Psalms for the Summer: Will He Defend His Honor : Psalm 79

Hello, you are listening to Second City Sermons,

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sermon. God Bless. Lord, we ask that you would

illumine our hearts, you'd open our eyes, that

we would receive this word, a word that is a

Psalm that's not very well known, a part of your

church's history that's not terribly well known

or understood well. God, I pray that having spent

this time, we would understand your kindness

to us, even in discipline. that we would have

a greater hope that you will make the world right,

that you will make good on your promises, that

our faith would grow. God, now may the words

of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts

be pleasing in your sight, the Lord, our rock

and our Redeemer. Amen. All right, I know because

I know many of your stories that many of you

have experienced great calamities in this life.

My guess is that many of you have experienced

disasters that have really kind of changed how

you understand the world, maybe changed the course

of your life. I know I have a good friend who,

when he was in college, his house burned down,

the house he was living in. And he said, you

know, most of the stuff that he lost were relatively

speaking, maybe trivial things. but they were

also significant because some of them were like

family photos and a guitar and things like that.

Things that may be in the grand scheme of things

may be sort of diminished by many of us, but

he's learned even through that experience to

cherish kind of things that we might consider

small. Some of you have gone through marital

separations and divorce. You've tasted something

that is joyful and lovely and life -giving that

became a reason for weeping. For sorrow for questioning

your decisions, right and your judgment judgment

And maybe also invited you to consider How you

contributed to the mess of it all? Some of us

have sat down with doctors to receive the outcomes

of biopsy Cancer is so prevalent, right? And

sometimes we've we've heard it going into remission

Partial or complete. And sometimes, actually

even in the life of our church, it was sort of

a spontaneous remission. Miraculous, but not

always. Sometimes it comes back. Of course, I

shared about our dear sister Donna. If you are

not familiar with her story, this time last year

she was regularly going to the Y for water aerobics

a few times a week right down there on Front

Street. The last 10 months, she has been in and

out of hospitals and rehabs and care facilities

and back to care facilities and hospitals. And

it's been a long journey. The fact is, is that

life is often tragedy to tragedy. Just presents

itself that way. So two falls ago, if you can

remember back then. We looked at the first 11

chapters of the book of Genesis. And in many

ways, we took that instead of kind of going through

the whole thing in part because those chapters

are an introduction to the Bible. Where's this

beginning and what's going on here? It's a good

place to start. And then there we saw what we

were made for. We were made to live into the

goodness of God, to life within His creation

and life with Him, to walk with Him, to talk

with Him. depend on Him for our provision and

our protection, to delight in His presence with

us. But of course the story, we don't get a lot

of that there. Very quickly we learn of our rebellion,

deciding that we know how to do life better,

now that we have a better sense of what this

life should look like, and we lived into this

rebellious way. And if you can think back on

those sermons, or maybe you can just think back

on those chapters, many of you probably know

them. What you'll remember is that this rebellion

results in death, in family division, in the

destruction of creation itself, in the elevation

of the self over against God and His place. but

also it has this rippling effect into creation

and a devaluation of creation and of human life.

What those 11 chapters that introduce the Bible

show us is that the world is badly, badly in

need of grace and of redemption. That's kind

of the setting up of the rest of scripture. In

a way, you get to the end of those 11 chapters

wondering Will this God who made this world and

declared it good and walked with his creation,

will he make good on some of the promises that

he made his world? Will he continue with it?

And we have glimpses that he will, Genesis 3

.15. Sometimes it's called the proto -aewongelion,

if you want to sound like a theologian to use

words like that. It just means the first good

news, the first gospel, the beginning. where

we heard that the seed of the woman would crush

the head of the serpent, right? That one day

all of this tragedy and all this rebellion would

be put to death. We also get a glimpse of that,

sort of a little look into this promise of God

for his world in the covenant of Noah. Oh, it's

echoing creation all over the place in that story.

But the story of rebellion continues. It just

seems to keep continuing in that. And so, So

as those first chapters come to an end, we're

introduced to Abraham, right? Abraham, and we

have this blessing of God to Abraham, that God

would bless Abraham and the whole Abrahamic family.

