Seeking for the help of the Lord,
I direct your prayerful attention to Psalm 25. Psalm 25 and verse
17. The troubles of my heart are
enlarged, though bring thou me out of my distresses. Psalm 25
and verse 17. This is a Psalm of David. a man after God's own heart. In the first part of this psalm,
David makes many beautiful statements concerning his trust in the Lord
and desire to walk in the ways of the Lord. He lifts up his
soul to his God, he testifies that he Trust in Him, O my God,
I trust in Thee, and makes those professions, let me not be ashamed,
let not mine enemies triumph over me. And then desiring that
the Lord would show him His ways and teach him His paths. There
are many things that evidence a real exercised soul and one
that desires to walk in the ways of the Lord. And it may be as
we start, as we look at a path like this, you think, well surely
such a one that is seeking to walk with the Lord, walk in His
ways and has these petitions and requests before the Lord,
that things would go well with them. They wouldn't have troubles,
they wouldn't have afflictions, they wouldn't have things that
really burden and exercise their souls and really trouble them
and cause them to be crying out for mercy and to making the statements
like we have in our text. The troubles of my heart are
enlarged, though bring thou me out of my distresses. You would
think if there was troubles, instead of them getting more
and more and enlarged, they would get less and less. How many times
the thoughts and expectations that we have of the Lord's dealings,
of the way that the Lord would be leading us and guiding us,
are not that which corresponds to reality. We think of how it
was with Abraham, led forth from Ur of the Chaldees into the land
that the Lord would show him off, given the promises of children,
his seed should be as innumerable as the sands of the sea. But
then he walks this path of 20 or so years and his wife is childless. It seems so different than what
his expectation was. And Jacob as well, to get to
such a path as to say, behold, all these things are against
me. We think then of Moses and having
the expectation that the Lord would by Him bring the children
of Israel out of Egypt. But how is it in that way? He's driven from Egypt into the
desert for 40 years. I wonder how often we think of
the length of some of the times that we read of in the Word of
God. Forty years. It's a long time,
isn't it? A large percentage of some of our
lives, and for the young people, more than their lives. Longer,
15 years longer than what I've been the pastor here. And all
this time, there is Moses languishing in the backside of the desert,
feeding sheep instead of leading the children of Israel out of
Egypt. Very different path. Joseph found
in the prison before Moses. The butler forgets him and all
the dreams that he'd had, all the expectation, the path seems
very, very different than that. We have when our Lord is born
and the things that happen that cause Mary to ponder over in
her heart. and all that she has to see of
how he is dealt with, his sufferings, and then his death. The disciples,
as they hear these things, they see the Lord crucified. We trusted
it should have been he that should have redeemed Israel. And what
they were thinking was very different than the reality. Even at the
end, when our Lord was to ascend into heaven, wilt thou at this
time restore the kingdom unto Israel? They still had not those
clear views of the spiritual kingdom of our Lord, of the Lord
coming again with power and great glory, that His kingdom was not
of this world, that it is within His people, and that it will
be at one day set up upon this world a new heavens and a new
earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness. And so we can be the same in
seeking the Lord, in walking in our path, in living out our
faith. There are those times that what
is happening does not seem to bear any relation to our expectations,
or sometimes even to the Word of God. Because we have in Psalm
73 with Asaph, how he struggled with the prosperity of the wicked.
They seemed to get on well, the Lord's people, they were tried,
they had troubles, they had afflictions. And these things stumbled him
until he went into the sanctuary of God. Then he understood their
end. And it does us good to look at
these things, these Psalms, these lives of those who've gone before,
and the thing that they have struggled with, we struggle with.
