SPEAKER_02: So today's reading is Psalm seventy-seven, and the question for today is what two things does this psalm say about the way of the Lord?
SPEAKER_02: To the choir master, according to Jeduthan, a psalm of Asaf, I cry aloud to God, aloud to God, and he will hear me.
SPEAKER_02: In the day of my trouble, I seek the Lord.
SPEAKER_02: In the night, my hand is stretched out without wearying.
SPEAKER_02: My soul refuses to be comforted.
SPEAKER_02: When I remember God, I moan.
SPEAKER_02: When I meditate, my spirit faints.
SPEAKER_02: I am so troubled that I cannot speak.
SPEAKER_02: I can consider the days of old, the years long ago, I said, Let me remember my song in the night.
SPEAKER_02: Let me meditate in my heart.
SPEAKER_02: Then my spirit made a diligent search.
SPEAKER_02: Will the Lord burn forever and never again be favorable?
SPEAKER_02: Has his steadfast love forever ceased?
SPEAKER_02: Are his promises at an end for all time?
SPEAKER_02: Has God forgotten to be gracious?
SPEAKER_02: Has he in anger shut up his compassion?
SPEAKER_02: Sila.
SPEAKER_02: Then I said, I will appeal to this, to the years of the right hand of the Most High.
SPEAKER_02: I will remember the deeds of the Lord.
SPEAKER_02: Yes, I will remember your wonders of old.
SPEAKER_02: I will ponder all your work and meditate on your mighty deeds.
SPEAKER_02: Your way, O God, is holy.
SPEAKER_02: What God is great like our God.
SPEAKER_02: You are the God who works wonders.
SPEAKER_02: You have made known your might among the peoples.
SPEAKER_02: You, with your arm, redeemed your people, the children of Jacob and Joseph.
SPEAKER_02: When the waters saw you, O God, when the waters saw you, they were afraid.
SPEAKER_02: Indeed, the deep trembled.
SPEAKER_02: The clouds poured out water.
SPEAKER_02: The skies gave forth thunder.
SPEAKER_02: Your arrows flashed on every side.
SPEAKER_02: The crash of your thunder was in the whirlwind.
SPEAKER_02: Your lightnings lighted up the world.
SPEAKER_02: The earth trembled and shook.
SPEAKER_02: Yet your footprints were unseen.
SPEAKER_02: You led your people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron.
SPEAKER_02: So reads God's word.
SPEAKER_00: Good morning, everyone.
SPEAKER_00: My name is Goss, for those who don't know me.
SPEAKER_00: I'm part of the City Church staff.
SPEAKER_00: And well, I'm very happy to be uh here this morning.
SPEAKER_00: Uh one of the things that I was afraid of if we moved to the chocolate factory was that today I was gonna be, I wasn't gonna be able to see you all, but now with the lights are on, so I'm I'm nervous anyway.
SPEAKER_00: Um so I'm very happy to be to be here and share with you the uh Psalm 77.
SPEAKER_00: Let me pray first.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, thank you for Psalm 77.
SPEAKER_00: Uh help us to see the light of Christ in the in the darkness of pain and suffering.
SPEAKER_00: Um I pray for our church.
SPEAKER_00: Help us to see us and to put our eyes on you and on the cross of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Uh please open our hearts to the beautiful and also to the painful truths of your words, of your words, and please help us and teach us this morning.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, teach us to love you and to see you in uh in the crisis of our lives.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, we pray for your help and grace in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: I think there are moments in moments in every person's life, regardless of whether you are a believer or not, when questions come to your mind and you question what you think that you believe, questions like, Why is this happening to me?
SPEAKER_00: Why uh why I am suffering?
SPEAKER_00: Moments where you find yourself probably crying uh in despair, maybe alone in your room, and you are taking your pain to God and saying, How long we will wait for an answer?
SPEAKER_00: How long will you keep me in this situation?
SPEAKER_00: Uh has been a long time.
SPEAKER_00: I've been waiting for an answer from God, and He hasn't replied to me, He hasn't responded to me.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe we have shared a few uh things with you with you, with some of you.
SPEAKER_00: Um, but possibly one of the most difficult times for us uh it was uh open our in was open our arrival uh in Ireland.
SPEAKER_00: Uh at that time we had left our country, we left our language, we left uh everything behind, we left our families, and we because we wanted to follow God and we wanted to serve Him uh in whatever in whatever way we could.
SPEAKER_00: However, uh we realized that God had different plans for us.
SPEAKER_00: At that time, we arrived in Ireland with a lot of expectations, and suddenly the pandemic arrived.
SPEAKER_00: And during this time, we began to question many things that we thought that they were true.
SPEAKER_00: We began question questioning God.
SPEAKER_00: We start questioning many things that we believe that they were true, and and along this time, we lost friends, we lost family, we lost uh financial resources.
