"The travels & tears of life" Psalm 56:8

Textual Idea – David declared the knowledge of God and His care for David’s travels & tears of his life.

Sermon Idea – Christians can be encouraged by God’s knowledge and care in the travels and tears of life.

Interrogative – How can Christians be encouraged in the travels & tears of life?

Transition w/ key word – Our text presents two facts of encouragement in the travels and tears of life.

God’s knowledge of our travels - 8a God’s knowledge of our tears - 8b

Introduction – Today is Mother’s Day 2021. It is a special day we set aside to honor the labors and love of mother’s. Mom’s are a unique breed that God has wired and designed uniquely to fulfill the role of wife and motherhood. A mom’s unconditional love of her children in many ways pictures God’s unconditional love for us sinful humans. But motherhood doesn’t come easy. The pain and sorrow of childbirth is profound and something no mom ever forgets. But the pain & sorrow of labor gives way to joy when that precious baby is born. Cheryl & I as you may have heard me say along the way, have 5 kids. Pregnancy came easy for us by the grace of God. For my kids however, pregnancies and births of grandkids has never really been easy for mom’s or babies - especially for our two oldest daughters Rachel & Ginny. It was on a Sunday morning, 11 years ago, April 25th 2010, as I was preaching the first service at Calvary where I pastored in Maryland, our daughter Ginny had suddenly gone into labor in Fort Worth. Our daughter Rachel was texting her mom Cheryl while I was preaching both Ginny & the baby were not doing well and she needed to get there ASAP. Of course I had no idea all this was happening. So between services, I got her an emergency flight, Cheryl ran home, threw a couple of outfits in a suitcase and one of my faithful deacons, Ernie & Kay Owens (Waylan’s oldest brother) took Cheryl to BWI for a flight to DFW. (Explain what happened to Addison, our first grand baby who got promoted to Heaven on Friday April 30th). Oh the tears we shed and have shed each year as we observe her birthday and passing. Last year, Rachel our oldest daughter suffered a traumatic miscarriage traveling home to WF Texas. We almost lost her! And a few short weeks ago, our youngest daughter Beth we thought was pregnant. Our dreams for grand baby #8 came crashing down when we learned her egg didn’t fertilize, so once again Cheryl traveled to come alongside her. 3 daughters, 3 lost babies - tragic and sad. When I got the news of Beth’s loss, I just cried. I’ve talked to many a mom who has suffered miscarriages or lost children. The only verse I could think of upon hearing the news from Beth was Ps. 56:8. I believe the Lord in that moment gave me the spark of this sermon for Mother’s Day 2021. My aim is not to be a bummer on Mother’s Day but to encourage because the reality is that pregnancy, childbirth & motherhood, life in general is not without great hardship, trial, tribulation and lots of tears! What does Ps. 56:8 say you ask? “You number my wanderings, put my tears into Your bottle, are they not in your book?”

Tranistion w/ key word - I want us to be encouraged by two facts King David declared about God’s knowledge and care for us as we journey through the travels & tears of life.

Background - The title of this song gives us important background for this Psalm and what was going on in David’s life. He was #1 on Saul’s national terrorist list. As a matter of fact, David was the only name on that list. 1st & 2nd Samuel catalogue over the course of about 10 years after David killed the giant Goliath as a teenager and became an instant hero how Saul tried repeatedly to kill him and hunted him like a wild dog to be executed on sight. 1st Sam. 21:10-15 tells us David was so desperate, in a moment of absolute terror from Saul; David fled to Gath, the Philistine hometown of none other than Goliath himself. The Philistines knew who David was and arrested him on the spot. David managed to escape from Gath by pretending to be a mad-man by pretending to be insane, clawing on the doorposts and letting his saliva drip down his beard. The king was like “I’ve got enough crazy people to deal with today.” So they let him go. Read verse 1-8 to get more context:

I. God’s knowledge of our travels - 8a

Explanation - What a map God had in glory, the map of David’s meanderings up and down the promised land, with Saul’s bloodhounds ever baying at his heels! David looked back over the past few years and was amazed. The hunt had gone on so long and so relentlessly it had driven him, in a moment of panic, right into Philistine territory. Not a single step was unmarked on that map.

