Why Are You Downcast O My Soul?

Sometimes my heart just feels heavy. Sometimes I feel sad and down. This week was the anniversary of a very difficult time in my life. It was a difficult week for me. I really always want to be happy and peppy and up, but sometimes things just don't work out that way. LIFE happens. Things are hard. I love reading the Psalms of David and I used to be amazed at how brutally honest David would be to God with his feelings. I used to wonder why God didn't just zap him when he shared his anger and his anguish and his heart. But I also knew that God said David was a man after His own heart, so there must have been something to his sharing and crying out to God. I've come to realize that while life is hard - God is still good. God is there, He hears our cries and He knows (in the words of Beth Moore) that it is scary to be us. He does not take lightly what we are going through. I am sharing this Psalm today. Hopefully it will encourage you as it has me this week.

Psalm 42

For the director of music. A maskil of the Sons of Korah.

1As the deer pants for streams of water,

so my soul pants for you, O God.

2My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.

When can I go and meet with God?

3My tears have been my food

day and night,

while men say to me all day long,

“Where is your God?”

4These things I remember

as I pour out my soul:

how I used to go with the multitude,

leading the procession to the house of God,

with shouts of joy and thanksgiving

among the festive throng.

5Why are you downcast, O my soul?

Why so disturbed within me?

Put your hope in God,

for I will yet praise him,

my Savior and 6my God.

My soul is downcast within me;

therefore I will remember you

from the land of the Jordan,

the heights of Hermon—from Mount Mizar.

7Deep calls to deep

in the roar of your waterfalls;

all your waves and breakers

have swept over me.

8By day the Lord directs his love,

at night his song is with me—

a prayer to the God of my life.

9I say to God my Rock,

“Why have you forgotten me?

Why must I go about mourning,

oppressed by the enemy?”

10My bones suffer mortal agony

as my foes taunt me,

saying to me all day long,

“Where is your God?”

11Why are you downcast, O my soul?

Why so disturbed within me?

Put your hope in God,

for I will yet praise him,

my Savior and my God.

And here is a link to a short exerpt from a presentation on You-Tube by Beth Moore:
It is Scary to Be Us

I am also linking this post up to Spiritual Sundays. Take some time to visit and read other posts on Spiritual matters that are posted every Sunday.