A Song. A Psalm of the Sons of Korah. To the choirmaster: according to Mahalath Leannoth. A Maskil1 of Heman the Ezrahite.
88:1 O LORD, God of my salvation, I cry out day and night before you. 2 Let my prayer come before you; incline your ear to my cry! 3 For my soul is full of troubles, and my life draws near to Sheol. 4 I am counted among those who go down to the pit; I am a man who has no strength, 5 like one set loose among the dead, like the slain that lie in the grave, like those whom you remember no more, for they are cut off from your hand. 6 You have put me in the depths of the pit, in the regions dark and deep. 7 Your wrath lies heavy upon me, and you overwhelm me with all your waves. Selah 8 You have caused my companions to shun me; you have made me a horror2 to them. I am shut in so that I cannot escape; 9 my eye grows dim through sorrow. Every day I call upon you, O LORD; I spread out my hands to you. 10 Do you work wonders for the dead? Do the departed rise up to praise you? Selah 11 Is your steadfast love declared in the grave, or your faithfulness in Abaddon? 12 Are your wonders known in the darkness, or your righteousness in the land of forgetfulness? 13 But I, O LORD, cry to you; in the morning my prayer comes before you. 14 O LORD, why do you cast my soul away? Why do you hide your face from me? 15 Afflicted and close to death from my youth up, I suffer your terrors; I am helpless.3 16 Your wrath has swept over me; your dreadful assaults destroy me. 17 They surround me like a flood all day long; they close in on me together. 18 You have caused my beloved and my friend to shun me; my companions have become darkness.4
Footnotes
[1]88:1Probably musical or liturgical terms [2]88:8Or an abomination [3]88:15The meaning of the Hebrew word is uncertain [4]88:18Or darkness has become my only companion
A Song. A Psalm of the Sons of Korah. To the choirmaster: according to Mahalath Leannoth. A Maskil1 of Heman the Ezrahite.
88:1 O LORD, God of my salvation, I cry out day and night before you. 2 Let my prayer come before you; incline your ear to my cry! 3 For my soul is full of troubles, and my life draws near to Sheol. 4 I am counted among those who go down to the pit; I am a man who has no strength, 5 like one set loose among the dead, like the slain that lie in the grave, like those whom you remember no more, for they are cut off from your hand. 6 You have put me in the depths of the pit, in the regions dark and deep. 7 Your wrath lies heavy upon me, and you overwhelm me with all your waves. Selah 8 You have caused my companions to shun me; you have made me a horror2 to them. I am shut in so that I cannot escape; 9 my eye grows dim through sorrow. Every day I call upon you, O LORD; I spread out my hands to you. 10 Do you work wonders for the dead? Do the departed rise up to praise you? Selah 11 Is your steadfast love declared in the grave, or your faithfulness in Abaddon? 12 Are your wonders known in the darkness, or your righteousness in the land of forgetfulness? 13 But I, O LORD, cry to you; in the morning my prayer comes before you. 14 O LORD, why do you cast my soul away? Why do you hide your face from me? 15 Afflicted and close to death from my youth up, I suffer your terrors; I am helpless.3 16 Your wrath has swept over me; your dreadful assaults destroy me. 17 They surround me like a flood all day long; they close in on me together. 18 You have caused my beloved and my friend to shun me; my companions have become darkness.4
Footnotes
[1]88:1Probably musical or liturgical terms [2]88:8Or an abomination [3]88:15The meaning of the Hebrew word is uncertain [4]88:18Or darkness has become my only companion
Redeemer exists to celebrate and declare the gospel of God as we grow in knowing and following Jesus Christ.
Jeffrey Heine:
Good morning. As, the Scotts alluded, we are gonna be in Psalm 88 today. So if you would turn with me in your Bibles, we're continuing our study in the Psalms. We will be in Psalm 88. All right.
Jeffrey Heine:
Psalm 88, let us listen carefully for this is God's word. Oh, Lord, God of my salvation, I cry out day and night before you. Let my prayer come before you. Incline your ear to my cry. For my soul is full of troubles, and my life draws near to Sheol.
