J. Albrecht…Pentecost…May 24^th, 2026…Ps. 42…My Soul Thirsts For God, For the Living God

As the deer pants for the water brooks, So my soul pants for You, God. ² My soul thirsts for God, for the living God; When shall I come and appear before God? ³ My tears have been my food day and night, While they say to me all day long, “Where is your God?” ⁴ I remember these things and pour out my soul within me. For I used to go over with the multitude and walk them to the house of God, With a voice of joy and thanksgiving, a multitude celebrating a festival. ⁵ Why are you in despair, my soul? And why do you groan within me? Wait for God, for I will again praise Him For the help of His presence. ⁶ My soul is in despair within me; Therefore I remember You from the land of the Jordan And the peaks of Hermon, from Mount Mizar. ⁷ Deep calls to deep at the sound of Your waterfalls; All Your breakers and Your waves have passed over me. ⁸ The Lord will send His grace in the daytime; And His song will be with me in the night, A prayer to the God of my life. ⁹ I will say to God my rock, “Why have You forgotten me? Why do I go about mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?” ¹⁰ As a shattering of my bones, my adversaries taunt me, While they say to me all day long, “Where is your God?” ¹¹ Why are you in despair, my soul? And why do you groan within me? Wait for God, for I will again praise Him For the help of His presence, my God.

Mercy, peace, and love be multiplied to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Amen.

INJ Who has given us the Holy Spirit to be filled with hope and trust in His salvation, DFR:

“God, if you’re out there…” fill in the blank. I think you know how such a prayer typically goes. Someone who has never much cared for God, His Church, or anything faith-related, finds himself or herself in a daunting, even dangerous situation. “God, if you’re out there, get me out of this jam, and I promise I will go to Church…” or whatever the bargain might be. What is the problem with such a prayer like that? There is no hope. There is no confidence that God would hear their prayer, nor that He would even answer, hence the bargaining chip at the end. Such a prayer lacks faith.

Contrast that with the heart of a Christian, who might be going through an equally difficult time or dangerous situation. How might their payer be different? It would look an awfully lot like Psalm 42. Because the one with faith looks past the impossibility of what is before him or her, and remembers the hope that is rooted in Christ Jesus. A hope in His promise to hear, to answer, and to act in deliverance.

Pentecost Sunday is the perfect reminder of how God is not so far off as your soul might think when in dire straits. See, Pentecost is the celebration of the pouring out of the Holy Spirit upon all of God’s people, you and me included. It’s not the majestic speaking in tongues or performing miracles, but God’s presence when in the depths of despair. It is the Holy Spirit working as an advocate in your heart, reminding you of God’s grace and mercy. Pentecost is the Holy Spirit taking your desperate pleas to God and transforming them into a God-pleasing prayer with hope.

This morning, as we explore the depths of woe in Psalm 42, may our Souls Thirst for God, for the Living God. The thirst, at times, is painful for we pass through much tribulation. But how blessed is the satisfaction that comes from our God who lifts us out of the pit with His grace and love. As we consider the Word of God before us, let us pray: May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in Your sight, O Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer, Amen.

The writer of Psalm 42 found himself in a very low and dark place. He desperately yearns for the days when he would go with a whole throng of people to the temple. Why does this cause him distress? Because it is impossible for him to go to the temple. He is in another land, foreign and filled with pagans who mock and jeer at him saying all day, every day, “Where is your God?”

This isn’t someone who is just weak minded where such a mocking shouldn’t have affected him, nor is he just going through a bout of mild depression. Think about what is happening. He was taken into captivity, and the pagans, who believe only in local gods with powers limited to their home location, are making fun of the true God for not protecting him. Their mockery scars deep. “Where is your God?” “Why isn’t your God here to save you? See! He is powerless and nothing, for here you sit. How pathetic.” It hurts because the Psalmist knows how the Lord can act in direct deliverance for His people. But why not now? Why not him?

⁹ I will say to God my rock, “Why have You forgotten me? Why do I go about mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?” The oppression of his enemy makes it seem like God has forgotten him, even though he knows God doesn’t forget. We see, then, why the Psalmist pants for God as the deer pants for water brooks.

Israel can be a very dry and barren place, especially during the summer. When the summer heat is at its worst, a deer is desperate to find water, not just to satiate its thirst, but for survival. That is how the Psalmist feels. He is depressed, unable to reach the living waters of the temple of God, and forced into drought by the mocking of his captors. Truly his soul is in despair, literally brought low, and it is restless, it groans within him in desperation.

You might not be whisked away from your homeland and forbidden from going to the temple of God, but have you been in the same position as the Psalmist? I think we all have at one point or another.

