Hope for the Hopeless
Psalm 39
Jim Davis
Writing messages on the first 41 Psalms is a melancholy journey to say the least. Listening to the heart rending cries psalm after psalm of those living troubled lives. Yet, as we contemplate our own personal heartaches and struggles, it is not that far removed from the everyday life many of us live. Facing failed plans, unanticipated struggles and set backs, death of love ones, pandemics, troubles resulting from personal moral failures can be extremely stressful.
These psalms allow us to identify with the writers as we struggle with our own problems. Their ancient world produced the same heartaches as our modern world. We can identify with the feelings. The specifics of their troubles are not revealed. I think this allows us to closer identify with what they are going through. Since, we have experienced very similar seasons in our lives. We experience the same hopelessness as we seek to understand the reason behind our troubles and the meaning of life.
The Psalms instill hope in the hopeless. In their troubles and losses they maintain their hope in God. I saw a prayer on the internet suggesting, when my life loses a sense of purpose and meaning, I should ask God to not allow me to lose my hope in him. At times I desperately need to pray this prayer.
At times our struggle and confusion becomes as unbearable as the psalmists.
Psalm 39:1-6
1 I said, “I will watch my ways
and keep my tongue from sin;
I will put a muzzle on my mouth
while in the presence of the wicked.”
2 So I remained utterly silent,
not even saying anything good.
But my anguish increased;
3 my heart grew hot within me.
While I meditated, the fire burned;
then I spoke with my tongue:4 “Show me, Lord, my life’s end
and the number of my days;
let me know how fleeting my life is.
5 You have made my days a mere handbreadth;
the span of my years is as nothing before you.
Everyone is but a breath,
even those who seem secure.6 “Surely everyone goes around like a mere phantom;
in vain they rush about, heaping up wealth
without knowing whose it will finally be.
The psalmist anguish increases as he seeks to control his thoughts and words and actions. He seeks to bridle his tongue by suffering in silence. Yet, his anguish drives him to a breaking point. It forces him to speak.
Seeking to be patient and suffer in silence until it all started making sense was too much. He cries out, “But my anguish increased . . . my heart grew hot within me. While I meditated, the fire burned; then I spoke with my tongue . . .” (v. 2-3) “Show me, Lord, my life’s end and the number of my days; let me know how fleeting my life is.” (v.4)
In essence he asks, when will all this end and what is the outcome concerning my life. The writer finds himself in the midst of a phantom existence wondering what his end is going to be. He observes people running around building seemingly meaningless lives. “Surely everyone goes around like a mere phantom; in vain they rush about, heaping up wealth without knowing whose it will finally be.” (v. 6)
He feels his life fleeting away before his eyes--he tries to make sense of it all--he cries out for relief. In the insecurity he faces he pleads to know how his life will turn out—what lies ahead--where will it all end? Will there be any real relief? Will it ever make any sense?
We live in world where enough is never enough. We binge watch a season of a TV show in a day on Hulu just to escape the boredom of life. Sometimes we just can’t put our phones down. We wonder what else is there to do with my time. We start feeling the words of the song “Killing time is killing me.” Eventually we come to the point of feeling meaningless with nothing better to do. It all seems pointless.
Looking around he observes those who seem to have a secure life. Yet they are but a breath away from leaving all they have behind. It seems so foolish. Leaving it all behind without a clue of who will end up with everything they spent a life time accumulating.
In his anguish he driven to acknowledge his only hope is in God.
Psalm 39:7
7 But now, Lord, what do I look for?
My hope is in you.
He manages to hold onto his faith in God. He thinks his troubles are God’s punishment for his transgressions. He embraces the responsibilities for all his transgressions. Perhaps he is thinking confession and repentance will reverse his troubles. Just maybe it will put life in reverse? Maybe it will fix his problem.
In his confession there is a cry for help!! “Look away from me, that I may enjoy life again before I depart and am no more.” It is not a cry for God to leave or dessert him. It’s a cry for a reprieve from what he believes is God’s discipline. He is hoping that forgiveness will resolve his problems or at least make them endurable. He is hoping that his circumstances might be altered by God’s forgiveness and deliverance from his transgression.
He is hoping God will relent in his punishment so that at least it would allow him to endure whatever remains of his miserable life.
Psalms 39:12-13
12 “Hear my prayer, Lord,
listen to my cry for help;
do not be deaf to my weeping.
I dwell with you as a foreigner,
a stranger, as all my ancestors were.
13 Look away from me, that I may enjoy life again
before I depart and am no more.”
The psalm is a cry of utter failure—a cry for relief. We find similar words in Psalm 88:
Psalm 88:1-5
1 Lord, you are the God who saves me;
day and night I cry out to you.
2 May my prayer come before you;
turn your ear to my cry.3 I am overwhelmed with troubles
and my life draws near to death.
4 I am counted among those who go down to the pit;
I am like one without strength.
5 I am set apart with the dead,
like the slain who lie in the grave,
whom you remember no more,
who are cut off from your care.
Hope of the Afflicted Never Perishes
Taking this journey through the psalms allows me to understand that regardless of their circumstance the writers maintain their hope in God. I can see this resounding hope throughout the psalms.
