Depression (Words Of Hope)

Questions This Sermon Answers:

1. What is Psalm 139 about?

Psalm 139 is a meditation by David on the God who knows him completely, is present everywhere, and formed him in the womb with a purpose. Its four movements move from God's omniscience (verses 1-6), to His omnipresence (verses 7-12), to His creating and ordaining hand (verses 13-18), and finally to a prayer for self-examination (verses 19-24). For the discouraged, Dr. Holt preaches it as words of hope: "Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain it" (Psalm 139:6).

2. Does God care about me when I'm depressed?

Yes. Dr. Holt presses the point that in a universe astrophysicists now estimate at roughly two trillion galaxies, "God's eye, His attention, and His love is upon the children He calls His own." He never called a planet or a mountain His child, but He calls you that, and He proved it by sending what was most precious to Himself to hang on a cross and die for your sake. If you wonder whether anyone loves you, you are beloved by the One who made all things, and that will not change tomorrow even if you mess up.

3. What does Psalm 139 say about God knowing us?

It says God knows us exhaustively and personally: "O LORD, You have searched me and known me... You understand my thought afar off... there is not a word on my tongue, but behold, O LORD, You know it altogether" (Psalm 139:1-4). Dr. Holt stresses that this is personal, not corporate: not us, but me. God knows the brightest lights in our heart and the darkness within, and in spite of all He knows, He loves us still. The God you go to bed praying to is the same God you wake up to.

4. Why is God's omniscience good news rather than frightening?

Because knowing all things is in the job description of being God, and a God who knows the future can act on it and answer prayer instead of rolling the divine dice. On a personal level, many spend a lifetime wanting someone, somewhere, to really understand them; the good news is there is One, the God who formed you, who not only gets you but loves you, sometimes in spite of what He knows. The Westminster Confession (2.1-2) confesses God as infinite, "knowing all things," and to that God the troubled soul may safely come.

5. Where can I flee from God's presence?

Nowhere, and the psalmist counts that a comfort: "If I ascend into heaven, You are there; if I make my bed in hell, behold, You are there... even the night shall be light about me" (Psalm 139:8-12). The pagans imagined gods of limited jurisdiction, like an AM radio signal that fades as you drive too far; David answers that the true God is omnipresent. Far better than a good neighbor or an insurance carrier, He is always at your side, so you are never alone, and that will not change no matter what hardships you face.

6. What does it mean to be fearfully and wonderfully made?

It means you are the deliberate handiwork of a divine craftsman, not a cosmic accident: "For You formed my inward parts; You covered me in my mother's womb... I am fearfully and wonderfully made" (Psalm 139:13-14). Dr. Holt recalls seeing his daughter's prenatal sonogram, fingers and toes and movement, knit together at the molecular level. Against the spirit of the abortion age, he urges, do not let anyone take that from you, for every life is formed by God with a divine purpose in view.

7. What does Psalm 139:16 mean when it says our days were written in God's book?

It means God ordained the length and shape of our lives before we lived them: "in Your book they all were written, the days fashioned for me, when as yet there were none of them" (Psalm 139:16). Dr. Holt explains that this book contains God's decrees, His plans and intentions, that which He has ordained. People will accept God in the abstract, an ethereal force like karma, but resist a God who has an agenda; the Westminster Confession (3.1) confesses that God freely and unchangeably ordains whatsoever comes to pass, and the psalmist praised Him for it.

8. How can Psalm 139 comfort someone who is suffering or disabled?

Dr. Holt insists that a child born blind or with Down syndrome is not an accident and not undesirable in the eyes of God. In a fallen world we all suffer fallen ills, all are two inches from the grave, and all are far more impaired than we realize. As he puts it, you will never reconcile why any man dies until you reconcile why every man dies, because the underlying condition of sin is shared by all. Yet God forms each of us with a purpose, and His good and loving plan can be trusted even in hardship.

9. Why does David ask God to search and examine him in Psalm 139?

Because a man after God's own heart, having called out the wicked, then puts himself under the same microscope: "Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me, and know my anxieties; and see if there is any wicked way in me" (Psalm 139:23-24). David, who as a boy refused to let Goliath blaspheme God's name, shared God's loves and hates, so his own sin convicted him. This is the heart of sanctification, captured in John Newton's confession that though he was not yet the man he should be, by God's grace he was not the man he used to be.

10. How does Psalm 139 point to the gospel and to Christ?

It points to a God whose perfect knowledge of our sin does not drive Him away but moves Him to redeem; the same omniscient, omnipresent God sent His Son to die for those He calls His own. Dr. Holt closes with hope: you are loved by your Maker, He has ordained your path onto His golden shores, and you have a great and glorious future. So be encouraged, do not be Jonah running to the seas, but lift your hand to His, and He will take it.