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Psalm 13:1-4
How long, Lord? How long, Lord?
Will you forget me forever?
How long will you hide your face from me?
How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and day after day have sorrow in my heart?
How long will my enemy triumph over me? Look on me and answer, Lord my God.
Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep in death, and my enemy will say, “I have overcome him,” and my foes will rejoice when I fall.
When traveling in a group, it’s common for someone to ask, “Are we there yet?”, “How much longer?”, “What does the map say?”. We ourselves have done that as children when going somewhere with our families. But people of all ages are also prone to ask similar questions when wearied because of life challenges that never seem to cease.
David experienced the same feeling, as we see in Psalm 13. David lamented “How long” four times in the first two verses (Psalm 13:1-2), feeling abandoned, forgotten, and defeated. “How long must I struggle with my thoughts?”, he asks in verse 2. When we look at Psalms like these, it’s comforting to know that it’s okay to go to God in worship while having questions like these at the back of our minds. After all, when facing extended periods of stress and strain, whom can we turn to but God? We can bring Him our struggles, our illness, our grief, the disobedience of a loved one, relationship issues; you name it.
We often faint because of the length of our trials. We feel we’ll be able to endure almost anything if we know when it would come to an end; which is basically the answer to the question, “How long, O Lord?”. When we have such questions, worship does not have to end. The omnipotent God of heaven invites us to present Him with our anxiety-inducing queries. Just as in the case of David, we might not get the answer to the question. But we see that soon the questions turn to expressions of faith and adoration. He sings,
Psalm 13:5-6 “But I trust in your unfailing love; my heart rejoices in your salvation. I will sing the Lord’s praise, for he has been good to me.”
Regardless of what we feel, God’s unfailing love and His goodness will not change. How grateful we are for His salvation. Just stop and think about it, “You are saved!”. Despite what’s going on around, it makes us so happy. Let’s approach this week the same way. Let’s just praise and enjoy Him.
Let’s Pray
Heavenly Father, we want to bring it all to you in prayer. Help us to remain content when we don’t find answers to some questions and help us to praise you as David did; actually, even more, than him as we face trials in this world. We love you, father. In Jesus’ name, we pray, Amen.
