Latest / Reformed Thinking / Looking to the Lord for Mercy in a Contemptuous World (Psalm 123) | Charles Spurgeon

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Looking to the Lord for Mercy in a Contemptuous World (Psalm 123) | Charles Spurgeon · Reformed Thinking

• 0:00
  Welcome to reform thinking. I'm so glad you decided to tune
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  in today. Yes, thanks for being here.
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  Have you ever noticed the the immediate, almost violent
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  physical reaction your body has when someone hurls an insult at
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  you? Oh.
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  Absolutely. Or, you know, when they look
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  down on you with just total withering contempt.
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  It is visceral. Yeah, your heart starts racing
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  in your chest. Your face flushes hot.
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  Your absolute first instinct, biologically speaking, is to
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  lock eyes with the threat. Right, you want to stare them
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  down. You want to defend yourself, you
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  want to throw something right back at them to, I guess, level
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  the playing field. Well, it is a completely
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  biological response. The fight or flight mechanism
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  kicks into high gear, you know? Yeah, we want to confront the
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  source of our pain on a horizontal plane.
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  We want to establish dominance or at least mount a defense so
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  we do not look weak. Nobody wants to look.
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  Weak. Exactly.
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  Wait, let me rephrase. No one wants to feel exposed.
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  It takes a massive amount of self-control to override that
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  instinct. So we're going to look at a
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  response to severe societal scorn today that completely
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  flips that biological instinct upside down.
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  I am really looking forward to this.
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  We are jumping into a deep dive on ancient Hebrew poetry,
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  specifically the song sung by people who are under intense
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  persecution. Which is incredibly relevant for
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  you today on. Our mission today is to look
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  closely at Psalm 123, and to do this we are using the historical
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  and theological commentary compiled in Charles Spurgeon's
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  massive work The Treasury of David.
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  Spurgeon essentially crowdsourced the greatest
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  theological minds across centuries for this collection.
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  You really do. He pulled together insights from
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  people like Walt, John Calvin, Martin Luther, the Venerable
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  Bead. Alexander Henderson is in there
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  too. Yes, compiling their thoughts on
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  these specific texts. It brings together centuries of
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  rigorous theological analysis into one single place.
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  What we are going to learn today, what you're going to get
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  out of this, is how historical believers handled intense,
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  burning society. Battle contempt.
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  And spoiler alert, they did not do it by fighting back on that
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  horizontal plane. No, they did not.
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  They did it by shifting their vision upward.
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  We are going to figure out what it means to be the Oculus
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  barons, the Eye of Hope. That is a great phrase.
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  Let us jump right into verse one of Psalm 123.
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  The text starts with the title. It says A song of degrees,
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  right? And the very first line is unto
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  thee. Lift eye up mine eyes, O thou
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  that dwellest in the heavens. But before we even get to the
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  action, we need to establish the setting.
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  Context is everything. What is a song of degrees?
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  I mean, what does that mean? A song of degrees, or sometimes
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  it is translated as a song of a sense, refers to the literal act
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  of climbing. Climbing up a mountain.
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  Yeah, you have to picture the geography of Israel to grasp the
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  physical reality of this. Jerusalem sits elevated on a
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  hill. Mount Zion.
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  Spot on The temple is built on Mount Zion, so when the pilgrims
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  traveled to Jerusalem for the annual festivals from the
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  surrounding countryside, they were physically walking uphill
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  for miles. And that is not an easy walk in
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  that climate. No, it is hot, dusty,
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  exhausting. But that physical climb mirrors
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  a spiritual progression. If you look at the songs right
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  before this one, you see that progression happening in real
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  time. I'm assuming this implies the
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  Psalms are arranged in a specific order for a reason,
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  they're not just thrown together randomly.
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  Yes, the arrangement is highly intentional.
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  The first step of this specific climb is Psalm 120.
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  In that song, the singer is lamenting their troublesome
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  surroundings. They say they are dwelling in
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  Mesak and the tents of Kedar. Let me pause you there.
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  Sure, for those of us listening who are not, you know, ancient
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  geography buffs, what do Mesak and Kedar actually represent?
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  Because those names do not mean much to a modern year.
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  Fairpoint Masek refers to a region far to the north and near
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  the Black Sea, known for its harsh, warlike people.
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  OK, so a rough neighborhood. Very rough and keto refers to
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  nomadic tribes in the Arabian desert to the South.
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  Also known for being hostile and aggressive.
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  But wait, they cannot be living in both places at once, right?
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  One is N, 1 is South. Right.
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  The psalmist is likely not living in both places at once,
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  geographically speaking. Instead, they are using these
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  names metaphorically. Oh, I see.
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  It is like someone today saying you know I am living surrounded
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  by wolves and sharks. We're looking around at the
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  horizontal level and seeing nothing but trouble, distress
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  people who hate peace. Yes, that paints a very bleak
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  picture of the starting point. So you start in the dirt,
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  surrounded by hostile neighbors. Then you take the next step up
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  the mountain. Which brings us to Psalm 121.
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  I know that one, the famous line.
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  I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my
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  help. Exactly.
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  The vision shifts from the immediate troublesome neighbors
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  to the distant hills. They are looking toward
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  Jerusalem, finding a sense of assured security.
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  You're looking at the destination, right?
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  Then they keep walking, and in Psalm 122 they arrive dive at
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  the gates of Jerusalem. They made it to the city.
