Verse 3. My tears have been my food day and night. This man is so depressed. He is on the

brink of tears all the time. Ever been there?

What do you do if you are suffering from spiritual depression? That's the question John

Piper answers from Psalm 42 in this episode of Light and Truth. This sermon was originally

preached at Bethlehem Baptist Church on June 1, 2008.

One of the prominent emotional conditions that are in the Psalms could be called spiritual depression.

I get the phrase from Martin Lloyd Jones's book. He wrote a whole book on this Psalm Psalm 42

called spiritual depression. It's a good book. I recommend you get it and read it.

The Psalm ends. Why are you downcast on my soul? And why are you in turmoil within me?

The Psalmists are unbelievably honest about their pain. And then they say things that are just

off the wall, hopeful. Even while they seem to be expressing hopelessness. It's very strange.

The Psalms are strange because it is a strange thing to live under the sovereign love of God

as a redeemed person. So let's do the overview and then tackle those practical

ways that we can follow him in responding. Three elements to the overview.

Externally his circumstances are oppressing. Verse 3. His enemies say to me all day long,

where is your God? So he's being taunted. Verse 10. Same thing. Only he describes the effect

as a deadly wound. As with a deadly wound in my bones, my adversaries taunt me while they

say to me all day long, where is your God? Now not only is it a hard thing to be taunted.

Somebody say, yeah, where's your God? But evidently when somebody says that, it means you look

like you've been abandoned. They wouldn't come along and say to somebody for whom everything

was going well, probably, yeah, where's your God now? Something's gone wrong.

And now they're taunting him so you've got the wrong that happened and you've got the taunt

...