Those things that they experience, we experience as well. When the
devil says, well, you're out of the secret, what you're going
through is not really in accordance with the word of God, and if
you really served the Lord, if you really trusted him, If you
really were one of his children, then you would not have all of
these things that are going on in your life at all. And yet
we have David saying, oh my God, I trust in thee, and then all
that follows in this psalm. Now it comes to the portion where
our text is, and it comes to a heart word. where the Lord begins, where
the Lord works in the heart, not of course the fleshly organ
that pumps the blood round our bodies, but what it sets forth
is what is our real being. A true faith affects our whole
lives. It's not just taking one aspect,
God is love, and just joining that to all of our worldly lives. It's not just taking one aspect
and saying, Just a little while on the Sunday we will worship
and then the rest of the week bear no resemblance to being
anyone that follows the law. Know where true faith is. It will affect all of our lives. We'll have closet religion and
walking with the Lord daily. And we will be mindful of the
Lord all the time. never mindful that we are before
Him, and walking before Him, the way that we think we'll be,
according to the Scriptures, and we will seek to walk in the
way that the Lord would have us to go. And if that is to be
so, it's not just an intellect, just something that we think,
and then regulate our lives by that. something that we actually
feel. It is who we are and what we
are in every situation. We're not changing our looks
from one place to another like a chameleon, changing our colour
to fit in with the surroundings. We are what we are, in every
place, in every way, where we'll go, with God's people, with those
that are not, we act the same in our own denomination and amongst
others. And as a preacher, to preach
the same, whether we're preaching in our own pulpit or preaching
somewhere else, we don't change our message just because we're
in a different surroundings and we think, well, people won't
receive that. Yes, of course, we don't deliberately
highlight those things that are of secondary importance that
would grieve the people of God if we were going amongst those
that did not follow in that way. I wouldn't go if asked to preach
in a Presbyterian church and deliberately speak against the
infant baptism. I wouldn't provoke in that way
where we felt the People of God, we're the Lord's dear people.
And these things, of course, in our own churches, we would
highlight the truth of believers' baptism and the error of infant
baptism. But we would be as one before
the Lord and bear witness to those things that the Lord has
taught us in our hearts. Before us this morning is the
troubles of the heart. David saying this, the troubles
of my heart are enlarged. He had trouble of heart, and
now instead of getting less, they're getting more. And he
joins that with desire, oh bring thou me out of my distresses. I want to look at three points. Firstly, the troubles of the
heart, and those things that bring the troubles there, those
things that really touch us. And then secondly, the feelings
of the heart. When those things come into our
lives that really affect us, then what are
our inmost feelings in that way? And then lastly, the Things that are desired of the
Lord, that desired of the Lord. And there's five things that
the psalmist desires the Lord to do for him. But firstly, troubles of the
heart. And just looking at the context,
those things that go before. We have in verse 15, feet in
a net. The prayer is, mine eyes are
ever toward the Lord for he shall pluck my feet out of the net. I believe all that desire to
follow the Lord or to seek in the ways of the Lord will find
that there is a never-ending series of snares throughout The devil lays snares, the world
lays snares. They're like nets. We think of
a net to catch a fish or a net that is cast upon an animal or
even a person in wartime to entangle them and how difficult it is
actually to extricate or get out of a net. And it is a very
vivid and very real illustration of what we face in this life. Many, many things that will entangle
us. The history of the Church of
God, and you don't have to read many, lives of the people of
God. And you find at some time or
other they got caught up in something, ensnared by something, drawn
away, There have been pastors that have done that, thankfully
been brought out of them. I remember reading many years
ago one of the former pastors at Melbourne, and he got snared
in some organisation and drew the church as well into it for
a while until he saw through it. And these things always have
a bait, always have an attraction as something that is good, is
worthy, is worth following, but that is what it is, it is a bait,
and then there is an entrapment in it. And how many Lord's people,
they know in their hearts, they know they would walk in the ways
of the Lord, they want to, they want to be delivered from worldly
friends, from associations that entrap, ensnare, that are not
good, not profitable, or those things that we look at, and today
of course on the internet, those things that we are snared with,
they're like nets to us, they hold us fast, we want to be free
from them, but fail to have the willpower and the strength to
do so, they have a hold over us, an old nature, it loves those
things. And these things then are like
nets, and our feet we get held fast in them. Is that the case with you? Is
that the case with me? As we come before the Lord to
die, there's those things that are in our lives and they greatly
affect us. And those things that we may
view really threaten very Machau, being a child of God,
he realized that there are those that are held by such snares
to their utter and eternal ruin. Things that they've gone in,
followed on, and never ever been plucked out of. The star must
hear, he speaks of, his feet in the net. And then the troubles
of his heart also were affliction and pain. He speaks of this. Turn thou unto me, have mercy
upon me, I'm desolate and afflicted. And in verse 17, verse 18, look
upon mine affliction and my pain and forgive all my sins. Many are the afflictions of the
righteous. We are told that the Lord delivereth
him out of them all. Not only is there pain of body,
but often pain of mind. And those afflictions, not only
are sicknesses, sometimes they are, sometimes they are infirmities,
but they're those things that make up in our lives the tribulation
that the Lord has said, in the world you shall have tribulation. And the apostles enforced it,
that he must, through much tribulation, enter the kingdom. We are in
a world that is a fallen world and under the sentence of death.
