Psalms 42:6

O my God, my soul is cast down within me: therefore will I remember thee from the land of Jordan.

Soul sorrows and soul reliefs

I. Soul sorrows.

1. Oppressive. “O my God, my soul is cast down within me.” They seemed to rest upon his heart as lead. Beneath their weight he sank down into darkness and despair. How often the soul falls prostrate beneath its load of grief and trials.

2. Tumultuous. “Deep calleth unto deep.” “Trials,” says our dramatist, “come in battalions.” In the hour of deep conviction for sin, there comes a moral inundation.

3. Excruciating. “As with a sword,” etc. As the physical nerves quiver with agony at the entrance of the sword, so his soul writhed at the reproaches of ungodly men.

II. Soul reliefs.

1. Memory.

2. Hope.

3. Prayer.

4. Self-fellowship. “David,” says Calvin, “represents himself here as divided into two parts. In so far as he rests through faith in God’s promises, he raises himself, equipped with the spirit of an invincible valour against the feelings of the flesh, and at the same time blames his weakness.” David here--

(1) inquires of his own soul the cause of his own sorrows; and

(2) exhorts it to trust in God. “Hope thou in God.”

God is the “health of my countenance.” He will clear away all the gloom, and make it bright with the sunshine of His love. (Homilist.)

My soul is cast down within me

There are times when the soul is cast down within us like David’s. Strength, courage, hope, are dead. We lose the very sense of freedom, and are as a wreck, borne to and fro helpless on the currents, to be dashed at last on some inhospitable shore. There are inward movements of the spirit, known only to God, which bring us to the same prostration. However it may have been reached, no man of deep human experience is ignorant of David’s meaning in our text.

I. Forgetting God is man’s natural instinct when his soul is cast down within him. Despair is reckless, and deep misery tends strongly to despair. Job’s state of mind, as described in Job 3:1., was anything but gracious. He was so unutterably wretched that he cursed his very existence. And this is the peril of souls when east down. They think no one cares for them. I am but a waif on the great moaning ocean; it may drift me as it pleases, and cast me when it has done with me to rot forgotten on the shore. This is the language of many a natural heart in its hour of anguish; and on a broader scale, times of great social or national misery are constantly found to be times of wild, fierce recklessness of truth, honour, dignity, charity, and God.

II. Consider the reason, nature, and fruit of David’s remembrance of God when his “soul was cast down within him.”

1. The reason. I will remember Thee, for I am not my own, but Thine. I am bound to measure myself by the measure of Thy love. What does the Incarnation mean, but that God claims us by a right, and holds us by a bond of infinite strength? Nothing worth in ourselves, in Christ we are precious in His sight.

2. The nature of the remembrance. That the Lord was his portion, of which neither earth nor hell could rob him. God was left if all else was lost. And God was his “rock,” enduring, unchangeable. And God was the health of his countenance, the spring of his everlasting joy.

3. The fruit of his remembrance of God in the depths--perfect peace. (J. Baldwin Brown, B. A.)

Help in God

I. As appropriation. “O my God.” In proportion as you feel your need of anything, and value it, you are anxious to make it your own.

II. The confession. “O my God, my soul is cast down within me.” “Man is born to trouble as the sparks fly upward.” Observe, here, the speaker himself. David, a great man who had even reached the throne, is the man who says, “My soul is cast down.” Do you imagine that the head never aches that wears a crown? Or that you are more likely to escape the winds and storms by building your house high on the side of the hill? A Christian merchant, some years ago, who had retired from business, and employed his substance in the cause of God, lately said to me, “I have found my troubles increase in life precisely in proportion to the number of my servants, and the growth of my property.” Paul says, “We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed.” This is well. It is not the water without a vessel, if it were as large as the Atlantic, that would sink it; but the water that gets in. While the mind is calm, peaceful, and heavenly, outward distresses are of little importance. But when all is dark without, and gloomy within too, then is he tried. “A man’s spirit may sustain his infirmities, but a wounded spirit who can bear?”--and we may add, who can cure?

III. His resolution. “Therefore I will remember Thee.” At, this is not a natural resolution: we are naturally alienated from the life of God. He destroys every drop of water in our vessels, in order that we may be compelled either to perish of thirst, or to inquire after Him, the fountain of living water. And it is well if we remember Him, and ask, “Where is God my maker, who giveth songs in the night?” Thus it was with Manasseh: in his affliction he sought the Lord God of his fathers, and He was found of him. It was thus with the prodigal, in the parable; when he began to be in want, he said, “I will arise and go to my father.” How many have done this since!

