Today’s Passage: Psalm 42
A deer at the end of a drought ‘ārag, pronounced ah-RAHG. Strong's H6165, to pant, long for, crave. This is a rare word, and it carries the picture of an animal so parched that its whole body leans toward water. It is nothing so mild as reaching for a cup at the end of an ordinary day. The psalmist takes that bodily craving and lays it on the soul, and the longing has a definite object: When shall I come and appear in God’s presence? He used to go up to the house of God. He cannot go now, and that is the wound underneath the thirst. , leaning its whole body toward a stream it cannot reach, and that is where this psalm begins, with a soul that thirsts for God in just that way. The worshiper’s tears have become his food both day and night, and all the while men press the taunt on him: Where is your God? Then he does something worth watching. He turns and speaks to his own soul. Why are you downcast? Put your hope in God. The ache is not gone by the time we reach verse 11, and yet he says the refrain a second time anyway.
This is not a psalm that hurries to fix the reader or to explain the pain away. It stays with the thirst and lets it stay honest, and that honesty is part of what it has to give.
As you read, hold this: Why are you downcast, O my soul? Put your hope in God.
Context A Maskil of the sons of Korah
The heading, “For the choirmaster. A Maskil of the sons of Korah,” is part of the text this house receives, not a later label to be skipped over. Korah’s line had once been spared judgment and later took its place singing in the sanctuary. The word Maskil most likely names a style of song, though its exact sense has not survived, and we can leave that standing without pretending to know more than we do. What we hear is one worshiper, far from the house he used to help lead, working an ache out loud.
Psalm 42:1-2 (BSB)
¹ For the choirmaster. A Maskil of the sons of Korah. As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul longs after You, O God. ² My soul thirsts for God, the living God. When shall I come and appear in God’s presence?
Psalm 42:3-4 (BSB)
³ My tears have been my food both day and night, while men ask me all day long, “Where is your God?” ⁴ These things come to mind as I pour out my soul: how I walked with the multitude, leading the festive procession to the house of God with shouts of joy and praise.
Tears have taken the place of bread, and the taunt is aimed straight at the tender place: Where is your God? Then memory rises, and the memory itself cuts. He remembers the crowd and the procession, the house of God and the shouts of joy. He misses God, and he misses the people he once stood among to worship.
Psalm 42:5 (BSB)
⁵ Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why the unease within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise Him for the salvation of His presence.
Study notes He talks to his own soul
He stops describing the feeling and turns to address it directly: Why are you downcast, O my soul? He does not pretend the soul is fine, but he will not let it have the last word either. Put your hope in God, he tells it, and he says it while the unease is still there in the room with him.
Psalm 42:6-8 (BSB)
⁶ O my God, my soul despairs within me. Therefore I remember You from the land of Jordan and the peaks of Hermon—even from Mount Mizar. ⁷ Deep calls to deep in the roar of Your waterfalls; all Your breakers and waves have rolled over me. ⁸ The LORD decrees His loving devotion by day, and at night His song is with me as a prayer to the God of my life.
Verse 5 did not erase verse 6, for the soul still despairs. He names the places where he now finds himself, the land of the Jordan and the peaks of Hermon and Mount Mizar, all of them north of the temple and far from the house he longs for. The thirst that began as a longing for water has become a flood: deep calls to deep in the roar of the waterfalls, and the breakers and waves roll over him. And yet even here verse 8 still names what remains, the LORD’s loving devotion by day and His song in the night.
Psalm 42:9-10 (BSB)
⁹ I say to God my Rock, “Why have You forgotten me? Why must I walk in sorrow because of the enemy’s oppression?” ¹⁰ Like the crushing of my bones, my enemies taunt me, while they say to me all day long, “Where is your God?”
The taunt comes back, the very same words as before: Where is your God? Notice that he still calls God his Rock in the same breath that asks, Why have You forgotten me? He does not carry the question away from God. He brings it to the One he still trusts to hear it.
Psalm 42:11 (BSB)
¹¹ Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why the unease within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise Him, my Savior and my God.
It is the same refrain once more, with one small change. In verse 5 he hoped in the salvation of God’s presence; here in verse 11 he hopes in my Savior and my God, a little more personal than before. The despair has not fully lifted, and still the soul is told the true thing again.
Psalm 43 will take up this same line once more, but for today the hold is already here. Why are you downcast, O my soul? Put your hope in God.