383: Ray Edgecombe - Exhortation: We Can Trust Our God (Psalm 142)

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   Welcome to Good Christophian Talks. Thank you for joining us this week on this podcast. We select one talk a week to help us get the Bible in our Daily News feed. Each week we post a talk that we previewed from suggestions sent in by listeners from around the world. Then we record a short intro beforehand as a personalized recommendation to you on why we are sharing the talk. And now let’s.

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   Talk more about this week’s talk. This week’s talk is an excitation that was given by Brother Ray Edgecomb in March of 2023 at the Enfield Ecclesia in Australia. The topic was we can trust our God. It’s a really excellent study in the Psalms, specifically Psalm 142. And I do enjoy kind of the study he does the unpacking of Psalm 142 and that section of Psalms around it, explaining that this is a Psalm that David is saying in his distress and that we can learn a lot about what to say to our God and our distress.

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   And I think that’s the most interesting for me, the most interesting part of the study was that he kind of spends some time on that growing up in our souls in, in Romans 8. And, and, you know, the idea of communicating without words with our God when we are in the spirit. And I think that’s that’s something that can be very encouraging, which is what Brother Ray points out when we are in times of distress, God is an anchor to our soul as he repeats over and over in this exhort.

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   This exhortation was suggested to us in 2023 and it was suggested again last month when Brother Ray passed after a very brief illness. So our thoughts and our prayers are with his family and with the Enfield ecclesia, and we pray that his sleep is short and that we are united again with our Father. We pray that that day comes soon. In the meantime, here is Brother Reyes exhort. We can trust our God.

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   Brother Chairman and my dear brethren and sisters in the Lord Jesus Christ, as Brother Sam read for us, very importantly, the beginning of that Psalm of the heading. It’s a Psalm, a Maskell of David. It’s a Psalm for instruction, and it was from his thoughts when he was in The Cave, I suggest probably The Cave of Dulham. But this Psalm here we’re going to look at in a little detail, but it’s actually in a bracket of eight psalms. If you come back to Psalm 138, you’ll see that that one’s also headed a Psalm of David.

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   And so is each of the next 7 psalms after that. Finishing in 145 is the last of the bracket of Psalms of David a little, a little cluster of psalms that have been placed here somewhere along the line. But certainly they have a structure to them. They are all written by David. The first two Psalms are very clearly positive psalms.

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   The last two psalms are clearly positive and full of praise. But in the middle there the four psalms, 140 to 143 are psalms of distress as David pours out his troubles to his heavenly Father. And I think as we look at 1:42, we need to realise that Structure 142 is not the end of the story.

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   It’s part of that progress from 1:38, beginning with praise but sinking into despair, but finishing finally as we need to, and we know we want to, with our praise to our God. And we’re going to have a look at the What is the darkest of those 4 central Psalms? 142 clearly, if you come back to 138 again, let’s just establish that pattern clearly. 138 is very positive. Verses one and two.

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   I’ll praise thee with my whole heart before the Elohim. I’ll praise, sing praise unto thee. I’ll worship toward thy holy temple. Praise thy name for thy loving kindness and thy truth. Thy mercy in thy judgement cheers Ed and emeth, for thou hast multiplied and magnified thy word above all thy name. So that Psalm continues in that theme. 139 is along the same lines. It’s a well known Psalm.

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    It praises thee features of God’s creation. Verse 14. I’ll praise thee, because I’m fearfully and wonderfully made. Marvellous are thy works, and that my soul knoweth right well. So these two psalms are clearly very, very positive, and so are the latter. 2 He wonders at the fearfulness and the wonder of the frame that God has made us with in that fourteenth verse. When you come to Psalms 144 and 45, they’re also positive in their conclusion of this cluster of Psalms verses 1 and 2, again of 144.

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    Blessed be Yahweh, My strength teaches, my hands to warm, my fingers to fight, my goodness, God’s loving kindness, my fortress, my high town, my deliver, my shield, and he in whom I trust, who’s a Jew, with my people under me. And likewise the last Psalm in verses 1 and 2. Again I’ll extol thee, my God, I’ll bless thee and bless thy name forever and ever. Every day I’ll bless thee, I’ll praise thy name forever and ever.

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    So this bracket of eight psalms are surrounded, 2 positive at the beginning, 2 at the end. But then these sums of distress, those 4 sums in the middle. So let’s come to Psalm 142.

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    David’s most definitely at one of the lowest ebbs of his life as he pens these thoughts in this Psalm as well as a Psalm of instruction. The heading indicates he was who says there in The Cave. Now that could have been in Getty, but most likely I think it’s more a Dalam because he was definitely there on his own in the first instance and it was after a whole series of events when he fled from Akish, the king of the Philistines in Ghia. When he fled from there, he went straight to this cave in Abarland because he was in distress. He had all of these things that have rolled upon him in these previous few weeks and months.