Jeffrey Heine:
I'm counted among those who go down to the pit. I am a man who has no strength. Like one set loose among the dead, like the slain that lie in the grave, like those whom you remember no more, for they are cut off from your hand. You have put me in the depths of the pit, in regions dark and deep. Your wrath lies heavy upon me, and you overwhelm me with all your waves.
Jeffrey Heine:
You've caused my companions to shun me. You've made me a horror to them. I'm shut in so that I cannot escape. My eye grows dim through sorrow. And every day I call upon you, oh Lord, I spread out my hands.
Jeffrey Heine:
Do you work wonders for the dead? Do the departed rise up to praise you? Is your steadfast love declared in the grave or your faithfulness in Abedon? Are your wonders known in the darkness? Or your righteousness in the land of forgetfulness.
Jeffrey Heine:
But I, oh Lord, cry to you. In the morning, my prayer comes before you. Oh, Lord, why do you cast my soul away? Why do you hide your face from me? Afflicted and close to death from my youth up, I suffer your terrors, I am helpless.
Jeffrey Heine:
Your wrath has swept over me, Your dreadful assaults destroy me. They surround me like a flood all day long. They close in on me together. You have caused my beloved and my friend to shun me. My companions have become darkness.
Jeffrey Heine:
The word of the Lord. Let's pray. Oh, Lord, you alone can rescue and we are in desperate need. Holy Spirit, strengthen our faith in Christ today. Guide us to truth.
Jeffrey Heine:
Deliver us from fear and confusion. And, Lord, help us to believe. Renew in each one of us the joy of our salvation today. We thank you for your word. May you lead us and comfort us.
Jeffrey Heine:
In the name of the father, the son, and the holy spirit. Amen. When I visit a new city, I like to track down a local bookstore. They're often filled with characters and history. I like to see what the shopkeepers suggest, you know, what books are on the local author shelves.
Jeffrey Heine:
And a few months ago, Caleb Crosby and I went to Denver to attend a conference. And One morning before the conference began, Caleb went to find the local CrossFit, and I went to find a local bookstore. You couldn't tell that by looking at us, I'm sure. But after walking for about an hour from our hotel, I came across this beautiful old building called Tattered Cover Bookstore. And it's been a staple in the local bookstore scene in Denver for close to 50 years.
Jeffrey Heine:
And it's everything that a book lover wants in a bookstore. You know, the wood floors and rows of new books and old books and the big comfy chairs where people sit and they read all day trying to decide if they're gonna buy that book or not. And I went to the suggested, you know, the staff, their recommendations, and I picked up a book for three reasons. Number 1, it said local author. Number 2, it said post apocalyptic.
Jeffrey Heine:
And number 3, I like the cover. That's I'm vain like that. I'm I'm okay with judging the book by the cover, and I picked it up. And, I was needing to to meet, Caleb and so I rang the little bell. Someone finally came out, because I guess they were selling books that day.
Jeffrey Heine:
And so someone finally came out and I purchased the book and I made my way. The book is called The Dog Stars by Peter Heller. And the book is about a man called Bangley and he has lost nearly everything in his life. I mean post apocalyptic, right? So he's lost everything in his life.
Jeffrey Heine:
He has suffered loss and misery. He has very little left in his life and halfway through the book, he suffers another devastating loss. And in the midst of this sorrow, this is what he says about pain. There is a pain you can't think your way out of. You can't talk it away.
Jeffrey Heine:
You can walk one foot, the other foot. Breathe in, breathe out. You can't metabolize the loss. It's in the cells of your face, your chest, behind the eyes, in the twists of your gut, muscle, sinew, bone. It's all of you.
Jeffrey Heine:
When you walk, you propel it forward and then it sits with you. The pain puts its arm over your shoulders. It's your closest friend, steadfast. And at night, you can't bear to hear your own breath unaccompanied by another, and underneath the big stillness, like a score, is the roaring of the cataract of everything being torn away. The pain is lying beside your side close, and it does not bother you with the sound of even breathing, end quote.