SPEAKER_00: People that we had loved all our lives were suddenly strangers to us, and many of them even hostile towards us.
SPEAKER_00: And during the pandemic, uh I remembered during the pandemic, uh, a friend of mine passed away.
SPEAKER_00: And I was remembering that I met my wife, I met Jackie uh at his wedding, and now he was gone, leaving his wife and his two children uh behind.
SPEAKER_00: So at these moments, then the questions come.
SPEAKER_00: The questions come, and why we were questioning why is God allowing all this?
SPEAKER_00: Why, if he has the power to prevent the suffering, why he doesn't do anything?
SPEAKER_00: Why he's not responding to my prayers?
SPEAKER_00: Does he really love me?
SPEAKER_00: Does he really care about me?
SPEAKER_00: And it I think it has been in moments like this when the deepest crisis of faith have come to my life and have hit the hardest.
SPEAKER_00: And maybe you have experienced the suffering in a different way.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe the pain has been different for you.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe suffering has been different in your case, but no matter how and no matter what, suffering is something that we all experience at different levels and at different times.
SPEAKER_00: And especially when pain and suffering come into our lives, we realize that not only that we are not in control, but that having that we haven't been in control at all.
SPEAKER_00: And many who have suffered a crisis of a recognized experience that Isabel describes here.
SPEAKER_00: So something happens that shakes our confidence in what God has said about himself, causing us to doubt what we have understood to be true about him or his character.
SPEAKER_00: We begin to question if God really hears our prayers, if he actually cares, if he really loves us.
SPEAKER_00: And this uncertainty produce anxiety and fear, and probably in an effort to calm down our anxiety, our minds searches for answers to restore our confidence, but nothing seems to work, and no one is immune to that anguish.
SPEAKER_00: So the question here then is how should Christians respond when we face with tragedies of this world?
SPEAKER_00: What can we say when we come face to face with physical or spiritual abuse?
SPEAKER_00: What can we do when we face terminal illness, the death of someone that we love, or the suffering that results from natural disasters?
SPEAKER_00: I think in general, Christians we tend to respond in two different ways.
SPEAKER_00: And normally our answers or responses to suffering normally are full of theological cliches.
SPEAKER_00: Some of us say, well, you know what, there is no reason to be worried about because God is in control.
SPEAKER_00: So don't be sad.
SPEAKER_00: Well, if you say that to us, I probably will slam you in the face, right?
SPEAKER_00: That is true, but that is not encouraging.
SPEAKER_00: Others can say, Well, you don't have faith, and that's why God is not answered to your prayers.
SPEAKER_00: That's why God is not blessing you.
SPEAKER_00: And that creates a sense of guilt and shame over that person's feeling, over the person's pain and their situations.
SPEAKER_00: So this psalm will reveal to us a painful truth.
SPEAKER_00: No one lives at a consistently triumphant level.
SPEAKER_00: This is a psalm that destroys every positivist perception of life.
SPEAKER_00: The psalms are written because no one lives in that way.
SPEAKER_00: And they are written by people who didn't live that way, for people who can't live that way either.
SPEAKER_00: They reveal to us that we are so fragile, so sinful, and filled with so much struggle.
SPEAKER_00: We are filled with so much darkness and we are beaten by so many difficult circumstances.
SPEAKER_00: And that is the reality of our fallen world.
SPEAKER_00: So in this song, we will see that there are two main sections.
SPEAKER_00: The first nine verses reveal that battle in the heart of Asa, that battle for the joy.
SPEAKER_00: And in the second half, he will show us his faith, he will show us the light of hope that he found in God.
SPEAKER_00: Let me read the first verse.
SPEAKER_00: First two verses.
SPEAKER_00: I cry aloud to God, aloud to God, and he will hear me.
SPEAKER_00: In the day of my trouble, I seek the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: In the night, my hand is stretched out without wearing.
SPEAKER_00: My soul refuses to be comforted.
SPEAKER_00: So we can see that Asaf here, he kept crying out to God even when heaven seemed silent.
SPEAKER_00: He kept crying out in his sorrow.
SPEAKER_00: When I read the Psalms, I couldn't stop thinking about the many times where I knew things about God, but it was hard to believe them.
SPEAKER_00: I know that when I pray, God listens to me.
SPEAKER_00: I know that.
SPEAKER_00: But it is different from feeling that my prayer really matters to him, especially when everything in my life is wrong.
SPEAKER_00: So here Asaf seems to be in an internal struggle between what he knows about God and what he feels.
SPEAKER_00: In verse 1 and 2, uh says that it was a cry.
SPEAKER_00: I cry aloud to God.
SPEAKER_00: This is a cry in the midst of anguish.
SPEAKER_00: Asa was sad, he was uneasy, he was confused.
SPEAKER_00: So Asa is not, he's not all an immature believer.
