In the first two verses, David lifts up for how long? For how long that say to you and me that dark days in the Christian life are not new. It's not a new thing. How long that say to you and to me that there are battles, that there are struggles, there's trouble in this wall, this pilgrimage that we call the Christian life, because we make our way through and in the midst of this fallen world. There is a fight of faith and there are spiritual struggles, there is such a thing as spiritual warfare. Listen again, verse 1, how long will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your faith from me? How long shall I take counsel on myself having sorrow in my heart daily? How long will my enemy be exhausted over me? Four how long? Four how long that point in three directions. How long for God and then how long for his own soul and then how long for his enemies? First how long is directed toward God? And you need to know at this point that David's strength is just about dried up. His patience is wearing thin. The addicts are good. The flavor is how long God will you intentionally not come to my aid? How long is it going to be before you finally help me? Will you reject me? Are you going to totally forget me forever? I wonder if you've ever looked into the eyes of a friend. And you immediately know that that person has been hurt. You quickly pick up on the fact that you are the one who has hurt them. And the first words out of their mouth is, you weren't there for me. How could you not be there for me? I know I've seen that. I've seen that have been myself in my dad one time when I was in seminary. I've never just hurt somebody. And you never forget that look in their eyes. I've hurt my dad. Specifics are important. But I did. And I remember that look in his eyes. We had tears in his eyes. But I can't believe you do that. I can't believe you wouldn't be there for me. It had an impact. It had an impact on me even as a minister. Because I know. So many, many things I don't do well in the ministry. You could talk about how busy the pastor is. I pray often that not one person in our church would ever be able to say, well, he wasn't there when I needed him. I would read knowing that. You should let me know if it happens, certainly. But that's a prayer that I would never not be there. But that's the way David feels about God. He feels like God is not not only not there, but he's never going to be there. And I notice when he says, in verse 1, how long the Lord will you forget me forever? David feels very alone. He feels isolated without hope. He feels very distant from the Lord. Even the tray, this fellowship with God, in which David had grown accustomed, has all but evaporated. That's why he talks to himself. So how long directed to his own heart? How long shall I take counsel in my soul having sorrow in my heart daily? If you're a Christian and you know you've been distant from the Lord before, you know what David's talking about when he says what he says in verse 2. If you've ever known distance from God, then you can identify with David wondering if that fellowships ever going to be restored. Think back on when that's true. Perhaps this is close as even this very evening. And you know there are those things, for example, those things you know that you need to be doing. But all those things should seem so empty. There are ways that you know that you should feel. You long for those feelings again, but those feelings are all that gone. You feel very emotionless. What about the names of grace? And you know what the names of grace are. But you're distant from God. There are things like prayer and reading God's Word and worship. They just all seem so superficial. Do I sound like someone who's been there before? But you know what I'm talking about. The anxiety, the fear that possibly you never will be restored, the confusion, loneliness. And you know as well as I do that when you're in times like that, you're given toward introspection. And that's what David's saying here. He's saying, how long am I going to be like this? Are you going to feel this right forever? Again, you know what he's talking about if you've been there. And then he's directs of how long to his enemies in the second part of verse two. How long will my enemy be exalted over me? It's a good thing that's solved on the end after two verses. At the end of two verses we're led to believe. It's a feeling yet that the enemy has the upper hand. And if the enemy has the upper hand, then we all know that calls into question. David's kingdom for one thing. It calls into question, God's justice, God's promises. It calls into question, God's faithfulness to the covenant that he made with David. And that's what David's saying. God is my enemy's exalted over me. If my enemy's wind is saying, what's that going to say about you? And what's that going to say about your promises and the way you keep them? If my enemies wind this thing, then what's that going to say? What kind of message is that going to send to that person to whom I'm witnessing? You ever say that to God? You ever use that kind of language in your prayers with God you can? You really can call to God that way. We need to learn to pray like David's two things that we learn specifically. One is the labor's half freedom of speech in the throne room of God. That's one of the things that Christ God to grant you. He's the mediator. And he says to you that you are to come to the throne of Christ and you can bring your broken heart. You should bring your broken heart and lay it at the feet of the king right at the throne, right at the footstone. Matthew Henry said, it is some ease to a troubled spirit to give vent to its grace. And we all know that when we're troubled it just feels good to vent our grace but especially to give vent to them at the throne of grace where we are sure to find one who is afflicted in the afflictions of his people. Matthew Henry is saying as if Christ feels our pain. Where