“When Theology Doesn’t Work” Psalm 44

It’s Psalm 44 this morning. Psalm 44. The Psalms are so good for us as God’s people. They are written by God’s people and they’re for God’s people. Many of them are addressed to God himself, and that’s what we see in our Psalm this morning. And it’s often in the Psalms that we find so much help, so much help for our daily life John Calvin said the Psalms are an anatomy of the soul, and that is so true.

The Psalms are where we often turn when we face difficult or confusing circumstances. We find that we can identify with the psalmist often because he shares his true feelings. He shares what is on his heart. He shares those raw emotions that we all face from time to time. And that’s what we’ll see in Psalm 44 this morning.

Two weeks ago while I was in California, one of the sermons that we heard preached was Dr. Austin Duncan preached on Psalm 44. And ever since he preached that, that psalm’s been on my heart. So I thought it would be fitting to focus on that this morning and share with you all what God has to say to us in this psalm. In fact, I borrowed the title that he used for this sermon. He said he borrowed it from a commentator himself. And it’s such a fitting title, and that’s the title I’ve used is, When Theology Doesn’t Work. When Theology Doesn’t Work.

Psalm 44 is different than many psalms. In fact, it’s one of the hardest psalms for many to understand. The reason why? Number one, it’s a lament. It’s a congregational lament. It’s not just the lament of one man. It’s a lament of the whole congregation, of all the people. And it’s a lament of people who are faced with hard circumstances, circumstances they don’t understand. And the difficulty in understanding this psalm as compared to others and even compared to other lament psalms is that this psalm does not end positively. A lot of the laments express the emotion and the complaint, and then they turn to God and are lifted back up. And many see this psalm as just a downer. I’m going to show you that that’s not necessarily the case, but it is one of the psalms, one of the laments that is often left as a conundrum for commentators and Bible scholars because it’s so depressing. It’s so down.

As one commenter says, in this psalm, Yahweh’s people complain that though they have been faithful to Yahweh, he has nevertheless cast them off and refused to bless them and keep them. And that’s really on its face what you see here. And that makes no sense compared to what we know about God. We think, well, when we’re faithful, that means God will bless me and he will keep me and he will keep me from harm. And that is not what we read in Psalm 44. Why does God sometimes meet faithfulness with disaster? It’s as if these people have concluded that the theology that they know, what they know about God, it’s not working in their situation. This is not the way it’s supposed to be.

So this psalm is a bit different. What do you do when your theology, when what you know about God, What do you do when your theology doesn’t line up with what you’re seeing? What do you do when what you see in your life, what you see before you, the circumstances that are arising, they don’t square with my theology? This doesn’t make sense. This isn’t the way it’s supposed to be. That’s the question before us this morning.

So to begin with, I’m going to read our passage, the entire Psalm, Psalm 44. This is the word of the Lord. For the choir director of the Sons of Korah, a mascal. Oh God, we have heard with our ears. Our fathers have recounted to us the work that you did in their days. In the days of old, you with your own hand dispossessed the nations. Then you planted them. You afflicted all the peoples. Then you cast them out. For by their own sword they did not possess the land, and their own arm did not save them. But your right hand, and your arm, and the light of your presence, for you favored them. You are my king, O God. Command salvation for Jacob.” Through you, we will push back our adversaries. Through your name, we will tread down those who rise up against us. For I will not trust in my bow, and my sword will not save me, but you have saved us from our adversaries. And you have put to shame those who hate us. In God, we have boasted all day long, and we will give thanks to your name forever. Selah. Yet you have rejected us. and you brought us to dishonor, and do not go out with our armies. You cause us to turn back from the adversary, and those who hate us have plundered us for themselves. You give us as sheep to be eaten, and have scattered us among the nations. You sell your people for no amount, and you have not profited from their price. You make us a reproach to our neighbors, a mockery and derision to those around us. You make us a byword among the nations, a laughingstock among the peoples. All day long, my dishonor is before me, and the shame of my face has covered me because of the voice of him who reproaches and reviles because of the presence of the enemy and the avenger. All this has come upon us, but we have not forgotten you and we have not dealt falsely with your covenant. Our heart has not turned back and our steps have not deviated from your path. Yet you have crushed us in a place of jackals and covered us with the shadow of death. If we had forgotten the name of our God or spread our hands to a strange God, would not God find this out? For he knows the secrets of the heart. But for your sake we are killed all day long. We are counted as sheep for the slaughter. Arouse yourself. Why do you sleep, O Lord? Awake, do not reject us forever. Why do you hide your face and forget our affliction and our oppression? For our soul has sunk down into the dust. Our body cleaves to the earth. Rise up, be our help. and redeem us for the sake of your loving kindness. This is the word of the Lord.