And through that blessing of Abraham, the blessing

of the world would actually come. So you're supposed

to get to that and you're like, oh, God is utterly

committed to this creation. He looks upon it

and he knows how rebellious it is. And yet he

is committed to its wellbeing. A particular blessing

to Abraham, but a blessing for the whole world,

a commitment of God to his creation. So we continue

the story and we get to the end of Genesis and

the beginning of Exodus, but then that very family

that is supposed to be the blessing to the world

is in slavery, right? So God saves them and he

brings them to Mount Sinai. We've been looking

at the 10 commandments. And the same commandments

were to be given to this kingdom of priests,

this holy nation, as Exodus 19 tells us. What

were they to do? They were to live with God in

such a way that the world, they would be reflecting

God to the world, a kingdom of priests saying,

look at the Lord. And if we kept continuing after

the commandments, we would learn about how the

tabernacle was built and where it was placed

was placed right in the midst of the community.

And it was furnished with things that would evoke

Eden, this place, this perfect place where God

dwells with his people as things were meant to

be, right? The tabernacle right there in the

community, and it would follow them along as

they journeyed to the promised land. And for

those first hundred years, they were in the promised

land, that while there, God said, I'm going to

be with you. And that initial sort of creation

promise, those early covenants, those early promises

to his people would come to fruition. And so

then we have the temple built under Solomon there

in the city of Jerusalem. But all of this, this

is what I want you to understand, all of this

was because God was committed to his world. In

the context of rebellion, God was saying, I am

committed to grace. to restoration, to the goodness

of what I made, even in its rebellious state.

Here's the thing, there's an ecstasy and an agony

all throughout the Old Testament. And to be honest,

they're the New Testament and in our own time.

The ecstasy is that the world would be redeemed

and God is acting. That God would dwell with

us, right? I mean, that's part of the thing.

God, in the midst of His people, there in the

tabernacle, He establishes His home there in

Jerusalem, His temple. And all that was saying,

one day God will make it all right. What's the

agony? The agony is that the dark, tragic fact

of all of it. that the people that were called

to be this sort of rescue mission for the blessing

of the world are themselves the one that are

in sore need of rescuing. And they're the ones

that are so often living the life of rebellion

and rejection of God, and so often Israel lived

the way of the world. Rejection of God. So far

from being a sign of God to the world, kingdom

of priests, they were the sign of rebellion,

of rejection, of living however they wanted to

live. And so the story seemed to continue again

and again throughout the Old Testament, time

and time again, they would rebel, they would

reject God, the very people who were to be priests

to the world, very people that needed saving.

So the culmination of this, I know this is sort

of a long introduction, but the fact is that

you can't really understand Some texts of scripture

without having all this. The culmination of this

rejection and the culmination of God's discipline

happens when the Babylonian empire comes and

it ransacks Jerusalem. This happened in 586 BC.

It came and it raised not only the city, but

the very place where God made his home, the temple.

The place that said to... Israel as a nation,

to the people of God, I am utterly committed.

I know your rebellion and yet I am here and I'm

going to make it good. That place, the temple,

was razed to the ground. They rejected him by

persisting in their idolatry and their social

injustice and their constant rejection of the

prophet's warnings. And so the place where God's

promise in some ways was most clearly seen was

itself taken apart, stone by stone, right at

the ground. This is the backstory of Psalm 79.

This is why actually, even to this day, every

Friday afternoon, this Psalm is said aloud at

the Wailing Wall. That wall, which is the second

temple wall, right? In Jerusalem there. It's

also why this psalm can be found in the Jewish

liturgy that commemorates the very day of the

destruction of Jerusalem. This is what's going

on in this psalm. It's the psalm of Asaph. I

don't always read the little title thing, but

I wanted you to hear that, and partly why I wanted

you to hear that, because the last few psalms

have been psalms of Asaph. And actually, if we

went back to Psalm 74, which was last summer,

We'd see, actually that Psalm is very similar

to this Psalm, but that Psalm kind of walks you

through, actually, it's more Asaph walking God

through the city. And listen to some of what

Asaph says there. In Psalm 74, direct your steps

to the perpetual ruins. The enemy has destroyed

everything in the sanctuary. Your foes have roared

in the midst of your meeting place. They set

up their own signs for signs. meaning they put

up idols in the midst of the temple. They were

like those who swing axes in a forest of trees,

just cutting everything down. And all it's carved

wood, they broke down with hatchets and hammers.

They set your sanctuary on fire. They profane

the dwelling place of your name, bringing it

down to the ground. They said to themselves,

we will utterly subdue them. They burned all

the meeting places of God in the land. That's

what Asaph is crying out. He's sort of walking

through the streets with God saying, look. Look

at how they wield the axe. Look at how they destroyed

it. Look at how they took even your temple, your

sanctuary down to the ground. Look at it all.