We partake of it with a body of death. And we are constantly
reminded that one day this mortal tabernacle shall be taken down. And those things that come upon
us, they always have an effect as how we think, how we feel,
how we act, and especially of our thoughts towards God Himself. Paul may have had a physical
impairment, but that which he describes as the messenger of
Satan A thorn in the flesh, yes, but when that thorn, when that
physical affliction works in such a way that it works satanic
thoughts and feelings and affections and affect in our heart, then
it is a message, a messenger of Satan to buffet us. So it's those things that are
going on outwardly, that are really affecting us. The troubles
of the heart, they are things we can't just shrug off and think,
well, they are inconsequence. They are not major things in
our lives. They will soon come and go. These things are things that
are very real things. They are things that may be bound
up in our providences, bound up in our lives. Going back to
the idea of the net as well. Many times we can get into things
in our lives and we think, how can we extricate ourselves from
them? We can't go back, we can't go
forward, we can't change our situation, we can't improve it
at all. And we seem to be hemmed in on
every side. How solemn that so many, especially
of young people, when they feel like this, feel the only way
out is to take their own life. Dear friends, it is not. It's
not a way out at all. But the way out is through our
Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. And so then we have another thing
that is the troubles of the heart, and that is sin. Deliver me from
all my sins. Forgive all my sins. Sin is a trouble, right through
this psalm, as mentioned. Verse seven, remember not the
sins of my youth, nor my transgression. Whatever the people of God go
through, if the Lord has a purpose of mercy and grace toward us,
it will bring us face to face with our sins. Sin will be a
real thing. Sin is the transgression of the
law of God. And we are sinners. We sin because
we are sinners, not the other way around. Yes, in one sense,
every time we sin, it reinforces we are a sinner. But you know,
you wouldn't say, well, a dog is a dog because it barks. You
would say that the dog barks because it is a dog. And we are
sinners, and we are fallen. in sin, and yet by nature we
won't acknowledge it, we don't groan under it, it's not a trouble
to us. But when the Lord begins to deal
with us, all those things we come across outwardly in our
lives, those things that especially are troubles and not pleasant
to us in our lives, they will aggravate those sins, they will
enlarge them, they will make them to be very real. It's like with the widow woman
that Elijah was told by the Lord, I've commanded a widow woman
to sustain thee in a time of famine. Famine that Elijah has
said would come upon the earth until he gave word otherwise. And the Lord was working a perpetual
miracle with that woman and her son and Elijah. The meal, the
barrel of meal, did not waste. The cruise of oil did not fail.