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    A bleak time in the life of David. We we won’t go there now, but first to Samuel 19 to 22. They’re the the chapters that surround the thoughts of Psalm 142A bleak time despite and probably because of his victories over the Philistines sought to use sought to use David Schweitzmach or to to slay him.

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    The only escape from that to find that Jonathan indeed confirmed with him that Saul was going to slay him. David was forced to break off with his only true friend, Jonathan. Forced to face the peril alone. He went down to the priest, the Hymnalech, and claimed the sword of Goliath, but in the process observed the presence of Doeg the Edomite, and doubtless that sent a shiver down David’s spine. And it was a shiver that was well determined, because Dalek of course, reported that matter to Saul and eventually resulted in the slaying of the priest.

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    An enormous scrape of mine to David that was to happen after this time, but I’m sure he noticed Dalek there and would wonder if the consequences of that action. A flees to Akish, the king in Gare, only to escape by the skin of his teeth. By feigning madness. Psalm 34 expresses his deliverance of that time.

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    All this was weighing on the mind of David alone. Distressed, he comes to The Cave of Dulham. It’s southeast from Gareth, southwest from Bethlehem to coming South. But the golem is not far from both of those places. So let’s have a look then at Psalm 142. The bleakness of His Spirit is clearly evident. You look at the expressions that He uses through this Psalm, verse one and two.

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    I cried unto Yahweh. With my voice unto Yahweh I made my supplication. I poured out my complaint. I showed before Him my trouble. My spirit was overwhelmed within me. In verse 5, no one cared. No man would know me. Refuge failed me. No man cared for my soul. In verse 6 he cried, Attend unto my cry. I am brought very low.

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    In verse 7, bring my soul out of prison. When we string all those thoughts together, we can clearly see the distress of David. But wasn’t he the heir apparent? How did Samuel anointed him to be king over the nation of Israel? Hadn’t he slain Goliath? Hadn’t he slain thousands of the Philistines? As it’s worse all his thousands and David his ten thousands. He was a scourge of the Philistines. How could he utter such sentiments in this Psalm? Distressed brethren and sisters, it distorts our perspective. There’s no doubt David felt all of those things. It was a distortion of reality.

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    But for him, at that point of time, alone in that cave, it was the reality. It wasn’t a distortion. He felt all of that distress. Now, all of us experience some bleakness from time to time. Some of it’s very, very severe in degree. Other times it may be a flaking dissatisfaction. We should note that we should be thankful in our days for the medical services that we can access. We would be most unwise.

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    It wouldn’t take advantage of those health services that are here, available to us in this century. But David knew underneath. He knew he could place his cares in the hands of God. Come back to those first 2 verses again. You notice David doesn’t tell God what he wants him to do. He puts the Massa in God’s hands. In all of his distress.

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    He cries with his voice. He makes supplication. He pours out his complaint. He showed before him his troubles. David does not try to tell God what to do. I think that’s a very important issue for all of us. We have perplexing issues in our lives from time to time. Don’t try and tell God what He ought to do for us or that issue.

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    Place the matter in His hands. Trust in His outcome and you know David was in very good company. Of course you think back to Joseph, you think back to Elijah. You thought he had the answers. They had to go to Sinai to find the reality of that still small voice. You think of Job, you think of Jeremiah, you think of Paul. All of them had occasion to to reach out in distress to our heavenly Father.

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    Paul says even of our Lord in Hebrews 5 and verse 7, in the days of his flesh, in the days of his flesh, he offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears. That was our Lord. The one on the table was no facade. There was no no kind of action that was insincere with strong crying and tears.

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    In the days of His flesh. Our Lord offered up His prayers. We’re in very good company when we pour it out of stress to the God of heaven. There is no place where God cannot be reached, no cave so deep, no despair so bleak. The verse 2 uses the word my complaint. It’s also been translated babbling, interestingly enough, because that’s probably what David was doing, just pouring out his thoughts to his God, not necessarily coherent, not necessarily structured, but in his distress, pouring out his issues before his God and he poured them out.

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    It says there in that verse, I showed before him my trouble. I poured out my complaint. That word poured out means to what’s been translated in other places, cast out, gush out to shed. And we’re getting all of that. The intensity of the words that David offered before he’s gone, you see, doesn’t matter how dark or heavy that cloud may but press us upon our minds if we open up to God, if we pour out our hearts to Him, even if we don’t know what to say.

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    As Paul says in everything, by prayer and supplication, let your requests be known unto God. Don’t, don’t tell God what to do, but open up your heart and let your requests be known unto God. See David’s complaint. His troubles were not petulant outcries. They came from the distress of his circumstances. And we each know, brethren and sisters, when we come before our father, we have the assurance He knew what our distress was before we came, but He will assist us.

