All right. Well, what we have here is the expression of the psalmist's complaint in verses 1 to 9 and the resolution of the psalmist's complaint in verses 10 to 20. All right.
Any comments on this psalm? Please come out to call us on... Uh, KB7's action.
I can't believe KB7's action. Go ahead. I'll get started in a moment.
That's wonderful. Uh, introduction match. I really captured, um, the, uh, the schedule of what's going on here.
You know, um, uh, we were, scholars have speculated, like, you know, around the time of the siege or the fall of, uh, Jerusalem there, and, uh, Babylonians, maybe the sanctuary has already been gone and looted, uh, but whatever the case, this is a, um, uh, A song that's affecting the community, affecting all the people here. And we see the cry of the English, the lamentation that it begins with. And then we see, too, in verse 3, how the memory of who God is, really initially starts to bring even more trouble in the heart of the psalmist here, because the way that you recognize that the separation of the God of old when it seems like God is absent in this time of trouble, the memory of God...
It just brings more sadness, more trouble to the heart. He cannot sleep, cannot find peace. Anguish is too much.
But then as he begins to question this, and question this separation from God, and where is God? Because he remembers that the, you know, the contrast when God is present and when God is there, Sometimes you feel abandoned, and you clearly feel completely abandoned here. But then he again reflects on the memory of God.
Here's the transition that takes place in verse 11. The memory of God that brings to mind... and remember the faithfulness of God.
And that God is the same God, the same character of God, the same God that delivered Jacob, the same God that delivered the Hebrews out of Egypt, the same God that delivered Joseph into the promised land, is the same God that lives today. And so that is what ultimately the psalmist leads on to, is yes, the sword can cut both ways, Where do we derive our comfort from? Where do we get our perspective and our stability from?
As you said and well said, it's by looking back at God's dealings with his people in the scriptures. And we say, okay, this is how it's gone for others. There's nothing like lightning to cause a man to think about the vertical issues.
And I thought you were that mad. We had the most greatest display. And what they're saying in these insurance policies is, you know, there's certain things that are not predictable, things we're not in control of.
And, you know, forces of nature are such that they're irresistible, they're uncontrollable, and they are so overwhelmingly powerful that there's nothing that can be done. You just have to stand back. and then go and pick up the mass afterwards.
And, you know, what this does is it's a physical representation of the power of God. Because God made the creation, and God controls the creation, and every once in a while God lets us know we're not in control of this life and this creation and all of those things that go on in there. Thank you.
And what we see here in verse 1 is that this really is a psalm of retrospective. Notice verse 1: "I cried unto God with my voice, even unto God with my voice, and he stayed here to me." So what he's saying is, he's looking at the past. He's talking about in the past when he prayed to God, and he's talking about the fact that God heard.
So this whole psalm isn't about his present circumstance. It's about something that happened to him in the recent past that he went through, and now he's giving a record of that. and of what he was thinking, and about how he dealt with it, and about how God brought him out of it and through it.
So this is a record of a past spiritual struggle brought into the present, so that we can utilize it for our own present circumstances. Alright, any other comments on this section, please come out and call the clerk. Thank you.
I knew I was going to have to follow a little bit of a pattern here, and I said, I'm going to have to listen to you. You were right, and I knew I was going to be a good person. We started with two songs.
We went through accidents, and took us up to time, and it's true. Since I'm 70, I've been doing it for a long time. I've been doing it for a long time.
I've been doing it for a long time. There's a lot of songs that the words tabernacle, temple, house, assembly, and congregation is in almost every song. But if I look back...
They are absolutely ridiculous. There are 27 chapters in the series. And, you know, they are really trying to do something more.
The interesting thing is, they did a last one, the first episode, and it's... Chapter 27, it contains the promises of blessings for Israel, and also the promises of retribution for Israel. And it appears that they are in one of those promises of retribution.
So let's hear what that means. *Gunshot* Thank you. and the tabernacle, and the people of God that congregate together in the worship of God, and the fact that there's 27 regulations in the book of Leviticus for the priests, and there's 27 Psalms in this section, so...
Mark actually was saying that to the instructional makeup of the book of Psalms, that it relates to the five books of Moses. So anyway, these Psalms that are dealing with the Sylvatico faction, all of them mention the temple, the tabernacle, the congregation, and the things that have to do with the worship of God. All right, Mark, good comment.
Thank you for that. Other comments, please come down. ♪♪ Thank you for that.
and the fact that it deals with the blessings of Israel and the retribution of Israel. And he thinks that this psalm is related to the retribution of Israel. Mark, thank you for that.
All right, and Roger, thanks for that follow-up as well. Okay, any other comments on our psalm, please come out. Thank you.
I think I heard Kevin kick me some of the good things. Kevin, please go ahead. Yes, very good.
And Mark has been doing a good job of trying to help with this. You know, the song is broken up into five books, and they do correlate with the Torah, if you will. in different ways.
And so it is interesting as we see them unfold some of the other elements of God's work in revealing his word in himself to future generations through the events of the times. and who are, you know, many times stated as far, but others as well. And, you know, and within that, even what you see here, there's a series of songs, which are kind of grouped together in a particular way as well.
