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 PrintableVersion 'Why do you hide your face?'Advice for hard-pressed Christians from Psalm 44The book of Psalms contains many songs of comfort and encouragement, but there is a voice within the Psalms that is far from reassuring. Instead of projecting heavenly peace into earthly confusion, these other songs are cries of pain and anguish. I find that a great help. When I struggle with crises my depression is often compounded by the suspicion that I shouldn't be feeling this way. And as I open the book of Psalms, what do I find? These great heroes of the faith went through crises that made them hurl angry questions at God. When I see this, it helps me understand that I'm not a dismal exception to the rule that Christians are strong and joyful all the time. Songs like Psalm 44 are included in the worship manual of God's people because its anguished stanzas can speak for us whenever we feel embittered by life's unfairness. Psalm 44 deals with a disturbing problem for God's people. 'Why, when we've been faithful to you, are you inflicting such suffering on us?' The author of this psalm could understand God imposing punishment on them if they had betrayed him by worshipping idols or compromising with the decadent lifestyle of the nations around them. But the people had been loyal to the covenant. Why, then, such terrible suffering? Psalm 44 resonates with so many people because this is a real dilemma for many Christians. In many parts of the world, faithful believers are oppressed and hounded. Even in Britain this dilemma frequently comes to the fore. How often do we find that the most devoted Christians in our churches bear terrible burdens of worry or ill health? Psalm 44 is for such people: it expresses their confusion. Intensifying the painFirstly, there is the reminder of different times (verses 1-3). Israel's history was the story of God's mighty acts. He had led them into the Promised Land, repeatedly rescued them from the threats of their enemies. The psalmist recalls those glorious days because it presented a problem. Why had God now abandoned his people? Sometimes this can be our experience. We look back to the great days of revival and we can get thoroughly disheartened as we face apathy in the church and indifference in the world. such contrasts should stir us up to prayer. 'I stand in awe of your deeds, O Lord. Renew them in our day' (Habakkuk 3.2). But there are times when, like the author of Psalm 44, we simply say: 'What's gone wrong?' So many Christians will find here an echo of their own experience. They have been faithful in Christ's service, yet they are under attack. If this describes your case, you can at least have the comfort of knowing your symptoms are not unique. The author of Psalm 44 understood the confusion that grips you. And a third factor that intensified the pain was his refusal to undermine God's sovereignty (verses 9-16). Many Christians, when they are going through undeserved suffering, comfort themselves with the thought that God would have prevented it if he had been able. Now this is not the theology of the psalmist. Look how he expresses himself: 'You have rejected and humbled us; you no longer go out with our armies' (verse 6). As we read this passage we repeatedly encounter the word 'you'. And it is used most often in connection with active verbs. The writer does not see God as the passive spectator of his suffering, but as somehow actively involved in it. Others may believe that our lives are the playthings of random forces, but the Christian should not. We should cling to the biblical truth that God superintends the events of our lives. He does this in a way that does not rob humans of their responsibility, he certainly does not become a partner with them in evil, but nothing happens without his authorisation. So instead of saying: 'I know you'd have prevented this if you could'. the author of Psalm 44 is forced to acknowledge that God has had a hand in his suffering. And he is left with the question 'Why?' Now this is of great value to us. If the psalmist is puzzled by the way God is acting in the turmoil enveloping his nation, we should not condemn ourselves for feeling similar confusion. We may be afflicted with depression, or overwhelmed with troubles, and it will all seem so unjust. Such anguish is a normal part of our experience in a world that is not yet fully redeemed from the curse of sin. Forgotten factorsBut I want to point to some forgotten factors. We need to remind ourselves of truths the psalmist could not be expected to see as clearly as we do, who live in the light of the new age introduced by Jesus. Our author lived at a time when the general rule was that if you obeyed, God's blessing would follow. So when he obeyed and suffering followed, he couldn't cope. That despair is expressed vividly in verse 22: 'For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered'. But that verse is quoted by Paul and set to a different tune. 'Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written "For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered". No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us' (Romans 8.35-37). The psalmist failed to appreciate that God's people sometimes suffer because they are loyal to God in a rebellious world. Throughout human history a spiritual battle has raged, and the lives of believers have often been the focus for this conflict. So committed Christians ought to expect suffering. 'Everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted' (2 Timothy 3.10-12). In that context the psalmist's complaining phrase, 'For your sake', takes on a different emphasis. To suffer for the Lord is a battle scar to be borne with pride. The cross - God's guaranteeEven more encouraging, no amount of suffering can ever be proof that God has abandoned us. Whatever the turmoil of our lives, nothing 'will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord (Romans 8.39). The cross is God's guarantee that he loves us without condition and without end. Even at our most despairing, God is still in the darkness alongside us. We should also remember that God uses the suffering of his people for positive ends. The author of Psalm 44 rightly saw that none of this grief would have come their way unless God permitted it. What he failed to realise was that God could raise a spiritual harvest from the stony soil of his grief. Jesus spoke not just of his own suffering when he told his disciples: 'Unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies it remains only a single seed. But if it dies it produces many seeds' (John 12.24). He stated a reality that was also true for his followers. We need to remember our Lord's words: 'Every branch that does bear fruit he [God] prunes so that it will be even more fruitful' (John 15.2). We are so painfully aware of the savage action of the pruning knife, we lose sight of the harvest to come from its drastic work. But there will be a harvest! This is always the case with believers; we can always be more than conquerors through him that loved us, no matter what our outward circumstances. I think of Amy Carmichael, young, energetic and wholly devoted to serving God in India. When a cruel accident left her paralysed she must have thought her usefulness was over, she was now a broken tool to be flung away. But her bedroom became the heart of a ministry that spread throughout the world and changed many lives. In Christ, we are never 'more than defeated', we are always 'more than conquerors'! Jeff Saunders,
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