Look at the destruction of this place, which

was to be this picture of your commitment to

the world. The blessing of your people for the

life of the world. All right, the background.

Let's turn to Psalm 79. Still have it open. I

don't, so I'm gonna turn there. Psalm 79. When

we turn to Psalm 79, we're told, I think the

big thing we're told is what we're to do in this

kind of perplexity. And what do you do with this

kind of scenario? The very hope that we kind

of long for, that the blessing of God to the

world seems to be utterly taken away. What do

we do in the confusion of destruction in the

midst of a loss of hope? And I want to just suggest

to you two things today that this passage is

pointing us towards, what to do with it. And

the first one is literally just bring it to the

Lord and then hang on to God. Okay, bring it

to the Lord and then hang on to God. So the first

four verses, actually, yeah, I'm going to read

All four, I'll kind of break it down into two

sections. Oh God, the nations have come into

your inheritance. They have defiled your holy

temple. They have laid Jerusalem in ruins. They've

given the bodies of your servants to the birds

of the heavens for food, the flesh of your faithful

to the beasts of the earth. They've poured out

their blood like water all around Jerusalem and

there was no one to bury them. We've become a

taunt to our neighbors mocked and derided. by

those around us. First, here's what I want you

to hear, okay? In the midst of this awful scenario,

what is Asaph doing? He's saying, Lord, look

what's happened. He is bringing it to God. That's

what he's doing. He's not just kind of saying,

forget it. He's saying, Lord, look at what happened.

He's bringing it to the Lord. And he does this

sort of in two ways. First, he cries out for

the honor of God. These are those first two verses

there. And I think most likely, hopefully because

of how I read it too, did you hear the repetition

of your? The first thing he's doing is saying,

this is about your honor, Lord. It's your inheritance,

he said, it's your temple, it's your saints,

it's the flesh of your faithful. Which is to

say, this is not just tragedy that's happened,

it's sacrilege. And that's part of what he's

doing. He's saying, God, this is your thing.

In some ways, this is your honor that's being

taken away. This is your promise that you made

that through this people, you'd bless the world.

He's bringing it to God, but he's also pleading

the very honor of God in this Psalm, these first

couple of verses. Second thing is he expresses

the extent of the pain. He's not hiding anything

back, right? Verses three and four. They're pretty

intense. They've poured out their blood like

water all around you. He's showing God the horrible

extent of this devastation. And there's no one

to bury them. We've become a taunt to our neighbors.

They lie unburied in humiliation. And he says,

God, you need to see this. He's bringing it to

the Lord. The extent of the tragedy of it all.

Being left unburied was sort of the great humiliation

in the Old Testament. To be buried was to be

honored, to have your body, even in death, be

treated with honor. And this was to be treated

as less than human, sort of less than an animal

even. The animals are the ones that are devouring

it there. It's to be disposable. The very people

of God are being treated as though they are disposable.

And he is crying out to the Lord with this. And

he says that they've actually become a ruin and

have been mocked. I'm going to get into this

a little bit, but what you have to understand

is passages like the Jeremiah 10 passage. Because

part of what has happened is because the shepherds

of Israel have rejected the Lord. that this is

actually the people of God who have been unfaithful

to the Lord. And this destruction has happened

and they've become a mock to the nations. They

have been raised to the ground, but they've also

been a laughing stock to the world. So let me

tell you a couple of accounts, little anecdotes

from church history and how the church has rejected

the ways of God and has become a laughing stock.

Most common folk in the 14th century thought

the church was rather a joke. It was a place

of perversion and wickedness. It's probably one

of the high points of the wickedness of the church.

Gone were there even the semblances of holiness

among the leaders, sacramental integrity, a commitment

to the scriptures. It was out the window. At

various times, you know, probably there were

two popes. For a little while, there were at

least three and one account that I heard said

that there were as many as seven at one point

that had their own kind of College of Cardinals

saying, I should be the one in power. Probably

many of you have learned about the Great Western

Schism when there was a papal throne in Avignon

in the south of France, and then there was the

one in Rome. Maybe you know that from actually

1409 to 1415, there was a third one in Pisa.

I mean, there was just all this vying for power.