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    You come to Romans chapter 8 and verses 26 and 27. They’re somewhat obscure words, but the intent is quite plain. They’re in the context of Romans chapter 8, where Paul is developing the issue of the mind of the Spirit versus that of the flesh. That’s very clear from the early verses. And in summary, in verse 6, for instance, to be kindly minded is death, but think after the flesh to think of after the world to think of normal thoughts that in the end is death. But to be spiritually minded to to mind the things of the spirit to have the word of God in your heart and mind, as tenuous as that might be to be spiritually minded is life and will bring peace.

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    I say that because through most of this chapter it’s got a capital S for spirit. Sometimes it is the Holy Spirit, but I think in most cases in chapter 8, it’s about the mind of the Spirit. That section, hopefully the majority of our thinking which has been channelled by the Word of God. And Paul says in verse 26, that Spirit that goes directed through his word, that Spirit in each one of us helps our infirmities.

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    They help David, they help each one of us. Sometimes we know not what we should pray for as we ought, but confused situation sometimes maybe beyond our control. We don’t know what to ask and it doesn’t matter. Put it before our God. And that spirit mind, because it’s related to God himself, we’ll make it a session with groanings which cannot be uttered.

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    God will see our hearts and minds. He will know the turmoil that is therein. And it doesn’t matter if no word comes out of our mouth, that mind of the Spirit in each of us will be recognized by God. And in verse 27, he that searches the hearts, our God and His Son, they search the heart. They know what is the mind of the Spirit, and He’ll make intercession for the Saints according to His will. They are so comforting, those words that our God and His Son can hear our hearts, even if we can’t express the groanings that are within us, because He will recognise in us the same mind of the Spirit.

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    Might be a small way, but if that mind of the Spirit is in us, He will be able to search that heart. Know that mind, and of course He will act for our good, whatever that may be. We never necessarily know what the outcome shall be, but we can place it in the hands of God and the outcome we’ll be assured. These words are very reassuring.

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    He understands our thoughts, whether we can express them or not. Whether we were able to articulate our dilemma or merely open our hearts to Him, He knows that heart. He knows our situation, no matter how bleak it may seem to us personally. Come back to Psalm 142. We’ll stay here for the rest of the exhort. In verse 3, read there, David’s sinking into absolute despair. His spirit within him was overwhelmed in the way when I walked, I privily laid a snare for me. Everywhere he looked, they could see the hand of Saul trying to entrap him and to take his life.

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    And he was overwhelmed by those events in verse four. He he felt alone. It says here there was no man that would know me. He felt totally alone. No man cared for my soul. But that wasn’t true, brothers and sisters. That was not true, Jonathan. Jonathan cared at this point and beyond for the soul of David and the life of David. Jonathan supported him in his role of becoming the King of Israel.

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    But that’s not what David saw here. He was so overwhelmed that no man cares for my soul. And that’s what distress does for us. It does distort reality. He was so consumed by his troubles, he couldn’t see beyond his despair. And you know we need to contrast, don’t we? Our Lord Jesus Christ, what did he say in similar circumstances?

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    Well, John 16 and verse 32. Behold, the hour cometh, and is now come, that you shall be scattered every man to his own, and shall leave me alone. And what did the Lord say? I am not alone because the Father is with me. That is how great our Lord is. He knew all those feelings of distress, of feeling alone, a feeling that no one cared, but he knew and believed and acted out all the time.

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    God was always there. In verse 6 he ask that God attend to his cry. In verse 7 he says bring my soul out of prison. He wasn’t in a prison president and sisters. He was in a cave, but he felt in his mind that he was trapped. He was locked up, he was shackled. He was bound by the circumstances of his despair. You don’t have to be in a prison to feel trapped. You don’t have to be in a prison to be shackled and bound by the circumstances of the moment.

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    How can our spirits be lifted from such despondency or despite the melancholy of this Psalm? And we’ve made that, I think, quite obvious. There are little expressions in this Psalm that David could hang on to and we can hang on to. There are certainties, there are sureties, there are anchors which we can cling to when those personal storms are raging.

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    You have a look at them in verse 3. It slips in this phrase. Then thou newest my path just a little expression, but you see that indicated a way out. God knows my path. God is constant sang in or we we we read together those meditating words. God is constant He changes not there is no variableness or shadow of turning with our heavenly Father.

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    He knows our path. He said to Job through all the things that but Job went through, not knowing what on earth it was all about. God said to Job, didn’t explain why it happened to him or anything else. Where were you, Job, when I laid the foundations of the earth? My purpose hasn’t changed. I know the path of all my children. You weren’t there in those times. But Job, I have never changed.