This is a worship song of God’s people. This is the song they would sing in their worship. And this psalm is directly addressed to God himself. There’s 26 verses in this Psalm, and the words you and your are specifically used 36 times, not to mention the times it’s implied. This is directed specifically at God. And it is not the most cheerful of tones. It is not what you would think of in a worship service. In fact, it sounds like God’s people have a beef with God. They know who God is and they know what God can do, and they’re confused as to why he hasn’t done it.

We as God’s people, we love to hear the theology of God. We love to think about the greatness of our God, the power of our God. We even sing it. My God is so big, so strong and so mighty. There’s nothing my God cannot do. God is able to do anything. He is all powerful. He’s omnipotent. He can do whatever he wants to do. Psalm 115 verse 3 says, but our God is in the heavens, and he does whatever he pleases.

In fact, there are actually things God cannot do, and even those things bring us comfort. There’s a book called 12 Things God Cannot Do, and in this little book it explains from scripture things that God, because he’s God, can’t do. Things like God can’t learn, God can’t be surprised, God can’t change his mind, God can’t be seen, God can’t bear to look upon sin, God can’t change, God can’t be lonely, God can’t suffer, God can’t die, God can’t be tempted, God can’t lie, and God can’t change. So even in the things that God can’t do, we’re comforted.

Because those things do not contradict the omnipotence of God. In fact, they enhance our understanding of God’s power. God always operates as God. He always acts according to his nature and his being. He doesn’t violate himself in the way that he acts. He doesn’t violate his character. God is always God. So even in the things he can’t do, that brings comfort in his power.

But even with all of this high theology of God, there are times where it seems like that’s not enough. There are times when we still have a hard time understanding. Even though I know that’s true about God, there are times where my circumstances make it difficult to hold on to that. Times when it’s difficult to believe that God is good. Times when it’s difficult to believe that God is working all things for my good. What do you do then?

What do you do when you lose your job? When you can’t find a new job. When you get that call from the doctor. When your mom has cancer. When your daughter has cancer. When your dad dies. When you lose your baby. What do you do then? What do we do then? I know we put on a good face and we tell everyone we’ll be fine. God is good and I’m trusting in God. But what do you do when you’re alone with your thoughts in those moments? What happened to our good God in those moments? That’s when this gets real.

That’s when we have a hard time with our theology that God is sovereign and God is good. And that never changes. My God is so big, so strong and so mighty, there’s nothing my God cannot do. All the time? Really?

That’s exactly the reality that we are confronted with in this psalm this morning. In times of crisis, times of catastrophe, when our world is shaken to its core, it’s in those times, when our theology doesn’t make sense, that we need to trust in God. We need to trust in who God is. It’s in our worst times that we are reminded that God’s godness is our only hope.

Many see this psalm as a song of doubt, that the author is doubting God. Don’t read this psalm that way. Like I said, many laments end with the psalmist reminding himself of God’s goodness and that everything will be okay because of who God is. Most laments end on a high note, and this one doesn’t. And what do we do with that? Well, I think the author leaves us in this lurch of our hard times contrasted with God’s goodness for a reason.

