◄ Psalm 42:5 ►














Pulpit Commentary Homiletics
Remonstrance Of The Spiritual Man Against The Natural Man
Psalm 42:1Psalm 43:5
C. Short
Supposed to be written by some king or priest on his way into exile, perhaps somewhere in the region of Mount Hermon. It is the remonstrance of the spiritual man within him against the despondency of the natural man.

I. THE CAUSES OF HIS DESPONDENCY.

1. An unsatisfied longing for God. He was being carried away from the temple to a land of heathen idolaters, and this aroused in him an intense longing for some manifestation of God which should deliver him from such a calamity. As the hunted stag pants for the watercourses, so he pants for the living God.

2. His enemies reproach him with being forsaken of God. (Ver. 3.) And he can only answer them with tears. His adverse circumstances seem to warrant the reproach; for he sees no prospect at present of a Divine deliverance. They were like Job's comforters. Spiritual calamity the greatest of all calamities.

3. He remembers with anguish the religious privileges he has lost. (Ver. 4.) In former days he had gone up with the pilgrim-processions to worship at Jerusalem, to keep holy day; and now he was going in a very different procession away from Jerusalem, as a captive to Babylon, and he is filled with bitter sorrow. Worship and fellowship with God the very air that he breathed.

II. HOW HE ATTEMPTS TO CONQUER HIS DESPONDENCY.

1. In the relocated question "Why?" he remonstrates with himself for yielding to it. As if it was only his lower self that was giving way, his higher self was braving itself to courage and strength.

2. He comforts himself with the everlasting resource of the soul. He hopes in God; for God is still the Health of his countenance and his God, who will show his loving-kindness in the open day of his favour, and give him songs of praise in the night of adversity. This is a hope that springs into the highest regions of faith.

3. He anticipates with assurance a time when he shall praise God for his deliverance. (Vers. 5, 11.) Here again is unconquerable faith, which refuses to believe that God will abandon him, though now he has lost the evidence of his presence. Even Christ cried," My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" - S.

Biblical Illustrator
Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and why art thou disquieted in me? hope thou in God.
Psalm 42:5
A prescription for a downcast soul
M. R. Vincent, D. D.
I. INQUIRY. "Why art thou cast down?" Many a man is in great spiritual darkness, without knowing, or being able to discover the reason. He has been trying to live rightly, so far as he knows. He has not neglected prayer nor the house of God, and yet God seems to have hidden His face; his peace is gone; his soul is full of harrowing doubts. Christians sometimes forget that they have bodies; and that the condition of their bodies has a good deal to do with the brightness or darkness of their spiritual moods; and now and then a man, through sheer ignorance, persists in some habit of eating or drinking which, by keeping his body in an unhealthful state, correspondingly lowers the tone of his spiritual life. Often the devil which torments him is one that goeth not out but by fasting.

2. Or the cause may lie deeper, in some mental disease — possibly inherited. Cowper.

3. On the other hand, the distress may arise from estrangement between man and God. Peter, when he went out and wept bitterly, was cast down and disquieted as he deserved to be.

4. If you cannot, on inquiry, discover that sin is at the bottom of your disquietude, it may occur to you that God has sent it. Thou art satisfied that the source of thy trouble is Divine; is that something to be disquieted about? Or dost thou fear it will be more than thou canst bear? O reflect that the Father is the husbandman. He is pruning thee that thou mightest bring forth more fruit. Dost thou forget Him who was made perfect through suffering, and who was in all points tempted and tried like as thou arty Why art thou disquieted? Is it because thou canst not see the end thy God has in view in thy trial, or wilt thou forget that this "light affliction which is but for a moment, worketh out for thee a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory"?

II. REMEMBRANCE.

1. The psalmist remembers his own experience. Ah, how often we need the psalmist's admonition to his own soul not to forget all God's benefits. They will crowd, at the summons of memory, thickly down to the very edge of to-day's trouble, like the cloud which followed the Israelites down to the merge of the Red Sea; and like that cloud will send light over the troubled waters through which lies the line of march. To-day's trouble will be lighter, and to-day's outlook more hopeful through the remembrance of the blessed past.

