Despair Exchanged for Hope
Notes
Transcript
The term gift exchange has many different meanings. When you hear “gift exchange” you might think of exchanging presents on Christmas morning, a Secret Santa list in the office or returning presents on December 26th in order to exchange it for something that you would rather have. When I hear “gift exchange” I think of being in 7th grade and going to my first Youth Christmas Party. It was a Progressive Dinner along with a White Elephant Gift Exchange. You had to bring a $5 gift to exchange. Can I ask a question? Why has inflation not increased that price of the gift exchange? I still see people have gift exchanges, and the maximum is either $5 or $10. You would think that would have increased over time! Thank God Dollar General’s and Dollar Tree stores.
At that gift exchange, which I don’t remember what I brought, but I remember that I wanted to make a good impression on everybody by having a good $5 gift, there were a lot of other things that weren’t so great. One person kept opening boxes, inside of boxes, like they were Russian Nesting Dolls, only to find an old Petra cassette tape. They were a Christian rock band from the 80s, and no one really wanted that. Someone else brought a box full of chocolate candy and some Ex-lax. That gift was only half its worth. Then there was a gift, it was a little plastic snowman and he came with the brown confectionary sugar pellet looking things. I thought it was some sort of toy that came with random candy. Then I figured it out. There was a little hole in the undercarriage of this snowman. You would open his tophat, put the confectionary sugar pellets in his head, close the top hat, and when you push down his head....out would pop one of those brown confectionary sugar pellets. See what I’m getting at?
In my really weird mind, I thought this was a funny gift and I loved it. Out of all the other gifts that night it wasn’t my favorite, it wasn’t the top one that I wanted. My problem was, the top gift that I wanted was valuable to everyone else. My pooping snowman was not valuable to everyone else, and if you have ever played Dirty Santa, then you know you have to have your gift taken, in order to have two more chances at getting other gifts. When no one thinks your gift is valuable, you don’t get a chance to exchange the gift for something else.
Life will tend to deliver you a pooping snowman. It can be a great gift depend on who you are, but it can be pretty poopy sometimes too. Our enemy, Satan and all of his minions will try to rob us of everything good that we know. He’ll leave us with a gift of hurt, grief, worry and despair. This morning I want to declare: Give God your despair and He’ll give you His hope.
For the choir director. A Maskil of the sons of Korah.
1 As a deer longs for flowing streams,
so I long for you, God.
2 I thirst for God, the living God.
When can I come and appear before God?
3 My tears have been my food day and night,
while all day long people say to me,
“Where is your God?”
4 I remember this as I pour out my heart:
how I walked with many,
leading the festive procession to the house of God,
with joyful and thankful shouts.
5 Why, my soul, are you so dejected?
Why are you in such turmoil?
Put your hope in God, for I will still praise him,
my Savior and my God.
6 I am deeply depressed;
therefore I remember you from the land of Jordan
and the peaks of Hermon, from Mount Mizar.
7 Deep calls to deep in the roar of your waterfalls;
all your breakers and your billows have swept over me.
8 The Lord will send his faithful love by day;
his song will be with me in the night—
a prayer to the God of my life.
9 I will say to God, my rock,
“Why have you forgotten me?
Why must I go about in sorrow
because of the enemy’s oppression?”
10 My adversaries taunt me,
as if crushing my bones,
while all day long they say to me,
“Where is your God?”
11 Why, my soul, are you so dejected?
Why are you in such turmoil?
Put your hope in God, for I will still praise him,
my Savior and my God.
As I read Psalm 42 & 43 this week, it was as if I heard the humanity of the psalmist come out. This is not some sort of high and lofty thought. In fact this was written by someone who came from a Maskil of the Korahites. The best thing to try and liken them to would have been worship leaders. Many scholars believe that they were a type of musician, as they stood in the synagogues and raised arms while they sung out to God. This is a real person, who was once part of the “festive procession to the house of God.” Now they seem to be on the outside looking in. They have been taunted by someone, because twice in verse 3 and verse 10 he says that his adversaries “taunt me” asking “where is your God?”
This Psalm is steeped in lament and in hope. This is a real person who struggles with a real problem, but he his trying to remember the hope that he has. Let me ask this, have you ever been there? Have you ever been to that place where you feel like you about to lose your mind, lose your cool, lose your patience, and at the same time you are trying your best to remember what was preached last Sunday. You’re trying your best to remember that promise that your were clinging to last week. You’re trying your best to remember how much you’ve been blessed even though you are losing it all? Have you been there?