Jeffrey Heine:
The man knows a pain that is deep in him, a pain that is his closest friend putting its arm around him, laying down beside him. And depression is a deep pain. It's a deep pain that is difficult to define and difficult to communicate. There are, however, two distinctions that I'd like to offer for our time together today. Number 1, there is the depression that nearly everyone experiences in life.
Jeffrey Heine:
A depression that's like what the man in the dog stars experienced, this deep pervasive sadness. It disorients. It's a depression of sadness that typically has a particular cause. And typically in time, a person comes out of that deep sadness, perhaps not to immediate happiness but to functionality. They come on to that other side of sadness.
Jeffrey Heine:
And then there's a depression that fewer, though many, many people experience. And this kind of depression is the form that author David Foster Wallace described as very different and indescribably worse. He called it a sickness of every cell. This kind of sickness, a sickness that neuroendocrinologist Doctor. Robert Sapolsky argues is the worst disease that a person can be afflicted doctor If your pancreas did not function, you would go see a doctor, you would get some insulin, and you would start to feel better and you wouldn't hide these things.
Jeffrey Heine:
But many of us, even in this room, won't talk about depression, both the deep sadness and the deep sickness and the mix of the 2. And these things are biological and psychological and spiritual, and and we do a real disservice within the church, and when we turn blind eyes to the complexity of life and health. And I'm choosing today to speak concerning both sadness and sickness in this broad definition of depression, not exhaustively, not anywhere close to that, but I believe that today's Psalm, Psalm 88, speaks concerning the breadth and depth of depression, both sadness and sickness and the horrific mix of the 2. This Psalm, the Psalm does not offer steps to better living, no 6 habits to kick depression, no little prayer that turns it all around in the end. In fact, this has long been recognized in the church as the saddest and darkest Psalm in all of this psalter.
Jeffrey Heine:
The poem in Hebrew literally ends with the word darkness. There's no resolve, no word of hope that most laments end with, no word of praise, just darkness. And that makes it a very difficult and precarious song to preach. At the moment, I cannot recall why I offered to do this. It's easy to find Jesus in the Psalms about a king or majesty or the rock of ages, but in Psalm 88, the psalmist drives into the ditch and does not get out.
Jeffrey Heine:
One of the most written about aspects of depression, both the sadness and the sickness is the incredible sense of feeling alone. And now I believe that this Psalm, Psalm 88, exists in our Bibles for many different reasons. But I'd like to highlight 3, three reasons why why this is in your Bible today. Number 1, it is to speak into the darkness and tell you that you are not alone. Number 2, to teach us that we can say these things to God.
Jeffrey Heine:
And 3rd, that we must say these things to God. We should say these things to God. So what is the psalmist saying? Let's look together in our Bibles. There's an inscription at the start of this.
Jeffrey Heine:
I always think that it's good practice for us to look at inscriptions and this one talks about a man named Heman. I'll save you a bunch of research. We don't know who he is. We don't know anything about him. There are lots of essays and writings on it, but at the end of all of them, they just say, we don't know who he is.
Jeffrey Heine:
So moving on. Verses 1 to 2. I think, just to put a pin in that, I think that one of the reasons why we don't know who this is is so we can all access this. We don't know if things got better for him. We don't know his story.
Jeffrey Heine:
But we have these words, these words that he offers in humility and in rugged vulnerability. And so we come to them, verse 1, oh Lord God of my salvation, I cry out day night before you. Let my prayer come before you. Incline your ear to my cry. These are the words of the opening, this petition.
Jeffrey Heine:
And while the Psalm is certainly a lament, the Psalmist is desperately asking God to help him. So verses 1 to 2 are these opening words asking God to listen. And this is not just any random, are you up there, God? Heman, this man is crying out to Yahweh, to Yahweh asking him to permit his prayer to come before him. He's begging Yahweh to listen to him.
