Seeking the help of God and your
prayers, I would direct your attention this morning to that
psalm that we read together, the 18th psalm. Psalm 18 and
verse 6. Psalm 18 and verse 6, where the
psalmist says, In my distress I called upon the Lord and cried
unto my God, He heard my voice out of his temple and my cry
came before him even into his ears. Psalm 18 and verse 6, in
my distress I called upon the Lord and cried unto my God. He heard my voice out of his
temple and my cry came before him even into his ears. And particularly it's the first
half of this verse that I would bring before you this morning.
in my distress I called upon the Lord and cried unto my God."
And you might be ready to say, well, that surely is a very simple
thing. Perhaps you look at the psalmist
here and you think, well, of course, it's very natural for
a man to call upon the Lord and cry unto God in a time of distress.
A very simple thing to do. Well, in a sense you're right,
but in a sense you're wrong. There's nothing simple about
this psalmist as he speaks in this way. Nothing simple about
the actions that he's describing. In fact, there is something miraculous
and supernatural in what the psalmist is doing here. There
is something that is above human nature. The psalmist is doing
something that the natural man, the man who is devoid of the
grace of God and has never known anything of his grace, will never
do this, will never call upon the Lord, will never cry unto
this God that the psalmist cried unto. A man must know something
of the grace of God in order to do this. Prayer is not simple. Prayer is not simple in one sense.
Prayer is something miraculous. Prayer is something supernatural. In another sense, of course,
prayer is a very simple thing. For the psalmist here, it seems
that it was his almost instinctive reaction to cry out in this way.
It wasn't something that he deliberated over, not something that he had
to think about. It was something that almost happened to him,
these cries that came out of his heart in this time of distress. But we noticed when we read the
psalm, the title tells us that it's the Psalm of David. It's
the psalm of David, the servant of the Lord, and we can read
about the circumstances that he wrote it in. It was a song
that he sang. The words here are words that
he spoke unto the Lord in the day that the Lord delivered him
from the hand of all his enemies and from the hand of Saul. You'll
find the psalm repeated almost word for word back there in the
second book of Samuel, where it's set in its historical context. David is looking back, isn't
he? He's looking back over his long and eventful life, and he
had many things to look back on, didn't he? Many things that
he would have remembered, many things that happened to him,
many things that he passed through. And he's remembering. He's remembering
those troubles that he's passed through in the past. The sorrows
of death compass me. And the floods of ungodly men
made me afraid. The sorrows of hell compassed
me about. The snares of death prevented me." We can think of
many times in David's life that he could have been thinking of
when he wrote these words. Almost from the very beginning
of his life we can read of him as a man who was often in trouble,
a man who was often in danger. When he was a shepherd looking
after his father's sheep, he had to fight the lion and the
bear. No doubt that was a time of danger. No doubt it was a
time in which he would have called upon the Lord and cried unto
his God. And he has to fight against Goliath, that great giant
of the Philistines. And again, no doubt there was
that prayer in his heart as he went out to meet him. He suffered
many things at the hand of Saul. He was chased out of Israel. He was chased all around the
land of Israel in danger of losing his life. because of the hatred
of Saul, the jealousy of Saul. He suffered at the hands of his
friends. Many of his friends deserted
him, didn't they? They went over and served his son Absalom when
there was that terrible rebellion, when Absalom set himself up as
king and David had to flee from his capital city of Jerusalem. Many of his friends deserted
him and went over to Absalom. His own children caused him great
trouble. Many times in his life we can
imagine him looking back at and saying these words, in my distress.