And though that miracle was continually going on, it appears that that
woman did not really view the word that was in Elijah's mouth
as truly from the Lord. And yet then the Lord slew her
son. Her son died. And she says to
Elijah, art thou come to bring my sin to remembrance in slaying
my son? It was through that trial that
it brought her sin to remembrance. So no doubt with David, when
he had the trials with Absalom, with Amnon, all in his family,
he remembered what the Lord had said, that the sword shall not
depart from thine house. Why? Because of David's sin,
because of his adultery, because of his murdering Uriah, the husband
of Bathsheba. He was under the chastening hand
of God. And every time those things happened,
painful as it was in his life, he would remember his own sin. The same as Joseph's brothers.
When Joseph was dealing hardly with them, they remembered back
20 years to how they dealt hardly with him and hadn't listened
to him. Those troubles, those things
we come on in our lives, will be used by the Lord to bring
our sin to remembrance. Our sin was already there, but
it will enlarge it, it will magnify it. And this is the word that
is here. It is those troubles of the heart
and the heart sins will be magnified, flared up, aggravated. Apostle
Paul, soul as he was, He says, I was alive without the law once,
but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died. Sin was already there, but it
revived, it was stirred up, it was seen to be what it really
was. And that by the law, sin was
made exceedingly sinful. And so those troubles of the
heart, when things come into our lives, Sin is flared up,
sin becomes very real, we become more evil and sinful in our own
eyes, and life instead of taking a nice, smooth, easy path, we
see it strewn with snares, with nets, and afflictions, and trials,
and troubles. What a different path than those
who say, well, you believe in the Lord, you'll have a nice
smooth path. Prosperity ministry, everything
will go well, everything will be good. But what a solemn thing,
we go through life like that and never know the truth of our
sin until the last judgment day. Never realize our need to the
Savior, never feel the need of mercy. Dear friends, may we look
upon those outward things we come across, not as enemies,
but as friends. Those things that work together
for good. Those things that, yes, stir
up and make to be a real trouble, deep trouble, not a superficial
one, a deep one. And yet it is in those things,
As he cried, he said, by these things men live, and all these
things, in all these things is the life of my spirit. I always
remember years ago, in the car, prayer to the Lord as driving
along. Lord, how much better Christian
I would be if I didn't have all my sins and temptations and weaknesses. And I believe the Lord showed
me if I in my own thoughts and own mind, didn't have these things. And I'd still be a sinner, a
still-fallen sinner. But if I could see that I was
quite a good sinner, and a good person, I'd have no need of the
Saviour. I wouldn't be seeking Him. I wouldn't be what the Lord would
have me to be. as a broken hearted sinner seeking
for mercy through our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. The hymn
writer says the flesh dislikes the way, but faith approves it
well. And so we have those things,
those troubles outwardly, but then what about in our second
point, the feelings of the heart? We read in the Proverbs that
the spirit of a man will sustain his infirmity, but a wounded
spirit who can bear. Some have many outward trials,
but have a very strong mental constitution. They can look on
the bright side or be upheld through them and strengthened
through them so that they're able to get through. Others it
may be much lesser things and mentally they cannot cope, they
cannot bear with it, they cannot sustain under it and their way
of defence in a way My own dear father, he had mental
breakdown in his life and then when afterwards, when he had
recovered, his way of dealing with things that got too hard
was to run away from them. He realised that if he abode,
if he tried to deal with them, then it would bring him down
again. And it's almost a subconscious way of defense. And it's a great
blessing to have a sound, a strong mind. But however strong we may
have, when the Lord deals with us, he will bring us to have
those things that deal with the feelings of the heart. And David here, he speaks in
this way of what things he he actually felt, and those things
that he was going through. In verse 16, he says, I am desolate
and afflicted. These are things that he is actually
feeling. And we need to be very real in
thinking of this, in those things that we go through. He not only says that, but he
says that he's distressed because He says, Thou bring me out of