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  They are delighting in the House of the Lord.
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  They are looking at the footstool of God on earth,
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  standing right there in the physical city.
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  But this deep dive is about Psalm 123.
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  Right in Psalm 123, we reach the highest ascent of all.
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  So the progression goes past the physical entirely, Yes.
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  I mean, they looked at the neighbors, they looked at the
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  hills, they looked at the temple, and now they look past
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  all of it straight. Up they look, above the hills
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  and above the physical temple. They look to the Lord Himself,
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  to his throne in the heavens. That is a huge shift in
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  perspective. It is, as Spurgeon notes, old
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  authors called the specific text The Oculus Barons, the Eye of
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  Hope. The eye of hope.
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  It is a very short Psalm, but it is written with singular art.
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  It contains 1 central thought expressed in the most engaging,
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  encompassing manner possible. Let us examine that term a bit
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  more Oculus spirits, The venerable bead, an English monk
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  riding in the early 8th century had a fascinating take on this
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  upward glance. You really did.
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  How does he connect the physical act of looking up to what is
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  happening inside? The person well bead connects
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  the physical direction of the eyes to the orientation of the
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  human soul. He says that the person singing
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  this is a Pilgrim who's ascending, and they are
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  ascending because they love. Because they love that is a
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  great way to phrase it. That we ascend from earth to
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  heaven each time we think of God.
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  The mechanical act of looking up reflects a spiritual reality.
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  Like your body follows your heart.
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  Yes, Bead points out that in that upward ascent lies all
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  goodness. If we want to repent, we do not
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  stare at ourselves, right? Right, because staring at
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  ourselves just leads to despair. We look at him if we want to be
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  humble. We do not focus on our own
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  flaws, we look at him. Because seeing his perfection
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  highlights our flaws naturally. Spot on.
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  If we want to truly love, we cannot manufacture the source of
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  that within ourselves. We have to look at Him who
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  dwells in the heavens. I want to tie this directly to
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  the nature of the God we are looking up to.
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  Spurgeon makes a very sharp observation here.
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  He always does. He says the Psalm almost
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  believed in a personal God, and he points out that the psalmist
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  knew nothing of modern pantheism, which is what calls
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  it nothing more than atheism wearing a fig leaf.
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  That quote is just brilliant. It stopped me in my tracks when
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  I read it. Pantheism is the idea that God
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  is simply the universe itself. Right.
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  Yes. Pantheism is the belief that God
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  is in the trees, the dirt, the collective energy of all things.
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  The force, basically. Like a cosmic force, God is
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  everything, and therefore God is not a distinct personal being
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  who dwells in the heavens and listens to his creatures.
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  So Spurgeon is arguing that if God is an impersonal force
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  permeating everything, you cannot truly look up to him for
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  mercy. You cannot have a relationship
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  with a localized personal king if the king is just the dirt you
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  are standing on. You know the best way I can
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  picture the futility of the pantheistic view.
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  Imagine walking up to a blank brick wall.
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  OK, a brick wall. You take a can of yellow spray
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  paint, you draw a big :) on the bricks, and then you just pour
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  your heart out to. It.
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  Wow, yeah. I mean, sure, you're talking to
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  something, but there's no personal reality there.
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  The Wall does not have a mind. It does not have a will, It
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  cannot hear your suffering. It certainly cannot reach out of
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  hand to help you. It is just raw material.
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  That is a stark visual. But the psalmist explicitly
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  says, O thou that dwellest in the heavens, this is a God who
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  resides somewhere, a God who was at home.
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  A God who has a throne and a personality, right?
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  The distinction is vital for a suffering person.
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  The higher the Lord is, the better it is for our faith.
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  How so? Well, if God is elevated above
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  the chaos of the earth, that height represents strength,
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  glory and excellence. He is not caught in the mud
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  with. Us.
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  Precisely because He is a personal God, all of that
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  strength and glory can be engaged on our behalf.
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  As Spurgeon says, it is a blessed condescension on God's
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  part that He permits us to lift our eyes to His glorious high
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  throne in the first place. Sometimes lifting the eyes is
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  literally all we can manage though.
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  So true. Jon Trapp, an English Puritan
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  commentator in the 1600s, has a quote about this that I want to
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  share. I know the one you mean, it is
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  beautiful. He says this verse is about
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  praying by the glances of the eye rather than by words,
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  because, and this phrasing is just beautiful mind afflictions
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  having swollen my heart too big for my mouth that is heavy.
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  If you are listening to this, you have probably been in that
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  exact place where the grief or the anxiety is so heavy, so
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  physically thick in your chest that you could not form a spoken
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  sentence if you tried. The trauma becomes a barrier to
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  articulation. You just cannot find the words.
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  You just choke on them. The theology here provides
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  immense comfort for those specific moments.
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  You do not need an eloquent, well structured speech to reach
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  the throne of Heaven. God is not great in your
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  grammar. Not at all.
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  Trap quotes a poem that captures the sentiment perfectly.
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  It says prayer is the burden of a sigh, the falling of a tear,
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  the upward glancing of an eye when none but God is near.
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  The upward glancing of an eye, the physical mechanics, is
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  simply looking up, right? Richard Holdsworth, another 17th
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  century theologian, breaks this down into five specific
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  testimonies. Yes, his analysis is very
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  detailed. He argues that the simple act of
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  lifting the eyes to heaven tells us 5 distinct things about the
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  person doing the lifting. Which might sound like an over
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  analysis at first. Yeah, when I read this, I
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  wondered why he focused so much on the physical posture.