2. But this remembrance of the psalmist also takes in God's dealings with His people. No one has such a range of history at his command as the believer who is in trouble; since the history of God's children is largely made up of trouble, and as largely of God's deliverances out of trouble. Sometimes a man is so engrossed with the pleasure and business of the present, that memory has no chance to do her work, and he is in danger of forgetting God's benefits altogether; and so God leads him away alone, whither he does not like to go, but where, cut off from the occupations of the present, he has opportunity to survey the rich and fruitful past, and to grow grateful amid his sorrow. Yea, often the very land of exile is the land of precious memories. Men of old have had their faith, their courage, their patience tried sorely in the very places where our faith and courage and patience are tried; and their experience of God's saving goodness and power calls on us to remember that the God of salvation is the same, yesterday, to-day, and for ever.

III. HOPE.

1. This hope is in God. Trouble opens a man's eyes to the need of a personal God. True hope, the psalmist's hope, would say, "This loss is God's work; I am God's child; this is God's discipline; through this He may be working out for me something far better than worldly prosperity. The best thing I have left, the thing to which I anchor my present and my future is — God is mine. This matter is all in God's hands, and whatever he may do with me or with my fortune, whether He give me back my prosperity or not, I shall yet praise Him who is the health of my countenance and my God."

2. This hope is a different thing from faith, while the operations of the two are nevertheless closely allied. When a physician gives to a sick man a remedy which for the time increases his distress, he does not realize nor feel that the work of restoration is going on; and in the dark places of Christian experience through which God causes a man to pass in the course of His discipline, the man does not always realize that God is doing a beneficent work upon him, or how He is doing it. Then hope comes in. "If we hope for what we see not, then do we with patience wait for it."

(M. R. Vincent, D. D.)

Despondency
A. P. Peabody.
I. THE UNREASONABLENESS AND VIRTUAL IMPIETY OF THE OVER-ANXIOUS, FOREBODING SPIRIT MANIFESTED BY SO MANY.

1. This spirit is rebuked by your whole experience. The vast preponderance with you has always been on the side of happiness. If you have been long of this foreboding habit, not one in a hundred of the sorrows that you have apprehended has reached you. Those, also, that have overtaken you have been lighter than you feared.

2. What can your anxiety do for you? Can it avert what you dread? No. But it may hasten it. In many respects, our health, our outward well-being, and that of our household, are committed to our own keeping, and can be safely kept only by a self-collected mind and a quiet heart.

3. Sorrow in prospect is much more bitter and grievous than it is in actual experience. Every trial comes with its alleviating circumstances, its mild preparatives, and abounding consolations. Sickness summons sympathy and patience for its ministers. Unmerited disesteem fortifies itself by the testimony of a good conscience. Poverty moves on under the guidance of health and hope. Bereaved. affection meets the risen Saviour at the grave-side.

4. Why do you dread aught that can befall you, when none of these things can take place without your Father? Under Him, all things will work together for your good. Lean, then, as children upon His arm, and commit yourselves as children to His keeping.

II. INCULCATE THE LESSON OF IMPLICIT TRUST IN A WISE AND PATERNAL PROVIDENCE.

1. An unexplored future is before us. But, as Christians, we have every possible ground for trust and hope; for that unexplored future is in the hands of our Father.

2. We have under God one object of hope continually in view, namely, the growth of our characters; and this is the great end for which, were we wise, we should desire to live. Does He send outward favours and mercies? It is that gratitude may engrave His image on our hearts, and write His law on our lives. Does He remove from us cherished blessings? He takes gifts which we were in danger of loving more than the Giver. He takes wealth that bound our souls to the sordid pathway which He bids us leave.

3. Heaven and eternity, brought to light by Jesus, re-echo the exhortation — "Hope thou in God." Have we the testimony of His love within? Are we living by the law and in the spirit of Christ? Have we the consciousness of pardoned sin and of souls at peace with God? If so, however heavy our outward burdens or sorrows, we may well ask, in self-rebuke, "Why art thou cast down?" etc.

(A. P. Peabody.)

Disquietude and hope
Homiletic Review.
I. DAVID'S DISQUIETUDE.

1. God's forgetfulness.

2. His own mourning.

3. Enemy's oppression.

II. DAVID'S HOPEFULNESS.

1. God is.

2. God is mine.

3. God will yet be praised by me.

(Homiletic Review.)