David chose Gath because he thought it was the last place Saul would ever look for him. He was right, but it presented a whole new set of problems. He left the land of Promise and blessing. For a Jew to leave Israel was like turning your back on the promises and blessing of God. We saw this in our study of Ruth sometime back with Naomi’s husband left Bethlehem to go to Moab. Hardship and difficulty got much worse for Elimelech’s family, he died and his two sons died leaving behind 3 widows and lots of tears. When David chose to go to Gath in the territory of the Philistines, he was walking by sight and not by faith. David’s faith was replaced by his own scheme and plans and it nearly cost him his life! Vs. 1 “Be merciful to me O God, for man would swallow me up.” Can you picture the sneers and jeers of the Philistines while they were waiting for the king so they could let him know they caught David and had him custody? Remember how they poked the eyes out of Samson and made him grind flower at a millstone? They were determined to abuse David and yet he declares here in verse 3-4, even though he was out of the will of God, His trust was still solidly in God so he determined to not be afraid. Then he declared in vs. 8 God’s knowledge of his travels.

“You yourself have numbered my wanderings” - the word wanderings can refer to travels or even to the tossing & turning of a restless night of fitful sleep. David’s declaration is that God knows all of our tossing and turnings, all the meanderings and walking down the path of life. I believe this is why the Bible repeatedly calls us to walk with God. Galatians 5:16 says “Walk in the Spirit and you shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh.”

Eph. 4:1 “I therefore the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worth of the calling with which you are called.” As David looked back over his fleeing for his life over the last months and even years and now in his current condition, alone, in captivity in the hands of Israel’s arch enemies and in the hometown of the giant he slew with a rock and sling, he took comfort in the fact that Almighty God knew exactly where David was and what was going on - so much so He even had a record of it! It was of great comfort to David in that confinement, that His Lord knew where he was and the route he took to get there. His Lord stayed up all night while David tossed and turned trying to sleep the Lord was counting his restless turning on his bed on hard ground. What did David do? Got his eyes off his circumstances and back on God seated on His throne!

Illustration - I marvel when I stop and think about how God brought a 17 year old HS senior from Richmond Va to McAllen Texas to a wedding where he met a beautiful young woman and fell in love with her immediately. How God brought that couple together to marry, allowed them to have secular careers in law enforcement, business and nursing and used all of those experiences as He led them to surrender to full time ministry, seminary training, planting a church in NH, helping a pastor plant a church in Houston, led Him Maryland, West Virginia and now Corpus to be your pastor! God has record of all of that! Guess what? God knows the journey’s of your life too! All the twists and turns, ups and downs, the good the bad and the downright ugly of your life and He has recorded every step of it and never lost track of you because you are so important to Him and He cares so much for you. You may be like David and got out of God’s will but yet God didn’t turn His back on you!

Argumentation - David would say in Psalm 139, a Psalm devoted to God’s knowledge of man, of God’s knowledge of where we go! CF 139:7-12. You may be discouraged today at the way your life has gone or is currently going; but be encouraged dear brother’s and sisters, the Holy Spirit of God inspired David to record that Almighty God knows intimately the travels, twists and turns of your life! Notice a 2nd fact:

II. God’s knowledge of our tears - 8b

Explanation - David asked God to collect his tears and record them in that same book in order to fully vindicate David someday. This may be an allusion to an ancient custom of mourners where they would collect their falling tears in a small bottle and place that bottle at the tomb of a deceased friend or family member as a sign and memorial to their love of their deceased loved one. In any event, David affirms in faith that God does collect our tears and records them in His book. If God had numbered David’s travels, surely He has recorded David’s tears! Malachi 3:16 speaks of God’s book of remembrance written for each one who fear the Lord and meditate on His name!

As I got the news of my sweet Bethany’s loss here a few weeks ago and the tears began to flow, the Holy Spirit reminded me that the Lord sees, knows and records our tears! I began researching for this sermon shortly afterwards and the science of tears is really something. There are 3 types of tears that all are produced in a small almond shaped gland above both eyes, called the lacrimal gland. (See slide) Scientists can explain the first two types of tears but the 3rd kind of tear is a mystery to this day to modern Science known only in the mind and heart of God!

1. Basal tears -

A protective tear that keep the eye moist and clear of debris that may get into the eye. Instantly the eyes will water and wash out that debris. I don’t think it’s this type of tear that God records.

2. Reflex tears -

These are somewhat like Basal tears but it is more of a chemical reaction that takes place for example and why your eyes begin to tear and water in response to peeling an onion. This chemical reaction is to protect the eye from any toxic substance that gets into the eye. Because they are reflex tears, they may occur reflexively to a sudden injury to another part of the body. If you’ve ever smashed your finger with a hammer or experienced a deep cut, or even gotten punched in the nose and the tears began to flow, this is a reflex tear. I’m not sure these are the tears God records but they could be.