In my distress I called upon the Lord and cried unto my God. In my distress. David was a man
who knew the grace of God. He's described to us, isn't he,
in the title of this psalm as the servant of the Lord. Elsewhere
we have him described as the man after God's own heart. He
knew something of the grace of God. He knew what it was to be
born again. He knew what it was to be brought
into a living relationship with God. But he was a man that still,
even after having known the grace of God, knew these times of distress. We know this in theory, don't
we? But we very often fail in our practice. What does the word
distress mean? It's not a word that we use very
frequently today, is it? More likely than not, if you
hear the word distress, perhaps it's talking about a ship who
has put out a distress signal. When a ship comes into a time
of trouble, they will sometimes put out a distress signal. Now,
in what circumstances would they do that? Well, they wouldn't
do it if it was just a minor problem, would they? If it was something that the
crew of the ship could deal with themselves, and if they weren't
really in any real danger of losing their lives, then it would
be inappropriate, wouldn't it, to put out a distress signal?
Distress signal is something that you put out when you're
in need of immediate and urgent help, when you're in great danger. It's a bit like our 999 service,
isn't it? When do you call 999? Well, you
don't call it just because you've got a minor problem, because
you've lost some personal item or you have some other problem
of that nature. You call 999 when there's an
emergency. When you're in a situation of
danger, of trouble that you cannot sort out yourself. That's what
distress means, doesn't it? When a person is in distress.
The implication is that they have a problem that they cannot
address themselves. They need help and they realize
it. When David was in distress, he
needed help and he knew that he needed help. In my distress I called upon
the Lord. So the first thing that we see from this verse is
that even those who are born again can come into these times
of distress. And as I say, we know this in
theory. As we look back over the history of the church, we
very often see the Christian in a time of great trouble, in
a situation that he cannot sort out himself. But very often, if we are Christians
and if we are in the Christian pathway and if we have known
the same grace that David knew, what is our reaction when we
come into a time of distress? What do we find ourselves thinking? Well, we often forget what we
know in theory when it comes to practice. And very often,
when we come into these times of distress, The first thought
that comes into our minds is, well, surely if I was a Christian
I would know what to do. We come into a situation that's
difficult. Perhaps there's a decision to be made. It might be a very
great decision. Shall we take this pathway or
that pathway? And we come to a standstill. And we know that this is an important
decision and we just can't decide which way to take. Or we come
into a situation where we're threatened, where something is
threatening to do us harm. When everything seems to be going
wrong. And we come into this time of
distress. And as I say, very often we find ourselves thinking,
well surely if I was a Christian I would know what to do. Surely
if I was a Christian, this wouldn't trouble me. We have this false
view of what Christianity is. As if when a man becomes a Christian,
somehow all his troubles fade away and all those things that
upset him and shook him before, he just moves smoothly through
them without any difficulty. It's not true, is it? It wasn't
true of David. He had difficult things to walk
through and he found them difficult. He had troubles and he found
them troublesome. He had enemies and he found them
difficult to cope with. He was a man that was very often
in distress. Come right to the other end of
the Bible and look at that man, the Apostle Paul, and you will
see him as one really that was very similar. We again, we look
at the Apostle Paul. And we think, surely a man with
such a remarkable experience, who had such a great faith, such
a tremendous gift of grace that was given to him. And we think
to ourselves, well surely life must have been very easy for
Paul. But what do we find him saying? We find him speaking
of himself as one that was troubled, one that was cast down. He could have said these same
words that David says here, in my distress. I called upon the
Lord and cried unto my God." So when we come into times of
distress and we find ourselves questioning our entire religion
and saying to ourselves, well surely if I knew anything of
the grace of God I would know exactly what to do here and these
things wouldn't trouble me in the way that they do and I wouldn't
find this situation so perplexing and difficult. Now we have to
remember what David found and what Paul found. In my distress I called upon
the Lord. He was distressed. He was troubled. We have the same truth put before
us, don't we, in that 107th Psalm. Who's that psalm speaking of?
