Hope in the Night (A 30-Day Reflection of the Word of God)

Twenty-First Night: Am I Sinful Enough to Fight with Myself?

"Why are you cast down, O my soul? And why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God; For I shall yet praise Him, The help of my countenance and my God."
- Psalms 42:11

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Reflection:

There is no comfort when it comes to our own sinfulness. But acknowledging that we used people, forget God, and being a self-serving human is an evidence that we were actually in the boxing ring with ourselves. When Jeremiah wrote that the "heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked," (Jer. 17:9) we are talking about right inside us. Our own heart lies to ourselves and this is different from being hypnotized; it is a situation where we are in an arm-bar.

I love how King David put his fear into words. These words became a Psalm, a song. The situation we are in right now - the fear, hopelessness, despair, dread and weariness - is similar to David's Psalm 42 and in verse 5, he said: “Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within us?"

I don't have a beautiful singing voice to begin with. I am naturally out of tune. I recognized the right notes in my head, sang well and beautifully in my head but I never could sing it with my mouth. With my voice. Correctly.

One time, I sang with the worship team in an evening worship service of our church and I sang too sudden and too loud because I was nervous that it disrupted the momentum of the congregation (and surprised the band, as well). Many times I tried to sing while playing guitar and I just can't get the right pitch at all. My family would always tease me about it. I would always just smile or joke about my disability but deep inside, I was hurting.

I would cry out to God, asking Him why? I wanted to sing in tune. I wanted to sing in the right pitch. I wanted to sing the songs I wrote myself. I love singing for Him badly. Why didn't He give me even an ounce of singing voice?

Dramatic? But that's reality. Silly reaction, yet I was truly traumatized. I never held a microphone without so many scenarios, so many flashbacks, so much fear after that. I even swore that I will never, ever hold a microphone and sing alone in front of a congregation again. I left the worship team.

We were allowed to prosecute our fears and the judgments they insist upon us with the, as Paul Maxwell called it, "gavel of Jesus Christ": “Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation” (Psalm 42:5). Maybe we won't be able to master it right away.

My siblings and I had been in silent arguments regarding my separation from the music ministry for months. I never told them about my fear and I had been battling it alone. I knew that I should hope in God and I should praise Him in spite of what had happened. I knew that I shouldn't dwell in the bitterness and fear but my emotions got the better of me. My emotions won't listen to the command of my mind. They even won the battle because for months I stayed in the solemnity of just standing in the congregation singing, and looking away from the worship team to avoid getting jealous.

David did the same. He commanded his emotions to "hope in God" but immediately he followed it in verse 6 with how he lose to his fear: “My soul is cast down within me”. He lost. Only that he didn't give up. He repeated the command in verse 11 as a reminder to himself, "Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God.”

Maybe we don't know how to deal with our fears and when it will last but there is one reminder that David demonstrated to us and this is also what the Lord wanted to tell us: Hope in God. Praise Him. Rejoice in your salvation. Rejoice in Him. Not all will come to destruction tomorrow. The truth and acceptance of our sinfulness drives us to rebuke ourselves from our anxieties and fear, and moved them from the place of being a “mind-controller” to our “opponent.”

Are you sinful enough to be fighting with yourselves? Yes, you are.

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Prayer:

Dear Heavenly Father, there are many times when I am in war with my sinful self. I know I have no capability to defeat the sins haunting me each and every time. Deliver me from this battle, Lord Jesus. I pray that I will overcome my fear, my struggles, my pain. I will overcome it with my Lord and Savior. So help me, God. Amen.