IV. A specification. “I will remember thee from the land of Jordan,” etc. Are there not spots toward which you can look, where God perhaps freed your mind from a grievous snare and temptation, and made you free indeed--where perhaps God commanded a wonderful deliverance for you--where He turned the valley of death into the morning--where at evening-tide it was made light. These Mizars, these little hills, are worth their weight in gold. (W. Jay.)

The remembrance of God the result of mental depression

I. Devout confidence. “O my God.”

1. Mine by natural right (Job 10:8; Psalms 119:73; Psalms 139:13; Zechariah 12:1; Hebrews 12:9).

2. Mine by personal preference (Psalms 63:1; Psa 72:25).

3. Mine by adopting love (Jeremiah 3:19; Romans 8:15; Galatians 4:6).

4. Mine by Divine appropriation.

5. Mine by public avowal (Isaiah 44:5).

II. Mental depression. This may result--

1. From bodily infirmities (Isaiah 38:14).

2. From backsliding of heart. Defects in love, zeal, diligence.

3. From inward conflicts.

4. From afflictive bereavements.

5. From the state of mankind (Psalms 119:58; Psalms 119:136; Psalms 119:158; Philippians 3:18).

III. A Pious remembrance of God.

1. Wherever we go, God should be in our recollection. His actual presence; His continual agency; what He is in Himself and to His people.

2. The remembrance of God is the most effectual antidote against mental depression (2 Corinthians 4:17; Hebrews 12:11).

The text may serve to remind us, by way of inference--

1. That man is born to trouble. The best of men may be disquieted and depressed: “without are fightings, and within are fears.”

2. That pious people are accustomed to pour out their complaints to God.

3. That men who have no interest in God have no refuge in the hour of trouble; for vain is the help of man. (Sketches of Four Hundred Sermons.)

Religious melancholy

1. The first case is of those who are apt to think that the reformation of their lives hath not proceeded from a sincere love of God, and an unwillingness to displease Him; but from a mere dread of those punishments which He hath threatened.

(1) Fear is one of the passions God has planted in our souls, as well as love; they are both the creatures of His wisdom and power; and whatever He did put in us was for some end, and may have a good use. Wherefore, when the passion of fear doth serve the end for which God grafted it in our minds, there can be no doubt but He will approve the good effects which it doth produce.

(2) God hath enforced all the laws He hath given to the children of men by threatenings as well as by promises; but as promises are to work upon our love, so threats are to excite our fears; God having made the motives to our obedience to answer the different passions with which He hath endued our souls.

(3) Our Saviour and His disciples address themselves not only to the passion of love, but also to that of fear: which they never would have done had they been conscious that the sacrifices of fear would not have ascended up to heaven with a grateful savour.

2. Some serious Christians complain of a want of inclination to holy things, and a coldness in their devotions. They do not come to God’s house, nor address themselves to their prayers, with such an appetite as they do to the business of the world; but want earliest and fervent desires for the success of the petitions. Now, in abatement of their trouble, give me leave to lay the following observations before them.

(1) The difference of degrees of affections with which men serve God often depends upon the difference of their tempers and constitutions. God will measure their obedience by the sincerity of their minds, that lies in their own power; and not by the difference of their constitutions, which was not made by themselves.

(2) They who are not carried by their passions into the service of God, but render worship to Him upon rational motives, because He is the giver of all good things, seem to act upon a higher and more sublime principle: for notwithstanding they are destitute of that pleasing warmth in their passions which provokes others to pray unto God, and to be thankful unto Him, yet they do not cease to celebrate His praise, because it is their duty to do it, and because reason suggests that they ought to make grateful acknowledgments of His infinite mercies.

(3) The most zealous are not always the best men.

(4) The most holy servants of God cannot maintain an equal warmth in their devotions at all times.

(5) What hitherto hath been said about coldness and damps in the minds of men while they are engaged in religious duty has been to comfort those who are exceedingly grieved at it. Now, notwithstanding it is not to be expected, nor necessary, that these innocent persons should meet with a complete cure of their grief, yet I must tell them that nothing will more enliven their spirits in the service of God than deliberate meditations of Him and of themselves before they enter upon any part of Divine worship.

