God's Pathway for Your Pain
Notes
Transcript
Pre-Introduction
Thanks, Isaac and Audrey, for being here and presenting. Please talk to them after church!
Explain our sermon break
Today, sermon for Thanksgiving
Next week, begin mini series for Christmas: “Christmas According to Matthew” which will look at Matthew 1-2.
Resume the second half of Ephesians starting back up in January
For today, please turn to Psalm 13.
Let’s pray.
Introduction
Introduction
There’s a moment in Les Misérables when a young man named Marius stands in a room once filled with friends and sings about “empty chairs at empty tables.”
It’s a powerful and memorable song that captures how many people feel walking into Thanksgiving and the holiday season.
They come to celebrate, but carry a lot of loss, a lot of pain.
And in our pain — after one struggle piles on top of another, when it seems like we just can’t catch a break, when it all piles onto us and we can’t come up for breath — it’s easy for us to ask God, “What do you want from me?”
In all this pain, what do you from me?
Q. What does God want from me in my pain?
Post-Introduction
This morning, in Psalm 13, we are going to learn God’s pathway for our pain.
Would you follow along as I read?
To the choirmaster. A Psalm of David.
1 How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me?
2 How long must I take counsel in my soul and have sorrow in my heart all the day? How long shall my enemy be exalted over me?
3 Consider and answer me, O Lord my God; light up my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death,
4 lest my enemy say, “I have prevailed over him,” lest my foes rejoice because I am shaken.
5 But I have trusted in your steadfast love; my heart shall rejoice in your salvation.
6 I will sing to the Lord, because he has dealt bountifully with me.
Q. What does God want from me in my pain?
God wants you to:
1. Talk to Him (vv. 1, 3, 5)
1. Talk to Him (vv. 1, 3, 5)
This first step is implicit in the Psalm, but I want to take a minute and reflect on this.
David, the Psalmist, is taking time to actually talk to God.
He is giving voice to his pain.
Look at how he talks to God directly.
Look at verses 1, 3, and 5.
1 How long, O Lord? . . .
3 Consider and answer me, O Lord my God . . .
5 But I have trusted in your steadfast love; my heart shall rejoice in your salvation.
God wants you to talk to him.
For some of us, this can be the hardest step.
Application -
In the demands of life,
bills
taking care of kids,
getting everything done at work, trying to keep up with the house and groceries
spending time with your spouse
being involved in church
getting all ready for hosting Thanksgiving,
it can be hard to slow down and actually acknowledge that you are exhausted or hurting or sad or angry or confused or overwhelmed.
And if you take the time to pause and stop and actually try to voice anything to God, you’re afraid of what that might mean.
But God wants you to talk to Him.
In my own life I’ve found this to be the hardest step.
To actually give myself permission to sit and face what I’m experiencing and bring it to the Lord in prayer rather than just powering through and trying to keep going.
I don’t like emotional pain. And sometimes its easier to try and just bury my feelings and keep trying to survive and get everything done rather than take my feelings to the Lord and actually talk to Him.
But, friend, God wants you to talk to him.
God wants to hear from you.
But he doesn’t want you to just say nice things to him.
He actually wants you to complain to him.
2. Complain to Him (vv.1-2)
2. Complain to Him (vv.1-2)
That’s what David does in this text.
David complains to God in verses 1-2, and he does it through a string of questions.
Look up at verse 1.
1 How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me?
2 How long must I take counsel in my soul and have sorrow in my heart all the day? How long shall my enemy be exalted over me?
I like the way the CSB, the Christian Standard Bible, translates verse 2.
2 How long will I store up anxious concerns within me, agony in my mind every day? How long will my enemy dominate me?
God wants you to complain to him.
(Examples:)
“How long is this going to last, God?”
“When are you going to stop ignoring me, God?”
“How long are you going to leave me here by myself trapped in my own head and all alone in my anxiety and my fear and my suffering?
“How long are you going to leave me in my sorrow, my overwhelming sense of dread and sadness and grief?
“How long are you going to let this evildoer win?”
“When will you intervene?”
“Is this just what I deserve?”
“Have you forgotten me?”
“Are you mad at me?”
“Is this just what my life is going to be now? No more joy? No more happiness? No more peace?”
I can’t do this much longer, God, I don’t have the strength.
“How long, O Lord, How Long?”
God wants you to complain to him.
The Bible is full of prayers of complaint to God.
We are not more spiritual by burying our complaints and our grief and pain.
We demonstrate authentic faith in God when we acknowledge that God is our loving Father who delights in us as His children, and who loves to hold us when we’re hurting.
He loves to comfort us and to hear our complaints.
Illustration -
What parent is there, who, if your young son wakes in the night with a nightmare and cries out “Mommy!” or “Daddy!,” what parent is there who won’t rise up and pick him up and hold him close and say, “It’s ok, It’s ok, I’m here. I love you. It’s ok, It’s ok, I’m here. I love you.”
The fear and pain and hurt of a toddler scared by a nightmare doesn’t change my steadfast love for him.