SPEAKER_00: He is not an immature believer who feels uh bitterness at the slightless pain.
SPEAKER_00: His actions were actually godly.
SPEAKER_00: In pain, he went to seek the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: In pain, he he said, in the day of my trouble, I seek the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: In the night, my hand is stretched out without wearing.
SPEAKER_00: Here, Asa is not trying to pretend that everything is fine in his life.
SPEAKER_00: He's not pretending to be a spiritual superhero or pretending that he has his life together.
SPEAKER_00: He's not trying to show that he has never known the depth of depression and fear.
SPEAKER_00: So in the dark moments of our lives, when our minds are divided between what we know about God and what we feel, I know that God is good.
SPEAKER_00: But now, right now, in my pain, right now when I have lost someone that I love, now that the crisis has come to my life, now that my marriage is destroyed, now that the disease is not being cured, when we don't understand why the Lord is not answered to my prayers, when I don't understand why the Lord has allowed the pain of infertility.
SPEAKER_00: I know that God is good, but I don't see him, I don't feel him, I don't find rest and peace.
SPEAKER_00: And when I think about God, I moan.
SPEAKER_00: And it seems that he doesn't listen to me.
SPEAKER_00: Even in that time, Asap says, keep crying out in your sorrow, keep crying out to God, even when heaven seems silenced, keep crying out when you fail to find comfort.
SPEAKER_00: Verses 3 and 6 tell us how during the night he stayed awake and he meditated.
SPEAKER_00: He longs to find comfort, he longs to fight to uh to find peace, but he says, My soul refused comfort.
SPEAKER_00: Nothing made him feel better.
SPEAKER_00: What it says here is that what Asaf knew about God was causing him a lot of confusion.
SPEAKER_00: He could not feed into his mind the promises of God and what what was happening in the present.
SPEAKER_00: He talks about his soul refusing to be comforted.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you have ever felt that kind of pain.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you have been calling now to God, asking if He hasn't, if He has forgotten you, what deep anguish and what grief and pain he must have known and felt to respond in this way.
SPEAKER_00: And possibly you can relate to that feeling when you know things that God has said about himself, when you know that God listens to you and that and that he responds.
SPEAKER_00: But that doesn't make your burden easier or lighter.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you have to say, Lord, when I think about you, I get more depressed.
SPEAKER_00: When I remember your character, when I remember things that you have said about yourself, I just don't believe them now.
SPEAKER_00: I don't understand what you are doing.
SPEAKER_00: Even in pain, he hadn't lost sight of the sovereignty of God.
SPEAKER_00: He continued to try crying out to him.
SPEAKER_00: And in your in your pain, perhaps you have said, Lord, I know that you are sovereign.
SPEAKER_00: I know that you have control of everything, I know that I should look at you, but it is precisely that what confuses me.
SPEAKER_00: Why don't you answer to me?
SPEAKER_00: Why don't you help me?
SPEAKER_00: So in your pain, you can keep crying out to God, even in your doubting.
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse uh 7 and 7, 8, and 9.
SPEAKER_00: Will the Lord respond forever and never again be favorable?
SPEAKER_00: Has his steadfast love forever ceased?
SPEAKER_00: Are his promises at an end for all time?
SPEAKER_00: Has God forgotten to be gracious?
SPEAKER_00: Has he in anger showed up his compassion?
SPEAKER_00: Do you realize how human this is?
SPEAKER_00: It is a bitter cry from the darkness.
SPEAKER_00: There seems to be no reconciliation between the character of God.
SPEAKER_00: So he questioned his love, his holiness, his justice, his mercy.
SPEAKER_00: And there are moments when you know that God is good.
SPEAKER_00: There are moments when you know that God is good, but you don't feel it.
SPEAKER_00: And when you know that God is faithful, but everything around you make it seem that that is not true.
SPEAKER_00: And also we know that God listens to us.
SPEAKER_00: It seems that this distorted image of God comes to our mind.
SPEAKER_00: And especially when pain hits, as if he were a spectator of a cruel hunger game.
SPEAKER_00: When pain has become a form of entertainment, and also he can stop it, he doesn't do anything.
SPEAKER_00: He seems to enjoy it.
SPEAKER_00: And that is where one of the most gloomy and dark prayers in this psalm comes out.
SPEAKER_00: As his steadfast love forever cease.
SPEAKER_00: Are his promises at an end for all time?
SPEAKER_00: Has God forgotten to be gracious?
SPEAKER_00: Has he in anger showed up his compassion?
SPEAKER_00: Brother, don't embrace the lie in your pain.
SPEAKER_00: Even when it seems that everything is dark, keep crying out to God.
SPEAKER_00: Keep crying out, don't lose heart, keep crying out in your adoption, keep crying out in your sorrow, keep crying out to God, even with God, with heaven seems silent.
SPEAKER_00: And I believe that we could all give some simple answers to this prayer, right?