Psalm 9:8
But God will never forget the needy;
the hope of the afflicted will never perish.Throughout salvation stories we find those who hope against hope.
Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations, just as it had been said to him, “So shall your offspring be.” And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.
Abraham hoping against all hope sounds unreasonable. Yet, it is the kind of hope that saves. It is the kind of hope that does not bring shame. There are times when we hope for things we have no real hope of happening---but you hope for it anyway.
Sadly, people do this every day buying lottery tickets. They stand in line every week to buy the lottery—I watch the look of disappointment as the lady runs the ticket through the machine and they come up losers. No big surprise to me—then they buy another hand full of lottery tickets. That’s hope against hope in the real world—in a lost world.
Maybe you know someone that needs to make some serious changes in their life. You hope and pray that change will come for that person. While at the same time you have no realistic hope that they will ever change. Yet, you keep praying and hoping.
Each of us has our own haunting troubles. It may be something that has been haunting you all your life. You have prayed and resisted the thorn in your own flesh that just will not go away. It maybe an addiction, an attitude, a temptation that preys on you especially in troubling times. Yet, the weakness is the one thing that keeps you crying out to God for help. It may be that one thing that makes you realize your total dependence on God. It may end up being the one thing that helps me maintain a constant hope in God.
Psalms 40:12-13
12 For troubles without number surround me;
my sins have overtaken me, and I cannot see.
They are more than the hairs of my head,
and my heart fails within me.
13 Be pleased to save me, Lord;
come quickly, Lord, to help me.
Clinging to hope has saved many in unrealistic situations. I watched a documentary about four men on a boat that capsized off the coast of Australia. They were caught up in a storm. The boat stayed afloat and they were trapped inside as the boated floated bottom side up. They cut a hole in the boat to escape to the outside. They clung to the boat to survive. It was their only hope. They had no life raft. Rescue teams searched for them for weeks and finally gave up the search after all hope was exhausted. Those men managed to stay alive for 3 months as they drifted with the currents. They fished and learned how to use what little they could salvage from the boat to survive. They devised a system to catch enough rain water to survive just as they were at the point of total dehydration. They finally drifted ashore after months at sea. No one believed they were at sea that long until sometime later. They found the boat they survived on and it was proof. It was such a hopeless situation that no one believed their story. They maintained their hope while having no realistic hope for survival.
Maintaining your hope in God is a realistic hope as you hope against hope. Throughout life we are often saved by hope as we cling to what seems unrealistic.
Romans 8
23 Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies. 24 For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? 25 But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.
Patiently waiting for what we hope for is much easier said than done. Solomon writes, “Hope deferred makes the heart sick . . .” (Proverbs 13:12).
Solomon also says, “but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life. (Proverbs 13:12) When we reach the end of that long sorrow filled tragic journey and receive what we hoped for it is a tree of life. Heaven will be worth it all; it will make the world pale into insignificance.
Throughout the biblical stories of salvation we see those who speak to God in hopeless situations.
Abraham and Sarah waited for a promised child until they were literally to old to have children. Abraham finally laughingly asks God to allow his promise to come through Ishmael. After all they were well past the age of having children. Yet, they held on until all hope was gone from a worldly point of view. That is hope against hope.
Gideon delivered his people with 300 men as he was wrestling to understand what was happening. When God ask him to deliver his people, Gideon asks, “If you are with us, why is all this happening to us?” Yet, he did what God ask him to do anyway, as he hoped against hope. It worked.
We need to open our eyes to God’s presence regardless of our troubles.
2 Kings 6:15-17
5 When the servant of the man of God got up and went out early the next morning, an army with horses and chariots had surrounded the city. “Oh no, my lord! What shall we do?” the servant asked.
16 “Don’t be afraid,” the prophet answered. “Those who are with us are more than those who are with them.”
17 And Elisha prayed, “Open his eyes, Lord, so that he may see.” Then the Lord opened the servant’s eyes, and he looked and saw the hills full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha.
If we could only see ourselves surrounded by heavens armies in every battle we face life would be less stressful. It doesn’t mean it will alleviate all our troubles, it doesn’t mean we will not have to deal with the same problems. But it is gives us strength to endure just to know we are not alone.
Conclusion:
Life is full of decisions and consequences for the choices we make and choices made by others we had no control over. Choices create the circumstances we live under. Some of those circumstances are a blessing and some bring God’s discipline. Others are just part of living in a fallen world.
We can use these troubles to help us look inward as the psalmist is doing. Handled correctly these troubles can give us a new lease on life as we seek a deeper relationship with God.
When we get that new lease on life we can rejoice with the psalmist:
Psalm 40
1 I waited patiently for the Lord;
he turned to me and heard my cry.
2 He lifted me out of the slimy pit,
out of the mud and mire;
he set my feet on a rock
and gave me a firm place to stand.
3 He put a new song in my mouth,
a hymn of praise to our God.
Many will see and fear the Lord
and put their trust in him.4 Blessed is the one
who trusts in the Lord,
who does not look to the proud,
to those who turn aside to false gods.
5 Many, Lord my God,
are the wonders you have done,
the things you planned for us.
None can compare with you;
were I to speak and tell of your deeds,
they would be too many to declare.