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  But biomechanically, our bodies reflect our internal state, do
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  they not? Absolutely.
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  When we are defeated, we're depressed.
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  We physically look down at our shoes.
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  Our shoulders slump. We make ourselves small.
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  When we are confident or hopeful, our chins lift.
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  Holdsworth is tapping into that timeless human psychology.
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  He absolutely is. Let us walk through his five
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  points, OK? What is the first one?
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  Holdsworth's first testimony is that lifting the eyes shows a
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  believing and humble heart. A believing and humble heart.
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  He says infidelity will never carry a person above the earth.
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  Unbelief keeps your vision locked on the dirt.
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  Because if you do not believe anything is up there, why look?
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  Right. And pride keeps your vision
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  locked on the earth as well, usually because you're busy
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  looking down your nose at other people.
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  Oh, that is a great point. It takes belief and humility to
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  physically and spiritually look up.
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  The second point he makes is that looking up shows an
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  obedient heart. Because you were waiting for a
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  command. By lifting your eyes to God, you
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  are acknowledging your subordinate position.
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  You are saying, Lord, I am waiting for your direction.
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  The third is a thankful heart. Thankful.
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  How does looking up show thankfulness?
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  Well, by looking upward, you acknowledge that every good
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  blessing, every perfect gift comes down from above.
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  You are admitting that your blessings are not the result of
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  your own striving down here on the earth.
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  You're giving credit where it belongs.
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  Yes. Fourth, he says.
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  It shows a heavenly heart. I like this one.
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  He argues that the person who lifts their eyes to heaven is
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  signaling that they are weary of the earth.
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  Their hope and their desire are located somewhere else.
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  They are no longer looking for satisfaction in their immediate
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  surroundings. The things of Earth have grown
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  strangely dim, to quote the hymn.
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  Yeah, the Earth is just not doing it for them anymore.
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  His 5th testimony is that it shows a devout heart.
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  OK, unpack that. Holdsworth makes the fascinating
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  observation that outside of the tongue, there is no part of the
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  human body that functions as a greater agent in prayer than the
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  eye. The eye is an agent of prayer.
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  Yes, the eyes communicate the desperation and the devotion of
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  the soul instantly. A single tear or a steady gaze
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  upward says as much as 1000 words.
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  So we have established this upward glance.
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  We're looking past the immediate trouble, past the distant hills,
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  straight up to the personal God who sits on a throne.
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  But when we hit verse 2, the imagery shifts.
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  It does the broad mechanics of looking up translate into a
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  highly specific posture. Verse 2 says Behold, as the eyes
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  of servants look into the hand of their masters.
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  That brings us to the hands. I want to talk about the
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  cultural context here. What kind of waiting is this
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  describing? Because I assume this is not the
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  casual waiting we do at a modern bus stop.
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  You know, checking our phones. Not even close.
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  We have to step out of our modern Western mindset and into
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  the ancient Eastern culture to grasp the weight of this text.
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  OK, take us there. In that historical context,
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  instructions within a large household or a Royal Court were
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  rarely given through loud spoken commands.
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  No shouting across the room. No, they were given through
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  slight, almost imperceptible hand gestures.
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  The servants or slaves stood at the edges of the room, usually
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  with their hands folded or crossed over their chests.
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  Just waiting. Their singular focus, their
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  entire job, was to watch the masters hands.
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  The source material has a great illustration of this.
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  There is a description from a traveler who visited a fine
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  house in Damascus. Oh, the Damascus house story.
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  I love this one. He notes that the people of the
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  East do not speak as much or as loudly as people in the West.
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  He was seated in this large, opulent room and he watched how
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  the household operated. Complete silence.
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  Complete silence. The master of the house made a
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  tiny wave of his hand. Instantly Sherbet was brought
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  out. Without a word.
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  Another slight wave and coffee and pipes appeared.
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  Another tiny signal and dinner was made ready.
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  That is incredible coordination. The attendants were practically
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  holding their breath, keeping their eyes glued to the Master's
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  hand so they could anticipate his will and execute it without
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  a single word being spoken. It requires an unbelievable
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  level of vigilance. If the servant is distracted by
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  a conversation across the room, or if they look out the window
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  for even a second, they miss the command.
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  And missing a command probably came with steep consequences.
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  Undoubtedly, another example in the text comes from the French
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  writer Savory, who observed slaves in Egypt.
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  What do you see? He described them standing
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  silently at the bottom of the room, hands crossed over their
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  breasts with their eyes fixed relentlessly upon their Master.
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  They were seeking to anticipate every single wish before the
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  Master even fully articulated it to himself.
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  The text gives a western equivalent to, which I find even
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  more vivid. It mentions the call Boy on the
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  River Thames in the 1800s. The riverboat analogy.
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  Yeah, picture the Thames during the height of the industrial
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  era. It is choked with fog, coal
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  smoke and dozens of massive paddles steamboats navigating a
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  crowded, narrow channel. Just utter chaos on the water.
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  The Captain's stands up high at the wheel.
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  The engines below deck are roaring so loudly that shouting
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  is completely useless. You cannot hear a thing.
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  So what do they do? The captain uses hand signals.