The complaint, the voicing of the pain and fear, actually activates and draws out my love for him!
God wants you to talk to him.
God wants you to complain to him.
But then, after we complain, God wants us to ask him what we want him to do.
God wants you to ask him.
3. Ask Him (vv.3-4)
3. Ask Him (vv.3-4)
3 Consider and answer me, O Lord my God; light up my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death,
4 lest my enemy say, “I have prevailed over him,” lest my foes rejoice because I am shaken.
David complains to God, “How long are you going to let this go on like this, God?” When will this end?
And then, David asks God what it is He wants God to do about it: “Answer me! Intervene! “Light up my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death.”
This is a figure of speech that is used here to mean “to revive his physical strength and moral energy.”
A Commentary on the Psalms 1–89, Volumes 1 & 2: Commentary Commentary in Expository Form
. . . here the word means to revive the physical strength and moral energy (see also
He’s asking for God’s face to shine on him, for God to be favorable, to give him strength and energy, and, ultimately to deliver him.
Compare 1 Sam 14:27-29
He doesn’t want his enemies to be able to boast about overcoming and defeating him.
This is a straightforward request — intervene! Help me!
God wants you to ask him.
Illustration -
7 “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.
8 For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened.
9 Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone?
10 Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent?
11 If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!
Jesus does the same.
In the Garden of Gethsemane, he asks the Father, clearly, specifically, what he wants.
39 . . . “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me . . .
Application -
God invites us to ask Him.
God wants you to talk to him.
He wants you to complain to him.
He wants you to ask him.
And he wants you to do all of those things so that you’ll be ready to do the last thing, the hardest thing:
God wants you to trust him.
4. Trust Him (vv.5-6)
4. Trust Him (vv.5-6)
There’s a little hinge word that everything turns on: that little word “but”
5 But I have trusted in your steadfast love; my heart shall rejoice in your salvation.
6 I will sing to the Lord, because he has dealt bountifully with me.
Three statements:
(1) But I have trusted in your steadfast love
(2) My heart shall rejoice in your salvation
(3) I will sing to the LORD because he has dealt bountifully with me
Again, I like the Christian Standard Bible’s translation of verse 6:
6 I will sing to the Lord because he has treated me generously.
In other words:
(1) I will choose to trust God’s faithful love *even in my pain*
(2) I will choose to be joyful in God’s salvation *even in my pain*
(3) I will choose to sing because of God’s generosity toward me *even in my pain*
Christian, the character and promises of God are the basis of your sanity and your only hope in the midst of your pain.
Gospel Call
And notice, it is God’s love, God’s salvation, and God’s generosity that can sustain us in the midst of our pain.
And that’s exactly what the good news of Christianity is. God’s love, God’s salvation, and God’s generosity, most clearly seen in Jesus Christ.
That though the enemies of our soul were threatening to overwhelm us and overpower us, God made his face to shine upon us in Jesus and rescued us from our plight. He acted in time and space and history to deliver us from our enemies.
Just like God redeemed his people from slavery in Egypt, God sent his son Jesus to redeem us from our slavery to sin.
And through Jesus’ perfect life of love, and through his sacrificial death on the cross in our place, and through his victorious resurrection from the dead, and by simply trusting in Jesus for our acceptance with God, we have the assurance that forever and ever, God is for us and will always be for us, and He will make everything right and we will one day be raised to everlasting life with God.
All will be well.
(1) I will choose to trust God’s faithful love *even in my pain*
(2) I will choose to be joyful in God’s salvation *even in my pain*
(3) I will choose to sing because of God’s generosity toward me *even in my pain*
And my ultimate confidence of God’s love, God’s salvation, God’s generosity, is in Jesus Christ, our great Savior.
[Address Unbelievers]: If you’ve never trusted in Jesus, that’s your next step.
If you’re here and you’re not trusting in Jesus, may I humbly suggest to you that there’s no way you’re going to be able to cope with living in this broken, beautiful world that we’re living in without Jesus?
Friend, do you need some hope? Jesus is the only hope we have. You’re not going to find true, lasting joy, true, lasting hope outside of Jesus.
He is the only way and he’s inviting you to trust in him.
[Address Christians]: Maybe you’re here and you are trusting in Jesus.
The call of this text of Scripture for you is keep trusting, even in your pain.
And after you talk to God, after you complain to God, and after you ask God, the final destination for all of those steps is to lead your heart to a place of trust.
Over and over and over and over again. Keep trusting.
Talk. Complain. Ask. Trust.
Repeat.
Talk. Complain. Ask. Trust.
Do it again.
Talk. Complain. Ask. Trust.
God wants you to choose to trust Him, even in your pain.
The destination of lament is trust.
Trust is lament’s appropriate conclusion.
It is where the whole process leads us, not just once, but each and every time on repeat.
But it’s a choice.