Possibly the greatest loss he has experienced is the loss of people. I said it last week, if 2020 has taught us anything it is that we need people. We need each other. We need to be able to hold hands, embrace and talk. We need to sit across the table from one another for a meal. Yet, this psalmist has lost the people that were closest to him, possibly they have turned on him. In other places in the Psalms here is what it looks like:
7 Everyone who sees me mocks me;
they sneer and shake their heads:
8 “He relies on the Lord;
let him save him;
let the Lord rescue him,
since he takes pleasure in him.”
11 saying, “God has abandoned him;
chase him and catch him,
for there is no one to rescue him.”
Look at what this man says: “As a deer longs for flowing streams, so I long for you, God. I thirst for God, the living God. When can I came and appear before God?” He has somehow been separated from those who are worshipping God and wants to be brought back. He goes on to say, “My tear have been my food day and night?” The emotions are real. He has been emotional day and night, with the only thing to eat is his tears. He declares himself (in verse 5 and verse 11) to be dejected and in turmoil. He has been disturbed, cast down, in despair and depressed. He is down in the dumps and crying the blues. This man has lost hope. Does any of that resonate for you?
Here we are at Christmas, which can already exacerbate any emotion that we experience, but this is Christmas 2020. No one has been through Christmas 2020. This thing might turn into the movie Elf and Santa breaks down in Central Park. I joke, but this is real stuff for this psalmist. He is trying his best to remember what is good, because for every lament, he returns the thought with hope.
The thought of being thirsty, emotional and God forsaken is returned with verse 4, Psalm 42:4 “I walked with many, leading the festive procession to the house of God, with joyful and thankful shouts.” Eugene Peterson says, “ I was always at the head of the worshiping crowd,
right out in front,
Leading them all,
eager to arrive and worship,
Shouting praises, singing thanksgiving—
celebrating, all of us, God’s feast
After asking himself why he is “dejected, why are you in such turmoil,” he then tells himself “Put your hope in God, for I will still praise Him, my Savior and my God.” When he feels like life is a waterfall, like the breakers of the ocean washing over him, he counters it with “The Lord will send His faithful love by dad, His song will be with me in the night - a prayer to the God of my life.” Even though I think Psalm 42 & 43 are suppose to go together as one psalm, he ends this psalm, repeating the words from verse 5: “Put your hope in God, for I will still praise Him, my Savior and my God.”
The translators of the CSB leave out a part that others translations leave in. They do it, because more original manuscripts of the Hebrew have been found and they don’t include the words, but most of the translations (KJV, NKJV, NASB) have something like: “For I shall yet praise Him, the help of my countenance.”
God wants you to Give Him your despair and He’ll give you His hope.
That is an awesome gift exchange. That is taking the most unwanted present at the Dirty Santa gift exchange and getting the most valuable thing at the party. Yet, unlike any $5 gift excchange, this one is priceless.
There is a hymn that we don’t sing named “Come Ye Sinners, Poor & Needy”
1 Come, ye sinners, poor and needy,
weak and wounded, sick and sore;
Jesus ready stands to save you,
full of pity, love, and power.
2 Come, ye thirsty, come and welcome,
God's free bounty glorify;
true belief and true repentance,
ev'ry grace that brings you nigh.
3 Let not conscience make you linger,
nor of fitness fondly dream;
all the fitness he requireth
is to feel your need of him.
4 Come, ye weary, heavy laden,
lost and ruined by the fall;
if you tarry till you're better,
you will never come at all.
5 I will rise and go to Jesus!
He will save me from my sin.
By the riches of his merit,
there is joy and life in him.
If you have been feeling the same feelings as the psalmist, if you have been dejected, tried, tired, in turmoil, in trials, depressed, in the dumps, crying the blues, distressed, disheartened, then know this the Lord is ready to take your despair and give you His hope. I’m not saying He is going to remove the problem from your life. I’m not saying that you’ll never have to deal with that person again. I’m not saying you’ll never have to walk into the house again. I’m saying that in the midst of the storm, in the midst of the billows washing over you, He can give you hope that weathers the storm.
Jesus said: 28 “Come to me, all of you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take up my yoke and learn from me,q because I am lowly and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
You are going to still have struggles and trials. You’re going to continue to go back and forth on feeling in despair. One commentator said: he point the psalmist seems to be making is that there was no reason for his depression if God was his Savior. The fact that he repeated this several times shows the difficulty of internalizing this truth.
However, I firmly believe give God your despair and He’ll give you His hope!