This psalm was probably written after a military catastrophe, as you see in the different paragraphs here, when God’s people were invaded and taken captive. We don’t really know the exact circumstances. Maybe it was when God’s people were dragged away from their homes and put into slavery in a pagan nation. We know that many in Israel, including the kings, were unfaithful in that time, that they turned from God. But not everyone. Remember Daniel and his friends. They remained faithful. They still feared God throughout their captivity. There were still faithful Israelites.

Maybe it was written during those times by a faithful remnant. Whatever the situation was, this was a time of great despair. We see it says, from the choir director of the sons of Korah, a Maskil. So we know that this wasn’t a psalm of David. The psalm was not written during the good times in Israel. Even though David had his hard times, that was still the golden age of Israel. This was much later than David.

And it’s a song for God’s people to sing corporately. There’s a lot of corporate concern here. The word we occurs over and over. And it was sung by the people of God in a time of crisis. In a time of what seemed like abandonment. Where is God? It was a time that conflicted with what they knew about God. They knew very well that God can’t sleep. And yet it says in the very last lines, awake, oh God. That’s where we identify with this psalm.

That’s where we identify with these people. It’s in those times where what we know about God is in conflict with what we see. When we want with all of our being to cry out, God, what gives? What’s going on? Where are you? When our life, when our crisis and our circumstance comes up against our belief in who God is and the omnipotence and sovereignty and goodness of God, that’s when we need a song like this. In fact, this song teaches us not to doubt, but to trust. When what we know is not enough, we trust. We need to trust what the Bible says about who God is, even when our circumstances aren’t telling us that. It is times like this that strengthen our faith, to trust the character and nature of God, no matter what’s happening in the world around us.

As I said, this is a Maskil. There are 13 Maskils in the book of Psalms, and that word really means it’s a wisdom psalm. And what that means is it teaches us how to put our theology into practice, how to take what we know and make it work in our life. That’s exactly what we’ll do this morning with Psalm 44. This song puts our theology to the test. It shows us what to do when our experience doesn’t line up with our theology. We need to see life through the lens of God’s truth.

It’s been said by some that this psalm is a miniature version of the book of Job. In the book of Job, he is met with disaster, and he’s never told why. He’s told to trust. Just like the book of Job, this psalm has a lot to teach us about our life, about our suffering, and about our faith. What do we do when our theology doesn’t work? We rely on our faith.

This psalm divides up into five different parts, and they all have to do with faith. We’ll see in verses one through three a foundation of faith, Then in 4-8 we have a witness of faith. 9-16 is the problem of faith. 17-22 is a pleading of faith. And verses 23-26 are a prayer of faith. So let’s look at this psalm this morning.

Our first division here is verses 1-3. the foundation of faith. Oh God, we have heard with our ears, our fathers have recounted to us the work that you did in their days, in the days of old. You with your own hand dispossessed the nations, then you planted them, you afflicted the peoples, and then you cast them out. For by their own sword they did not possess the land, and their own arm did not save them, but your right hand and your arm and the light of your presence for you favored them.”

This psalm begins like many psalms do, reminding us of God’s work in the past, because that’s where we start. We’re reminded of what God has done in the past for his people. It speaks of the faith of our fathers. It’s the, oh God, our help in ages past. That’s why we sang that this morning. That’s how Psalm 90 starts. That’s what’s on display here in these opening three verses. They’re looking back at God’s work in the past as the basis for their faith. We trust in God, firstly, because of what he’s already done. What we’ve seen him do. what we’ve heard that he’s done. And that’s the very place we find ourselves.

