Psalm 77:2 In the day of my trouble I sought the Lord: my sore ran in the night, and ceased not: my soul refused to be comforted. My hand in the night season was stretched out, and ceased not. The figure is of the hand stretched out in prayer till it was unnerved by weariness, and yet refused to rest. The cause of lying awake at night is usually mental anxiety and distress; burdens on the mind rather than pains in the body. We begin to think worryfully, and so banish sleep. The text, therefore, presents a season of mental depression; and the occasion of it is found in the anxious condition of the nation. Illust. by the times of Hezekiah. Times of mental depression are not necessarily wrong. They are the natural response of the mind to physical conditions and outward circumstances. They mean "sensitiveness," "quickness to respond;" and these differ in different individuals. Some are easily made despondent; they can always see, or think they see, black clouds gathering in the sky. Some are unduly hopeful, and fail to respond when circumstances do call for anxiety. We make the mistake of failing to recognize Divine working through the anxieties of the mind, as well as through the pains of the body, and the distress of the circumstances. We deceive ourselves by thinking these mental trials are in no sense sent; we make them ourselves, and so we fail to associate God with them, and lose what would be our best comfort and relief. The truth is, that God is even more freely working through our mental depressions, because they are immaterial - they belong to the innermost of us, to the sphere in which God's grace is most unhindered. I. MENTAL DEPRESSIONS KEEP US CONVINCED OF THE SPIRITUAL. Suppose we took all things easily; never troubled over them; never brooded; - how easily the "material" would gain the mastery! We know there is another world than the world of sense; there is a world of thought and feeling. How intense and real this world is we are made to know when depression prevents sleep, and even breaks down health. And so we come to apprehend the reality of the "spiritual." II. MENTAL DEPRESSIONS CONVINCE OF THE SERIOUSNESS OF OUR MORAL CONFLICT. Conceive that the struggle for character only concerned circumstances and relations, and then what an unimportant struggle it would seem to be! "But we wrestle, not with flesh and blood only, but with the rulers of spiritual darkness." Add mental conflict, and virtue becomes a sublime achievement, a transcendent victory, won at an awful cost. III. MENTAL DEPRESSIONS MAY BE OVERRULED SO AS TO GIVE NOBLER VIEWS OF GOD. Illustrate by the psalm (vers. 10-20). The law of rebound applies. Compare such a case as that of the poet Cowper, whose songs of trust were the cries of one who was often in despair. The question is - Do we yield to mental depressions, or do we resist them, and so let God work his work of grace through them? - R.T. Parallel Verses KJV: In the day of my trouble I sought the Lord: my sore ran in the night, and ceased not: my soul refused to be comforted. |
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