Asaph has really been “down.”

Much like Jonah was, and Elijah and even Jeremiah, during their days of discouragement. Maybe even John the Baptist as well!

Read three verses from Psalm 77. “Will the Lord cast off for ever? and will he be favourable no more? Is his mercy clean gone for ever? doth his promise fail for evermore? Hath God forgotten to be gracious? hath he in anger shut up his tender mercies? Selah.” Verses 7-9, practically a stanza!

Today, in our clause by clause journey through the Poem, we stop to observe that last series of questions. “Hath God forgotten to be gracious? hath he in anger shut up his tender mercies?” Remember, this is verse 9.

“To forget” implies (in Hebrew “shakach”) “ignoring” something or someone! “Ceasing to care,” says one lexicon. And the adjective “gracious” (spelled “chanan” in its root) means “to pity,” but especially in the sense of answered prayer. In one of its two Bible uses, “intreated” is the translation, King James Version.

Has God lost interest in answering prayer? So reasons, so wonders Asaph!

Is God angry, mad?

Here “aph” in Hebrew means “anger,” their word literally for the human “nose, nostril!” Almost as if God is so upset He is snorting, breathing very hard, noticeably so!

“Hath God forgotten to be gracious? hath he in anger shut up his tender mercies?”

To “shut up” means “to draw together,” like tying the strings on a garbage bag or lacing one’s shoes. Has God ceased opening the windows of Heaven? Is He pouring forth no more blessings?

And His “tender mercies” are His “racham” (just pluralized) once again, the normal noun for “intestines or womb or insides!” His “most intimate” Feelings!

No doubt our little psalmist is under “pressure.”

Going through “hard times.”

BUT PLEASE NOTICE … HE IS STILL TALKING ABOUT HIS GOD AND (MOST IMPORTANTLY) TO HIS GOD!

This is the same man who later will, later in this same Psalm, utter: “Thy way, O God, is in the sanctuary: who is so great a God as our God?”

Wow!

Many afflictions … but apparently, great deliverance!

Psalm 34:19 is always true, one way or another. “Many are the afflictions of the righteous: but the LORD delivereth him out of them all.”

Amen.

Take courage, dear friend today.

Through Christ, victory is in your future!

— Dr. Mike Bagwell