It's not really speaking about the wicked, it's not speaking
about those who have never known the grace of God. What does it
say there in the first verse? Oh, give thanks unto the Lord,
for he is good, for his mercy endureth forever. And then he
says this, he says this, let the redeemed of the Lord say
so. Let the redeemed of the Lord say so, whom he hath redeemed
from the hand of the enemy." And he describes these situations
that these redeemed people find themselves in. They wandered
in the wilderness in a solitary way. They found no city to dwell
in. Hungry and thirsty, their soul
fainted in them. Then they cried unto the Lord
in their trouble. They cried unto the Lord in their trouble
because they were troubled, because they were in distress. They didn't find it easy. They
couldn't just say, well, of course, the Lord will provide. They couldn't
just glibly say, well, of course, I've been redeemed, and whatever
may happen in my life, I needn't be concerned about it, because
God will take care of me. That wasn't how they found it,
though they came into these times of trouble, and they were troubled.
They were distressed. Then they cried unto the Lord
in their trouble, time and time again, as we look through that
psalm. We have that phrase repeated,
then they cried unto the Lord in their trouble. Then they cry
unto the Lord in their trouble. Then they cry unto the Lord in
their trouble. Look how the psalmist speaks
of those in verse 23, they that go down to the sea in ships,
that do business in great waters. He's talking about spiritual
things, isn't he? He's talking about a spiritual experience,
primarily. These see the works of the Lord
and his wonders in the deep. He commandeth and raiseth the
stormy wind, which lifteth up the waves thereof. They mount
up to the heaven, they go down again to the depths. Their soul
is melted because of trouble. David knew what this was, in
a spiritual sense, for his soul to be melted because of trouble. as he passed through these things,
as he was mounted up to the heavens, going down again to the depths,
and he knew such a life of changes, didn't he? There seemed to be
one trouble after another, very often in the life of David. And
again, he didn't find it very easy just to think to himself,
well of course the Lord will provide. It wasn't that he was just able
to smoothly pass through these troubles that came into his life
without really being affected by them. His soul was melted. Because of trouble they reel
to and fro and stagger like a drunken man and are at their wits' end.
At their wits' end. What does that mean? Well, the
Margin has a much more striking illustration, a striking translation
of it. They reel to and fro and stagger
like a drunken man and all their wisdom is swallowed up. All their
wisdom is swallowed up. That's what it is to come to
the end of your wits. To be at your wits end, all your
wisdom is swallowed up. Perhaps when we come into these
troubles for a time we think that we can manage it. We think
that we know what to do. But if God is teaching us, as
he's teaching these redeemed people that are spoken of here
in Psalm 107, we'll have to come to our wits' end. Because it's
only when we come there that we cry unto the Lord in our trouble.
Then they cry unto the Lord in their trouble. That's what David
found. In my distress, I called upon
the Lord and cried unto my God. He came to these places in his
life when he just didn't know what to do. when he just didn't know how
to move forward, he didn't know what to say, he didn't really
know what to think. We have another illustration
of it, don't we? In that man, Job, and again,
you think of the changes that that man knew. Previously one of the greatest
men, one of the richest men in the East, and then in that one
day all his riches are taken away. What do we find him saying there
in the 10th chapter of Job? If I be wicked, woe unto me.
And if I be righteous, yet will I not lift up my head. I am full
of confusion. I am full of confusion. Therefore,
see thou mine affliction, for it increaseth. Again, Job was
a man that knew something of the grace of God. As he described
to us, that man was perfect and upright, one that feared God.
He knew something of the grace of God. But when he comes into
this time of trouble, He finds himself full of confusion.
He doesn't understand. He doesn't understand why these
things have happened to him, why these things have come into
his life. He's full of confusion. You know, there's no sin in being
confused and there's no sin in being perplexed. I am full of confusion, therefore
see thou mine affliction, for it increaseth." We have again,
you think of that good king, Jehoshaphat. There were many
bad kings that ruled over the nation of Israel, but there were
a few that were good, and one of those good kings was that
man, Jehoshaphat. We read of him that the Lord
was with Jehoshaphat because he walked in the first ways of
his father David and sought not unto Baalim, that false god that
very often the Israelites worshipped. He sought to the Lord God of
his father and walked in his commandments and not after the
doings of Israel. Therefore the Lord established
the kingdom in his hand. His heart was lifted up in the
ways of the Lord. He took away the high places
and groves out of Judah, those places where previously the children
of Israel had worshipped false gods. Jehoshaphat took them away. And we might think, well surely,
he being such a good king, wouldn't he always know what to do? Wouldn't
he always find that even in times of trouble, God would just support
him in such a way that he would just sail smoothly through them?