Depression can be a difficult beast to endure. Sometimes you don’t know why your soul is brought so low. But everything seems to compound the way you are feeling. Other times, you do know what causes your soul to be in such a distress. Maybe it is a lost pregnancy; or a little child gone so young. Maybe it is losing a loved one when you least expected it. Maybe you isolate yourself because no one seems to look favorably upon your faith, but that isolation becomes too much. Or you have withdrawn because you feel like you have failed yourself or your family. The causes of anguish in the soul are numerous. Some causes are extreme events. Others less extreme, but every time it is real despair of the soul and a grip of the mind.

You know what it feels like. In verse 3 the Psalmist says, ³ My tears have been my food day and night, While they say to me all day long, “Where is your God?” When in the depths of sorrow or the anguish of the soul, it often takes away any appetite. In its stead is a raw gnawing feeling that doesn’t go away. For the Psalmist, his tears had become his food, he could do nothing else, not even nourish his body. In verse 7, the mighty roar of a waterfall is the empty sound echoing in the soul as you lay paralyzed by this despair. Wave after wave of hollow emption and aching thought washes over you.

It is in those moments, isn’t it, when the tempter comes alluring. You might not have others around you saying, “Where is your God?” But that doesn’t stop Satan from setting that temptation within you. Yes, the temptation when our souls are in turmoil within us is to wonder if God has stopped caring, if He has maybe forgotten you and your plight. Is God truly powerful to cover even you? These thoughts and temptations seem irrational to the soul that is satisfied, but for the soul that is brought low and desperately thirsty, these thoughts are as rational and reasonable as anything can be.

The Psalmist found himself at this very crossroads. Would he give in to the mocking of those around him, listen to the hollow despair of his soul; or would he return to what he knows and remind himself of a very real comfort for his very real distress? The Psalmist reminds himself what it is he ought to do because he knows that God has not forsaken him, or forgotten about him, but will bring satisfaction to his soul. These reminders are placed throughout the Psalm. Let us consider them.

⁵ Why are you in despair, my soul? And why are you restless within me? Wait for God, for I will again praise Him For the help of His presence.

Wait for God. You might find in other translations the word hope. Hope is the essence behind this kind of waiting for God. We wait in an expectant hope of God’s deliverance. That is exactly what the Psalmist means. His soul will again be lifted up in praise to God as it was when he would go to the temple with the multitudes, as it was when he was surrounded by water for his soul. What shall he praise God for? The help of His presence. It is literally, the salvation of His face. During the Benediction, one of the blessings is “The Lord lift up His countenance upon you.” This is what that means. It is God’s face looking upon you with favor so that His blessings fall upon you. The Psalmist knows the Lord’s favor will shine upon him because the Lord has promised to do it.

How does the Lord bring His salvation to you in your depression and anguish? Here, the Psalmist doesn’t say, nor do we need him to. We don’t need to know exactly how God will heal our souls, just that He will. For maybe it will come in the way you expect, by returning to the house of God to be refreshed by the comfort of the Gospel. Or, His help may come in the way you least expect. In either case, we wait in hope for the countenance of the Lord to look favorably upon us. Not because we demand it, but because He has promised to do so for the sake of Christ, our Savior.

⁸ The Lord will send His grace in the daytime; And His song will be with me in the night, A prayer to the God of my life.

This prayer is one of praise and thanksgiving. This is the kind of song the Psalmist means, namely a prayer-song, a praise-song. It is directed unto God, but unto Him as He who by His grace shows Himself as “the God of my life,” which means: the God who does not abandon me unto death.—So the singer’s soul is cast down and suffers much; he admits it. But he is not abandoned unto this grief, the Lord’s grace comes like a messenger to him, and in spite of everything fills him with a prayer of praise and song of thanksgiving.

When in the hour of utmost need – those extreme cases that might cast our souls down, is it not the reminder of God’s great love for us in Jesus Christ, who offered Himself in our place for our sins, that begins to lift us out of our state? There is a reason God always points us to the cross, even when we are sorely depressed. Because there, His love is undisputed. His care for you cannot be denied. God gave up His Son, for you, there is nothing else that He wouldn’t do if He knows it is good for you.

That is why He has sent you the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit’s work is to build up and edify your heart and soul. He instills that hope within you so that even in the darkest of days, you look to the light of your salvation, Jesus Christ. When you are in painful thirst for God, He leads you to the brook of Living Water that does not run dry – Your Savior Jesus. In the waters of baptism, you have been united with Christ into His death and sealed with the promise of eternal life. He invites you to drink this Living Water often, receiving His body and blood in the sacrament of the altar for the forgiveness of all your sins. Daily the Holy Spirit does His work to turn your soul in hope to God.

The Bible is full of examples like Psalm 42. It may seem to us like they lived in a totally different world and had a much different experience because God worked differently back then. The Psalmist reminds us that is not true. The people then suffered the effects of a sinful world the same way we do. Moments of a desperate thirst for God, for the living God. We know the thirst is painful, but we also know how good and gracious our God is, that He will satisfy our souls fully. Hope for God, for I will again praise Him For the help of His presence. Amen.