Psalm 42:11 (NIVUK)
11 Why, my soul, are you downcast?
Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
for I will yet praise him,
my Saviour and my God.
These are the closing verses from a Psalm about disappointment. The Psalmist feels like a thirsty deer, stumbling about for water in a dry land. They can remember good days when God seemed close and all was good, but those days now seem far away. When we’re disappointed, the temptation is always to blame either ourselves (‘I’m useless!’) or others, even God (‘You’ve let me down! It’s your fault!’). We live in a complex and fallen world, however, where things will inevitably go wrong. This needs understanding and compassion instead, arising out of a realistic and sympathetic judgement, rather than a quite desire to point the finger. In such disappointment, the Psalmist finds hope by turning to God rather than away from him. Because God is love, and God is faithful, in our disappointment he can become our concrete hope: unlike us he is consistent and powerful, working out our salvation, even when we are unaware of him.
Father, when I’m disappointed, help me to find hope in you, and in doing so, be slow to blame and quick to understand and forgive.
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