We look to the record of God’s word. We look to the Old Testament. That’s why the Old Testament is here. So we can read about what God has done to show himself to his people, to deliver his people. We read those things and we believe them. We trust in them. Because of what he’s done in the past, I know what he will do in the future. He starts with, our fathers have recounted to us, they’ve told us of your deeds in the past. Verse two, he talks about the conquest. This is from the book of Joshua, where Joshua leads the people into the land and God drives out these nations. Joshua 24, he says, God sent a hornet to drive out all the peoples. The Israelites didn’t conquer the land on their own. It wasn’t their skill or their power. He says, it was your right hand and your arm and the light of your face. Not of works lest anyone should boast. That’s how God works. It’s not what you do, it’s what he does.

The message in their testimony focuses on the sufficiency of God. That’s where he starts. God is enough. God has done it in the past. We trust him. This is a reminder of Deuteronomy 6. He says, our fathers have told us just like they were supposed to. Moses said in Deuteronomy 6, tell this to your children, teach it to them. They did. They’ve heard. Our fathers told us. They know how to walk and talk and live because of what their fathers taught them.

And in verse three it says, no, it was not by their sword that they won the land. It was not by their arm. It was by your right hand and your arm in the light of your countenance. This is a God-centered retelling of history. This would include God’s working among the patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. His working through Moses to deliver the people from Egypt. His sustaining them in the wilderness. As I mentioned, their conquest of the promised land. God’s working through the kings and even the exile and return. Not to mention the messianic hope that he gave them in the Old Testament. All those things that we remember from the Old Testament.

Salvation is what’s in focus here. God has delivered them. He has saved them. And he says, all of these deliverances, all these things were because of you, oh God.

History is important. We need history. We need to know history. History teaches us. We need to know our history. It’s like when you go to the doctor’s office and you have to fill out your family medical history. Did your dad have heart disease? Did your grandma have diabetes? All these questions you have to fill out. That stuff’s all important. You need to know that stuff. Although someone should probably tell the doctor’s office so they don’t immediately shred that paper so I have to fill it again next time I go to the doctor’s office. But history is important.

Think about history in the Old Testament like they just mentioned. Think about one specific instance, the Battle of Jericho. It’s important that we know the details there because that was some real military genius on behalf of Israel, wasn’t it? They were given this plan to walk in circles around the city in broad daylight for everyone to see and blow their trumpets. So much for the element of surprise. And then God knocks down the walls and says, have at it. It’s yours. Why did God do it that way? Why do we have those details? Why do we need to know that history? God did that to show them this isn’t you. This isn’t you. He did that to show them who he is. He purposely gave them the most incompetent battle plan there ever was so that they could say God gave us Jericho. We didn’t win Jericho because we knocked down the walls with our trumpets. God gave us Jericho.

That’s why history is important. And the history of God’s people in the Bible is your history. It’s God’s story, but it involves and it implicates you. Because as a recipient of the same kind of grace he favored them with, you are God’s people if you’re in Christ. He begins here with the foundation of their faith, what he’s done in the past.

And that brings us to verse 4, which is the witness of faith. He starts with a foundation, and then the psalmist turns to their day, their witness of faith. He says in verse four, you are my king, O God. Command salvation for Jacob. Through you, we will push back our adversaries. Through your name, we will tread down those who rise up against us. For I will not trust in my bow, and my sword will not save me. But you have saved us from our adversaries, and you have put to shame those who hate us. In God, we have boasted all day long. and we will give thanks to your name forever. Selah.

Verse four brings this to a confession of these people. They’ve heard what their fathers have done in the past, what God has done through them, and now they begin to say, we have seen it too. God didn’t just work back then, he’s been working now.

He starts with verse four. You are my king, oh God. He says, command salvation to Jacob. The word salvation means full victory. It’s a holistic salvation of their people, of their nation. And he says, for Jacob, which is a word for Israel. It’s another name for Israel. He says, we will push back our enemies and we will tread down our foes. This is ultimate confidence in the power of God. Because he says, you have saved us. You put to shame those who hate us. He says, not in my bow will I trust. And my sword will not save me, but you have saved us.