SPEAKER_00: Has his steadfast love forever ceased?
SPEAKER_00: Well, no.
SPEAKER_00: Are his promises at an end for all time?
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: Has God forgotten to be gracious?
SPEAKER_00: Well, of course not.
SPEAKER_00: What's wrong with this guy?
SPEAKER_00: How can he think this way?
SPEAKER_00: However, the very fact of expressing his feelings in words is his fierce is his fierce step towards his restoration.
SPEAKER_00: He's not holding anything, he's putting everything on the table, and we are no different from Asa.
SPEAKER_00: How often do we find ourselves in a problem or in illness?
SPEAKER_00: We begin to feel that God has forgotten us, that his promises were not as true as we believed.
SPEAKER_00: Our thoughts and emotions begin to betray us in the midst of God's silence, and we begin to doubt the reality of God's presence in our lives.
SPEAKER_00: For many of us, when we go through a time of suffering, when we go through a time of pain, uh it comes to an end.
SPEAKER_00: After a season of unemployment, well, we get a new job.
SPEAKER_00: After a time of illness or health issues, uh, we get better.
SPEAKER_00: After a difficult time in marriage, uh conflicts, we'll we resolve it, and that's it.
SPEAKER_00: However, the reality is that sometimes, for some of us, there is no end to the suffering.
SPEAKER_00: The suffering doesn't go away.
SPEAKER_00: No matter how much we pray, and no matter how much we read the Bible, depression increases.
SPEAKER_00: Illness still resists treatment, or children still reject Jesus, or marriage is destroyed.
SPEAKER_00: No matter how much we pray for help, it seems that we don't receive it.
SPEAKER_00: Brother, I want to remind you that God, that you are not alone on this one, on this.
SPEAKER_00: You are not the only one, and you are not alone.
SPEAKER_00: God has seen you, God sees you, but he won't always answer according to your wishes, but he will always do everything for your good.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus Himself, the holy and the perfect Son of God, who never sinned and whose prayers were always perfect, and his faith was always pure.
SPEAKER_00: He prayed and his request was not answered.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus understands you, brother.
SPEAKER_00: So, what do we do when suffering doesn't go away?
SPEAKER_00: What do we do when the pain is even stronger?
SPEAKER_00: What do we do when heaven seems closed and silent?
SPEAKER_00: What can we do when God seems distant?
SPEAKER_00: What can we do when anxiety invades us?
SPEAKER_00: What hope can we have when circumstances don't change?
SPEAKER_00: Keep crying out.
SPEAKER_00: Keep crying out to God in your sorrow, keep crying out to God in your doubting.
SPEAKER_00: You are going to a difficult through a difficult time.
SPEAKER_00: The God of heaven is not playing with you.
SPEAKER_00: He's not playing a cruel cosmic game.
SPEAKER_00: He finds no joy in seeing you suffer.
SPEAKER_00: So keep crying out to him, even when it seems like your words are bouncing off the ceiling.
SPEAKER_00: That this is not over yet.
SPEAKER_00: He will finish what he started.
SPEAKER_00: And when life feels difficult, when you are grieving, and when hope feels so far away, when you are anxious and worried, or even when life just feels so pointless, you may be asking, you may be asking God the same question, where are you, Lord?
SPEAKER_00: Where are you?
SPEAKER_00: Why aren't you responding to my prayer?
SPEAKER_00: So what is the hope that Asa finds in his sorrow after asking this despairing question?
SPEAKER_00: Asa takes a step back and he reminds himself something.
SPEAKER_00: He reminds himself who God is.
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 10.
SPEAKER_00: Then I say, I will appeal to this, to the years of the right hand of the Most High.
SPEAKER_00: So in his suffering, he remembers the greatness of his God.
SPEAKER_00: And it is evident that things look different in this in the second half of the Psalm.
SPEAKER_00: It seems that things changed here.
SPEAKER_00: The question is, did God take Asa out of his trouble?
SPEAKER_00: Well, no.
SPEAKER_00: Circumstances didn't change, the suffering didn't go away.
SPEAKER_00: But there is something different here.
SPEAKER_00: There is a change in strategy to say to face suffering.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you have ever tried to make a sandcastle when you go uh in your holidays to the beach.
SPEAKER_00: Or maybe you have tried to help your kids, right?
SPEAKER_00: You know how weak they are.
SPEAKER_00: You know when you try to build or when you try to make the sand castle, it's very weak.
SPEAKER_00: Only the when especially when the waves start hitting the building, the tower and the and the building collapses.
SPEAKER_00: And sometimes I think we find we build our faith in something like that.
SPEAKER_00: We build our faith on sand.
SPEAKER_00: Many times we rely on teachings, on beliefs, or even in emotions that move so easily.
SPEAKER_00: Our faith needs to be placed on something more real and more solid than what we desire and long for to happen.
