Listen to Asaph, the writer of Psalm 77. In a moment of “introspection!” He shares: “I call to remembrance my song in the night: I commune with mine own heart: and my spirit made diligent search.” Psalm 77:6

What’s his purpose?

In such musings?

Maybe the next verse will help reveal the context. “Will the Lord cast off for ever? and will he be favourable no more?”

Three verbs appear above, in today’s verse. “I CALL TO REMEMBRANCE my song in the night: I COMMUNE with mine own heart: and my spirit MADE DILIGENT SEARCH.”

I have capitalized them. Remember they are Hebrew verbs, not strictly English.

We are here being taught how to self-inspect, spiritually.

One, he thought upon past blessings. “I call to remembrance my song in the night.” The “good” times of his life.” Job uses this expression too. “Where is God my maker, who giveth songs in the night.? Job 35:10, “songs” again suggesting periods of joy.

This reminds me of the hymn, “Count your Blessings, name them one by one! Count your many blessings … see what God has done!”

Two, he “communes” with himself, Asaph does. Wondering “why” God has seemed to “forsake” him. “Why” so many problems have beset him. “I commune with mine own heart.”

The verb used here for “commune” is “siyach,” meaning “to meditate.” But in this sense, “to talk, speak, muse, declare,” here to oneself. He’s asking, “What might have I done WRONG? Have I sinned? Or is God perhaps “testing” me? To make me stronger? To “prove” my faith?

Paul, in like manner, wrote the Corinthians. “Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates?” Found in 2nd Corinthians 13:5, a pretty strong verse!

Third, get your “spirit” involved! That part of you that has been born-again! That part of creation placed deep inside you that has God-consciousness. “My spirit made diligent search.”

This verb, “chaphas,” is relatively rare, used only 23 times in Scripture. “To find something hidden!” To “disguise” oneself and investigate a matter! And here in verse 7 the verb is a “Piel” stem construction, intensively searching! Vigorously! Looking for anything that might displease Almighty God!

This is parallel to the last paragraph of Psalm 139. “Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.” Psalm 139:23-24

Wow!

Paul once wrote … “If we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged.” Not be judged by the Lord! 1st Corinthians 11:31

Sounds like the Psalmist, Asaph, agrees!

We should too.

— Dr. Mike Bagwell

 

Today’s verse is “quaint,” yet fundamental in teaching us how to better live the Christian life. Psalm 77:5 is short, too, but echoes a great Old Testament Truth.

“I have considered the days of old, the years of ancient times.”

That’s all!

Yet … why such intense, deliberate reflection?

The Psalmist is suffering. Physically perhaps, but certainly emotionally.

Racked with “troubles,” running “sores” and overall “restlessness!” Add “insomnia” to the list as well. Things to him seem “out of control,” his word … “overwhelmed.”

But what’s the cause of such turmoil?

He is searching for the answer.

Talking to His God (praying) all the way through the trial!

So, Asaph pledges himself to REMEMBER!

To look to the past.

Again, our Text for today, Psalm 77:5 … “I have considered the days of old, the years of ancient times.”

“Remember,” one of the key words of the Christian life.

I just counted “remember” 14 different times in the Book of Deuteronomy alone! God does not want us to “forget!”

For example, Deuteronomy 5:15. “REMEMBER that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the LORD thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm.” Yes, consider the days of old, the years of ancient time … and see God’s Amazing Grace in your lives!

Then Deuteronomy 7:18-19. “Thou shalt well REMEMBER what the LORD thy God did unto Pharaoh, and unto all Egypt; the great temptations which thine eyes saw, and the signs, and the wonders, and the mighty hand, and the stretched out arm, whereby the LORD thy God brought thee out.” Recall God’s Might Acts on your behalf!

Deuteronomy 8:2 as well. “And thou shalt REMEMBER all the way which the LORD thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, and to prove thee, to know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldest keep his commandments, or no.” Do not forget how God has trained, disciplined, prepared you to better obey His Word!

Consider the days of old, the years of ancient time … also remembering you past mistakes, sins! “REMEMBER, and FORGET NOT, how thou provokedst the LORD thy God to wrath in the wilderness: from the day that thou didst depart out of the land of Egypt, until ye came unto this place, ye have been rebellious against the LORD.” Deuteronomy 9:7

Such Psalm 77:5 remembering (“I have considered the days of old, the years of ancient times.”) is apparently a proper way to live the life of faith!

Again and again, remember!

That’s one reason God gave the Israelites Holy Days such a Passover! “That thou mayest REMEMBER the day when thou camest forth out of the land of Egypt ALL THE DAYS OF THY LIFE.” Deuteronomy 16:3

Wow!

Maybe we too, should do more REMEMBERING, in this godly fashion.

Thank you, Asaph, for another valuable lesson.

— Dr. Mike Bagwell

 

This Psalm gets “personal!”

As much as those well-known passages in Jeremiah or Habakkuk or Jonah, for that matter.

And in Psalm 77 Asaph is facing some sort of challenge … severe in nature. And the man wisely brings all his problems to the Lord!

Today’s Verse, the 4th of 20, is so brutally honest! “Thou holdest mine eyes waking: I am so troubled that I cannot speak.”

“Thou” meaning the Lord, of course.

In other words, “God is keeping me awake, giving me no sleep!”

The verb “holdest” is “achaz,” meaning “to seize, take possession of, catch.” The Lord is thus holding his eyes open, no rest whatsoever!

That’s a unique way, though Biblical, of viewing insomnia!

On the other hand, read Psalm 127:2. “It is vain to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows: for so HE (the Lord) GIVETH HIS BELOVED SLEEP.” 

Jeremiah once said, “My sleep is sweet unto me.” Jeremiah 31:26

But not Asaph!

He is, according to our verse, “troubled.” Again: “Thou holdest mine eyes waking: I am so troubled that I cannot speak.”

The verb “am troubled” is “paam,” only found 5 times in the entire Old Testament. It means “disturbed.” Or “beaten persistently, pushed, impelled.”

Certain things, conditions of his life, are “bullying” him!

Sounds like Paul’s “thorn in the flesh!”

These burdens are so vexing the man cannot even “speak!” Cannot logically express himself (“dabar” in Hebrew) as he would wish. I think he means he cannot “pray” like he would ideally.

Yet he, with Holy Spirit inspiration, sure did write a beautiful Psalm.

Question today … Have any of you our readers been in such a deep, dark, trying place?

No sleep?

Thoughts so tangled that you can’t half talk?

And God does not seem to care?

Then, if so, real the rest of Psalm 77.

The man achieves victory ere the Poem ends!

Through the Lord God Almighty.

Learn to “filter” all your feelings, emotions, thoughts, decisions, life “turns” … through Scripture. You will “grow” spiritually in the process.

Like Peter said, many years later: “Desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby.” 1st Peter 2:2

Amen.

— Dr. Mike Bagwell