and I to know Him and find hope and strength in even the most dark and bitter times.

CONCLUSION

Our hope in sorrow

Our hope in loss and grief

Is found in the great love of God for us who sacrificed so much to offer us a path to him.

I cannot promise the days ahead will be grief and sorrow free. I am pretty much guarantee the opposite. You will have plenty of moments.

BUT

I can promise this…if you entrust yourself to God, you will have all the comfort and strength you can manage from your relationship with Him. It is my prayer for you that your grief and sorrow would have you run to Christ, not away. Perhaps the first step for you is to repent and trust. If you already have, run to his arms for comfort and strength and led him lead you. This is our hope when we face our bitter cups.

The following words come from a prayer written in a Gestapo jail cell (with a few updates in language by me) by German Christian Dietrich Bonhoeffer several months before his death at the hands of the Nazi regime. Pastor Bonhoeffer called on a biblical metaphor – the cup – to describe the frequent and most defining event of his life – suffering. His statement highlights the perspective we should have regarding sorrow, and the bitter cup of life’s hardships.

"And should You offer us the bitter cup, resembling sorrow,

Filled to the brim and overflowing

We will receive it thankfully, without trembling

From Your hand, so good and ever-loving.

But if it be Your will again to give

Joy of this world and bright sunshine

Then in our minds we will past times relive

And all our days be entirely Yours.”

Let’s pray…