Sermon Introduction The Dark Cry of the Soul Psalm 88

A Song. A Psalm of the Sons of Korah. O LORD, God of my salvation; I cry out day and night before you. Let my prayer come before you; incline your ear to my cry! For my soul is full of troubles, and my life draws near to Sheol.

I am counted among those who go down to the pit; I am a man who has no strength, like one set loose among the dead, like the slain that lie in the grave, like those whom you remember no more, for they are cut off from your hand.

You have put me in the depths of the pit, in the regions dark and deep. Your wrath lies heavy upon me, and you overwhelm me with all your waves. Selah

You have caused my companions to shun me; you have made me a horror to them. I am shut in so that I cannot escape; my eye grows dim through sorrow. Every day I call upon you, O LORD; I spread out my hands to you

Do you work wonders for the dead? Do the departed rise up to praise you? Is your steadfast love declared in the grave, or your faithfulness in Abaddon? Are your wonders known in the darkness, or your righteousness in the land of forgetfulness?

But I, O LORD, cry to you; in the morning my prayer comes before you. O LORD, why do you cast my soul away? Why do you hide your face from me?

Afflicted and close to death from my youth up, I suffer your terrors; I am helpless. Your wrath has swept over me; your dreadful assaults destroy me. They surround me like a flood all day long; they close in on me together.

You have caused my beloved and my friend to shun me; my companions have become darkness.

ENCOURAGMENT THIS IS THE CRY OF FAITH even when it is a dark cry; it shows the invincible steadfastness of faith that is centered on God. When things get really dark, steadfastness of faith is what we need!!

ENCOURAGMENT Derek Kidner – Ps 39 & Ps 88 “ Their presence is a witness to God’s understanding. He knows how men speak when they are desperate.”

vs. 1-9 THE DESCRIPTION OF HIS CONDITION He has been crying out but isn’t being heard His soul is greatly troubled He has been put in a dark pit – by God His friends have been removed – by God God’s wrath has rested upon him

Lesson #1 Darkness of the soul can last a long time EXTERNAL & INTERNAL DARKNESS.

We practice wisdom when we avoid the pat answers of the moralist and the secular cynic 1) Religious moralist – “Bad stuff is happening because you’ve been bad.” 2) A secular cynic believes that there is no God and no ultimate truth, and suffering confirms his view.

Questions for the Cynic If praying to God when things aren’t going well seems useless, how are we helped by the view that there is no God? Does it really help to take God out of the picture?

vs – GOD IS INTERROGATED LESSON #2 The despair of suffering can be a time of growth when we process our anguish through faith. David Powlison – “There may be mixed motives, but over time it always becomes clear whether we are processing our anguish through faith or through pride and unbelief.”

v THE FINAL LAMENT OF FAITH Lesson # 3 We can grow in the darkness when we learn to cling to God alone. Walter Brueggemen- “ Psalm 88 stands as a mark of biblical faith. It has a pastoral use, because there are situations in which easy, cheap talk of resolution must be avoided.”

“Don’t Waste Your Cancer” (suffering) - John Piper – 1.You will waste your cancer/suffering if you do not believe it is designed for you by God. 2. You will waste your suffering if you believe it is a curse and not a gift.

5. You will waste your suffering if you think that spiritual victory means getting the outcome you want rather than cherishing Christ in the midst of the trial. 7. You will waste your cancer if you let it drive you into solitude instead of deepening your relationships with manifest affection.

10. You will waste your cancer if you fail to use it as a means of witness to the truth and glory of Christ. “But this is impossible”

The answer isn’t a theology, but a Person.

The Problem of Pain… "We are,..in very truth, a Divine work of art, something that God is making, and therefore something with which He will not be satisfied until it has a certain character. Here again we come up against what I have called the 'intolerable compliment'. Over a sketch made idly to amuse a child, an artist may not take much trouble: he may be content to let it go even though it is not exactly as he meant it to be

But over the great picture of his life - the work which he loves, though in a different fashion, as intensely as a man loves a woman or a mother a child - he will take endless trouble - and would, doubtless, thereby give endless trouble to the picture if it were able to feel.

One can imagine a picture with feelings, after being rubbed and scraped and recommenced for the tenth time, wishing that it were only a thumbnail sketch whose making was over in a minute

In the same way, it is natural for us to wish that God had designed for us a less glorious and less arduous destiny; but then we are wishing not for more love, but for less." - C.S. Lewis