This is big God theology. We boast in God and we will give thanks to your name forever. Amen and amen. This is really good theology. These people have God right. They have salvation right. It’s grace alone, faith alone, for the glory of God alone.

And you see the selah there at the end. We don’t have the specific translation of that word, but we know at least it means to pause and think about what was just said. It’s as if the psalmist is saying, think about that. All of the things God has done in the past and then God has done for us even now, stop. Think about that for a minute. They needed to dwell on the reality of who God is and their faith in him. They couldn’t just rely on verses one through three. They couldn’t just rely on the faith of their fathers.

You can’t rely on your parents’ faith. You need to trust in God for yourself. What is said in verses four through eight needs to be true for you. You need to trust in God, in Christ alone for your salvation.

We read from the Second London Baptist Confession of Faith every Sunday. Why? because it’s an anchor to the past. It’s a reminder that almost 500 years ago, there were churches who were very similar to us in belief. We aren’t making this up as we go along. We confess what they confessed, but the confession is not our authority. It’s a reminder. God’s word is our ultimate authority, and each one of us, each one of you, needs to make belief in what God’s word says a reality in your life. You can’t rely on what your parents believed. You can’t just rely that, well, I go to a good church, so that’s good enough.

What we see in verses four to eight is that when it moves from the historical to the contemporary, that needs to become true in your life. They’ve learned their lessons from their fathers, but they made their faith real in their own life. And this is so comforting and stabilizing for us. It’s a reminder that in every age, God is still the same. It’s the same truth. It’s the same salvation, the same deliverance. But now it’s being enacted and lived out in this church. God still saves. If you’re a believer in Christ, even a very young believer in Christ, this is not your parent’s church. This is your church. This is your responsibility to believe the truth, to live out the truth. and to keep the truth. We think about the history of God working with his people and we think about the history of God working in us. That’s the witness of faith in verses four through eight.

And then we come to verse nine. He says, yet you have rejected us. You brought us to dishonor. You do not go out with our armies. You cause us to turn back from the adversary. And those who hate us have plundered us for themselves. You give us as sheep to be eaten. You’ve scattered us among the nations. You sell your people for no amount. And you have not profited from their price. You make us a reproach to our neighbors, a mockery and derision to those around us. You make us a byword among the nations, a laughingstock among the peoples. All day long my dishonor’s before me, and the shame of my face has covered me. Because of the voice of him who reproaches and reviles, because of the presence of the enemy and the avenger.

This is the problem of faith. This is the problem that their faith has brought them to. This is the problem that their theology isn’t lining up with what they’re seeing. Verses nine through 16 are like a record scratch right in the middle of this psalm. It’s like someone pulled the emergency brake and the tires are squealing. This is a worship song and it was cruising right along at normal worship altitude and then all of a sudden it comes crashing down. The disasters and the difficulties and the trials and the tribulations, they’ve burst upon the scene. Everything changed in a moment.

And we’ve all had moments like that. Everything changes. When everything comes crashing down, maybe it’s a call from the doctor’s office. Maybe it’s a call from a family member. Maybe a test result comes in. And in those moments, everything seems to be upside down. Like, can I confess and repeat all of my theology? I can do it with the best of them, but what good does that do me now? And that’s exactly why this song is being sung. Because now the gears have come to a grinding halt. And the storm clouds are forming. Now what do we do? Now what? Think of those moments where you’ve had the now what moment.

See, these people can’t reconcile what’s happening to what they believe about God. What they believe about the favor of God, the strength and salvation of God. God, you’ve done all these things. Look at what you’ve done for our fathers. Look at what you’ve done for us. And verse 9 starts with, yet. We believe all that’s true, but look at it. Look at what’s going on. And again, this is a common occurrence for God’s people throughout history, for us.

And this is why the Psalms don’t give us the exact details of what specifically they were going through, because this is a reality for God’s people for all time. And sometimes we just can’t reconcile what we know with what we see. This is the song that Job needed to sing. This is the song that the exiles needed to sing. This is the song that every hurting believer that doesn’t understand why God is doing what he’s doing needs to sing. This is a song for you and for me.