he invites us to come say what we're to say from our hearts at the throne of Christ and he feels it with us. And so that he is troubled with the feeling of their infirmities. There we have boldness of access by faith. There we have freedom of speech. To think about that, let us work contemplating that the very one that bids you come the mediator himself knows your pain. He's been there himself. He's known that affliction. He's been disordered. He knows what it is to be lonely and afflicted. And as Matthew Henry would say that he feels your affliction even in heaven as I guess is your praise, your intercessor. He's touched by your troubles, your spiritual struggle. And he says, come, come to the throne of Christ and speak freely. Tell me what your heart is saying. So you need to do that in your prayers. Realize you have freedom of speech. And then also realize there is no darkness like spiritual darkness. We all agree, as hardly anything in all the world that vexes our souls more than being distant from God, hopeless feeling, as we've already alluded to, that feeling that you'll never be restored again. It's a horrible feeling for the Christian, miserable to be distant from God. William Plummer said, how bitter is the cry of the soul unsastained by God? That sounds like a man has been there today. How bitter is the cry of the soul unsastained by God? You know how else knew that bitterness? Job. I don't want you to see this, but put back one book to the book of Job. And you'll see the bitterness in Job at chapter 29. Actually, in chapter 30, in chapter 29, Job is counting all of his blessings. But then you get to the next chapter in chapter 30. We overhear Job saying in verse 19, he has cast me into the mire, and I have become like dust and ashes. Particularly looking at verse 40, he says, I cry out to you, but you did not answer me. I stand up and you regard me, but you have become cruel to me. With the strength of your hand, you oppose me. You lift me up to the wind and cause me to ride on it. You spoil my success, or I know that you will bring me to death into the house appointed for all living. That's a man who understood that there is no darkness like spiritual darkness. Well, what is the Christian to do? What did Job do? What did David do? David ushers in an answer for us. In verses 3-4. I don't mind telling you in one word, the answer is pray. What do you do when you find yourself in trouble? You pray that feel confused. Pray. You say, I feel lonely. Pray. I don't feel like praying. Pray. That's David's answer in these verses. That's why I wanted you to say in the author, what we need to be meditating on. William Plummer said, this is good for us, which leads us to pray. No matter how difficult the circumstances are, if it causes you to hit your knees, if it drives you to your knees, you can say, it's good for me. It comes from the hand of a good God. And then you want to know the end of that quote. This is very interesting. This is what else William Plummer said after. He said, he said, it's better to be praying in a well's belly than to be asleep on the buns. A lot of wisdom in man. And we're given this glimpse into the prayer life of David. And here's a man after God's own heart. And we want to ask, how does a man like that pray? Well, here we have a glimpse into his problem. We're told, the physicians that a man like David prays, in verse three, consider and hear me, oh Lord, my God, enlighten my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death, lest my enemy say I've prevailed against him, lest those who trouble me rejoice when I'm moved. You ever noticed that David lives his life in this constant awareness of God and his enemy? That's one thing we learn about David is we go through the Psalms that he is a man who lived with this constant tension between God on the one hand and his enemies on the other. Well, we also learn about David that it was in the midst of that tension in the midst of those struggles that the best years of David's spiritual life were produced. Tulip said, a great number of our own German hymns were composed in the gloomy days of the 30 years' war. That's another good thing to contemplate. This truth, David's life, David's spiritual sloth occurs when he is most at ease and wonder if you can identify with that. At the time when he knows the most calm in his life, when he feels the greatest blessing in his life, that's when we find David the most spiritually lazy, really. But in the midst of those spiritual struggles in the days of Saul, in the days of the Philistines, in the days of Civil War, that's when we see David's soul start. And we see his soul strengthen. Are you conscious of those poems in your life? Are you conscious of the fact that you have God, your creator, your captain, your victory on the one hand, but on the other hand you have this enemy that would love to strike you down an enemy that would like nothing more than to sit you like wheat and he crows around you, he lurks, and would love to destroy your soul, devour you. The follow-up question would be, if you're aware of that, does that awareness of those two poems strengthen your resolve? So that you trust God in the midst of your struggles, you're trusting Him in the midst of those greatest battles in your life, the strongest spiritual battle, and you can say, I have faith in God at this point in my life. That's what he's praying for in verse three, when he says, enlighten my eyes. That's actually a prayer for faith. It's the Old Testament way of saying, guide me, O thou great Jehovah. Guide me to hope, give me faith, give me strength. What I'm trying to say is what David is trying to say here, is that though it seems so unnatural, when we're in the midst of trouble, it's then that we remind ourselves by faith that God does indeed care for me. That is very unnatural, it's not a natural and glorious faith. It's faith to say, I know that God loves me enough to put me in this situation, to put