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  The callboy stands on the deck and his only job is to watch the
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  captain's hand unblinking so he can instantly relay those orders
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  down to the engine man below. It is a literal life or death
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  situation. If the boy looks away to watch a
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  passing seagull and he misses the signal to reverse the
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  engines, the boat crashes. You cannot miss a signal when
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  the stakes are that high. That riverboat analogy perfectly
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  illustrates the vast vocabulary of the human hand.
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  It is not just pointing. No, it is a whole language.
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  The French philosopher Michel de Montagne has a brilliant list
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  detailing the sheer volume of communication we accomplished
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  with our hands without ever opening our mouths.
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  I want to read some of this list because it is staggering when
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  you actually stop and think about it.
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  Go for it. Montagne says that with the hand
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  we demand, we promise, we call, dismiss, threaten, entreat,
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  supplicate, deny, refuse, interrogate.
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  He continues saying we express fear, express shame, express
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  doubt, we instruct, command, unite, encourage, swear,
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  testify, accuse, condemn, acquit.
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  We insult, despise, defy, disdain, flatter, applaud, bless
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  a base, ridicule, reconcile, recommend, exalt, regale,
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  gladden, complain, afflict. It goes on and on.
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  It covers the entire spectrum of human emotion and action.
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  Think about modern life. A traffic cop holding up a flat
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  palm stops a line of speeding metal cars.
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  A thumbs up across a crowded room communicates complete
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  approval. The Hand is an entire language
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  all on its own. Montagne argues that this
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  variety and multiplication keep pace with the tongue itself.
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  Applying that to the theology of Psalm 123.
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  The believer is standing like that vigilant servant or that
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  riverboat call boy, watching the hand of the master.
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  Watching for those tiny gestures.
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  Yes, Creation, Providence, grace, These are all motions of
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  Jehovah's hand. Believers must study these
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  motions carefully to discover the divine will.
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  Like reading the room, but reading the universe.
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  Does the hand wave us forward into a new season?
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  Does it tell us to wait where we are?
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  Is it a hand of provision, dropping blessings?
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  Or is it a hand of correction bringing discipline?
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  Now, if you were listening to this right now, you might be
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  feeling a bit of friction with this metaphor.
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  I know I did. Same here when I first read it.
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  The imagery we are using here, masters and slaves standing
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  silently at the bottom of the room terrified to miss a hand
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  signal. It is deeply uncomfortable for
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  modern years. It grates against our modern
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  sensibilities. We live in a society that prizes
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  autonomy, freedom and independence above almost
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  everything else. The idea of adopting the posture
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  of a slave watching a master's hand feels degrading it.
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  Feels like a loss of dignity. Why should anyone today embrace
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  this specific posture toward God?
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  That discomfort is a natural reaction for modern readers, and
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  the theologians and Spurgeons collection anticipate it.
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  How do they handle it? John Calvin addresses this exact
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  issue. He acknowledges that the
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  condition of slaves in the ancient world was shameful and
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  degrading. They were treated terribly.
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  Often subjected to horrific abuse and they could not move a
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  finger to repel outrage. But Calvin flips the perspective
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  by pointing out a specific historical and legal fact from
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  the ancient world. What was the law?
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  It was often a capital crime for bondsman to carry a sword or any
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  weapon. They were legally required to be
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  entirely disarmed. They had. 0 means of
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  self-defense. None, but because they were
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  disarmed and exposed to every kind of injury, the law and the
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  social structure dictated that their masters were bound to
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  defend them. Oh, that makes sense.
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  If a stranger attacked a slave in the street, they were
• 19:26
  attacking the master's property, and the master would respond
• 19:29
  with fierce, overwhelming protection.
• 19:32
  The master becomes the shield. Exactly.
• 19:34
  Now think about Calvin's own life.
• 19:36
  He is writing during the Reformation in the 16th century.
• 19:39
  He is watching his fellow Protestants, the Huguenots in
• 19:42
  France, being severely persecuted, exiled and burned at
• 19:46
  the stake. They were haunted down.
• 19:47
  They have no political clout. They have no military might.
• 19:50
  They are functionally disarmed. Calvin says that God purposely
• 19:54
  disarms believers. He strips us of all worldly aid
• 19:58
  and our own weapons of self-defense so that we learn to
• 20:00
  rely entirely on His guardianship.
• 20:03
  That reframes the entire concept.
• 20:05
  The master and slave dynamic here is not about God being a
• 20:09
  cruel parent who gets a thrill out of humiliating us.
• 20:13
  No, not at all. It is about God being the sole
• 20:17
  fiercely protective defender of people who have been completely
• 20:20
  stripped of their own armor. If you drop your sword, he picks
• 20:24
  up his. Calvin argues that when God sees
• 20:27
  us placing an exclusive dependence on his protection,
• 20:31
  completely renouncing all confidence in our own resources,
• 20:35
  He will step in and shield us from the molestation of the
• 20:38
  world. He will fight the battle for us.
• 20:40
  Martin Luther adds another layer to this dynamic.
• 20:42
  Luther points out that the people praying this Psalm are
• 20:46
  the chosen people of God. The Israelites.
• 20:48
  Right. They already possessed the
• 20:49
  dignity of being children of God, yet in this specific prayer
• 20:53
  they do not say, Behold, as the eyes of children look to the
• 20:56
  hand of their fathers. They could have said that it is
• 20:58
  a true statement. But they do not, they actively
• 21:01
  choose to say, as the eyes of servants.
• 21:03
  They intentionally downgrade their own title in the prayer.