3. I come to the case of those unhappy persons who have naughty and sometimes blasphemous thoughts start in their minds while they are exercised in the worship of God, and to fear that God hath utterly cast them off. That their case is not so dangerous as they apprehend it, I shall endeavour to show by the following considerations.

(1) Because these frightful thoughts do for the most part proceed from the disorder and indisposition of the body.

(2) Because they are mostly good people who are exercised with them.

(3) Because it is not in the power of those disconsolate Christians, whom these bad thoughts so vex and torment, with all their endeavours to stifle and suppress them.

(4) They who labour under the burden of such dismal thoughts are seldom betrayed into any great or deliberate sin. For they, having a very low opinion of the condition of their souls, are jealous of the least temptations. Which is the cause they commonly set a strict guard over their words and actions.

Advice for behaviour under these perplexing disorders of mind, and for recovery from them.

(1) Frequently observe how your thoughts are employed. Men cannot think foolishly and act wisely. Besides, idle thoughts are neighbours to bad ones, and there is a straight and short passage from one to the other.

(2) Endeavour to keep all your passions within due bounds, since storms of passion confound the soul, and make way for evil thoughts.

(3) Do not leave your calling, nor forsake the post wherein Providence has placed you. There is always more melancholy to be found in a cloister than in the market-place.

(4) When you find these thoughts creeping upon you, be not mightily dejected, as if they were certain tokens of your reprobation. For so far as they depend upon the indisposition of the body, which for the most part they chiefly do, I take them no more to be marks of the Divine displeasure than sickness, or losses, or any other calamity you may meet with in the world. When these troublesome thoughts begin to stir, do not fall into any violent passion, which will abate the courage and shatter the resolutions of your soul; but having first commended your miserable case to the tender care and compassions of your Heavenly Father, who will not let you be afflicted above measure, endeavour with a meek and sedate temper quietly to bear them.

(5) Do not think the worse of God for them, or accuse His providence of want of care of you. For He might have permitted such thoughts to have continued perpetually, or at least to have visited you much oftener, and in a more frightful manner, and all this without the least diminution of His justice.

(6) Let not these afflicting thoughts discourage you from the exercise of your devotions; nor tempt you to omit, or negligently discharge any one Christian office or duty. (Bishop Moore.)

Depression of spirits in Christians

I. The causes.

1. In many cases melancholy proceeds from bodily weakness.

2. Another cause is a habit which some have of judging themselves, not from the Word of God, but from the words of men.

3. They who seek God and endeavour to serve Him, in some instances, form too high expectations of assurance and of comfort. They expect clearer revelations of Divine things; brighter evidence of their justification, and greater joy in the Holy Ghost, than is promised them in this present world.

4. Another cause of discouragement, or deep concern in Christians who have been for some time disciples, is the advancement they have made in spiritual knowledge. Every succeeding year they appear to themselves more sinful and less worthy than in years past. They think more, also, of what is at stake, and what it is to lose their souls.

5. There is also a plain distinction between the doubting of unbelief and the doubting which is through infirmity; as there is also between the sins of infidels and of weak believers.

II. Them use. They are profitable--

1. For the trial of your faith. “The Lord would have those who walk in the light never forget what it is to sit in darkness and the shadow of death. A grieved spirit is the best foundation of a faithful heart.”

2. These desponding apprehensions are a powerful remedy for self-righteousness and spiritual pride.

3. By this depression of spirits, to which good men are subject, you are taught how little confidence can be placed in your religious feelings, or the mere state of your passions. In a spiritual sense it is sometimes “better to go to the house of mourning than to the house of feasting.”

III. What is the remedy for this dejection? Do as the psalmist did; put your trust in God. How far religious sorrow may be profitable for you, how far necessary, He only knows. It seems to us more desirable to rejoice in the Lord than to mourn His absence. (Bishop Griswold.)

Sweet stimulants for the fainting soul

I. The complaint.

1. The causes of our being cast down are very numerous. Sometimes it is pain of body; peradventure a wearying pain, which tries the nerves, prevents sleep, distracts our attention, drives away comfort, and hides contentment from our eyes. Often, too, has it been debility of body; some secret disease has been sapping and undermining the very strength of our life.