me in this trial in His good providence. And when you exercise that kind of faith, you can know God's at work in your life, that there's a divine work going on in your heart. So you say things like, Lord, I believe, but help my unbelief. It's a prayer faith. And then we find David moved from troubles to trials. There's some great lessons to learn from David in verse 5. He says, But I trust it in your mercy. My heart shall rejoice in your salvation. To what is our assurance grounded? So when we read verse 5, you have, where is our hope? How do we have hope in the midst of trials? And it's found in the love of God. It's found in his mercy. It's grounded in his loving kindness. David doesn't come to this trial in his life and only then begin to trust God. David's been spiritually nourished on a steady diet of God's love and God's faithfulness to him. He remembers that in the past. He knows what God has done for him. So he recalls it. He calls it to mind over and over and over again. We sometimes think that it's only when we're in trouble that we should begin trusting. But when we do that, we find that we're going to lose the battle because we hadn't trusted in the good times. We find that our shield of faith is so small we cannot extinguish the flaming missiles of the evil one because we've not given the attention to our faith and the good times we're not sung to him and read his word and spend time in prayer leading up to the trial. So our faith shrinks. I have no idea if this is an appropriate illustration. But I kind of like it. It's a spiritual analogy from ESPN. But if you follow any of those commercials, they've got some good ones out there. I've got to wear I really like commercials a lot. That's enough. I laugh out loud. I used to not do that. It's a sign of getting older, I think. But I enjoy the commercials. And now there's commercials that are almost soap operas. I mean, they have this continuing thing. And they've got one on ESPN where these guys have their knowledge of what they know about sports, particularly hockey. And it's their cat. And it's this big furry ball. And it's got these low eyes on it, little feet and arms. But depending on how much knowledge you have, it's how big your knowledge is. And so they take their knowledge places. You know, and they brag about how much they know. And this one of these guys goes on a trip, goes on vacation to Cancun. And he comes back, and he says, I went to Cancun. You know, he opens the door where he's keeping his knowledge, his little pet knowledge. And it's so small. And you can just see his face. And the next thing he's sitting there in front of ESPN with a clicker. And it's the last thing he says is, I hate Cancun. Because his knowledge was so small, so that's not real property. But that's what we need constantly to be feeding our faith so that it grows. We need to be teaching our children the great hymns of the faith so that when they're in the heat of battle, as they grow up, and they find themselves in the heat of battle, those hymns are beating in their breast. And they know where they find their help, and they know how to praise God even in the midst of war. It does, we need to learn that first, or don't we? How to praise God in the midst of trials? Faith has to be practiced steadily. And David does that. David gives us the example of, how do you feed your faith? You meditate on God. You meditate on His love. You meditate on His mercy and His kindness. It's not this positive thing, like I believe, I believe, I believe, everything's going to be okay. It's this undercurrent, this running under your faith. It's always saying, I believe in God. I believe that He is loving, that He is kind, that He's merciful, that He said His love on me, and that He's made promises to me, and He will never, ever, ever forsake His promises. And that's what we find David doing in the good and the bad. Over and over and over again, recalling God's faithfulness to Him. So then He has, and He believes, in a bright future, future deliverance, future blessing. He's so confident, in fact, that He sings in verse six, I will sing to the Lord because He has dealt bountifully with me. You may not be experiencing the same trouble that David is experiencing. You should praise God that you're not, but your troubles, then again, may be a different kind of trouble. And we can all learn from Psalm 13. We can all learn, always, from God's hymn book. And tonight we can learn that our faith must be in the loving kindness of God. And when that is true, we will find ourselves being propelled out of, out of the depths of despair, and into great hope and into great confidence. We'll find ourselves, as we meditate on the loving kindness of God, we'll find ourselves climbing the wrongs of the ladder that are presented in the psalm, and we'll find ourselves climbing out of despair, and into hope we'll find ourselves waiting on the Lord, renewing our strength, mounting up with wings like eagles, running and not becoming weary, and walking without thinking, as we pray together. Our Father, we know that in a size of fellowship like this, we know that there's got to be some here this evening who are overwhelmed by their trouble. And we pray that you would speak to their hearts. We pray that you would use the trouble and their lives, and the trouble that is inevitable for any of us who name the name of Christ, that you use that trouble to woo us to your side, woo us to who you are and what you're like, and particularly your mercy and your loving kindness and that you would never put it in a situation that is too much, that you're always there for us, and you never break a promise. And we pray that we would put such trust in you that we will walk out of here, praising your name, no matter where we find ourselves tonight. Please show us the light. Please give us hope, and we know that our hope is found only through the Lord Jesus Christ, our Lord in our Savior, and to His name we pray. Amen.