Psalm 42. If I were to title that Psalm it would be something like “Where is God When It Hurts?” Travel with me mentally back to the time of Job. Imagine him sitting in an ash heap. Why is he sitting there? He lost most of everything he held dear in his life. He lost ten children at one time. They were at a party and a tornado blew the house down killing them all. He had been a wealthy man with livestock that seemingly could not be counted because they were so many, and now the sheep, camels, goats, cattle, and every other item of material wealth were gone with the wind. He had respect and people loved to be around him. Then it happened; his health was lost overnight, and he did not know why. As he sits in the ash heap pondering all this, three well-meaning friends with good intentions begin offering him bad theology. They thought “all” suffering was the chastisement of God and therefore concluded that he was living as an unrighteous man. They were wrong. Job knew he was innocent and had not lived in a godless or careless way. Job would come to realize in time that he was simply a piece in a cosmic struggle between God and Satan.
Each of us face struggles and some are so burdensome we doubt whether we will survive. Doubts arise and questions come by the truck load and answers seem few and far between. A lost job or a looming foreclosure. A body that is racked with disease or a divorce that rips a family to pieces. The loss of a loved one often breaks people who are left and lives are shattered like a broken glass. Sometimes even young people have their hopes and dreams crushed leaving them to ask, “Where is the God when it hurts?”
The song writer in Psalm 42 knew what it was to be crushed and have the sting of hurt. We can summarize this Psalm into two stanzas. He closes each stanza with the words “Why art thou cast down, O my soul?” and “Why are thou disquieted in me? hope thou in God: for I shall yet praise him for the help of his countenance.” The first five verses, stanza one, he looks to the past, thinking fondly of it, even as he contemplates his current condition. He then closes the first stanza with the above verse. The next six verses, stanza two, he rehearses the pain of being taken from Israel into a foreign land as a captive. While traveling north away from the Temple, he remembers geographical places like pickets on a fence. He thinks about the Jordan Valley and majestic Mizar, one of the lower peaks on the Mount Hermon Mountain range. The pain and turmoil in his soul is overwhelming. The beauty of a Mount Hermon waterfall is used to describe his hurt as water cascades down, so does his suffering. He questions, “Have you forgotten me” (v.9)? He closes the second stanza with the same words as the first stanza. He ends his song with an expectancy and hope. I will not spend time on Psalm 43 today, but it is a companion to Psalm 42. They really go together. He gains perspective and as a result he can ask God for rescue, and he had faith that one day he would be back worshipping in Jerusalem. One day things will be better. What about Job? Things got better. His health returned, his wealth became greater than before, and God gave him ten more children. He now had ten in heaven which he would see again and the blessing of having ten with him giving him joy and help when needed.