But in the very next chapter, in the very next chapters of the
Book of Chronicles, we find that he comes into a
situation where he is distressed. The children of Moab and the
children of Ammon and others beside them, they come against
him to battle. There come messengers to him
saying, there cometh a great multitude against thee from beyond
the sea on this side Syria. And Jehoshaphat feared and set
himself to seek the Lord and proclaimed a fast throughout
all Judah. And what do we find Jehoshaphat
saying in his prayer as he comes before the house of the Lord? Oh our God, he says, will thou
not judge them? For we have no might against
this great company that cometh against us. Neither know we what
to do. We don't know what to do, he
says to the Lord. We've come into this situation and we're
just lost. We've come to the end of our
wisdom. This is a righteous man, a godly man, a converted man.
Neither know we what to do. Well, in one sense he didn't
know what to do, but in another sense he knew exactly what to
do and he did it. Neither know we what to do, but
our eyes are upon thee. That's the very thing he should
have done. And again, isn't that the same
with David here in this 18th Psalm? He doesn't know what to
do. He's in a time of distress, confusion. He can't see the way
forward. In one sense he doesn't know
what to do, but in another sense he knows exactly what to do and
he does it. I called upon the Lord. In my distress I called upon
the Lord and cried unto my God. This takes grace. This takes
something more than just nature. We're not born knowing this God
in the way that David knew him. Why did he call upon him? Why
did he cry unto him? Because he knew that he would
help. Because he knew that he was the only one who could help.
Well, if we don't know what David knew, we won't call and we won't
cry in the same way. how we have to learn from the
experience of these men. So that when we come into times
of distress, if we are Christians, if we know what the psalmist
knew, if we know the same grace that he knew, don't be surprised
if you come into times of distress, into times and situations where
you are at your wit's end. In my distress I called upon
the Lord and cried unto my God. It's a hard lesson to learn,
isn't it? It takes a lifetime to learn it. It took David a
lifetime to learn it. What's our natural response when
we come into times of distress? Well, we try and sort it out
ourselves, don't we? Before we come to the end of
our wisdom, we think that we can handle it. In my distress I called upon
the Lord and cried unto my God. We're slow to do this. Too slow
to do this. What did he do? Well, essentially he prayed,
didn't he? But look at the words that he uses to describe his
prayer. He speaks of it as calling and crying. What's the picture
that we have here? Well, it's not a picture of a
man who's making long, elaborate, complicated and sophisticated
and eloquent prayers. It's not long prayers that David
is talking about here. I called, I cried. What is it
to call? Well, we might send someone to
call someone if we have children and one of them is at the bottom
of the garden and we say to one of the others, well, go and call
them in. What do they do? Well, they don't speak a long
sentence, a long address to them, do they? They just shout at them.
Just a few words, come in. In my distress I called upon
the Lord and cried unto my God. What is it to cry? Again, it's
not a long and elaborate prayer that David is referring to here. And very often when we come into
times of distress, this is all we can do. This is all the Christian
can do when he comes into a time of distress. All he can do is
call and cry. Suddenly then all the long prayers
that we so often take pride in when we're in an easy pathway,
they all have to go out the window, don't they? We don't find them
useful anymore. We can't compose such elaborate
prayers as perhaps sometimes we take pride in. We just have
to call. In my distress I called upon
the Lord and cried unto my God. Oh, don't be afraid of short
prayers then. Don't be afraid of short prayers. You look through
the prayers that we have recorded in the New Testament, the prayers
of Jesus Christ and the prayers of the apostles, and very often
you'll find they're short prayers but they're good prayers. Don't suppose that you have to
pray for a certain amount of time or say a certain number
of words in order for your prayers to be any good. Short prayers very often are
the best prayers. And again, we're not to be We're not to
fall into the trap of thinking, well, in this situation of distress
that I'm in, when my mind is so confused and when I can't
see what is right and what is wrong and the way that I should
go, we're not to think to ourselves, well, I can't pray in this situation.