• 21:05
  They do, Luther says. This is a massive display of
• 21:08
  modesty and humility. By lowering themselves to the
• 21:12
  status of servants in their own minds, they actually secure
• 21:15
  their dignity as God's children even more firmly.
• 21:18
  Because God elevates the humble. Yes, they are acknowledging
• 21:22
  their absolute, unvarnished dependence on God's provision
• 21:26
  and protection. Let us move to the second-half
• 21:28
  of verse 2. The text says, And as the eyes
• 21:31
  of a maiden unto the hand of her mistress.
• 21:34
  The female perspective. The psalmist specifically
• 21:37
  includes both the male servant watching the master and the
• 21:39
  female servant watching the mistress.
• 21:42
  Why do you think the specific inclusion of the maiden in the
• 21:44
  Mistress was necessary here? Spurgeon suggests A practical
• 21:48
  cultural reason for the inclusion.
• 21:50
  He notes that in the East, women were often even more thorough
• 21:54
  and exacting in the training of their attendants than men were.
• 21:56
  They ran a tight ship. Very tight.
• 21:58
  The Roman matrons and Eastern ladies issued commands with
• 22:01
  intense precision and required absolute perfection.
• 22:05
  The maidens had to be extraordinarily sensitive to
• 22:07
  every look and gesture. So the vigilance required of the
• 22:10
  female servants was, if anything, more acute than that
• 22:14
  of the men. That is Spurgeon's take, but
• 22:17
  Alexander Henderson, a Scottish theologian from the 1600s, takes
• 22:21
  us in a more applicational direction.
• 22:22
  What's he say? He argues that this specific
• 22:25
  mention is recorded to let us know that both sexes can and
• 22:29
  should be completely confident in God.
• 22:31
  A universal application. Right.
• 22:33
  The faith of women is noted and commended by the Spirit of God
• 22:37
  just as much as the men. This would have been a
• 22:40
  significant point to highlight in 17th century Scotland, where
• 22:44
  societal roles were rigidly defined.
• 22:46
  I imagine so. Women were often sidelined in
• 22:48
  theological discussions. Back then, Henderson highlights
• 22:50
  this by pointing to biblical history.
• 22:52
  He mentions judges like Deborah and Jail who showed immense
• 22:56
  courage in God when the men of their day hesitated.
• 22:58
  They really stepped up. He also points to the New
• 23:00
  Testament, noting how the women followed Christ faithfully,
• 23:04
  staying with him all the way to the cross when the male
• 23:06
  disciples fled in terror. They stood their ground.
• 23:09
  The inclusion of the maiden in this Psalm is a clear indicator
• 23:12
  of the universal call to vigilant faith, regardless of
• 23:15
  gender. I want to point out a linguistic
• 23:17
  shift in the text that caught my eye.
• 23:19
  OK, what is it? The first part of verse 2 says
• 23:22
  as the eyes of servants look unto the hand of their masters,
• 23:27
  and the maidens look into the hand of their mistress.
• 23:29
  Right, the verb is look. But then the application to the
• 23:32
  believer changes the verb, he says.
• 23:35
  So our eyes wait upon the Lord our God until that He have mercy
• 23:38
  upon us. Look versus wait.
• 23:40
  Looking and waiting are two very different actions.
• 23:43
  I can look at a clock on the wall, but waiting for that clock
• 23:46
  to strike 500 PM on a Friday takes a lot more out of me
• 23:50
  psychologically. It is exhausting.
• 23:52
  Why the change in verbs? The translators actually added
• 23:55
  the word wait to capture the full theological weight of the
• 23:58
  original Hebrew intent. Richard Holdsworth points this
• 24:01
  out in his commentary. So it is an intentional
• 24:03
  translation choice, yes. He says the psalmist leaves the
• 24:07
  earthly comparison behind and elevates the concept to wait is
• 24:11
  much more than to look. Because waiting implies a
• 24:14
  passage of time, usually an uncomfortable one.
• 24:17
  Holdsworth explains that to wait is to look constantly with
• 24:21
  patience and submission. It means subjecting your
• 24:24
  affections, your will, and your desires entirely to God's
• 24:27
  timeline. Giving up control of the
• 24:29
  schedule. Exactly.
• 24:31
  The earthly servant looks at the master for a quick command, but
• 24:35
  the believer waits upon the Lord for mercy.
• 24:37
  And mercy takes time. Mercy, as Holdsworth notes, is
• 24:41
  something so precious that we must be willing to endure the
• 24:44
  heavy passage of time to receive it.
• 24:46
  You are not just glancing up to get an instruction.
• 24:48
  You are holding your gaze steady.
• 24:50
  You are holding it through suffering, refusing to look away
• 24:53
  until God decides it is the right season to move His hand.
• 24:57
  Waiting is an active posture, not a passive 1.
• 25:00
  You have to fight the urge to take matters into your own hands
• 25:03
  while you wait. The temptation to fix it
• 25:05
  yourself is so strong. It requires incredible mental
• 25:08
  and spiritual diligence. To maintain that diligence, we
• 25:12
  have to keep our relationship with the master at the forefront
• 25:15
  of our minds. There is a wonderful anecdote in
• 25:18
  the source material about the English poet George Herbert.
• 25:21
  Oh, George Herbert, what did he do to?