But one of the things in this song, too, I think that really comes out, and you touched on it in the beginning as well, It's true, we see the sovereignty of God at work. And not only the faithfulness, but even when circumstances around us, as you're crying now, you know, I'm talking about crying out in great distress, and you've got E.D.D. who is still at work today, and it's the impression that it's very recent.
It could have been yesterday, it could have been earlier in the week, or whatever the case. And one of the things we see here too, first of all, I think he made an extra point. He didn't shake his fist at God.
He didn't start accusing God. He cried out to God. And despite the horrible circumstances that he just...
is losing sleep over literally. He cannot rest. So it's a trouble.
He cries out to God. And God does hear him. And you know what a heart is, right?
The matter is the trouble of anguish. when we cry out to God, even though we don't see his presence around us, even if we can't look like his presence is around us by the calamity around us, we can be sure that God does hear us. as he heard of this psalmist here.
And the God is a sovereign God. And we see that right after this. As we see through the text, as we move through the waters, you know, as we move through the waters, you don't leave a footprint.
But the evidence of God's faithfulness is certainly there. KB7, that except. Yeah, you're right.
We can't see God. No man has seen God at any time, but we can see the works of his hands in our history and in our lives. So people say, well, you know, where's God?
Well, God is seen in his actions. And so that's the psalmist. You know, we're running out of time, and I want to just really focus on verse 77.
and in Psalm 77, I notice in Psalm 77 and verse 7, he asks a bunch of questions. Will the Lord count us forever? Will we be favorable to no more?
Is mercy going on forever? I promise you, for any evermore of us tonight, has God forgotten to be gracious and be in anger, so that we can tend to mercy? So that's all these rhetorical questions, right?
And I just want to provide some answers to those questions. In Psalm 77, verse 7, he says, Will the Lord be cast off forever? Right?
Romans 11:1 says, "Isaiden has God passed away his people, God forbid." For I am also an Israelite under the seat of Abraham, under the tribe of Benjamin. God has not passed away his people which he foreknew. And in the next question there, "Will you be favorable no more?" Psalm 85:1, "Lord, I was unfavorable to thy land, I was brought back to the captivity of Jacob.
You've forgiven me and made me free of the faithful, you've covered all their sins." And then notice the next question in verse 8a, "Is his mercy clean gone forever?" Psalm 36:1, "I'll give thanks unto the Lord for he is good, for his mercy endures forever." And then in 77.8b he says, "Does this promise fail forevermore?" Numbers 23:19, "The Lord is not a man that he should lie. Jesus is not a man that he should repent. As he said, and shall he not do it?
Or as he spoke it, and shall he not make it good?" And then notice Psalm 77:9a, "Has God forgotten to be gracious?" And it says, can a woman forget her second child that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? Yea, they may forget, but I will not forget. I'll hold that grave in the palm of my hand.
My walls are continually before me. And then he asks this last question in verse 9b, it has to be an angershot of his undermercy. And then it says in Psalm 86, that the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting upon them that fear him and his righteousness to children's children.
So each of these questions has an answer. Alright, that's my point. And that there's other places in the scripture that provides an answer to these questions.
And of course, the answer to these questions is that none of these things are true of God. Because we can look at other verses, we can look at other passages, and we see that these are all false accusations that people make in their minds against God when they're gazing and gazing and crazy thinking. Okay?
You know, when we're in trouble, we have all kinds of crazy thoughts go to our minds. Wild accusations against God. And we have to just control our thoughts and answer our anguish with the promises of God and His Word.
And when we do that, then we find that we regain perspective and we can get rid of that crazy thinking. And that runs through all of our minds, mine included, when things are going really poorly and we're saying, God, what are you doing? Have you forgotten me?
No, I haven't forgotten you, Lord, which you always need at the end of the age. And you quiet your thinking and bring into capture that I ever thought you'd be in the Christ. We've been working all together for good, and we'll supply all of your needs according to His riches in Christ.
We have all these promises that anchor our crazy thinking, and bring it back into control, and into patience and faith. We're waiting on the timing to bring about the solution to... Thank you.
We pray for the Lord to be great for you, but you may not. We have to pray that God will be just as good to us as Jesus for us. We have a church that needs to be more educated, and we need to be more resilient.
Let's go on, let's go on. We have to be confident. We have to be confident.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Thank you. Oh, yeah. We haven´ts heard from her.
I don´d think she´s trying to find a friend out there. She´s wearing a bra. Well, they all have made it out of their wheel.
And they need to help him. We need to meet him. But we can keep it right here.
My friend is a student at MIT. So I am the IT person. He is a fantastic teacher.
I can give you a job. And I´m a great teacher. I'm sorry.
So, don't you just try to expose me to the animals that you would have to feed them. You would be following my The providential demon has been deemed so negative. And yet, Lord, we know, based on our psalm today, that your purposes are good, that your love is permanent, and, Father, that your grace on our seat is at work.
and Keith and Sarah and Caleb's wives. Both of them continue to pray for Ed and fix their situation as brother-in-law Ed and his wife need to sell their home for the mid-at-home sale. Now, Father, he'll head our problem and we know that he's had ups and downs there.