SPEAKER_00: So we need to depend on something more constant and more firm than the pain around us.
SPEAKER_00: And I think that is what is happening.
SPEAKER_00: Happening here.
SPEAKER_00: I think that is what is happening with Asaf in the first half of the Psalm.
SPEAKER_00: In the first section, there is a use of the pronoun I more than 20 times.
SPEAKER_00: But in the second half, that no longer happened.
SPEAKER_00: Now he started using the pronoun you, referring to God and his work and his character.
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 11.
SPEAKER_00: He says the deeds of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: In verse 12, he talks about his work, your work, your mighty deeds.
SPEAKER_00: 13, your way, for things you have made known your might, your arm redeemed your people.
SPEAKER_00: The water saw you, your arrows, your thunder, your lightnings, your way, your path, your footprints, you led your people.
SPEAKER_00: Can you see that?
SPEAKER_00: There is a complete change in the strategy.
SPEAKER_00: There is a complete change.
SPEAKER_00: Asaf is still focusing on the circumstance and his own experience and put his hope in the one who doesn't change and in the one who is faithful.
SPEAKER_00: So in your suffering, you can remember the greatness of your God.
SPEAKER_00: In your suffering, you can remember the deeds of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: I will remember the deeds of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Yes, I will remember your wonders of all.
SPEAKER_00: I will ponder all your work and meditate on your mighty deeds.
SPEAKER_00: And there is something different in this psalm.
SPEAKER_00: Unlike the other Psalms where uh the writer normally says, I cry aloud to God, and God responded to me in this way.
SPEAKER_00: And God responded to me.
SPEAKER_00: That doesn't happen in Psalm 77.
SPEAKER_00: We don't see that God has changed the situation that Asa was experiencing here.
SPEAKER_00: He didn't change the trouble, he didn't change the circumstance, but he changed his heart.
SPEAKER_00: Wasn't this the same thing that he did at the beginning of the text?
SPEAKER_00: Is that the same thing that he did in verse 3 and 6 when he tried to remember things?
SPEAKER_00: And apparently this memory exercise, instead of helping him, made everything worse?
SPEAKER_00: What is different with this second half?
SPEAKER_00: I think Asaf changes the focus of his attention.
SPEAKER_00: Instead of focusing on himself and his pain, he begins to focus on who God is and what he's done.
SPEAKER_00: His strategy is to remember and meditate and reflect on the acts and wonders of God in history.
SPEAKER_00: So we can see that the central biblical strategy for emerging from darkness and discouragement and doubt is a con is a conscious memory effort of the work of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: So in your suffering, you can remember the deeps of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: In your suffering, you can remember the holy God.
SPEAKER_00: Your way of God is holy.
SPEAKER_00: I think it will be terrifying to be in the hands of an almighty God who was not holy.
SPEAKER_00: And it will be useless to be in the hands of a good God who was not almighty.
SPEAKER_00: And the truth is that we may never know why something happened to us.
SPEAKER_00: We may never see the end of the suffering in this time.
SPEAKER_00: Our comfort in pain is not based on our level at which we can understand God's purposes for our pain.
SPEAKER_00: But on whether we can trust our Savior.
SPEAKER_00: And we won't always understand the reason behind our pain.
SPEAKER_00: And there is not always a lesson to learn.
SPEAKER_00: Just like Job, he could never see the reason for his pain, but he could see who God was.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus is sufficient in your pain, in your doubts.
SPEAKER_00: However, in darkness, the light of truth continues to shine.
SPEAKER_00: Even when it seems that there is no answer from heaven, and the situation don't change, and we we can rest in the truth that who God is and what and what he's known and what he's done.
SPEAKER_00: And know that although we may never know why the law, why we love someone we love, and when our pain will end, or if our pain will ever be eased.
SPEAKER_00: Still our God is holy and good and sovereign and faithful and righteous and merciful.
SPEAKER_00: The holy God who saw the pain, he came in flesh.
SPEAKER_00: And on the Calvary, He carried, He carried our sins, so that one day we won't suffer anymore.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus doesn't leave his heart in that.
SPEAKER_00: He experienced the suffering that we experience.
SPEAKER_00: He suffers with you.
SPEAKER_00: Your tears are not being despised.
SPEAKER_00: For him, our pain is his pain.
SPEAKER_00: His holy heart is not indifferent to you.
SPEAKER_00: It's not indifferent in your pain, it's not indifferent to you in your suffering because his power doesn't prevent his compassion.
SPEAKER_00: He's merciful towards us.
SPEAKER_00: So in your suffering, remember the Holy Ghost.
SPEAKER_00: Remember the holiness of God in times of darkness.
SPEAKER_00: Remember that if he's holy, he doesn't lie.
SPEAKER_00: And if he's holy, he hasn't abandoned you.
SPEAKER_00: In your suffering, remember that there is no one like him.