Of course, why was one in France and why was

one in Italy? Well, it was the politics of the

day. We want our own French pope. We want our

own Italian pope. There's this vying for the

ways of this world. I learned actually when I

was kind of reading about some of this this week

that even as recently as the mid 20th century,

there were significant debates within the Catholic

Church about what is actually the proper papal

line of the line of Peter because of the mess

of it all. One thing I heard in a lecture was

that at one point the King of England and his

regent, which was John of Gaunt, largely because

they were sort of harboring John Wycliffe. the

great Bible translator and early reformer. They

received nine letters of excommunication in one

month. And part of it was because there were

just multiple people sending them. Listen to

this. I think this actually illustrates what's

going on. Just the mess of it all. This is Dante,

who was himself a devout Catholic. And he wrote

pretty famously against the corruptions of one

of the most corrupt popes ever, Pope Boniface

VIII. This is his Canto 27th in his Paradisio.

And it's the Apostle Peter that's speaking here,

which you will know likely was, according to

Catholics, the first pope. So this is what he

says. He who on earth usurps my place, my place,

my place that in the sight of God's own son is

vacant now. He said, it's so corrupt, it's empty.

Has made my burial ground a sewer of blood. a

sewer of stench, so that the perverse one who

fell from heaven here above can find contentment

there below. He's saying that Rome, the throne

of the papacy, was a sewer of blood and a sewer

of stench. He's saying that Satan, who fell from

heaven, that's the image there, can find contentment

in the church. That's Dante sort of walking through

the ruins of the very place where God's blessing

was to rest in such a way that it went for the

blessing of the world and saying, look at the

destruction. Look at what happens when the people

of God just want to rebel and live for themselves,

live the life of the world about them. More recently,

and I'll be honest, I don't have all the details

of this, but more recently, in fact, this summer,

the Presbyterian Church in the United States

of America had an overture brought to their General

Assembly by a Presbyterian in New Mexico. And

that overture was recommending something which

seems very reasonable. That overture was recommending

that ministers live only in monogamous relationships.

It was an overture for ministers against polygamy.

That overture was deemed administratively out

of order. And they set up a study committee to

study whether or not they should recommend such

an overture. Now, let me say, again, I don't

know exactly why it was deemed out of order.

Probably could have read up on that a little

bit more. But the fact that they decided we ought

to study whether ministers should not enter into

polygamous relationships is a blight on the church.

And that body as a whole, you may know, was in

1983 at 3 .1 million members and today is barely

over a million members. But what is happening

is, look Lord, the very body that is to be your

blessing to the world, that is to present you

to the world, is in destruction, it's in ruins.

Look, bring it to the Lord. In the perplexity

in life, in the perplexity of the state of God's

people, which we could, of course, go into so

many stories of the church itself not acting

for God and actually receiving His just discipline.

We could go into so many stories, but in the

perplexity in life, in this kind of a state of

God's people, in this reality that we are so

often the problem, part of what this psalm is

saying is bring it to the Lord. Plead His honor.

Speak to Him the extent of the destruction. But

the second thing I think, the second big thing

I think this text is telling us is speak to the

Lord and hang on to God. Hang on to Him. And

I think this is kind of, the rest of this is

sort of this appeal. So verse five says, how

long, O Lord? We're just saying that, didn't

we? Say, how long? And that cry, how long is

found throughout the Psalms, is found throughout

much of scripture. But that is a cry truly of

saying, Lord, where are you? But it is a cry

directed Godward and as if to say, I am holding

on, right? Hang on to God. It's a cry of faith.

How long is a cry of faith? It's a cry of perplexity.

It's a cry of wonder. It's a cry of saying, Lord,

where are you? But it's a cry of faith. So a

few things that I think Asaph does as he hangs

on to God, a few things that are kind of mentioned

here on to God. One thing that Asaph does, and

again, this is reiterated for us a ton in the

prophets, particularly Jeremiah, who's experiencing

this utter destruction. One thing that Asaph

does, he understands that God's discipline is

always just. He asks how long But he doesn't

say that the discipline isn't warranted, right?

So how long, the Lord, will you be angry forever?

Will your jealousy burn like fire? Jealousy in

the scripture is what God is jealous for what

is rightly His, right? It's rightly His. So His

discipline, which is coming out of His just anger

and His just jealousy, is something that is right.

God has a holy jealousy, and sometimes this text

even says that holy jealousy burns like fire.

Which is to say that Asaph knew that they had

been rebellious, that they had turned from the

ways of the Lord, that they had not sought Him,

that they had not been the blessing to the world

that they were called to be. He knows that God

had been merciful to them, even in His judgment.

