O my God, my soul despairs within me. Therefore I remember You from the land of Jordan and the peaks of Hermon—even from Mount Mizar.My God, my soul is in despair within me. Therefore I remember you from the land of the Jordan, the heights of Hermon, from the hill Mizar.O my God, my soul is cast down within me: therefore will I remember thee from the land of Jordan, and of the Hermonites, from the hill Mizar.O my God, my soul is cast down within me: Therefore do I remember thee from the land of the Jordan, And the Hermons, from the hill Mizar.
4 sermons cite this verse
I was at a funeral a couple of months ago, and I heard a pastor say on that occasion that there are two ways that the Bible speaks. Most of the time, the Bible speaks to us. That is, instructing us, exhorting us, teaching us. But there are times in our lives where the Bible speaks for us as well, discerning our hearts and drawing out the hidden depths of our emotions and our feelings and psalm 42 is is much like that you can probably feel it as you read it it speaks to us in many respects but it can also speak for us as well it's a psalm that's written by a troubled soul for other troubled souls and that's the theme of the sermon this morning, a troubled soul. Now, you might be here and you might be thinking, well, you know, it's Easter season, it's springtime, and we have our spring luncheon after the service today. The masters are going on. That theme of troubled soul doesn't quite seem to fit this morning, or maybe it doesn't even quite fit my season of life right now. I really don't have a troubled soul, I would say. …
And, verily, the Word of God puts the mouth in taste. Some things are sweet in the mouth if the mouth is sweet, but if the palate is out of taste, you cannot get the flavor of them. But the Word of God cleans the mouth for you and though a man of God may find himself as much out of sorts as he can be, if he needs to get his mouth in proper order for feasting on the Word of God, he need not go anywhere else but to the Word, itself! The idea of preparing ourselves for Christ is not a Gospel idea. The idea of preparing our minds for the Gospel by thinking about something else always seems to me unnatural. If your minds are inactive, go and read a good stirring part of God's Word and that will prepare you for another part—for the Word will act first as a tonic to give an appetite and will afterwards be a food upon which that appetite can be satisfied! Yet honey, with all its sweetness, may be forgotten. But the Word of God, if we once know its sweetness, will abide with us forever. Let your child eat honey to its heart's content, yet the flavor of it will not be in his mouth in a week's time. So, too, have some of us retained the flavor of the honey we got 15 years ago. "Ah," says David, "I will remember You from the land of Jordan, and of the Hermonites, from the hill Mizar." I do not know how many years that was, but some of us can remember times of communion and refreshing from the Presence of the Lord ten, fifteen, or, perhaps, 40 years ago! When Christ spread His flavor upon your soul, no sweetness was so sweet and you have the sense of it now! You like to talk of those seasons of delight, and you think— …
Then, as you are to look above other men, much more are you to look above yourselves. In one sense, it is hard work to keep a Christian's eyes looking up. But in another sense, it is equally difficult to keep them looking down. You may rake over the dunghills of your own corruption to try to find something good, but you will only find what Paul calls dung! But if you look up to the Most High, you will not search in vain for treasures that will endure forever! If you will persist in looking within, look there till you are tired and then do not look any longer. One look at Jesus Christ will remunerate you far better than 20 looks at yourself! No doubt there are certain marks and evidences of the Christian life for which it is quite right to talk, yet it is better to look at the marks of the Savior's wounds and to see the evidences of God's Love manifested in the Person and work of His well-beloved Son. It is much more profitable to look at the Creator than at the creature. If you must bring self in at all, let it only be as Ezekiel did when he said, "The hand of the Lord was upon me in the evening." This text should also encourage us to remember previous Divine visitations. I suppose Ezekiel had often felt the hand of the Lord upon him, but this time he recorded it. David called to remembrance former manifestations of God's mercy when he wrote, "O my God, my soul is cast down within me: therefore will I remember You from the land of Jordan, and of the Hermonites, from the hill Mizar." Sailors keep a logbook in which they enter the principal incidents of the voyage. And Christian, you ought to keep a log of your voyage to Heaven! And you should especially record the visitations of God to your soul. There may come times when you will not have these visits and then, if you turn to your diary, you will be able to call to remembrance the joyous seasons of the past—and it will be a great comfort to you to recollect the experiences you passed through on Mizar's hill and Hermon's mount. There are certain occasions that some of us can never forget—and in our dark hours we think of them and say, "Lord, by all that we have felt in the past, we are assured that You will not let us go, but that You will hold us fast to the end." …
Should fright us from the shore." Roughly treat us as You will, good Lord, if we have this money in our sack's mouth and this provision by the way, we will be well content! The Lord sometimes sustains His people under His own roughness by the recollection of their past experiences.''My God, my soul is cast down within me; therefore will I remember You from Hermon and from the hill Mizar." The faithfulness of God in the past has been so vividly remembered that the child of God could not dare to doubt! The evidence of God's love was so strong, vehement and fresh in his soul that he cried, "Though He slays me, yet will I trust in Him; let Him do what He will to me, yet do I know that in very faithfulness He has afflicted me." He could hear these silver bells, thousands of them, all around, above, below, beneath—ringing out this tune— "For His mercy shall endure, Ever faithful, ever sure." Oh, let the Hell drum be beaten as loudly as the devil can beat it and let affliction come from Heaven, earth and Hell all at once—as long as we know that God's mercy endures forever, our mouth shall be filled with laughter and we shall boast in the name of the Lord! …