3. Emotional tears -

These tears are completely different than basal or reflex tears. Scientists have conducted chemical tests and found that both basal and reflex tears have similar if not identical chemical make up. But emotional tears have something basal and reflex tears do not have! Emotional tears have hormones and endorphins, they are more viscous or thick, they tend to flow more slowly and adhere to the cheeks as they flow so they are more visible to others! Isn’t that amazing? Those tears have natural pain killers and yet scientists are baffled as to what this means or why tears are connected to human emotions. Did you know that humans are the only part of God’s created order that cry emotional tears? They have figured out that testosterone in men tends to limit emotional tear production and prolactin in women tends to promote crying. The whole thing with emotional tears seems to promote social bonding among human beings! It is these emotional tears I believe God collects and records! We cry when we’re happy, we can cry when we’re sad and overwhelmed with grief. We can cry across all range of human emotions. In a course I have taught called “Emotional Fitness” I found an “emoji chart” that describes the myriad of emotions we humans have that can produce tears! (Show slide & elaborate).

God has designed us to where when we cry human emotional tears that other humans rally around us and empathize with us. The word “empathy” comes from a greek word that literally means to “feel into.”

There’s an old adage “people don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.” Because men and women are different, they respond to crying differently. Women can see another woman crying and they start crying too. Some of you women are fighting back tears just because I’m talking about tears, crying and emotion! Men see women crying and we just want to fix it and we put on our plumber hats to try and shut off the water works! Men, your wife doesn’t want you to fix her tears, she wants you to feel her tears! And all the wives said amen! Often children when they cry don’t want the problem fixed, they want us to feel their pain. (Garrett fell on his behind hard as a toddler - crying - His mama Cheryl said let me look. “Oh honey it just has a little crack in it.” Boy the weeping and wailing!

Folks, our wonderful, good and gracious Heavenly Father has given us the gift of emotional tears, that science can’t explain but God has assured us through the pen of David, the sweet psalmist of Israel, a man’s man who knew how to cry and show his emotions that our God collects and records our tears! Have you considered the blessing of tears? Some quotes I found related to tears:

“Tears are God’s gift to us. Holy water that heal us as they flow.”

“What soap is to the body, tears are for the soul” - Jewish proverb.

“Sometimes crying is the only way for your eyes to speak when your mouth can’t explain how broken your heart is.”

“Tears of the safety valve for the heart when too much pressure is laid on it.”

“God gave us crying so other people could see we need help & help us.”

Applications -

1. Would you just pause right now and thank God He knows you so well that He has recorded all of your travels and tears?

CF Matt. 10:28-30.

2. For some of you, the greatest need of your life to to be rescued from your sin by putting your faith in Jesus Christ. Your tears come from the sin in your life & choices you’ve made.

As Jesus was approaching the city of Jerusalem, headed to the cross, He lamented because they refused to repent and recognize Him as their long awaited Messiah. The Lord Jesus is crying out to you to be saved today! Share the ABC’s.

3. What trauma or pain in your life has caused tears to flow and still plagues you to this day?

Was it some sort of abuse you endured? Was it a miscarriage precious lady that has been so hard for you? Was it an abortion that plagues you to this day? Is it a fractured relationship between spouses, or parents and children? Maybe you’ve been hurt in a church, wounded and ostracized. Maybe your tears flow because of the impact of a loss, a spouse, a parent, a child. PTSD from action in wartime and the nightmares sill bring tears to your eyes if you pause to think about it? Oh hurt one, God knows and has collected those tears! Maybe you’re the victim of violent crime and were brutalized and you wonder if anyone cares? When David said God collects our tears and records them; for what purpose? Why else would God say “Vengeance is mine, I will repay says the Lord!” Romans 12:19 Do not avenge yourself. God wants you to be freed today because He has meticulously logged the tears from that trauma in your life and He will take care of it in due time! Will you by faith release to Him today? Maybe just maybe your righteous anger as devolved into bitterness over not willing to let it go, forgive and let God take care of it.

Close – Romans 12:15 principle - rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep. I want all of our deacons to come forward. We’re going to weep and pray with those who are willing to acknowledge the hurts they’ve carried. Loss of a child, any trauma I mentioned above. Musicians “You are my all in all” - You come let us mourn with you, and let the HS take care of your tears.