2. Let us pass now from the most obvious to the more subtle causes of soul-dejection. This complaint is very common among God’s people. When the young believer has first to suffer from it, he thinks that he cannot be a child of God; “for,” saith he, “if I were a child of God, should I be thus?” What fine dreams some of us have when we are just converted! We know not what we are born to in our second birth, and when trouble comes upon us it surprises us.

3. Let me go a step further, and say that the disease mentioned in our text, although it is exceedingly painful, is not at all dangerous. When a man has the toothache it is often very distressing, but it does not kill him. In like manner, God’s children are much vexed with their doubts and fears, but they are never killed by them.

4. I would remark, yet further, that a man may actually be growing in grace while he is cast down; aye, and he may really be standing higher when he is cast down than he did when he stood upright. When we sink the lowest in our own esteem, we rise the highest in fellowship with Christ, and in knowledge of Him. To be cast down is often the best thing that could happen to us. Do you ask, “Why?” Because, when we are cast down, it checks our pride. Were it not for this thorn in the flesh, we should be exalted beyond measure. Besides, when this downcasting comes, it sets us to work at self-examination. Another benefit that we derive from being cast down is that it qualifies us to sympathize with others.

II. The two remedies here mentioned.

1. A reference of ourselves to God. If thou hast a trouble to bear, the best thing for thee to do is not to try to bear it at all, but to cast it upon the shoulders of the Eternal. Often, when I call to see a troubled Christian, do you know what he is almost sure to say? “Oh, sir, I do not feel this--and I do fear that--and I cannot help thinking the other!” That great I is the root of all our sorrows, what I feel, or what I do not feel; that is enough to make any one miserable. It is a wise plan to say to such an one, “Oh yes! I know that all you say about yourself is only too true; but, now, let me hear what you have to say about Christ.” What a change would come over our spirits if we were all to act thus!

2. The grateful remembrance of the past. You have known the sweetness of Jesus’s love, yet you are cast down! Shame upon you! Pluck off those robes of mourning, lay aside that sackcloth and those ashes, down from the willows snatch your harps, and let us together sing praises unto Him whose love and power and faithfulness and goodness shall ever be the same. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

Religious depression and its remedy

I. The sigh of religious depression. What has caused it?

1. The faithlessness of friends and kindred. Bitter as it may be to feel the want of respect, of reverence, of obedience, of love from the children that are dear to us, that bitterness is intensified when memory testifies that we ourselves caused the evil by our unwisdom, neglect, or excess of tenderness.

2. The sneer of enemies. To many sensitive natures this is the most painful form of persecution.

3. The hiding of God’s face.

II. The remedy.

1. Faith remembering.

2. Faith hoping. If you turn your back to the sun your shadow will be before you, but if you turn your face to the sun your shadow will be behind you, and you see it not. If you turn your back on God dark shadows will cross your path, thick darkness will be before you; but with your face towards God you will see light in His light, the darkness is past and the true light shineth.

3. Faith triumphing. On the Welsh coast there is a small rocky island with a lighthouse, and in the lighthouse a bell, which on stormy nights rings out its solemn warning to the approaching mariner. When all is calm the bell is not heard, it hangs mute; but when the winds become fierce, and the waves dash high, the bell is set going. It was the storm of trouble that awoke the full harmony of David’s harp. (R. Roberts.)

Disappointment

The path of life is strewed with the fallen blossoms of hope.

I. God often disappoints us to teach us submission to his will. Many and painful experiences are necessary before the natural self-will and self-sufficiency are expelled from the heart.

II. Disappointments are sent us because God means to cite us something better than what we have chosen for ourselves. This is a most familiar experience. We have set our heart upon the attainment of some particular good. God knew better than we did, and in His love He refused to give us what would have been unsuitable to us.

III. God disappoints us at present, to give us what we seek at some better time. Illustrate by Joseph’s disappointment when forgotten by the butler. But, when his hopes were at last realized, how much richer the inheritance! God’s choice of time, as well as God’s choice of gift, will always be found to he the wisest and best.

IV. Our sense of disappointment is unreasonable and foolish. We are ready to forget that there is a law of orderly development by which God works out His plans. Would the husbandman have a right to be disappointed when he discovered that the seed he sowed yesterday had not yet even appeared above the soil? And many of our disappointments are as unreasonable. (Evangelical Advocate.)