A couple years ago we studied in our men’s study the book by Jerry Bridges called Trusting God. And there’s a line in that book that is so memorable. And it’s because he says there’s two ways you can read this. There’s one short little sentence. Can I trust God? You can read it, can I trust God? Like, is it within my capacity of faith to be able to trust God? Can I do it? Or, you can read it, can you trust God? Like, is God trustworthy? Is God able to be trusted?

And now immediately we think, oh, that’s an easy question, of course He can. We read that all over the Bible, God can be trusted. Until you recognize that God is sovereign over the bad stuff too. Not just when things are going great. Not just when you get the good news, or you get the promotion, or you get the sale. It’s when stuff starts falling apart. And those storm clouds are coming in. God’s sovereign over those things too. None of those things happen without God specifically saying so.

We read Job as though, oh, the devil got one over on God and he got to Job. Read Job again. The devil’s before God and God says, hey, have you seen my servant Job? God pointed him out. God pointed Satan in his direction. God did it. So can you trust God?

That’s what’s happening in verses nine to 16. The people feel, just look at the words used here, they feel rejected, turned back, plundered, eaten, scattered, sold out, reproached, mocked, derided, cursed, humiliated, dishonored, ashamed, and reviled. Those are the good guys. That’s God’s people. Sovereignty of God is tough. It’s tough.

One of the great things that we need to acknowledge about this little section of Scripture is that in all of these 26 verses, the psalmist does not blame the enemy. He never blames the nations, the foolish, the wicked. He doesn’t blame them. He never blames them. He blames God. He points the finger, you have done this.

But that isn’t blaming God. He’s recognizing a God-centered view of all things. This isn’t written to accuse God. It’s written to show us that even God is in control of all these things. This is a bad deal we’ve gotten. We’ve been sold out. We’ve been sold at no cost. We’ve been mocked. A

nd now God’s name is being drug through the mud. That’s what you see in verse 13. You make us a reproach to our neighbors, a mockery and a derision to those around us. He’s saying that this reproach has come upon us. It’s come upon God too. He’s saying the nations are mocking you because of what you’ve let happen to us. He’s saying, oh, those are God’s people? What kind of a God is that, that would allow His people to go through such things?

It’s one of the reasons why Job’s friends were so bad at this. Because ultimately, what they kept coming back to is, this can’t be God’s fault, it’s your fault, just admit it. And they were wrong. And many people still think those things today. They think because things are not going well for them, it must be God’s judgment in my life. I must have done something wrong. Where’s the problem that I can fix so that God will start treating me nice again? But this song shows us that that is not the case.

Because we see in verses 17 to 22 a pleading of faith. Verse 17, he says, all this has come upon us, but we have not forgotten you, and we have not dealt falsely with your covenant. Our heart has not turned back, and our steps have not deviated from your path, yet you’ve crushed us in a place of jackals, and covered us with a shadow of death. If we had forgotten the name of our God, or spread our hands to a strange God, Would not God find this out? For he knows the secrets of the heart. Before your sake, we are killed all day long. We are counted as sheep for the slaughter.”

It was really the psalmist pleading innocence. He says, we haven’t broken your covenant. We believe in you. We trust in you. We haven’t forgotten the name of our God. He even says, if we had gone to worship other gods, wouldn’t you know? The psalmist is saying, God, I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know. He’s appealing now to God’s omniscience, His knowledge. Not only is God all-powerful, He’s all-knowing. He knows that if they’d forsaken God, they would deserve all this. But that’s not what happened. These people know Deuteronomy 28, where all those curses are listed out, that if you don’t keep the covenant, this is what’s coming. They know that. And they’re explaining, look, we didn’t break the covenant. This isn’t a result of disobedience, but it feels like it. It feels like judgment. So what is God doing?