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    I am constant. I laid those foundations and I will see them through through the end God said of Jeremiah chapter 1 and verse 5. Before I formed thee in the belly, Jeremiah, I knew you. I knew your path. I knew the way that was mapped out for you. You can have confidence, security, and certainty in that knowledge. The angels of God encamp around his children. As David said in Psalm 34, the the parallel Psalm when we feel like David, just hang on to the certainty that God knows our path.

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    He said with Paul in Hebrews 13 verse five, I will never leave you or forsake you. I know your path. It’s an anchor you can hang on to. Verse 5, he slips in this expression, thou art my refuge and my portion. Thou art my refuge. But he said in the verse before, there’s no one that would know me. Refuge failed me.

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    But in verse 5 he says I really do know that you are my refuge. It’s translated that word refuge, shelter, hope or trust. Jeremiah, whose life was one of unrelenting despair, said in Jeremiah 17 and verse 17, You are my hope, my refuge in the day of evil. The wings of the Almighty, of their brethren and sisters to provide refuge, protection and hope. They’re symbolised in the Caribbean above the mercy seat in the Tabernacle, those wings that that touched each other and were joined to that mercy seat.

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    The almighty power of God to support, to forgive, to protect. We find that kind of expression quite a number of times throughout the Scriptures. God said of Israel, He bore them on eagle’s wings. He said of Ruth in Ruth chapter 2 and verse 12. Yahweh has always said to her, Yahweh, recompense thy work. Yahweh, Elohim, under whose wings Thou art come to trust, Thou art my refuge.

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    Psalm 17 and verse 8. Keep me as the apple of the eye. Hide me under the shadow of Thy wings. Psalm 91 and verse four. He shall cover thee with His feathers. Under Thee His wings Thou such trust. Thou art my refuge. Of that we can be assured, even our Lord. Remember He came to the city of Jerusalem, he wept over it because he wanted that people to be gathered under the wings of the Almighty and they would not. But God is our refuge of that we can be assured under those wings we find another anchor in our personal storms. In verse 5, David said you are my portion. Yahweh is our portion.

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    That word portion is used right throughout the book of Joshua to describe the petitioning of the land. The lots that they cast, That’s the word portion. It’s an inheritance or a lot. Yahweh is our portion of the Lord. It was said in Psalm 16 and verse 5. Yahweh is the portion of mine inheritance. Another little anchor, brethren and sisters, God wants us to share his character.

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    He is our inheritance. He wants us to reflect Him, to be His glory in the Kingdom of God. Hang on to that anchor. In verse 7, David says, For thou shalt deal bountifully with me. Bountifully is translated to good, to reward, to recompense, he says in his last expression There I do. I really know you shall deal bountifully with me. In reflecting on these events, he himself said in Second Samuel 22, verses 2021, that he brought me forth into a large place. He delivered me because He delighted in me. Yahweh rewarded me.

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    He dealt bountifully with me. He was brought forth out of that lonely cave, that mental prison of His mind, into a large place of sunshine and joy. Brethren and sisters, God can deliver. He may do that now. It may not come until the Kingdom of God. Those things are entirely in His hands.

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    But Paul says He will deal bountifully with us if we are exercised by those experiences of life. Hebrews 12 and verse 11 afterward. Afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness to them that are exercised thereby. We grow by that experience. Distress might distort the reality, but we can grow by that experience and it will yield peaceable fruit, at least in the Kingdom of God, if not before.

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    David is in great despondency. But this was the centre of these Psalms, the centre of a cluster that finished in Psalm 145. Let’s look at those words as we conclude our exhortation. Psalm 145 and verses 18 and 19. Here’s his conclusion. Distortion may be the case at times, but in verse 18 of 145, Yahweh is nigh to all them that call upon Him, to all that call upon Him in truth. He will for fear fulfil the desire of them that fear Him. He also will will hear their cry, and He will save them. Yahweh preserves all them that love Him. Brothers and sisters, we come to the emblems, We come to our Lord, we come to the emblems of His victory. He was mistreated, He was unjustly accused, but he opened not his mouth.

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    He was misunderstood by his own disciples, who fled in confusion at the very hour of his need. He said on one occasion, Now is my soul troubled? What shall I say, Father, save me from this hour for this cause came I unto this hour. And we celebrate that victory this morning. Paul teaches us in Hebrews 6 and verse 18.

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    He says to each one of us we have a strong consolation. We who have fled for refuge to hold heck, hold on the hope set before us, which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, sure and steadfast, which was entered into that which is within the vile. Let us take comfort in those words. Thank you for listening to the good Chris Adelphian Talks podcast.

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    God bless and talk to you next week.