Again, that's something that we very often fall into, that
you find in the experience of Christians, they very often fall
into that way of thinking. Where they say to themselves,
well I'm so confused, everything seems turned upside down and
my mind is so dark. And they almost think to themselves,
well I can't pray like this. I'll have to wait until things
have settled down, until things have sorted themselves out. Until
the pathway is clearer and lighter and I have that clarity about
the way that I'm walking in. No, says David, it was in my
distress. In my distress, in my distress, not after my distress.
But in my distress I called upon the Lord. We instructed in one
of the other Psalms, the Lord says, call upon me in the day
of trouble. In the day of trouble, I will
deliver thee and thou shalt glorify me. In my distress I called upon
the Lord and cried unto my God. What is it that keeps us away
from him? Well, it's pride really, isn't it? It's pride, and sometimes we
see it in the way that we deal with other people. Perhaps when
we're at school and we've been given a task to do, and we think
that we can do it, and we make a start. Perhaps you're doing
some mathematical problem. I often used to find this, you
make a start, you think you know what you're doing, and then you
suddenly come to a position where you find that five equals four,
and your maths doesn't work out. We come to those times when we
need help, and yet so often our pride stops us looking for it.
And we think to ourselves, well surely I can sort this out. We don't want other people to
see our mistakes, do we? We like to hide them, we like
to keep them away from other people. But David says, no, I
have to come in my distress. I've come to such a place that
I just can't see any way of continuing. All I can do is call upon the
Lord and cry unto my God. In my distress I called upon
the Lord and cried unto my God. Short prayers. They may be confused
prayers. There may be prayers that you
would be ashamed for anyone else to hear. But if they're the same
kind of prayers that David is talking about here, they're the
best kind of prayers. In my distress I called upon
the Lord and cried unto my God. Who's he praying to? We've seen something of the situation
that he was in, his distress. We've seen something of what
he did. He called, he cried. Who did he call upon? In my distress
I called upon the Lord. I called upon the Lord. And you
don't need me to tell you what the word Lord means when it's
in capital letters like this. It's the name Jehovah, the existing
one, the eternal one. David knew something of this
God that he was calling upon. He wasn't just praying to some
impersonal and distant being. He wasn't just throwing out these
words into the dark in the hope that someone would hear them.