Listen to what one writer says on this:
“This prayer language [of lament] is divinely designed to guide you to the spiritual safe harbor of confidence in God and praising his name. Reaching out to God in prayer, laying your complaints before him, and boldly asking for help were meant to bring you to this point: to invite you to make the decision of faith-filled worship.”
Mark Vroegop
To quote one pastor my dad and I were really encouraged by a couple years ago:
Don’t quit. Don’t quit. Don’t quit. Don’t quit. Don’t quit. Don’t quit. Don’t quit. Don’t quit. Don’t quit. Don’t quit. Don’t quit. Don’t quit. Don’t quit. Don’t quit. Don’t quit. Don’t quit. Don’t quit. Don’t quit. Drop dead, and go to heaven.
Talk. Complain. Ask. Trust.
Keep trusting.
Application
Q. What does it look like, practically, to get this place of trust? To choose to trust?
Again, Mark Vroegop is helpful in this.
He says some days trust sounds like confident statements that you can say to yourself about what you know to be true about God.
“God, I know you’re in control. I do trust you.”
Other days, you might not be able to come up with the words on your own, so you just read what the end of the lament psalms say; they give you the script of what to say and you just ask God to help you say them out loud.
For example, you might just say v5 outloud:
5 But I have trusted in your steadfast love; my heart shall rejoice in your salvation.
Other days, maybe you can quietly sing a song that captures what is true as you tune your hearts to trusting in God.
“When we are battling falsehoods in our thinking, sometimes singing has the power to convince our emotions to change.”
Mark Vroegop
Or maybe there are days or moments when you just need to sit quietly before the Lord.
“Exhaustion or weariness can create a silent language of trust. We can bank our confidence in this: “Be still and know that I am God” (Ps. 46:10)”
Mark Vroegop
"Lament creates a path through the messy wilderness of pain.”
Mark Vroegop
Don’t get hung up on getting it perfect.
Maybe it’s just a simple prayer: “God, I choose to trust you right now.”
Maybe its using Psalm 13 or another Psalm of lament as a template to make the prayer of Scripture into your own.
What does God want from you in your pain?
He wants you to talk to him.
He wants you to complain to him.
He wants you to ask him.
He wants you to trust him.
And God wants all of that for you because:
Big Idea: God wants you.
What does God want from you in your pain? He wants you.
He wants your heart. He wants your words. He wants your complaints. He wants your requests. He wants your trust. He wants your love. He wants you.
He doesn’t want you as a performer, He wants the real you.
And because He wants the real you He has given you a pathway for your pain, so you can open yourself up to God so He can draw near to you and so you can receive the greatest gift God could give you in your pain, the gift of Himself.
Illustration -
Application -
Christian, I don’t know all of the hurt and pain and suffering you are carrying. I know some of it for some of you.
But I don’t know the scope or breadth or the real heartache that you know. Because you are the one carrying it.
But I do know this: God wants you to talk to him. And He wants you to complain to him. And He wants you to ask him. And he wants you to trust him.
And the reason for all of that is because in your pain, God wants you.
And he’s given you Jesus to prove it
Conclusion
Conclusion
Friend, the Christian life is an ongoing rhythm of Talking. Complaining. Asking. and Trusting.
This isn’t something you do one, and check a box, and then you’re good.
It’s both a journey and a language.
A pathway and a vocabulary.
Lament is the means God gives us to keep us trusting. Because in our pain, what God wants most is us.
This is a lesson God teaches us in the life of the English poet William Cowper. Cowper lived from 1731 to 1800.
He was discipled and cared for by John Newton, the writer of the hymn Amazing Grace who was a former slave-trader,
Cowper was the author of such hymns as “O For a Closer Walk with God” and “There Is a Fountain Filled with Blood”
Cowper’s life is both depressing and, paradoxically, encouraging. (I would encourage you to read more about his life in the links on the handout.)
He wrestled with overwhelming depression and despair for many, many years of his life.
He attempted to take his own life at least four times.
And he was overwhelmed with despair and doubt and grief.
During one particularly difficult season, Cowper penned what has become one of my all-time favorite hymn-texts, “God Moves in a Mysterious Way.”
God moves in a mysterious way,
His wonders to perform;
He plants his footsteps in the sea,
And rides upon the storm.
Deep in unfathomable mines
Of never-failing skill,
He treasures up his bright designs,
And works his sov'reign will.
Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take,
The clouds ye so much dread
Are big with mercy, and shall break
In blessings on your head.
Judge not the Lord by feeble sense,
But trust him for his grace;
Behind a frowning providence
He hides a smiling face.
His purposes will ripen fast,
Unfolding every hour;
The bud may have a bitter taste,
But sweet will be the flower.
Blind unbelief is sure to err,
And scan his work in vain:
God is his own interpreter,
And he will make it plain.
What does God want from you in your pain?
He wants you to talk to him.
He wants you to complain to him.
He wants you to ask him.
And he wants you to trust him.
And he wants all of those things for you, because He wants you.
He wants your heart, even in your pain.
The question is, will you have Him?
Will you trust him?
Let’s pray.