Jeffrey Heine:
And then the Psalmist begins to describe his state of trouble. Listen to the different ways he describes his place and his pain. Verse 3, for my soul is full of troubles, My life draws near to Sheol. Sheol, is hell. It's the depths of that distance from God.
Jeffrey Heine:
I'm counted among those who go down to the pit. I am a man who has no strength, like one set loose among the dead, like the slain that lie in the grave, like those whom you remember no more, for they are cut off from your hand. You have put me in the depths of the pit, in the regions of dark and deep. Your wrath lies heavy upon me and you overwhelm me with all your waves. So each line offers this new description of his trouble.
Jeffrey Heine:
Each line describes the hell of his experience and existence and the deepness of his pain is imaged, and the depths that he describes. And he does this to express his pain, and also I believe he does this for us. Let's not forget that the Psalms exist for the people of God. To give words to our crying out, to give words to the pain and confusion that we might feel, to give words to the praise and adoration in our hearts, to give us words. And the psalmist offers rich descriptions of his pain.
Jeffrey Heine:
Troubles, Sheol, the pit, the grave, regions dark and deep. In all of this, the psalmist is describing his despair. This is how the psalmist feels and he's carrying it to God. He's completely overwhelmed with darkness. And not only does he see himself as the one whose life is drawing near to hell, he sees that he's regarded that way.
Jeffrey Heine:
This isn't just what he feels. He's saying that other people look at him like someone who is camped out on the edge of hell. That's how everyone looks at him and treats him. And the psalmist in all of these horrors holds fast to his view of God's sovereignty. When I was a kid and I'd hear about some terrible accident and then the remarkable story that someone survived that accident and I would hear someone say, God was really with them.
Jeffrey Heine:
And then I would hear, perhaps even in that same accident, the other car where someone died, and I would think, where was God with that person? It's great that we're celebrating the nearness and closeness of God here, but what about here? Because not every story is one of survival. Not every story goes into chicken noodle soup for the Christian soul. Not all of them are these success stories that we find strength in.
Jeffrey Heine:
What about these confusing circumstances? What about that? See, here in verses 6 and 7, this is what makes this Psalm so precarious. The Psalmist has Yahweh on the hook for these things. Other Psalms talk about an enemy that's threatening or or an enemy that's persecuting them.
Jeffrey Heine:
But here the psalmist says, you, Lord, have put me in the depths. You have caused my friends to leave me. You are the one who overwhelms me. This suffering, the psalmist says, is because of you. The psalmist knows God isn't sovereign only when things are going well, but that he is sovereign over everything.
Jeffrey Heine:
And it's ultimately God's sovereign hand that is permitting this suffering to come to him. And this stark truth does not lead the psalmist away from God, but it leads him to God. And I hope that as we have been making our way through this summer series, through the Psalms, that you've kind of picked up on this counterintuitive nature of the Psalms. The pain, suffering, confusion, anxiety, all of these things, the real elements of our human life, as they're depicted in the Psalms are actually drawing people closer to God, seeking him. Now I don't think that we could have begun this sermon series with Psalm 88.
Jeffrey Heine:
We kinda had to work our way here to get to a place where we can see something so stark, this heavy, heavy text. I was telling Busby earlier, I like to think of myself as a pretty, like, happy, fun loving guy. I like to joke, and I keep getting texts like this. You know, I I preach Judas and the darkness of of the betrayal, and these things are the real aspects of life. Look at verses 8 to 9.
Jeffrey Heine:
The psalmist says, you've caused my companions to shun me. You have made me a horror to them. I'm shut in so that I cannot escape. My eye grows dim through sorrow. Every day I call upon you, oh lord, I spread my hands out to you.
Jeffrey Heine:
The Psalmist believes that this is not random chance. This isn't mere circumstance. This is under the sovereignty of God that he would be permitted to suffer. And that also means that Yahweh is the only one who is powerful enough, the only one who is authoritative enough to do anything about this suffering. And it's because he believes us that he calls upon Yahweh every day.
