Outside Reading, Blog #3

Communicating with the Soul

1 As the deer pants for streams of water,
    so my soul pants for you, my God.
2 My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.
    When can I go and meet with God?
3 My tears have been my food
    day and night,
while people say to me all day long,
    “Where is your God?”
4 These things I remember
    as I pour out my soul:
how I used to go to the house of God
    under the protection of the Mighty One[d]
with shouts of joy and praise
    among the festive throng.

5 Why, my soul, are you downcast?
    Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
    for I will yet praise him,
    my Savior and my God.

6 My soul is downcast within me;
    therefore I will remember you
from the land of the Jordan,
    the heights of Hermon—from Mount Mizar.
7 Deep calls to deep
    in the roar of your waterfalls;
all your waves and breakers
    have swept over me.

8 By day the Lord directs his love,
    at night his song is with me—
    a prayer to the God of my life.

9 I say to God my Rock,
    “Why have you forgotten me?
Why must I go about mourning,
    oppressed by the enemy?”
10 My bones suffer mortal agony
    as my foes taunt me,
saying to me all day long,
    “Where is your God?”

11 Why, my soul, are you downcast?
    Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
    for I will yet praise him,

    my Savior and my God.

  

       There has been a point in every person's life, Christian or not, where that person has felt alone, helpless, hopeless. When reading Psalm 42, this is all I see. A man who is in complete misery, and who's soul is unwilling to be joyous, going against all of this psalmist's head knowledge. His head and his heart know that he wants to be and should be worship praising God, yet his soul is "downcast" (v. 6). 

       This psalm is composed in very lyrical and poetic fashion. This psalm helps communicate the mercies of God to those who are unable to feel it in their current state. When reading a psalm, a person must be reading it with emotion; he or she must be reading it in a poetic style. There is much human emotion in the psalms, and especially Psalm 42. The psalmist also uses imagery to capture his emotions: "my tears have been my food day and night," and "deep calls to deep in the roar of your waterfalls." He understands that the Lord is his rock, the immovable God, yet his soul is not cooperating; at one point, he is literally yelling at his soul: "Why are you downcast, O my soul?... Put your hope in God." There is a form of communication going on in the psalmist's being that cannot be experienced the exact same way by anyone else. He is unable to have someone who has known exactly what is going on, but through this psalm he attempts to secure empathy from people through emotions and lyricism.

        In order to feel God's sovereign love for him, the psalmist is preaching to his own soul, his inner most being, that it is this way. He won't simply accept misery, but will require his soul to persevere through it and praise God all along. 

        It's funny how, during the time of when this psalm was written (many scholars believe it to be David, written during Absalom's rebellion, explained in 2 Samuel, David is not in sorrow because of the situation that is happening around him, but at the fact that his soul is not cooperating and praising God. He's upset that while his head and his heart are captivated by God and his love, he is struggling to communicate this to his own soul. The times of today are not important to David, but honoring his God is, and he wants all who read this psalm to know that praising God is the most important thing we can do, despite what our soul may be in the mood for.