He knew who he was praying to, the Lord, the Eternal One. Oh yes, we come into times of
distress and confusion when everything is dark and unclear, but that
never happens to him. He is the Lord, He is eternal,
He is unchanging. Surely that's what the hymn writer
puts before us in that first hymn in this book, when he speaks
of eternity. Our lives, he says, through various
scenes are drawn and vexed with trifling cares. He says it's
not like that with God. while thy eternal thought moves
on thy undisturbed affairs. These things that come into our
lives, these things that came into the life of David that were
so upsetting. Perhaps he had it all planned
out. Perhaps he knew in his own mind
how things were going to work out. and then suddenly something comes
and it all seems to be turned upside down and he's confused
and he doesn't understand. But God is not confused. It's not true of God that he
doesn't understand because he is the Lord. He is the eternal
one. He is the unchanging one. His
plan is never frustrated. It's not that he makes plans
and then finds that they're disrupted. In my distress I called upon
the Lord, but not just the Lord. He cried, he says, unto my God. The Lord, but he doesn't say
I cried unto God. He doesn't just say I called
upon the Lord and cried unto God. No, it's a very different
thing, isn't it? A very different expression that
he uses. He cries unto his God. I cried
unto my God. You know what Martin Luther said,
the life of Christianity consists of possessive pronouns. What
did he mean? Well, what he meant was that
it's a very different thing to talk about Jesus Christ as a
saviour and to talk about him as my saviour. He is a saviour. Even the devils know that he
is a saviour, but they can't speak of him as my saviour. The
devils believe and tremble. They believe that he is a saviour,
the saviour, but they can't say that he's my saviour. But David
speaks of this God as his God. I cried unto my God. How is he able to speak like
this? Well, he knew something of the grace of God. He knew
something of what it was to be born again. That's why I said that the man
who has never known anything of the grace of God can never
pray as the psalmist prays here. The man who has never known anything
of the grace of God can't cry unto his God. He doesn't know
him. But David knew him. He says, I cried unto my God. David knew this. In my distress
I called upon the Lord and cried unto my God. What a comfort it
must have been for David when he came into this time of distress
and confusion to be able to say that he wasn't just crying unto
a God or the God. Again, he wasn't just throwing
out his words into the universe in the hope that someone would
hear them. No, he was crying unto his God,
my God. In my distress I called upon
the Lord and cried unto my God. Well, David knew what it was
to be in distress. And Paul knew what it was to
be in distress. And Jehoshaphat knew what it was to be in distress.
And Job knew what it was to be in distress. And they all called
upon the Lord. They all cried unto their God.
But it's not just David that we have set before us in this
psalm, is it? It's the psalm of David, the words were written
by David, but David was a prophet. He wasn't just a king, he was
a prophet. He spoke of things to come. The Lord Jesus said
of Abraham that Abraham saw my day and was glad. That was true
of David. He's there, isn't he, the Lord
Jesus Christ is there, right at the end of the psalm. great
deliverance giveth he to his king, and showeth mercy to his
anointed. That word anointed, really in
the Hebrew it's the word from which we get our word Messiah.
And showeth mercy to his Messiah, to David and to his seed forevermore,
not just for a few years, not just for a few centuries, but
forevermore. David is not talking about himself
only, He's talking about the one who was to come, his anointed, David's greater son. Great deliverance
giveth he to his king and showeth mercy to his anointed, to David
and to his seed forevermore. And this sixth verse was certainly
true of the Lord Jesus, wasn't it? He called. He cried. Look at
him there just a few psalms later on in Psalm 22. He uses exactly
the same phrase, doesn't he? And it's undeniable that this
22nd psalm, it's a psalm that speaks of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Look at how it opens. My God, my God, why hast thou
forsaken me? Those very words that the Lord
Jesus spoke as he was there, hanging upon that cross. My God,
my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Why art thou so far from
helping me and from the words of my roaring?" He cried. He called upon the Lord. He cried
unto his God. He was distressed. He was perplexed. Again, it's
a mystery, isn't it? We think of the Lord Jesus Christ
and we realise and we, I was going to say we understand something
of his two natures perhaps, that would be too strong to say that
we understand it, but we surely see it in the word and we acknowledge
it. Verily God and verily man. And
yet even he comes into this situation where he asks these questions,
why? Why hast thou forsaken me? Again, it wasn't that the Lord
Jesus just passed through these things. They didn't come as a surprise
to him, did they? He knew what was coming as he journeyed on
that last journey up to Jerusalem. He spoke of it often to his disciples,
didn't he, how he was going to be delivered into the hands of
the Romans. and crucified, and how he would
rise again the third day. He knew these things were coming,
and he set his faith to go through them. He was truly God, and he knew,
but he was truly man, and he felt. He was truly man, and you see
it in the questions that he asks, why hast thou forsaken me? Didn't
he know why God had forsaken him? Didn't he understand why
God had forsaken him? Well, of course he did in a sense,
but he came into the trouble and it was suddenly not so clear
as it were. Why hast thou forsaken me? Why
art thou so far from helping me and from the words of my roaring?