Jeffrey Heine:
He holds his hands out to receive whatever the Lord has for him, which might mean more pain and suffering, but he goes to him day and night. Then the psalmist starts to ask these questions. They can come across as kind of a sardonic in their tone, but if you really picture the deep suffering that he's going through here, it's desperately sad. He asks, verse 10, do you work wonders for the dead? Do the departed rise up to praise you?
Jeffrey Heine:
Is your steadfast love declared in the grave or your faithfulness in Abaddon or perdition? The depths, the depths, the depths of Sheol. Are your wonders known in the darkness or your righteousness in the land of forgetfulness? He believes that he is camped at the edge of hell. And here, he is asking God if he works miracles for those in the grave.
Jeffrey Heine:
He doesn't want to die. He wants to live and praise God. In verse 13 he says, but I Lord, oh Lord, I cry to you. In the morning, my prayer comes before you. 14 through 17, he asked, Lord, oh Lord, why do you cast my soul away?
Jeffrey Heine:
Why do you hide your face from me? And then he closes his Psalm by going back to what the Lord has done to him. Afflicted and close to death from my youth up, I suffer your terrors. I am helpless. Your wrath has swept over me.
Jeffrey Heine:
Your dreadful assaults destroy me. They surround me like a flood all day long. They close in me together. And then the last verse, verse 18, he says, you have caused the love of my life and all my friends to shun me. And the only friend that is left is darkness.
Jeffrey Heine:
And that's where it ends. No rejoicing, no resolve, no hopeful the sun will come out tomorrow. It just ends. You know, a lot of Psalms are kind of like nineties sitcoms. 22 minutes go by or 22 verses go by and there's good, then trouble comes, and then there's resolution.
Jeffrey Heine:
And at the end of the psalm is when the soft music plays and the lesson is learned. Danny Tanner sits on the edge of DJ's bed, and he tells her why stealing a sweater from the mall is wrong. Then they hug, lesson learned, and the credits roll. But not here. Not here, not Psalm 88.
Jeffrey Heine:
There's just darkness that lays down next to him, His only steadfast friend. Earlier I said that this Psalm exists for many different reasons but that we would look at 3. Number 1, that you are not alone. Number 2, that you can say these things to God. And 3, that you should, that you must say these things to God.
Jeffrey Heine:
And I'd like us to think through these together. So first, you are not alone. Everything in your heart and mind might feel utterly abandoned and alone, but I want to tell you, you are not alone. This Psalm tells you that men and women of God have gone before you. They have felt as you feel.
Jeffrey Heine:
They have hurt as you hurt, and they went to the lord. In this place, Redeemer Community Church, in this household of faith, in this family, we will not let you be alone. Number 2, you can say these things to God. The psalmist teaches us that we can say these things, that you can express frustration and doubt, fear, pain, anger, confusion. You can express these things to God.
Jeffrey Heine:
The psalmist refers to God as His. Verse 1, Yahweh is His God and the pain and confusion goes to Yahweh. He takes it to him. He isn't crying out to the universe. He isn't crying out to just nebulous good vibes out in the world.
Jeffrey Heine:
No. He's going to Yahweh, creator, sustainer of all things seen and unseen. He goes to him and He says, You are the God of my rescue. You can say these things to God. You don't have to hide.
Jeffrey Heine:
You don't have to wait till you're in a better place. You can cry out from where you are because your cry displays a belief that God is able, and that is the definition of faith. You might not feel like you have a lot of faith, but the cry out to God is a demonstration of something that is greater than you are, that is working in you, what he has begun in you, and that he will be faithful to finish in you. You can say these things to God. And 3rd, you should.
Jeffrey Heine:
You must say these things to God. The psalmist knows that not only can we say these things, but we should. He says day and night, early in the morning, he goes to the Lord in prayer. Because the struggle of yesterday will not become the hopelessness of today. He will go to the Lord again.