And verse 22 is key to this whole psalm because he lists out all the reasons that they’re innocent and he says, but for your sake, we are killed all the day long. We are counted as sheep for the slaughter. He says, it’s not because of us that this is happening. It’s for your sake. The suffering they’re going through is unexplainable. And he’s saying that God is doing this. The same God who delivered our fathers. The same God who saved and delivered us. It’s for His sake. We are suffering this. This is a sort of confession of their faith. They haven’t lost their knowledge and trust in God, because it’s for your sake.

Derek Kidner, who has a great commentary on the Psalms, he says that “this verse implies a revolutionary thought, that suffering may be a battle scar rather than a punishment. At the price of loyalty in a world which is at war with God.” This is a battle scar for them. They’re not suffering because they’ve brought it on themselves or they sinned and they deserve it. They’re suffering because they’re God’s people. It’s for his sake. They hate God and they’re just in the way.

This is the psalmist saying, God, we will take all things that come from your hand. We will receive the blessings and the deliverance that you gave us. and will also take the suffering from the world because they hate you. It’s for your sake. This is faith. Sometimes this is what faith looks like, that you don’t understand. It doesn’t make sense. This isn’t the way it should be, but it’s for your sake.

Sometimes our suffering for the name of God is a battle scar. It tests our faith, and it proves our faith. Weak faith only wants the feel-good moments. They only want what’s easy. But when you have true faith, you receive everything that comes from the hand of God. The sign of loyalty between them and God. And sometimes this is why bad stuff happens to God’s people. The prosperity gospel, the health and wealth churches, they have no category for this. Our defeats and our struggles and our sorrows, just like our victories, become a sign of our fellowship with God. And it’s not the alienation that it feels like. It might feel like God has abandoned you, but He hasn’t.

This whole psalm is a testimony of faith. The victory and deliverance in the first half testified to their faith in God and who He is and what He’s like and what He’s done. And the suffering and turmoil and pain in the second half also testifies to their faith. They’re going through this because they’re God’s people. And despite the truth that, yes, sometimes our suffering can be a testimony of our faith, that doesn’t mean we should want to suffer.

Because that’s where verses 23 through 26 come in, and this is a prayer of faith. He says, arouse yourself Why do you sleep, O Lord? Awake, do not reject us forever. Why do you hide your face and forget our affliction and our oppression? For our soul has sunk down into the dust and our body cleaves to the earth. Rise up and be our help and redeem us for the sake of your loving kindness.

He says, wake up, God. Why are you sleeping? This is a bold prayer. He knows God doesn’t sleep. Psalm 121:4 says, Behold, he who keeps Israel will not slumber and will not sleep. God doesn’t sleep, we know that. This is another one of those contradictions. When what we know doesn’t make sense with what we’re experiencing. These times when what we know doesn’t seem to line up with what we see. We know God doesn’t sleep. He never forsakes us. But man, sometimes it feels like it. So what do we do in those moments?

In the last line of this psalm, this last verse gives us a clue. He prays, rise up and be our help and redeem us for the sake of your loving kindness. You see, despite all of the suffering that these people have gone through, all the suffering and humiliation and pain and sorrow that the psalmist has described already, he knows who his deliverer is. He knows who it is he prays to. He still has his faith. He still trusts in God enough to ask for deliverance.

That last word there in our English Bibles is lovingkindness. It’s that great Hebrew word hesed. It’s the all-encompassing attribute of God, His lovingkindness or His love, His faithfulness, His mercy, His grace. It’s a reminder that nothing can stop God from saving His people. When our theology doesn’t line up with our circumstances, we need to trust the one who can deliver us. What we know may not be working in the moment, but when what I know is not enough, I rely on what I believe.

What a great psalm this is. It might be difficult to understand what the author is doing at first glance, but what a reminder of the faithfulness of our God. And before we’re done, you should have recognized one of the lines in this psalm. I read it earlier in the service. I said verse 22 was key to this psalm. And the apostle Paul thinks so too.