SPEAKER_00: God is great, like like your God.
SPEAKER_00: You are the God who works wonders.
SPEAKER_00: You have made known your might among the peoples.
SPEAKER_00: The problem that Asaf had was that he had a very narrow vision of God.
SPEAKER_00: He had created a God who he who that he hoped that could do and respond to what he needed and wanted.
SPEAKER_00: And when God didn't do that, then he questioned him.
SPEAKER_00: And he doubted if he was who really he said he was.
SPEAKER_00: And sometimes pain can easily lead us to be blind to reality.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes pain puts us at the center of our suffering as if God didn't exist.
SPEAKER_00: And sometimes weakness can bring out the worst of us.
SPEAKER_00: But now we see a renewed heart in Asaf.
SPEAKER_00: And I know that it may seem impossible for your joy to be placed in the person of God and not in the circumstances.
SPEAKER_00: And I know that it is difficult to recognize the greatness of God during his silence.
SPEAKER_00: And that that is why we need to put into perspective who God is and what he's done.
SPEAKER_00: We need faith to know that God just just doesn't just know what is the best for us, but that he is the best for us, regardless of circumstance.
SPEAKER_00: And it is impressive how this lament not only leads him to recognize the evil around him and the pain that he carries with himself.
SPEAKER_00: But he sees that his perception of God was very short.
SPEAKER_00: He recognizes, God, you are holy and I am not.
SPEAKER_00: You have done wonders before and I have not.
SPEAKER_00: You are great, the other gods are not.
SPEAKER_00: You have redeemed your people, I have not.
SPEAKER_00: There is no one like you.
SPEAKER_00: Brother, although I cannot promise you that, God will always answer your request.
SPEAKER_00: He wants to hear your prayers, so persevere and keep crying out to your God.
SPEAKER_00: Pray with confidence, pray with open hands, surrendering your future into the hands of your loving Father.
SPEAKER_00: So trust that if he says no to your prayer, or even if he doesn't respond to your request, it is for a good and loving reason that go beyond your understanding.
SPEAKER_00: Trust that his answer is the answer that you will want if you knew what he knows.
SPEAKER_00: So trust that a no is as much a blessing as a yes.
SPEAKER_00: So in yourself and remember that there is no one like him.
SPEAKER_00: And in yourself and remember that you are his.
SPEAKER_00: You are his own.
SPEAKER_00: With your arm you redeem your people, the children of Jacob and Joseph, Sela.
SPEAKER_00: The waters when the waters saw you, O God, when the waters saw you, they were afraid.
SPEAKER_00: Indeed they the deep tremble.
SPEAKER_00: The clouds pour out water, the sky is gay for thunder, your arrows flash on every side.
SPEAKER_00: The crash of your thunder was in the whirlwind.
SPEAKER_00: Your lightings lighted up the world.
SPEAKER_00: The air trembled and shook.
SPEAKER_00: Your way was through the sea, your path through the great waters, yet your footprints were unseen.
SPEAKER_00: So we can see that Azap intentionally reflects on a specific time in the history of Israel.
SPEAKER_00: And with this, he ends his meditation.
SPEAKER_00: He remembers the salvation that God provided for his people in Egypt.
SPEAKER_00: He remembers how God, after years of silence, when his people were in slavery, he took his people through the Red Sea.
SPEAKER_00: The waters fear, the greatness of God, the creation trembled at the presence of the Creator.
SPEAKER_00: But God, out of love for his people, he fulfilled his promise to Abraham and Jacob and Joseph.
SPEAKER_00: God redeemed his people to bring them back home.
SPEAKER_00: So this moment becomes a declaration of praise for Asaf.
SPEAKER_00: And although he doesn't see his situation resolved, he doesn't see his suffering that has ended.
SPEAKER_00: He finds refuge and comfort in knowing that God hasn't forgotten him.
SPEAKER_00: Brother, you haven't been forgotten.
SPEAKER_00: Even if you have been praying to God and you haven't received an answer, God hasn't forgotten you.
SPEAKER_00: God has been faithful before.
SPEAKER_00: God has saved his children, his people in the past.
SPEAKER_00: There is nothing that can separate us from him.
SPEAKER_00: Brother, God is not playing with you.
SPEAKER_00: He's not putting you in a dungeon and see and seeing if you can crack the code to understand the hidden lesson.
SPEAKER_00: He's not holding his presence and his goodness hostage until you learn your lessons.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus doesn't mock you.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus doesn't mock those who suffer as they play helplessly in a current of pain.
SPEAKER_00: Rather, he enters the sea of our suffering and he says, Let me be a refuge for you.
SPEAKER_00: Christ doesn't look down on your suffering.
SPEAKER_00: He's not disappointed that you didn't understand everything.
SPEAKER_00: He's not ashamed on you.