Jeffrey Heine:
And I want to speak specifically to those of you who feel like the Psalmist. If the writer of this psalm is is saying words that that you say or maybe want to say, don't know if you can say. I I wanna say these things. You are not alone. You're not alone.
Jeffrey Heine:
I know you feel alone. I know that everything screams inside of you that you are alone, but we will not we will not let that happen here, not in the family of God, not as brothers and sisters who are bought by the very blood of God. We will not let this happen. You might not be okay right now and Jesus is enough. You are not okay right now and Jesus is enough.
Jeffrey Heine:
If you were in the darkness of depression, deep sadness, deep sickness, some painful mix of the 2, I want to be clear as a family, as a household of God, we will not let you sit in the darkness alone. We will whisper, we will sing, we will speak and if need be, we will scream the words of hope in the dark. If that's you, I want you to listen to 2 faint whispers of hope in the dark that we see in Psalm 88. I read a number of theologians in preparation for this sermon, and they emphasized the utter hopelessness of this psalm. And in many ways, that is true.
Jeffrey Heine:
It doesn't end with this hopeful resolve like other psalms, but John Calvin helped me see that while it does not end in a resolve, it begins with 1. Look at verse 1, oh lord, God of my salvation. Do you see the crack of light? The 20th century theologian and martyr, Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote regarding Psalm 88, and he said, even in the deepest hopelessness, God alone remains the one addressed. Of all the darkness found in Psalm 88, there's a sliver of light breaking through.
Jeffrey Heine:
Everything in this Psalm, the hard reality of suffering, the pain so deep that it feels like hell, all of this is expressed in the light of verse 1, the crack of light that says, you are the God of my rescue. It's true. The Psalm does not resolve in hopefulness, but it is born of it. This Psalm is born of hope because in the midst of all this suffering, the psalmist still cries out to God day and night, day and night. The first whisper of hope is that it's lived before the God of his salvation.
Jeffrey Heine:
The second whisper, and for this whisper, we have to go from the darkness of Psalm 88 to the darkness of Gethsemane and Golgotha, the cross. Jesus quotes a lot of Psalms in the New Testament gospel accounts, but Psalm 88 is not one of them. But Jesus lived Psalm 88. Jesus cried out in prayer Psalm 88. He prayed the prayers of the rejected and the suffering.
Jeffrey Heine:
He prayed the prayers of the one cut off, shunned by his friends in utter despair. He prayed the prayers of the one drawing near to hell. He prayed the prayers of the depressed mother, the shattered teenager, the sick brother, the suicidal daughter. He took on the brokenness of us all, and he carried the weight of our suffering so we can be healed fully, completely, eternally. Do the works of wonders happen for the dead?
Jeffrey Heine:
They have. Do the departed rise up to praise you? They do. Are your wonders known in the darkness? They are.
Jeffrey Heine:
When the silence of the borrowed tomb was broken with the sound of the breath of the risen Jesus, When Jesus arose and folded his burial cloths, the psalmist got his answer. God does work wonders in the darkness. The wonder that calls you out of darkness and into marvelous light, the wonder that transferred you from the domain of darkness and into the kingdom of the sun, He has heard your cry. He has inclined his ear to your despair. He has declared his steadfast love in the grave when he raised up the sun to rescue you.
Jeffrey Heine:
And that is all our hope. That is our hope in the darkness. Let's pray together. God, this is a heavy text. This has been a heavy half hour, but this is a heavy life we live.
Jeffrey Heine:
We thank you for the comfort of your holy spirit who whispers in the darkness. We ask that in this time, you would show your loving kindness to us. You would help us to know that we are not alone. We are not alone because your spirit is with us, that you have you have brought us near, that we have been reconciled to you, that you are with us, and that as a family of God, we are with one another. God, help us to know that we can say these things to you and that we we should because we can come to you confident because of the blood of Jesus.
Jeffrey Heine:
So help us to come. We pray this in the name of Christ, our Lord. Amen.