• 25:23
  Break his reliance on earthly people and to quicken his
• 25:26
  diligence in God's service, Herber made a deliberate habit
• 25:30
  of altering his everyday speech. Also, whenever he mentioned the
• 25:33
  name of Jesus, he would add the phrase My Master.
• 25:36
  He would say Jesus, my master, just constantly reinforcing that
• 25:41
  relationship out loud. Every single time.
• 25:43
  Reminding himself who holds the authority and whose hand he's
• 25:47
  supposed to be watching. By repeating that phrase, he was
• 25:50
  training his brain. If we truly consider God our
• 25:53
  Master, our respect for His command, His will, and His
• 25:56
  pleasure becomes the dominant force in our lives.
• 25:58
  It crowds out the other voices. We stop being distracted by the
• 26:01
  horizontal threats around us because our eyes are locked on
• 26:04
  the vertical authority. So we have these servants, they
• 26:07
  are vigilant, they are watching the master's hand, they are
• 26:10
  waiting patiently. But they are also in deep,
• 26:13
  agonizing pain. Which brings us to verse 3.
• 26:17
  Why would someone adopt this desperate level of absolute
• 26:20
  submission? You do not do that when life is
• 26:23
  going well. No, when life is good you feel
• 26:26
  independent. You do that when you are
• 26:27
  fundamentally broken by the world around you.
• 26:30
  Verse 3 reviews the reason for the waiting.
• 26:32
  It says, Have mercy upon us, O Lord, have mercy upon us, for we
• 26:36
  are exceedingly filled with contempt.
• 26:38
  The tone shifts completely here. The first thing that jumps out
• 26:41
  at me here is the grammatical shift.
• 26:43
  We start in verse one with unto thee Lift eye up mine eyes,
• 26:47
  singular individual. Right I and mine.
• 26:50
  But now in verse 3, it shifts. Have mercy upon us, plural.
• 26:53
  Why move from I to we? Wolfgang Musculus, a reformer
• 26:56
  from the 16th century, provides excellent insight into this
• 26:59
  shift. Musculus knew a thing or two
• 27:01
  about suffering, right? He did.
• 27:03
  Musculus himself knew what it meant to face intense opposition
• 27:06
  for his beliefs, so he writes from experience.
• 27:08
  He says this shift reveals how a truly godly person thinks and
• 27:11
  speaks. OK, unpack that.
• 27:13
  A faithful person is not just grieved over the personal slight
• 27:17
  they endure. They do not just say have mercy
• 27:20
  upon me because I am disgraced. They groan for the collective
• 27:24
  scorn levelled against all faithful people.
• 27:26
  It is a collective empathy. You feel the pain of the whole
• 27:29
  group. Musculus notes that there is an
• 27:31
  accord among the godly, a deep unity.
• 27:35
  They share the cross, they share the groanings, and they share
• 27:37
  the invocation of divine grace. When one hurts, they all hurt.
• 27:42
  When one suffers contempt, they all feel the weight of it.
• 27:45
  They are standing together in that metaphorical room, all
• 27:48
  watching the master's hand, all whispering the same desperate
• 27:51
  prayer for the whole group. Look at the intensity of that
• 27:54
  prayer. Have mercy upon us, O Lord.
• 27:56
  Have mercy upon us, it is repeated.
• 27:58
  The repetition is key. Spurgeon says the writer hangs
• 28:01
  upon the word Mercy and embodies it in a vehement prayer.
• 28:05
  He says the very word seems to hold him, and he harps upon it.
• 28:09
  It is a plea born of sheer desperation.
• 28:11
  The reason for this desperate repetition is the second-half of
• 28:14
  the verse, for we are exceedingly filled with
• 28:16
  contempt. Exceedingly filled.
• 28:18
  Albert Barnes, the biblical commentator, points out that the
• 28:22
  Hebrew word use here means to be saturated.
• 28:25
  Saturated in the way a hungry or thirsty person is fed until they
• 28:29
  are completely full. They cannot take another bite.
• 28:31
  The idea is that they have absorbed as much contempt as a
• 28:34
  human soul can possibly take. They are at maximum capacity.
• 28:39
  They cannot experience a single drop more without breaking.
• 28:43
  Spurgeon compares it to pouring bitter wine, Wormwood and gall
• 28:47
  into a cup until it runs over the brim.
• 28:50
  It monopolizes the soul. It taints everything I was.
• 28:52
  Trying to think of a way to describe this saturation and my
• 28:55
  mind immediately went to modern social media.
• 28:57
  Oh, that is a fitting comparison.
• 28:59
  Imagine someone makes a mistake online or states an unpopular
• 29:02
  belief. Suddenly thousands of people who
• 29:05
  do not even know them decide to anonymously hurl abuse at them.
• 29:08
  The. Internet Dogpile.
• 29:10
  Yeah, they're receiving death threats, insults about their
• 29:12
  appearance, attacks on their family.
• 29:14
  Their entire digital existence is saturated with organized
• 29:17
  scorn for people who face zero consequences.
• 29:20
  It is suffocating. It is not just one insult, it is
• 29:24
  a flood that permeates every corner of their life.
• 29:28
  That dog piling effect is the modern equivalent of what the
• 29:31
  psalmist is feeling. The soul becomes waterlogged
• 29:35
  with the acid of human scorn. Contempt truly acts like an acid
• 29:39
  on the human spirit. Spurgeon points out that a
• 29:42
  little contempt is something we can usually bear.
