Psalm 42
Yearning and Satisfaction
There is an aching melancholy deeply stitched into the reality of this Psalm. Life East of Eden is pockmarked by our encounters with sorrow. And also a yearning for connection and healing. While never falling into despondency or hopelessness, this Psalm captures the heart-sadness living in the world as it is.
Yet this dissatisfaction with the world offers us the opportunity to press deeper into the one who holds the words of life.
(There are a number of similarities between this and the next Psalm causing some people to suspect they are actually meant to be joined together. While we cannot be sure, they are obviously a pair which invite us to draw near to the one who draws near to us.)
For the director of music. A maskil of the Sons of Korah.
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
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 Saviour 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 Saviour and my God.
This Psalm has been penned by one who seems to have been denied access to the temple of the living God (v4), whether by geography or maybe something more nefarious.
This song opens with a vivid image which brings home the reality personally and immediately. Deep in a drought, a long way from any source of water, a deer pants deeply and desperately. We can hear the heavy breathing. We can imagine the dry tongue hanging out. We can see the eye straining to spy anything, something that might quench this deep thirst.
And this is where the Psalmist is. His soul craves and yearns for a water that will eternally satisfy (John 4.14). There is a defiance sewn into this cry of longing. Though for a time denied access into the temple, he doesn’t go seeking counterfeit gods. So even though others mock him (3), questioning where his God is, he fixes his desires on the Living Water. For he know his heart’s longing will only be contended by God himself. And God indeed will do that. For as Jesus taught, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled” (Matt 5.6).
This Psalm invites us, during dry seasons for our souls, to pant after after God, for he alone can quench the thirst of our hearts.
In this season of weakness, his soul is sapped of strength and is cast down (6). It is from the deep that he calls out to God (7). And it is down in the depths that God continues to pour out his steadfast love on his people (8). As we will see, his trials have not ended, but neither had God’s faithfulness and goodness towards his beloved.
We get an echo of the lament from earlier in the Psalm in v9-10 reminding us the trials have not ended in this current age. This is a lament rooted in faith, as it is not made to God the Rock, but God my Rock. The personal possessive pronoun means that this is not a theoretical religious allegiance but a personal relationship with the God who rules and reigns with all authority. And it is to him that he directs the struggles and suffering he is enduring from the hands of his enemies.
This Psalm closes with a refrain (v11) we first sung in v5. There is a change in direction here. Where once we prayed to God, now we address our own souls. More than that, we exhort and encourage our souls. We cajole them to persevere. To press on in hope. A hope rooted in the depths of God’s faithfulness. Knowing he is faithful to save. To redeem us out of the pit of despair. To lift us up and restore us into his presence once more. And forevermore.
And here is the other invite the Psalmist extends to us. To join with him in preaching to ourselves. To remind our souls of the truth. To point ourselves to the Truth himself, Jesus. The one who saves.
Glory be to God the Father, our Rock and Saviour.
Glory be to God the Son, who leads us to the living waters.
Glory be to God the Spirit, the living waters, who satisfies our weary hearts.
Ever three and ever One.