my distresses, in our text. And so, that's a very strong,
strong feeling, to have one that is really distressed. Distressed by the things that
going through, distressed by those things that we feel within,
distressed by our sins, feel desolate, left of the Lord, deserted
of the Lord, and by these things, afflicted not just outwardly,
but inwardly as well. It is vital that, like David
here, those things that we feel, we acknowledge them before the
Lord. We bring them to the Lord, we
confess them to the Lord. Sometimes the devil can be very
cunning, as if to say, if you're one of the Lord's people, you
shouldn't let these things touch you. They shouldn't really affect
you in this way. You should be able to rise above
them. It should be mind over matter. If your faith is strong, you
should be able to get through these things. But the Word of
God shows the reality of what is actually felt. and needing
for the Lord to appear and the Lord to deliver. You know, the
gospel is not a self-help gospel. It is not saying, well, read
this, apply it, and you'll be better. It is a looking to the
Lord to deliver, and there's a great, great difference in
that. The Lord says, your time is already,
but my time is not yet. We read this solemn word where
the people of God are reproved that they walked in the sparks
of their own kindling. They made their own fire. They
made their own lines. They had their own remedies. But the woman that came to the
Lord that had the issue of blood for 12 years, she sought remedies
from many. And she was coming to the Lord
for a remedy in which she couldn't find it anywhere else at all. And so it will be with us, those
feelings of the heart, in the Lord Jesus Christ, in what He
has suffered for sin, in the conquest that He has made over
sin and death and hell, over the grave and to rise again. What he has done, he has done
it for his dear people, to save them from their sins, to save
them from the working of the curse throughout the world, how
it then touches their hearts and lives, and to be like the
tree that was cast into the waters that were bitter the children
of Israel came to, and they could drink of those bitter waters. And the bitter waters of life
and those things that touch our hearts and we feel to bow down
under, they will be bitter until the Lord makes them sweet. Until
He shows us and opens our eyes to see His protection, to see
His working for good, To see His path, His way was much rougher,
darker than mine. It is the Lord that applies the
remedy, and not us. And so in the words of our text,
the troubles of my heart are enlarged, O bring thou me out
of my distresses. And these first two points should
really emphasize the outward troubles, then touching the feelings
of the heart and bring them all as though in complete troubles
and trials of a child of God. Only then, in our third point,
are those things that David desires the Lord to do for him. And may it be we desire the same. May we cease from trying to apply
self-applied remedies and that our whole eyes and expectation
and desire is unto the Lord, that He will do these things
for us. In Ezekiel 36 we have all that
the Lord will do in changing the heart, taking away the evil
heart, giving a new spirit. And He says, I will yet be inquired
of the house of Israel to do it for them. All the time, the
gospel is to do it for them. In Romans 8, what the Lord could
not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own
Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condemned
sin in the flesh. All the time, it's the Lord doing
it for them. The blind men that were crying
out to the Lord, our Son of David, have mercy upon us. The Lord
says, what will power? that I should do unto thee, do
for thee, Lord, that we might receive our sight." How could
they give themselves sight? They couldn't. And they asked
the Lord to do it for them. And that is why we be a people
that are waiting for the salvation of the Lord. We do not have help
in any other but the Lord, cannot rise ourselves, lift ourselves
up, look to the Lord. So I want to look, there's five
things. The psalmist here makes his prayer
to the Lord and may that be so with us that we have that same
desire. We have in verse 16, turn thee
unto me. The looking of the Lord toward his
people. Turn thee unto me. Sometimes we may feel the Lord
is looking away from us. He's not regarding us. He's not
looking toward us at all. Now when the children of Israel
first had Moses go to them, in effect, this was the message. The Lord had looked on them and
had respect unto them. Yes, they were going to go through
even greater trials. And being such bitterness, they
would never even listen to Moses. But in the first, they rejoiced.
And it was that the Lord was moving. He was doing something.