He knows that they have suffered in a way even

less than they deserve. He understands that God's

judgment is just, that is part of hanging on.

The other second thing, he does ask that God

would punish those who hurt him, hurt them. So

this, okay, verse six, pour out your anger on

the nations that do not know you, on the kingdoms

that do not call upon your name, for they've

devoured Jacob and laid waste his habitation.

I won't pretend that these are easy words. These

are not easy words, are they? I mean, they're

not. They're words that come up in Scripture

here and there, but they're not easy for us.

They can be hard to hear. After all, we are told

to forgive our enemies, right? To pray for those

who persecute us, to bless and do not curse.

But we also need to be careful to not be too

easy on those who do evil. This is how I wrote

it out, because I wanted to be careful here.

We can be lazy in forgiveness, which we often

aren't, right? We're not eager or quick to forgive.

We can also be lazy for justice, to call out

wrongdoing and ask God to act and to stop it

and to put it to an end. And the Bible doesn't

have a hard time saying both of those things.

And he says, as you hold on to God, do this.

What Asaph didn't know though, is that justice

would come and it would be God who brought it.

God's the one that brings justice. He's the one

who properly brings justice here. Third thing

he does is that he asks for forgiveness. Verse

eight, do not remember against us our former

iniquities. Let your compassion come speedily

to meet us, for we are brought very low." I think

about this, the people are experiencing this

utter devastation of their whole civilization.

Economics are gone, right? Socially, many people

have been taken out from Jerusalem. Think of

Daniel and his buddies. They were taken to Babylon,

right? Jeremiah will, of course, write to the

exiles in Babylon later on. So socially, it's

all messed up. Religiously, the temple itself

has been razed to the ground. But he is saying

there is an aspect in which we are complicit

in the sin that brought this about. He's not

just wanting to throw it off on someone else,

but he's actually willing to say, Lord, how have

I contributed? And can you have mercy on me?

Which is to say, Asaph does not excuse sin away,

which is something that we are so tempted to

do. He doesn't brush it off. Rather, he acknowledges

their own complicity and the rejection of God

and need for His forgiveness. The fourth thing

is that he asks for the glory of God. Verse nine,

listen to this. Help us, O God of our salvation,

for the glory of your name. Deliver us and atone

for our sins. for your name's sake." Verse 10,

why should the nations say, where's their God?

Let the avenger of the outpoured blood of your

servants known among the nations before our eyes.

What he's ultimately doing, he's asking God to

work in their midst and in the midst of their

perplexity for the sake of his name in the world.

He's saying, Lord, if this has happened to your

place and to your people, won't you become a

laughing stock? Why is it the case that the church

seems to run so often to the world? Lord, make

the church holy. Help us to be repentant people.

Help us to be a people that seek justice and

love mercy for your name's sake. That's what

he keeps going back to. God's discipline is just.

He brings justice to those who do wrong. He forgives

sin. And all of it, all of this is for the sake

of the Holy name of God. So in some ways, what

I've done is share with you the story of the

Bible. I began with the beginning. We kind of

slow, we walked rather quickly actually for the

first, through the first couple of books. And

then we got to this crazy story of the destruction

of Jerusalem by the Babylonian Empire. But what

I kind of wanted to show you through that small

snippet, like that quote from Dante, and even

this small snippet of this overture that came

before this other denomination this summer, was

that in some ways, this is the story. That we're

living in this kind of perplexed place of saying,

God, what's happening in the world? Why does

your church seem to ebb and flow and faithless?

Why is it sometimes good in a way for you to

say, I need to bring my discipline to the church.

They need to learn repentance. And why do we

need to cry out, Lord, bring honor to your name?

People are looking at the church, Lord, and saying,

what a joke sometimes. God, listen. God, hear.

So I begin with the beginning of the Bible, and

just as a way of ending, I want to point us to

the end of the Bible. So the first book in the

Bible is Genesis, which means the book of beginning,

and the last book of the Bible is the book of

Revelation. You probably know that Revelation

is notoriously difficult to understand at points.