O my God, I cry in the daytime, but thou hearest not. And in
the night season, and I'm not silent, we see something, don't
we? We have an insight into what was going on in the very soul
of the Lord Jesus as He hung there upon that cross. I cry
in the daytime, but Thou hearest not. And in the night season,
and I'm not silent, I am a worm and no man, a reproach
of men and despised of the people. All they that see me laugh me
to scorn. They shoot out the lip, they shake the head. saying
he trusted on the Lord that he would deliver him. Let him deliver
him, seeing he delighted in him. Be not far from me. Trouble is
near. There is none to help. It's so figurative. It's such
expressive language, isn't it? I am poured out like water and
all my bones are out of joint. My heart is like wax. It is melted
in the midst of my bowels. He came into this same situation
that David knew. And surely it would be no exaggeration
to say that David's distress was nothing compared to the distress
that the Lord Jesus knew there upon that cross. He was distressed
as no one else has ever been distressed. He knew suffering
and sorrow and confusion and darkness of mind to the extent
that no one else has ever known it. Yes, it's true of him. In my distress I called upon
the Lord and cried unto my God. Well, if David was distressed
and Paul was distressed and even the Lord Jesus Christ was distressed
and confused by the things that he passed through, don't be surprised
if you're distressed and confused by the things that you pass through.
Don't be surprised if you have to come to the same place that
David came to, where all he could do was call and cry. When he came to the end of his
wisdom, all of his wisdoms followed up. Then they cried unto the
Lord in their trouble, and he saved them out of their distresses. Well, we spoke about the distresses
that David knew, didn't we, in a natural sense? His trouble
with Saul, his trouble with his own children, his trouble with
enemies looking in from the outside, as well as those unfaithful friends
that were surrounding him. But when we consider the trouble
of a Christian, we see that they know a trouble that nobody else
knows. They walk in a pathway which is unique. The Lord Jesus
spoke of it as the narrow way, didn't he? And the narrow way
and the broad way are very different ways. And those who are in the
narrow way, they know troubles that those in the broad way know
nothing of. But we see it in some of the
hymns. Look at what the hymn writer says. There in the 293rd
hymn, he speaks of his troubles, but what are those troubles? Encompassed with clouds of distress
and tempted all hope to resign, I pant for the light of thy face.
That's his trouble. He wants to see the light of
God's face, and he can't see it. Disheartened with waiting
so long, I sink at thy feet with my load. All plaintive, I pour
out my song and stretch forth my hands unto God. You read through
that hymn and you will see something of those troubles that the Christian
knows, that the non-Christian will never know. I thirst for thy spirit, he says,
with cries and groanings that cannot be told. It's not just outward things
that trouble the Christian, is it? It's not just outward things
that trouble David. What does he say in Psalm 31?
Again we see him in a time of trouble. Have mercy upon me,
O Lord, for I am in trouble. Mine eye is consumed with grief,
yea, my soul and my belly, for my life is spent with grief and
my years with sighing. My strength faileth. What was
it? What was it that was troubling him? It wasn't Saul. It wasn't Absalom. It wasn't
his enemies. It wasn't his children. No, he
says, my strength faileth because of mine iniquity. Because of
my iniquity, not anyone else's iniquity, not Absalom's iniquity
or Saul's iniquity. My strength faileth because of
my iniquity and my bones are consumed. David's greatest trouble
was his own sin and if your greatest trouble is not your own sin,
then there is something lacking in your understanding. If you
still think your greatest trouble is because of other people, or
because of circumstances of life, or because of things that you
want and you don't have. Well, when we find ourselves
thinking like that, we haven't understood what David understood,
we haven't understood what Paul understood when he said, wretched
man that I am. Who shall deliver me from the
body of this death? Well, if your sin distresses
you in the way that it distressed David, if it makes your strength
fail. If your life is spent with grief
and your years with sighing, well, there's only one place
to turn, isn't there? And it's the same place that
David turned to. In my distress I called upon
the Lord and cried unto my God. These are the means that God
uses to bring his people to that place where they call and cry.