Lord be pleased that he'll head and we'll stand by that. His mom on treatment and radiation. Father, for his prostate cancer, may they both be effective.
And understand he's starting radiation treatment now. We pray for his wife, Martha Faye, and that you would heal her broken stone. Lord, I know how painful that is.
And Lord, may she not have to hobble around any further. Father, continue to pray for Joe Keith, WVD, and his brothers for healing from his head injury. Father, just bless Joe, and I pray that you bless him in his work.
Father Jeff, aka 6OK, shipping out Bibles to the troops. Father, I pray that you would repeat the work of Satan and attempting to bring hindrances to that. May those Bibles get to the troops, may they be read, may the Spirit of God work through them to bring about a new prayer in the lives of those troops.
Father, we pray for your daughter Heather, who has lupus. and his son who has multiple sclerosis. Father, heal the both and drive the chronic diseases into remission, we ask.
Pray for Patty, Lord, that you continue to heal her wrist. And Father, we just pray that the surgery, in fact, would not be needed on that wrist. Father, we just thank you for taking care of the TPO and the good report.
We pray that his pain would continue to be reduced. Thank you. The x-ray came back, and that was a good report.
And Father, things are healing well. And he's going to have another x-ray in six weeks. Pray, Lord, that that will have a good report as well.
Father, I just ask that the healing would eliminate the pain and that Lord Chris would be able to return to normal work and life. Continue to pray for our brother Tom, WW17. Lord, I pray that you supply him with the wheelchair he needs.
May the physical therapy be effective in reducing his pain and increasing his mobility. Father, I just ask that Tom Dale get his antenna back up so we can hear his voice. Father, we just continue to pray for Brother Beck, Alpha Alpha 518, for the healing of his vision and hearing.
Lord, just bring complete healing to both of those sensory organs in his body. And Lord, we just pray that...
========== ### Scripture Reading (KJV)
<blockquote> Psalms 77:1-20 (KJV) 1 I cried unto God with my voice, even unto God with my voice; and he gave ear unto me. 2 In the day of my trouble I sought the Lord: my sore ran in the night, and ceased not: my soul refused to be comforted. 3 I remembered God, and was troubled: I complained, and my spirit was overwhelmed. 4 Thou holdest mine eyes waking: I am so troubled that I cannot speak. 5 I have considered the days of old, the years of ancient times. 6 I will remember the works of the Lord: surely I will remember thy wonders of old. 7 And I will meditate in all thy works, and talk of thy deeds. 8 Thy way, O God, is in the sanctuary: who is so great a God as our God? 9 Thou art the God that doest wonders: thou hast declared thy strength among the people. 10 Thou hast with thine arm redeemed thy people, the sons of Jacob and Joseph. Selah. 11 The waters saw thee, O God, the waters saw thee; they were afraid: the depths also were troubled. 12 The clouds poured out water: the skies sent out a sound: thine arrows also went abroad. 13 The voice of thy thunder was in the heaven: the lightnings lightened the world: the earth trembled and shook. 14 Thy way is in the sea, and thy path in the great waters, and thy footsteps are not known. 15 Thou leddest thy people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron. </blockquote>
### Study Summary
In Psalm 77, the psalmist reflects on a time of deep distress, possibly during a siege or the fall of Jerusalem. The passage is divided into two parts: the psalmist's initial complaint (verses 1-9) and his resolution (verses 10-20). The psalmist begins by crying out to God in his trouble, expressing his overwhelming distress and inability to find comfort. He questions God's faithfulness and wonders if God has forgotten His people (Psalm 77:7-9).
However, in verse 11, the psalmist transitions from his lament to a reflection on God's past faithfulness. He remembers God's deliverance of Jacob, the Hebrews from Egypt, and Joseph into the promised land. This reflection serves as a reminder of God's unchanging character and His past acts of deliverance, providing comfort and reassurance to the psalmist.
The psalmist's questions about God's faithfulness and mercy are answered in other scriptures. Romans 11:1 affirms that God has not forgotten His people, while Psalm 85:1 speaks of God's forgiveness and restoration. Psalm 36:1 reminds us of God's enduring mercy, and Numbers 23:19 emphasizes God's faithfulness and truthfulness. Psalm 86 further underscores God's mercy and righteousness.
This psalm teaches us that in our present circumstances, we can apply the psalmist's struggle and resolution. God's sovereignty and faithfulness are evident even in difficult times. The importance of not accusing God but crying out to Him in distress is highlighted. Anchoring our thoughts in God's promises and Word can help us regain perspective and find comfort in times of trouble.
The study concludes with prayers for various individuals and situations, emphasizing the need for healing, provision, and protection. Prayers are also offered for the successful delivery of Bibles to troops and their spiritual growth, as well as for the healing and remission of chronic diseases. The group prays for the reduction of pain and return to normal life, and for Brother Tom's provision of necessary equipment and healing. Prayers are also made for Brother Beck's healing of vision and hearing. ==========