Praise in the Darkness!

Recently one of my friends made a comment to me that made me think about how I first starting reading the Bible.  The background was I was 11 years old and my mom told me that she and my dad were separating.  I was so torn up by this.  I remember wandering the house so angry that God would let this happen to my family.  I couldn't understand why my parents didn't care about each other.

I needed someone to talk to then and I found a teacher at school that I confided in. She pointed me toward God and reading the Bible for comfort. She told me to start in psalms.

So I started reading in Psalms and almost instantly connected with the words of David.  It was like he was reading my thoughts.  It gave my pain voice.  I was always amazed at how David through all the struggles he went through, still praised God.  He was always honest with God, sometimes brutally honest about his feelings, but in the Psalms he always turns his face toward God at the end and verbalizes his trust.

There are so many great Psalms it is hard to pick favorites, but some of mine are:

Psalms 13

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.

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

Psalms 27:1

The Lord is my light and my salvation —
whom shall I fear?
The Lord is the stronghold of my life—
of whom shall I be afraid?

Psalms 27:13-14

I remain confident of this:
I will see the goodness of the Lord
in the land of the living.

Wait for the Lord;
be strong and take heart
and wait for the Lord

Psalms 34:18

The Lord is close to the brokenhearted
and saves those who are crushed in spirit

Psalms 42:5

Why, my soul, are you downcast?
Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
for I will yet praise him,
my Savior and my God.

Psalms 46:1-3

God is our refuge and strength,
an ever- present help in trouble.
 Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way
and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,
 though its waters roar and foam
and the mountains quake with their surging.

There are so many other great ones. I can't begin to list them all. David understood that in the deepest darkness that God was still Real, Loving, and Present in his life.  He understood the true nature and heart of God even through his tears and pain.   

A sermon lately struck me with the idea of sacrifice of praise.  You don't think of praise as a sacrifice.  But you know, that is exactly what David did throughout his life.  The Bible even has a verse on it. 

• Hebrew 13:15 : "Through Jesus, therefore, let us continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise—the fruit of lips that openly profess his name." NIV

So Faith is trusting when we can't see, Darkness.  And by trusting God we are able to give a sacrifice of praise, Lifting God Up, even in the darkness... even through our tears.  Little  did I know the full concept of this at 11 and 12 when I started reading these verses, but now through this even greater family trial, it holds so much more depth and comfort to me.

So many around me also suffer from darkness in their lives, and I'm sure many of you reading this do as well. But lets lift our eyes and see God's goodness in His word and remember all the times He has lifted us up.  So in our darkness we can keep the faith, find our hope, and give sacrifices of praise to our God of unfailing, everlasting, love.  No darkness lasts forever.  Let God's light and hope pour into your heart through your darkness now.  You'll never regret it.