We've just been singing about it, haven't we, in that 295th
hymn. where John Newton looks back over his own experience
and he sees something looking back that he never saw at the
time. Here he is praying that he might
grow in faith and love and every grace. It's a good prayer. Might
more of his salvation know and seek more earnestly his faith.
And he hoped, didn't he? He hoped that it would just happen
as if by magic, that one day he'd just wake up and find himself
a better Christian. That was what he was hoping for,
but it wasn't the way in which God answered his prayer. Instead
of this, he made me feel the hidden evils of my heart. And
you can read through the hymn. This is the way that the Lord
answers prayer for grace and faith. These inward trials I
employ from self and pride to set thee free and break thy schemes
of earthly joy that thou mayest seek thy all in me. That was
what David had to come to. to seek his all in God, in the
Lord Jesus, to make him sick of self and fond of him as we
have it in that other hymn. Well, it worked for David, didn't
it? Look at how he opens this psalm. I will love thee, O Lord,
my strength. I will love thee. It's always
striking as you look through the psalms to look out for those
little I will phrases. I will love thee. See David's
determination. I will love thee, O Lord, my
strength. Why was he determined to love this Lord so much? Because
he had prayed to him and his prayer had been heard. We have
that spoken of in the second half of the verse. He heard my
voice out of his temple and my cry came before him, even into
his ears. I will love thee, O Lord, my
strength. Again, in the second verse, my
God, my strength in whom I will trust. In verse 3, I will call
upon the Lord. It's as if he would say whatever
anyone else does, this is what I will do. I will love and I
will trust and I will call. In my distress I called upon
the Lord and cried unto my God. And this is something that all
Christians will do. This is something that they all
have in common. They have many things that make them different
from each other, don't they? As Christians, we look into the
Christian church and we see people who are very different from each
other. I'm sure we can all think of examples, those who are very
outgoing and you can hardly keep them quiet. And then there are
those who you can hardly bring to say anything. that they all have this one thing
in common. You look through the hymns, you read the experiences
of Christians of days gone by and you will see that they all
have this in common. They all call upon God. They all cry unto
their God. God will bring them to do that.
In my distress I called upon the Lord and cried unto my God.
He called. He was heard. This is why God brings his people
into these times of distress. See it in the 107th Psalm, you
see it here. He brings them there in order
to make them call upon him. Well, has he brought you here?
Do you know this same experience that the psalmist knew? It's
not once in a lifetime, is it? It's not something that a man
knows once and then life is easy from that moment forward. No,
we have to be brought back again and again to this. In my distress
I called upon the Lord. We don't get any better. This is the only place that a
man can look when he is first convicted of sin. It's the only
place a man can look on his deathbed. He may have been in the Christian
life 50, 70 years. But if his Christian experience
is a true one, he will only be able to look to that same place
that he was able to look at at the beginning. I called upon
the Lord and cried unto my God. Oh may God grant us that our
distresses, and we all have them, we all have troubles. Man is
born unto trouble as the sparks fly upward. We, each one of us,
could no doubt write a long list of things that trouble us. But
do they bring us to this? In my distress, I called upon
the Lord and cried unto my God. He heard my voice out of his
temple and my cry came before him, even into his ears. But
we see these three things then, David's situation, he was in
distress, the Christian sometimes is. The best of Christians sometimes
is. So don't dismiss your entire
Christian experience because you find yourself in a time of
distress. David was in distress. He called and he cried short
prayers, not eloquent prayers, not prayers
perhaps that people would hear and think, oh, that was a good
prayer. In my distress I called and he
called upon the Lord and he cried not unto a God or the God, but
his God. May God grant us that same experience.
Amen.