People
Hermonites, Korah, Psalmist
Places
Jerusalem
Topics
Bowest, Cast, Confess, Countenance, Crushed, Despair, Disquieted, Disturbed, Health, Hope, Moanest, O, Praise, Presence, Salvation, Saving, Savior, Soul, Thyself, Troubled, Wait, Within, Yea, Yet
Outline
1. David's zeal to serve God in the temple
5. He encourages his soul to trust in God

Dictionary of Bible Themes
Psalm 42:5

     5805   comfort
     5914   optimism
     5916   pessimism
     8478   self-examination
     8479   self-examination, examples
     9612   hope, in God

Psalm 42:1-11

     5831   depression

Psalm 42:3-6

     5938   sadness

Psalm 42:4-11

     8670   remembering

Psalm 42:5-6

     5436   pain
     5831   depression

Psalm 42:5-11

     8713   discouragement

Library
July 16. "As the Hart Panteth after the Waterbrooks, So Panteth My Soul after Thee, O God" (Ps. Xlii. 1).
"As the hart panteth after the waterbrooks, so panteth my soul after Thee, O God" (Ps. xlii. 1). First in order to a consecrated life there must be a sense of need, the need of purity, of power, and of a greater nearness to the Lord. There often comes in Christian life a second conviction. It is not now a sense of guilt and God's wrath so much as of the power and evil of inward sin, and the unsatisfactoriness of the life the soul is living. It usually comes from the deeper revelation of God's truth, …
Rev. A. B. Simpson—Days of Heaven Upon Earth

The Alarum
That is not, however, the topic upon which I now desire to speak to you. I come at this time, not so much to plead for the early as for the awakening. The hour we may speak of at another time--the fact is our subject now. It is bad to awake late, but what shall be said of those who never awake at all? Better late than never: but with many it is to be feared it will be never. I would take down the trumpet and give a blast, or ring the alarm-bell till all the faculties of the sluggard's manhood are …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 17: 1871

Knox Little -- Thirst Satisfied
William John Knox Little, English preacher, was born 1839 and educated at Cambridge University. He has filled many parochial cures, and in 1881 was appointed canon of Worcester, and sub-dean in 1902. He also holds the vicarage of Hoar Cross (1885). He is of high repute as a preacher and is in much request all over England. He belongs to the High Church school and has printed, besides his sermons, many works of educational character, such as the "Treasury of Meditation," "Manual of Devotion for Lent," …
Grenville Kleiser—The world's great sermons, Volume 8

Be not Far from Me, O My Strength,
"Deep calleth unto deep at the noise of Thy waterspouts; all Thy waves and Thy billows are gone over me. Yet the Lord will command His lovingkindness in the daytime, and in the night his song shall be with me, and my prayer unto the God of my life." -- Psalm 42:7,8. Be not far from me, O my strength, Whom all my times obey; Take from me anything Thou wilt; But go not Thou away, -- And let the storm that does Thy work Deal with me as it may. On Thy compassion I repose, In weakness and distress: …
Miss A. L. Waring—Hymns and Meditations

Longing for the Courts of the Lord's House. --Ps. Xlii.
Longing for the Courts of the Lord's House.--Ps. xlii. As the hart, with eager looks, Panteth for the water-brooks, So my soul, athirst for Thee, Pants the loving God to see: When, O when, with filial fear, Lord, shall I to Thee draw near? Tears my food by night, by day, Grief consumes my strength away; While his craft the Tempter plies, "Where is now Thy God?" he cries; This would sink me to despair But I pour my soul in prayer. For, in happier times, I went, Where the multitudes frequent; I, …
James Montgomery—Sacred Poems and Hymns

As Pants the Wearied Hart for Cooling Springs
[1190]Pax Dei: John Bacchus Dykes, 1868 Psalm 42 Latin Version by Robert Lowth, 1753; Tr. George Gregory, 1787 DOXOLOGY As pants the wearied hart for cooling springs, That sinks exhausted in the summer's chase, So pants my soul for thee, great King of kings, So thirsts to reach thy sacred dwelling place. Lord, thy sure mercies, ever in my sight, My heart shall gladden through the tedious day; And midst the dark and gloomy shades of night, To thee, my God, I'll tune the grateful lay. Why faint, …
Various—The Hymnal of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the USA

Questions which Ought to be Asked
ELIHU PERCEIVED the great ones of the earth oppressing the needy, and he traced their domineering tyranny to their forgetfulness of God: "None saith, Where is God my Maker?" Surely, had they thought of God they could not have acted so unjustly. Worse still, if I understand Elihu aright, he complained that even among the oppressed there was the same departure in heart from the Lord: they cried out by reason of the arm of the mighty, but unhappily they did not cry unto God their Maker, though he waits …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 26: 1880

