Psalm 42 Where is Your God?

An introduction of Psalm 42 taken from Matthew Henry's Complete Commentary

If the book of Psalms be, as some have styled it, a mirror or looking-glass of pious and devout affections, this psalm in particular deserves, as much as any one psalm, to be so entitled, and is as proper as any to kindle and excite such in us: gracious desires are here strong and fervent; gracious hopes and fears, joys and sorrows, are here struggling, but the pleasing passion comes off a conqueror. Or we may take it for a conflict between sense and faith, sense objecting and faith answering.

I. Faith begins with holy desires towards God and communion with him (v. 1, 2).

II. Sense complains of the darkness and cloudiness of the present condition, aggravated by the remembrance of the former enjoyments (v. 3, 4).

III. Faith silences the complaint with the assurance of a good issue at last (v. 5).

IV. Sense renews its complaints of the present dark and melancholy state (v. 6, 7). V. Faith holds up the heart, notwithstanding, with hope that the day will dawn (v. 8).

VI. Sense repeats its lamentations (v. 9, 10) and sighs out the same remonstrance it had before made of its grievances.

VII. Faith gets the last word (v. 11), for the silencing of the complaints of sense, and, though it be almost the same with that (v. 5) yet now it prevails and carries the day. The title does not tell us who was the penman of this psalm, but most probably it was David, and we may conjecture that it was penned by him at a time when, either by Saul's persecution or Absalom's rebellion, he was driven from the sanctuary and cut off from the privilege of waiting upon God in public ordinances.

The strain of it is much the same with 63, and therefore we may presume it was penned by the same hand and upon the same or a similar occasion. In singing it, if we be either in outward affliction or in inward distress, we may accommodate to ourselves the melancholy expressions we find here; if not, we must, in singing them, sympathize with those whose case they speak too plainly, and thank God it is not our own case; but those passages in it which express and excite holy desires towards God, and dependence on him, we must earnestly endeavour to bring our minds up to.
 

Psalm 42

As the hart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God.

² My soul thirsteth for God, for the living God: when shall I come and appear before God?

³ My tears have been my meat day and night, while they continually say unto me, Where is thy God?

⁴ When I remember these things, I pour out my soul in me: for I had gone with the multitude, I went with them to the house of God, with the voice of joy and praise, with a multitude that kept holyday.

⁵ Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and why art thou disquieted in me? hope thou in God: for I shall yet praise him for the help of his countenance.

⁶ O my God, my soul is cast down within me: therefore will I remember thee from the land of Jordan, and of the Hermonites, from the hill Mizar.

⁷ Deep calleth unto deep at the noise of thy waterspouts: all thy waves and thy billows are gone over me.

⁸ Yet the Lord will command his lovingkindness in the day time, and in the night his song shall be with me, and my prayer unto the God of my life.

⁹ I will say unto God my rock, Why hast thou forgotten me? why go I mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?

¹⁰ As with a sword in my bones, mine enemies reproach me; while they say daily unto me, Where is thy God?

¹¹ Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and why art thou disquieted within me? hope thou in God: for I shall yet praise him, who is the health of my countenance, and my God.

Answering the Rhetorical Question from the Scriptures

1. My God is ABOVE me.  (Isa. 55:6-9; Psa. 61:1-2; Dan. 4:28-37
2. My God is BENEATH me.  (Deut. 33:27)
3. My God is AROUND me. (Psa. 34: 1-7)
4. My God is BESIDE me.  (Dan. 3:19-25)
5. My God is WITH me.  (Matt. 28:18-20)
6. My God is BEHIND me.  (Rom. 8:28-39)
7. My God is BEFORE me.  (Ex. 23:23; Matt. 16:24)
8. My God is INSIDE me.  (John 14:15-18)