Turn with me to Romans 8. In Romans 8, Paul is reminding his readers the faithfulness of God in the midst of their suffering. Paul’s writing to a people who are being dragged out and killed and persecuted and tortured. And Paul himself says in verse 18 of chapter 8, for I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy. to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us. And that kicks off Paul’s description of the glory. He contrasts the suffering with their salvation.

And then in verse 35, he says, who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will affliction or turmoil or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword? Just as it is written, for your sake we are being put to death all the day long. We are being counted as sheep for the slaughter. But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through him who loved us. Verse 35, he lists off all these sufferings, and it sounds very similar to Psalm 44, what that author has just described they’re going through. And then in verse 36, Paul quotes Psalm 44, verse 22. For your sake, we are being put to death all the day long. We are counted as sheep for the slaughter. Now that seems out of place, because he just said, who will separate us? And he quotes a Psalm, a verse about being slaughtered.

But what the New Testament authors often do when they quote the Old Testament is they’re just giving you a clue. They want you to go read the whole context. Go read all of Psalm 44. You gotta remember, Paul didn’t have chapters and verses like we do. He couldn’t just give a reference. He quotes, remember that Psalm. What will separate us from the love of Christ? Will affliction or turmoil or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword? Remember Psalm 44 when they asked for the same thing? God, why is this happening? Why is this stuff separating us from you? And Paul says, remember what they were going through.

He goes on to say in verse 38, I am convinced, I am convinced, right after he quotes Psalm 44, I’m convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. What did the psalmist ask for at the end of Psalm 44? Deliver us according to your loving kindness. And what did Paul say? The love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Paul is saying the prayer of Psalm 44 has been answered. Psalm 44 ends with a prayer that God’s love would come. It ends in confidence and victory. God’s love will come because of who God is, because of his nature, his character, his loving kindness. God’s love will come, and Paul says God’s love did come. The fullest expression of God’s loving kindness is the Lord Jesus Christ.

The same God who split the Red Sea, that very same God revealed himself in Jesus Christ. He brought atonement and defeated sin and death and everything that the psalmist feared. And the psalmist’s experience is the same experience of the persecuted church of the apostles, and it’s the same experience we have today. Nothing can separate us from the love of God. His commitment and His love were proven to be unbreakable in His Son.

So if you’re listening to this this morning and you’ve never understood the love of God, If you’ve never trusted in Christ as your Savior, you need to come to Him. You yourself. You can’t rely on your parents’ faith. You can’t rely on what your church believes. You yourself need to trust in Christ. You need to believe in Him, and you need to trust Him as the payment of your sin today. And then, Because of the Lord Jesus Christ, you can know without a doubt that nothing can separate you from the love of God.

So when our theology doesn’t line up, and there are a lot of days where it seems like it won’t, we don’t just need an old story from the past. We have a powerful prayer of God’s people in every age. We can appeal to that same love that that psalmist appealed to, that love that was demonstrated for us on the cross. That is the basis for faith, for God’s people in every time. No matter what is going on in your life, no matter what is coming down the road that you can’t see yet. The loving kindness of our God has been revealed in Christ. And it’s our faith that gets us through those times when our knowledge isn’t enough. We serve a God that we can trust. And no matter how you ask the question, can you trust God, the answer is yes.

Let’s stand and close in a word of prayer. Our Father and God in heaven, we are humbled by this prayer, this psalm that just expresses so much the emotions and the feelings and the hurt that we feel so often. We thank you that we can be reminded that even when what we know doesn’t seem to be enough, that we can trust, we can have faith in you because of who you are, because of what you’ve done in the past, because of what you’ve done for us now, because of what you’ve told us you will do in the future. We thank you for who you are. We thank you for sending your son as the full expression of your love for us. We pray all of these things in Christ’s holy and precious name. Amen.