• 29:45
  Yeah, we can brush off a straight insult from a passing
• 29:47
  stranger. We shake it off, but when you
• 29:50
  are satiated with it, when it is pressed down and heaped up over
• 29:53
  a long period, it becomes an embittering, festering wound.
• 29:57
  It breaks you down. It makes you feel unutterably
• 30:00
  wretched when the world constantly makes little of you.
• 30:03
  It becomes terrifyingly easy to start making little of yourself
• 30:06
  and to lose sight of the consolations God has prepared
• 30:09
  for you. Where is this contempt coming
• 30:11
  from? Why are they being mocked so
• 30:13
  relentlessly? That is the big question.
• 30:15
  Robert Nisbet offers a brilliant observation about the source of
• 30:18
  this scorn, which he calls the prosperity bias.
• 30:21
  The prosperity bias. This is such an incisive
• 30:23
  concept. Can you breakdown what Nisbet
• 30:25
  means by that? Nisbet describes how prosperous
• 30:28
  neighbors often treat those who are afflicted.
• 30:30
  The prosperous look around at their own comfortable lives,
• 30:33
  their healthy bank accounts, their stable families.
• 30:36
  Their manicured longs. Right.
• 30:38
  And they declare that the world is a generous, happy scene for
• 30:41
  everyone who simply deserves its gifts.
• 30:43
  It is the ultimate pull yourself up by your bootstraps mentality,
• 30:47
  but weaponized against the suffering.
• 30:50
  Because they are comfortable, they attribute poverty, sorrow,
• 30:54
  or persecution solely to unworthiness.
• 30:57
  They assume if you are suffering, you must have done
• 31:00
  something wrong. Think about how this applies
• 31:02
  today. Someone loses their job due to
• 31:04
  corporate downsizing or they develop a chronic illness that
• 31:08
  leaves them bedridden. Something completely out of
• 31:10
  their control. The prosperous person looks at
• 31:12
  the bleeding hurting believer and says if you just exerted
• 31:16
  yourself more, if you had a better attitude, if you ate
• 31:18
  better, if you worked harder instead of praying all the time,
• 31:21
  you would be fine. Your suffering is your own
• 31:23
  fault. That is brutal.
• 31:25
  Nisbet calls these words harsh and unfeeling ignorance that
• 31:29
  acts like poison to the wounds of a bleeding heart.
• 31:31
  It is a massive lack of empathy which leads us into verse 4,
• 31:35
  where the psalmist explicitly identifies who is pouring out
• 31:39
  this bitter wine of contempt. He names the culprits.
• 31:42
  Verse 4 says our soul is exceedingly filled with the
• 31:45
  scorning of those that are at ease and with the contempt of
• 31:48
  the proud. At ease and proud.
• 31:50
  We have two descriptors here, those who are at ease and the
• 31:53
  proud. Let us start with the at ease.
• 31:55
  When I hear the phrase at ease, I picture someone lying in a
• 31:58
  hammock on a Sunday afternoon. Sounds relaxing, sounds
• 32:01
  peaceful, but given the context of persecution here, I get the
• 32:04
  feeling this is not about healthy rest.
• 32:07
  Is this implying a dangerous sort of complacency?
• 32:10
  You hit the nail on the head. Edward Bouvery Pusey, a 19th
• 32:13
  century scholar, argues that this word ease refers to those
• 32:17
  who are recklessly at their ease.
• 32:19
  Recklessly at ease. The careless ones.
• 32:21
  Pusey says that constant luxury and ease actually sensualize the
• 32:24
  human soul. What does that mean?
• 32:26
  Sensualize the soul. It makes the soul dull, stupid
• 32:30
  and hard hearted. When you know no troubles of
• 32:32
  your own, when your life is completely insulated by wealth
• 32:35
  and convenience, you lose the capacity for empathy.
• 32:39
  You become numb to the suffering of others because you have never
• 32:43
  had to exercise the muscle of compassion.
• 32:45
  Thomas Manton, a Puritan clergyman, adds another
• 32:48
  dimension to the psychology of the comfortable.
• 32:50
  Manson lived through some turbulent times, did he not?
• 32:53
  He lived through periods of massive political and religious
• 32:56
  upheaval in England, so he saw how the wealthy elite operated
• 32:59
  up close. He says that when men go on
• 33:02
  prosperously and undisturbed, they become.
• 33:04
  Insolent insolently. And they are entrenched within a
• 33:08
  mass of wealth, strength and greatness.
• 33:11
  Because of those earthly fortifications.
• 33:13
  They begin to think that absolutely no one can call them
• 33:16
  to an account. They feel untouchable.
• 33:18
  Not society, not the law, and certainly not God.
• 33:21
  They sit fast, well at ease, and they think they can do whatever
• 33:24
  they please. And because they feel
• 33:25
  untouchable, they turn their attention to the people who are
• 33:28
  struggling, the people who are relying on God and they.
• 33:31
  Them it is a sport to them. Who is the Lord that we should
• 33:34
  obey His voice? They ask, and then they turn
• 33:37
  with a sneer toward those who fear God.
• 33:40
  Spurgeon brings up a modern reference in his commentary that
• 33:43
  I found really striking. Oh the statesman.
• 33:45
  He mentions a well known statesman.