SPEAKER_00: He's not waiting for you to report on the lessons that you have learned before granting you his presence.
SPEAKER_00: He simply wants you to throw yourself into his loving arms.
SPEAKER_00: And while suffering, remember that you are his, even when his footprints are on sin.
SPEAKER_00: God is a good who delights in saving his own.
SPEAKER_00: The work of the cross reminds us that we haven't been abandoned.
SPEAKER_00: And I cannot tell you that you will always know the reason for your suffering and you won't always learn a lesson from it.
SPEAKER_00: But in every moment of darkness, you can be confident that Jesus is enough.
SPEAKER_00: There are times when we look back and we can see some of the reasons why God allowed difficult things to happen in our lives.
SPEAKER_00: But there are also situations when everything is confusing and it seems meaningless.
SPEAKER_00: So let's not pretend to get all the answers.
SPEAKER_00: But look at the God who suffered for us.
SPEAKER_00: The God who holds us in his hand and in the sorrows of the incarnate God.
SPEAKER_00: We can find certainty that he cares about our suffering.
SPEAKER_00: He cares about us.
SPEAKER_00: He's the God who has redeemed you, the God who has loved you and who cries for you.
SPEAKER_00: Your tears are his tears.
SPEAKER_00: Your suffering is his suffering.
SPEAKER_00: He's the God who suffers for you and the God and the God who suffers with you.
SPEAKER_00: There is a scene in one of the books of the Chronicles of Narnia, where a boy named Digori meets Aslan.
SPEAKER_00: Aslan is the lion who represents Jesus in the books.
SPEAKER_00: And the mother of this boy is sick and he wants to ask Aslan for help, but he's afraid.
SPEAKER_00: So C.S.
SPEAKER_00: Lewis says that until that moment the eyes of the boy had been on the on the lion's enormous path.
SPEAKER_00: But then in his desperation, he looked up at his face.
SPEAKER_00: And what we what he saw was surprising more than anything in the world.
SPEAKER_00: The lion's face was leaning close to his, and there were huge unbright tears in the lion's eyes.
SPEAKER_00: So they were so big and so shiny compared to Digory's tears, that for a moment that boy the boy believed that the animal felt more pain for his mother than he did himself.
SPEAKER_00: My son, my son, said Aslan, I know.
SPEAKER_00: The pain is very deep.
SPEAKER_00: And only you and I in this place know.
SPEAKER_00: Brother, sister.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: The pain is very deep.
SPEAKER_00: And only you and Jesus in this place know.
SPEAKER_00: Only you and him know.
SPEAKER_00: Probably nobody else know.
SPEAKER_00: The pain has been very deep, and only you and him know.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus understands your pain.
SPEAKER_00: Even more, he suffers together with you.
SPEAKER_00: And there is no one because there is no one like him.
SPEAKER_00: So remember that you are his, you are his own, you are his people.
SPEAKER_00: He has sinned.
SPEAKER_00: He has seen your silent and lonely tears.
SPEAKER_00: He has seen you in your suffering.
SPEAKER_00: So being redeemed is our confidence in affliction.
SPEAKER_00: So when God allows seasons of suffering, when he allows needs and adversities, we can trust that he intended it that way.
SPEAKER_00: If the Lord decides to lead us through the valleys of affliction, we can rest in knowing that this is his wisdom and providence.
SPEAKER_00: And if he says that we must go through sickness or need, then we can go through trusting in his loving wisdom.
SPEAKER_00: Because he doesn't abandon us in our pain.
SPEAKER_00: Your good father has freed you to take you home, brother, don't lose heart.
SPEAKER_00: Keep crying out to God, don't lose heart.
SPEAKER_00: In verse 2, after Asaf says that God will listen to him.
SPEAKER_00: He says that the more he thought about God, the more he lamented, the more he moaned.
SPEAKER_00: He seems to not listen to him.
SPEAKER_00: He seemed to ignore his prayer.
SPEAKER_00: It was impossible to see the hand of God.
SPEAKER_00: But in verse 20, he said, You led your people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron and Aaron.
SPEAKER_00: So the hand of God may not have been in his sight.
SPEAKER_00: He may not have seen the hand of God or felt the hand of God.
SPEAKER_00: But God holds the hand of his people through the hand of Moses and Aaron.
SPEAKER_00: So this is a picture of God being with his people, but not always visibly.
SPEAKER_00: Not always with a clear answer to every question.
SPEAKER_00: But even at that moment when we don't see his hand, we can see how he has freed us, how he has guided us like a flock, or good shepherd guides us by the hand.
SPEAKER_00: And this is a really marvelous Psalm in terms of expressing the depth of pain, but also showing us a way forward.
SPEAKER_00: The psalm doesn't close by saying, and then my situation changed.
SPEAKER_00: And suffering went away.
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't close by saying, I felt perfect again.
SPEAKER_00: Everything was fine.