He was looking upon them. He was taking notice of them. You know, the woman with the
daughter that was afflicted, when she first came, a seeking
of the Lord to heal her daughter, he answered her not a word. And
then she cried after the disciples and they wanted the Lord to turn
her away. But what a difference it was
when the Lord started to take notice of her and speak to her,
speak about her. And so, may our desire be, our
prayer be, turn thee unto me. The second is to have mercy,
verse 16, and have mercy upon me. The Lord said to the one
in the temple that beat his breast, the publican, God be merciful
to me, a sinner, that he went down to his house justified rather
than the other. So in all that we may feel and
go through, may we ask the Lord to have mercy upon us. The third thing is to bring us
out. Bring me out. Oh, bring thou
me out of my distresses. The words actually in our text. Bring thou me out of my distresses. That, in your case and mine,
might be very different things, but it may involve, you might
say, a whole realigning of our whole life, our changing so many
circumstances in our lives, so many things in our home, in our
family, in the Church of God, all of those things that may
be causing a distress. And here is the prayer I bring
thou, me out of my distresses. I cannot get out of my distresses. I know not which way to go out
of them." And you know, this is joining together the feelings
of the heart, facing up to them how they're actually felt, and
asking the Lord to bring us out of them. When was the last time
you asked the Lord to do that? Or were you just so bowed down
So desolate, so afflicted, so troubled, you think, well, it's
useless. I haven't bothered asking. No, you are to ask. And this is what is desired of
the Lord. Turn unto me, have mercy upon
me, bring me, bring thou me, out of my distresses, which I
can't see how the Lord will do it. You don't have to see how. David doesn't dictate here how
he's to do that. When Martha and Mary had Lazarus
sick, all they said, he whom thou lovest is sick. They didn't
dictate what he had to do. Lord help us to lead more to
the Lord in our petitions. Here really is an outcome. to
be brought out of our distresses, but how it should be so, to leave
it with Him. Then we have the forgiveness
of sins. Forgive all my sins, in verse
18. Look upon mine affliction and
my pain and forgive all my sins. Something that only the Lord
can do. Only our Lord and Saviour can. If we confess our sins, He is
faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us
from all unrighteousness. When was the last time you asked
the Lord to forgive you all your sins? You might say, well, David is
already in this time. He knows he's a child of God. His sins are forgiven. Why is
he praying this again? Sometimes in circles today, and
I would leave it before the Lord as to how right it is, that there's
a praying, instead of praying that the Lord would forgive us
all of our sins, all of our recent sins, And in one sense, when we have
received the pardon and forgiveness of our sins, and then we have
fresh contracted sin, we want the sense of that fresh contracted
sin pardoned and forgiven. But David here, he not only just
confines it to those fresh contracted sins, but he just wants all of
his sins forgiven. And may we ask the same. And
then the last thing that he desires is that the Lord would consider
his enemies. Consider mine enemies, for they
are many and they hate me with cruel hatred. The child of God
always will have many enemies, many adversaries. We cannot escape them, we won't
escape them. You know, David literally had
Saul and then The Philistines and many that were against him.
But it is the Lord alone that will preserve the people of God. And those enemies are not just
outside, they're in their own hearts, they're in the church
of God, they're all around, all that seek to attack and destroy. Safety is of the Lord. Safety is where the Lord is found. But may these prayers be our
prayers, and their others as well, throughout this psalm. May we learn from the psalms,
learn from the Word of God, how we are to pray, what we are
to ask, how often we are silent, or how often it would be reproved
to us, the Lord said, thou hast not asked. Thou hast been in
trouble, afflictions, and so churned up in your heart, but
you've never brought it to me. You haven't asked me to deliver
you and to save you. For the Lord, for His dear people,
has wrought at Calvary, accomplished salvation for them and delivered
them. And in heaven He is. out-advocate
with the Father, the voice that speaks for us, that is like Mordecai,
speaking peace to all his seed, like Joseph next to Pharaoh,
watching over his people and doing them good. And the Lord
is in that position for his people, a friend that sticketh fast,
closer than a brother, and in a position of authority and in
a position where he's already paid the debt and that he may
do exceeding far above all that we can ask or even think. The troubles of my heart are
enlarged, O bring thou me out of my distresses. The Lord at
his blessing. Amen.