• 33:47
  He does not name him, but clearly someone prominent in
• 33:50
  Victorian politics who was a master of jives and flouts and
• 33:54
  sneers. Spurgeon points out that the
• 33:55
  contempt of the great ones of the earth is often peculiarly
• 33:58
  acrid. Men like that statesman never
• 34:01
  seem so much at home, so gleeful in their acrimony, as when they
• 34:04
  are tearing down a servant of the Lord.
• 34:06
  They use their intellect, their education, and their massive
• 34:09
  public platforms to craft falsehoods and hurl venom at
• 34:13
  people who cannot fight back. Spurgeon admits that it's easy
• 34:16
  enough to write a commentary about this, to sit in a quiet,
• 34:19
  warm study and analyze the Hebrew words for contempt.
• 34:23
  It is easy to be academic about it.
• 34:25
  But to actually be selected as the target of that organized,
• 34:28
  articulate contempt is a whole different reality, he writes.
• 34:32
  Great hearts have been broken and brave spirits have been
• 34:35
  withered beneath the accursed force of falsehood and the
• 34:39
  horrible blight of contempt. That is a staggering sentence,
• 34:43
  brave spirits withered. If you are the person in the
• 34:46
  crosshairs. If you are the one whose soul is
• 34:48
  exceedingly filled with the scorning of the proud, how do
• 34:53
  you keep your heart from breaking?
• 34:55
  How do you survive it? Yeah, how do you survive that
• 34:57
  specific targeted mockery without losing your mind?
• 35:00
  The theologians all point to the same answer.
• 35:03
  You have to look to the ultimate model.
• 35:04
  The ultimate model. If we connect this to the
• 35:06
  overarching narrative of the Christian faith, we have to look
• 35:10
  at Jesus Christ. He was the literal embodiment of
• 35:12
  the Master's hand, yet he was despised and rejected of men.
• 35:16
  He knew contempt better than anyone.
• 35:18
  He experienced the absolute zenith of human contempt.
• 35:21
  He was mocked by the religious who thought they were protecting
• 35:24
  God. The Pharisees and Sadducees.
• 35:26
  He was sneered at by powerful politicians like Herod and Pilot
• 35:31
  who were completely at ease in their palaces.
• 35:34
  He was ridiculed by the masses. Even on the cross.
• 35:36
  Yet he never ceased from his perfect service.
• 35:40
  He kept his eyes upward until he was exalted to dwell in the
• 35:43
  heavens. He endured the cross, despising
• 35:46
  the shame. He took the absolute worst
• 35:49
  horizontal contents the world could muster, and he responded
• 35:52
  with perfect vertical submission.
• 35:55
  Spurgeon argues that for the believer, enduring a share of
• 35:58
  this worldly evil actually brings comfort in a paradoxical
• 36:02
  way way. Comfort from contempt?
• 36:04
  How does that work? The contempt of the ungodly acts
• 36:07
  as a certificate. A certificate, like a diploma.
• 36:09
  Like proof of identity, it is proof that believers are not of
• 36:12
  the world, because if we were of the world, the world would love
• 36:15
  us as its own. The world loves its own.
• 36:17
  The mockery of the proud is the seal confirming that you belong
• 36:21
  to a different Kingdom entirely. That brings this entire deep
• 36:24
  dive full circle. It really does.
• 36:26
  We started down in the dirt, feeling the biological physical
• 36:29
  reaction of an insult, wanting to lash out horizontally and
• 36:31
  defend ourselves. And we learn to shift, lift our
• 36:34
  gaze upward, ascending from the earthly troubles to the distant
• 36:37
  hills, and finally to the personal God who dwells in the
• 36:41
  heavens. We adopted the posture of the
• 36:43
  Oculus barons, the Eye of Hope. We looked at the intense imagery
• 36:47
  of the unarmed servant standing silently at the bottom of the
• 36:50
  room, completely dependent on the master's hand for direction,
• 36:54
  for provision, and especially for defense.
• 36:57
  We recognize that waiting for mercy requires constancy and
• 37:00
  patience, even when the acid of the world's contempt is pouring
• 37:04
  over us, threatening to saturate our souls completely.
• 37:07
  We saw that those who are recklessly at ease, the proud
• 37:10
  who hurl the insults, are hardened by their own luxury and
• 37:13
  prosperity bias. But their mockery is, in the
• 37:16
  end, just a certificate confirming where our true
• 37:18
  citizenship lies. It is an incredible progression
• 37:21
  of thought, from looking around in panic to looking up in hope,
• 37:24
  to waiting patiently for the Master to move his hand.
• 37:27
  As we wrap up this deep dive, I want to leave you with a final
• 37:30
  thought to Mull over something to carry with you the next time
• 37:33
  you feel that biological instinct kicking in.
• 37:36
  That hot flush of anger when someone looks down on you or
• 37:39
  attacks your character. Think about this.
• 37:42
  If the hand of God directs the entire universe.
• 37:46
  If that hand commands the stars, provides your daily food, and
• 37:50
  acts as your soul. Impenetrable defense against the
• 37:53
  cruelty of the proud. What specific gesture, what
• 37:57
  subtle movement of instruction or grace from him are you
• 38:00
  currently missing? Are you missing it because your
• 38:02
  eyes are locked horizontally in a stare down with the people
• 38:05
  mocking you rather than fixed vertically on the master's hand?
• 38:08
  It all comes down to where you choose to fix your gaze.
• 38:11
  You cannot watch the Master's hand if you are too busy
• 38:13
  watching the enemy's mouth. Thank you for joining us on this
• 38:16
  deep dive. Keep looking up.