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: The Psalm finishes saying, But I had a hand to hold on to.
SPEAKER_00: That reminded me that God was holding on to my hand as well.
SPEAKER_00: The Lord didn't forget his people in suffering, and he will not forget you.
SPEAKER_00: In your sorrow.
SPEAKER_00: In your suffering, you can remember that he holds your hand.
SPEAKER_00: And I don't want to be insensitive to your pain.
SPEAKER_00: Perhaps you've been crying out to God for help and you haven't received an answer.
SPEAKER_00: And I cannot promise you that you will receive an answer soon.
SPEAKER_00: But the promise of the gospel is that your pain, that this pain won't last forever.
SPEAKER_00: One day all that pain and all that confusion will disappear.
SPEAKER_00: And the day is coming when our hearts will be comforted.
SPEAKER_00: Brother, don't lose heart.
SPEAKER_00: The day is coming.
SPEAKER_00: When that suffering will go away.
SPEAKER_00: So when we feel overwhelmed and alone, we must remember.
SPEAKER_00: Remember the good things that the Lord has done.
SPEAKER_00: Remember the things that He did in the Bible.
SPEAKER_00: The things that He has done in your life.
SPEAKER_00: Remember the good that the Lord has done and what He's doing now for you.
SPEAKER_00: He sees your silent suffering.
SPEAKER_00: He draws close to you and always intercedes for you.
SPEAKER_00: And he prays that you will persevere in the midst of your pain, in the midst of your suffering.
SPEAKER_00: He prays for you.
SPEAKER_00: And he won't let you go.
SPEAKER_00: There is no suffering that is not seen.
SPEAKER_00: Don't lose heart when heaven seems silent.
SPEAKER_00: He's a holy God.
SPEAKER_00: We can trust him.
SPEAKER_00: We can trust his ways.
SPEAKER_00: Our God is a great God.
SPEAKER_00: He's unique in his greatness.
SPEAKER_00: He's greater than us.
SPEAKER_00: He's greater than this world.
SPEAKER_00: So we can rely on him.
SPEAKER_00: And many times God will not answer or play as we wish, or prayers.
SPEAKER_00: But we can trust that he is not indifferent to our pain.
SPEAKER_00: The irony of the cross is that this is the most terrifying and darkest moment, but also is the most glorious and wonderful moment in the history of the world.
SPEAKER_00: The cross of Jesus is a reflection on how God transformed darkness into light.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus experienced the real abandonment of the Father, so we don't have to be abandoned anymore.
SPEAKER_00: And it doesn't seem to make sense, but God heard the cries and the tears of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: He listened to his beloved and perfectly obedient Son.
SPEAKER_00: However, Jesus still suffered and died.
SPEAKER_00: He was not rescued from the cross.
SPEAKER_00: And God doesn't always deliver us from the trials that we faced.
SPEAKER_00: But we are not in the hands of a blind destiny.
SPEAKER_00: We are in the hands of a holy, unique, and loving God.
SPEAKER_00: The God who makes the mountains the mountains tremble and the seas pass away.
SPEAKER_00: He's the God who is our shepherd.
SPEAKER_00: Brother, He loves us too much to just do what we want and when we want it.
SPEAKER_00: But He always sees you, He always listens to you.
SPEAKER_00: And in Christ He will respond, not necessarily when and how you want, but with the response that you need.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus leads to leads us to our eternal home because He is our shepherd.
SPEAKER_00: And while we wait for His return, we can trust that He has not forgotten His promises, that He has been faithful before, and He will be faithful at the end as well.
SPEAKER_00: So in moments of deep darkness, we can remember how God guided His people Israel.
SPEAKER_00: And how God, in His providence, has never abandoned His church saved by the blood of His Son.
SPEAKER_00: And I and I don't know the reason for your tears and pain.
SPEAKER_00: And maybe you have been asked, uh you've been tirelessly asking God for help and you haven't received an answer.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you have only received silence.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe this morning you are in grief and in sorrow.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you have questioned yourself over and over again if God really is who He says he is, or if He really cares about you, or if He loves you.
SPEAKER_00: But I am comforted by I'm comforted by the last words of this song.
SPEAKER_00: Like a flock, you led your people by the hands of Moses and Aaron.
SPEAKER_00: By the hand he leads you.
SPEAKER_00: He holds the future in his hand.
SPEAKER_00: He's a great God.
SPEAKER_00: He's a God of miracles.
SPEAKER_00: You are his.
SPEAKER_00: So follow after him.
SPEAKER_00: So cling to him.
SPEAKER_00: Remember how he was there, even through the darkest valleys of his people.
SPEAKER_00: His steadfast love never ceased for them.
SPEAKER_00: And it won't cease for you either.
SPEAKER_00: By the hands, by the hand, he leads you.
SPEAKER_00: By the hand, he leads you.