1 to Pray Does not Imply that Without Prayer God Would not Give us Anything...
1. To pray does not imply that without prayer God would not give us anything or that He would be unaware of our needs, but it has this great advantage, that in the attitude of prayer the soul is best fitted to receive the Giver of blessing as well as those blessings He desires to bestow. Thus it was that the fullness of the Spirit was not poured out upon the Apostles on the first day, but after ten days of special preparation. If a blessing were conferred upon one without a special readiness for …
Sadhu Sundar Singh—At The Master's Feet

The Kingdom Divided
THE PROPHETICAL BOOKS: Jonah Page Amos Page Isaiah Page OUTLINE FOR STUDY OF PROPHETICAL BOOKS 1. Class. 2. Commission of Prophet. 3. Biographical Description of Prophet. 4. Title of Prophet. 5. Historical Place. (a) Name of Kingdom. (b) Names of Kings. 6. Outline of Contents. 7. Prophecies of Earthly Kings or Kingdoms. 8. Prophecies of Christ. 9. Prophecies of Christ's Kingdom. 10. Leading Phrases. 11. Leading Chapters. 12. Leading Teachings. 13. Questions. 14. Items of Special Interest. …
Frank Nelson Palmer—A Bird's-Eye View of the Bible

The Holy War,
MADE BY SHADDAI UPON DIABOLUS, FOR THE REGAINING OF THE METROPOLIS OF THE WORLD; OR, THE LOSING AND TAKING AGAIN OF THE TOWN OF MANSOUL. THE AUTHOR OF 'THE PILGRIM'S PROGRESS.' 'I have used similitudes.'--Hosea 12:10. London: Printed for Dorman Newman, at the King's Arms in the Poultry; and Benjamin Alsop, at the Angel and Bible in the Poultry, 1682. ADVERTISEMENT BY THE EDITOR. Bunyan's account of the Holy War is indeed an extraordinary book, manifesting a degree of genius, research, and spiritual …
John Bunyan—The Works of John Bunyan Volumes 1-3

His Past Work.
His past work was accomplished by Him when he became incarnate. It was finished when He died on Calvary's cross. We have therefore to consider first of all these fundamentals of our faith. I. The Work of the Son of God is foreshadowed and predicted in the Old Testament Scriptures. II. The incarnation of the Son of God. III. His Work on the cross and what has been accomplished by it. I. Through the Old Testament Scriptures, God announced beforehand the work of His Son. This is a great theme and one …
A. C. Gaebelein—The Work Of Christ

Dialogue ii. --The Unconfounded.
Eranistes and Orthodoxus. Eran.--I am come as I promised. 'Tis yours to adopt one of two alternatives, and either furnish a solution of my difficulties, or assent to what I and my friends lay down. Orth.--I accept your challenge, for I think it right and fair. But we must first recall to mind at what point we left off our discourse yesterday, and what was the conclusion of our argument. Eran.--I will remind you of the end. I remember our agreeing that the divine Word remained immutable, and took …
Theodoret—The Ecclesiastical History of Theodoret

The Exile.
David's first years at the court of Saul in Gibeah do not appear to have produced any psalms which still survive. "The sweetest songs are those Which tell of saddest thought." It was natural, then, that a period full of novelty and of prosperous activity, very unlike the quiet days at Bethlehem, should rather accumulate materials for future use than be fruitful in actual production. The old life shut to behind him for ever, like some enchanted door in a hill-side, and an unexplored land lay beckoning …
Alexander Maclaren—The Life of David

"But it is Good for Me to Draw Near to God: I have Put My Trust in the Lord God, that I May Declare all Thy
Psal. lxxiii. 28.--"But it is good for me to draw near to God: I have put my trust in the Lord God, that I may declare all thy works." After man's first transgression, he was shut out from the tree of life, and cast out of the garden, by which was signified his seclusion and sequestration from the presence of God, and communion with him: and this was in a manner the extermination of all mankind in one, when Adam was driven out of paradise. Now, this had been an eternal separation for any thing that …
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning

Love
The rule of obedience being the moral law, comprehended in the Ten Commandments, the next question is: What is the sum of the Ten Commandments? The sum of the Ten Commandments is, to love the Lord our God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our strength, and with all our mind, and our neighbour as ourselves. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.' Deut 6: 5. The duty called for is love, yea, the strength of love, with all …
Thomas Watson—The Ten Commandments