There in Revelation chapter six, There are the

Four Horsemen. The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse,

which has sort of become like, it's just part

of our cultural language now, the Four Horsemen

of the Apocalypse. Some of you may know that

the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse are a reference

to four football players from Notre Dame who

beat the army in 1924. I doubt it, may know that

it's the name of a restaurant in Brooklyn. Some

of you may know that the Four Horsemen of the

Apocalypse are also four things that will predict,

likely predict, a marital divorce, according

to Gottman. In Revelation, the Four Horsemen

refers to conquest, war, famine, and death. Conquest,

war, famine and death. And that was the experience

of the people of this song. And often it has

been the experience of Christians throughout

time living in this world where it seems as though

conquest of the church, destruction of the church,

the death of the church, war within the church

is what is so prevalent. The experience of God's

people, the experience of the world over. Some

probably of the experience of this Psalm may

be your experience, maybe in a communal life,

maybe in a personal life, I hope not much. But

no doubt you've had these sorrows upon sorrows,

these tragedies upon tragedies that have caused

you to question, God, what's happening? What's

going on? No doubt you've had times that you

brought to the Lord in anguish, recounting all

the destruction. I hope you've had times of hanging

on to God in the midst of a world that feels

so much in upheaval, crying out for justice,

maybe crying out for forgiveness, maybe crying

out for the glory of His name. My guess is that

if you've been a Christian for a while, you've

looked at the state of the church and you've

said, God, bring honor to your name. Bring honor

to your name. Why do the nations mock and laugh?

Well they're in Revelation. We don't only just

find the four horsemen of the apocalypse. The

main character in Revelation is the lamb who

was slain. The main character is the one who

experiences to agree this conquest and this war

and this famine and even death. The main character

is the lame of God who takes away the sin of

the world. And there in that book we find in

some ways the culmination of the promises made

there in chapter three of Genesis, culmination

of what is promised there in Genesis chapter

nine, the culmination of what is found there

at the covenant in Exodus 20 and all throughout.

That God always makes good on his promises. That

in the midst of a world that feels like the Psalm

79, God, what is happening? Is the blessing of

the world that you've promised, will it come

about? And the message there is that it will.

That there will be a day when our cries for justice,

when our cries for forgiveness, when our cries

for a new life will be heard fully and completely.

They will be answered. There will be a day when

death is no more. There will be a day when crying

and tears and pain are no more. There will be

a day when the anguish of crying out, how long

will be met with now? And all of it will be because

Jesus himself came into this very world. That

Jesus himself received the pain of this world

into himself. that Jesus himself went to the

cross through death to the empty tomb for the

sake of this world that has so constantly been

in rebellion and rejection of him. In a way you

could say it is all because Jesus himself went

through conquest and war and famine and death

for us. So what do we do? What do we do when

we're in this kind of scenario? Truth be told,

we are not in the exact kind of scenario. Similar

things that cause us to question, to wonder,

what do we do with the perplexities of our experiences?

What the psalmist is saying is, bring it to the

Lord. Cry out for His honor. Lord, I am your

child, whom you love, whom Jesus died for. Meet

me in this pain. Why do you seem to stand far

off? Cry out the Lord's honor. What else should

you do? Bring it all before the Lord. Bring the

stuff that you want to hide away. Think of how

gruesome this was. Blood strewn throughout the

city of Jerusalem. Get it all to God. And bring

it to Him and remember. Remember the blessing

of God to the world. Remember His promises of

God to the world. And remember most of all that

Jesus Jesus is the great picture of God's love

for us. It is his utter commitment for us that

the fact that God did not spare his own son,

but gave him up for us all. How will he not,

at least at some point, give us all things? Let

me pray for us. Lord, we have a Psalm that is

foreign to us and a history that few know well.

and actually a history that is so unsettling

in a way. The texts are unsettling, the extent

of destruction is unsettling, and yet we live

in a world, we live in a world that is so utterly

unsettling, so perplexing. We go through trials,

tragedies, that are so great they test our faith,

they make us wonder what you are up to. And yet,

Lord, here again, we're called to cry to you,

to bring it to you, to hang on to you, to cling

to Jesus, the author and the perfecter of our

faith. Gotta pray that we would be those who

in the midst of trial, in the midst of tragedy,

who might give these kinds of psalms to our lips

to cry out to you, to plead for you to act. to

plead for you to forgive us when we need that,

to plead to you to bring your justice, to plead

with you to defend your honor for the glory of

your name. God, when we look at the church and

we have so many reasons to wonder why it's the

church, not the beacon of light that it is called

to be the source of your blessing to the world.

These kinds of times, Lord. Would we look to

these psalms? And more than anything, would we

look to Jesus? I pray this all in His name. Amen.