The Poetical Books (Including Also Ecclesiastes and Canticles).
1. The Hebrews reckon but three books as poetical, namely: Job, Psalms, and Proverbs, which are distinguished from the rest by a stricter rhythm--the rhythm not of feet, but of clauses (see below, No. 3)--and a peculiar system of accentuation. It is obvious to every reader that the poetry of the Old Testament, in the usual sense of the word, is not restricted to these three books. But they are called poetical in a special and technical sense. In any natural classification of the books of the …
E. P. Barrows—Companion to the Bible

The Nature of Spiritual Hunger
Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness Matthew 5:6 We are now come to the fourth step of blessedness: Blessed are they that hunger'. The words fall into two parts: a duty implied; a promise annexed. A duty implied: Blessed are they that hunger'. Spiritual hunger is a blessed hunger. What is meant by hunger? Hunger is put for desire (Isaiah 26:9). Spiritual hunger is the rational appetite whereby the soul pants after that which it apprehends most suitable and proportional …
Thomas Watson—The Beatitudes: An Exposition of Matthew 5:1-12

Motives to Holy Mourning
Let me exhort Christians to holy mourning. I now persuade to such a mourning as will prepare the soul for blessedness. Oh that our hearts were spiritual limbecs, distilling the water of holy tears! Christ's doves weep. They that escape shall be like doves of the valleys, all of them mourning, every one for his iniquity' (Ezekiel 7:16). There are several divine motives to holy mourning: 1 Tears cannot be put to a better use. If you weep for outward losses, you lose your tears. It is like a shower …
Thomas Watson—The Beatitudes: An Exposition of Matthew 5:1-12

Of Faith. The Definition of It. Its Peculiar Properties.
1. A brief recapitulation of the leading points of the whole discussion. The scope of this chapter. The necessity of the doctrine of faith. This doctrine obscured by the Schoolmen, who make God the object of faith, without referring to Christ. The Schoolmen refuted by various passages. 2. The dogma of implicit faith refuted. It destroys faith, which consists in a knowledge of the divine will. What this will is, and how necessary the knowledge of it. 3. Many things are and will continue to be implicitly …
John Calvin—The Institutes of the Christian Religion

Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners:
A BRIEF AND FAITHFUL RELATION OF THE EXCEEDING MERCY OF GOD IN CHRIST TO HIS POOR SERVANT, JOHN BUNYAN; WHEREIN IS PARTICULARLY SHOWED THE MANNER OF HIS CONVERSION, HIS SIGHT AND TROUBLE FOR SIN, HIS DREADFUL TEMPTATIONS, ALSO HOW HE DESPAIRED OF GOD'S MERCY, AND HOW THE LORD AT LENGTH THROUGH CHRIST DID DELIVER HIM FROM ALL THE GUILT AND TERROR THAT LAY UPON HIM. Whereunto is added a brief relation of his call to the work of the ministry, of his temptations therein, as also what he hath met with …
John Bunyan—The Works of John Bunyan Volumes 1-3

Rules to be Observed in Singing of Psalms.
1. Beware of singing divine psalms for an ordinary recreation, as do men of impure spirits, who sing holy psalms intermingled with profane ballads: They are God's word: take them not in thy mouth in vain. 2. Remember to sing David's psalms with David's spirit (Matt. xxii. 43.) 3. Practise St. Paul's rule--"I will sing with the spirit, but I will sing with the understanding also." (1 Cor. xiv. 15.) 4. As you sing uncover your heads (1 Cor. xi. 4), and behave yourselves in comely reverence as in the …
Lewis Bayly—The Practice of Piety

Letter Xl to Thomas, Prior of Beverley
To Thomas, Prior of Beverley This Thomas had taken the vows of the Cistercian Order at Clairvaux. As he showed hesitation, Bernard urges his tardy spirit to fulfil them. But the following letter will prove that it was a warning to deaf ears, where it relates the unhappy end of Thomas. In this letter Bernard sketches with a master's hand the whole scheme of salvation. Bernard to his beloved son Thomas, as being his son. 1. What is the good of words? An ardent spirit and a strong desire cannot express …
Saint Bernard of Clairvaux—Some Letters of Saint Bernard, Abbot of Clairvaux

Psalms
The piety of the Old Testament Church is reflected with more clearness and variety in the Psalter than in any other book of the Old Testament. It constitutes the response of the Church to the divine demands of prophecy, and, in a less degree, of law; or, rather, it expresses those emotions and aspirations of the universal heart which lie deeper than any formal demand. It is the speech of the soul face to face with God. Its words are as simple and unaffected as human words can be, for it is the genius …
John Edgar McFadyen—Introduction to the Old Testament

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