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The Dark Night of the Soul
This psalm is an individual lament of Heman the Ezrahite. Heman was a brother of Asaph (1 Chr 6) and was a Levitical worship singer as well as a prophetic seer and a counselor to King David (1 Kgs 4:31; 2 Chr 35:15). Asaph, Heman, and Jeduthun were responsible for the music around the tabernacle and later in the temple. Every other individual lament psalm in the book of psalms ends with confidence in God’s response, and then a hymn, praise to God, or a blessing. But not Psalm 88. This is the prayer of a man where death is the only remedy for his suffering according to the will of God. That is why this Psalm would have been a fitting prayer for Jesus the Messiah in the garden of Gethsemane (the crushing, olive press) before the cross (Luke 22:44). God’s will could only be fulfilled in His death (Luke 22:42). Thus, for our appointed time of death (Heb 9:27) and the Messiah’s there is no hope of escaping death and for some, suffering as well. One of the title phrases is translated by some “concerning afflicting or humbling sickness.” This book of Psalms (Book 3) teaches us by contrasting praise with lament, the two opposites on the emotional spectrum. You can only understand the richness of joy when it is compared with the depth of grief. Those who can never feel grief, cannot feel great joy either. Hebrew parallelism is used throughout this sad song.
I. A prayer for help during times of despair (vs. 1–2)
A. Faith leads a man to pray in his darkest hours
B. Yahveh is the God of his deliverance
C. Poetic parallelism, saying the same thing twice with the second occurrence being a little more intense is used throughout this psalm
D. His request: Please listen to my prayer for deliverance
II. Experiencing the pains of death while still alive (vs. 3–5)
A. My soul is so afflicted with pain that I despair even of life
B. This is the state of Jesus in the garden with the weight of what was about to occur, the sinless one would take our sin upon himself, His humanity would be separated from the love and blessing of God the Father for the first time, He would bear the Father’s wrath against sin
C. The physical ailments that one in David’s time would have that are listed in the Psalm are similar to leprosy, but the author Heman, the prophetic seer did not have this disease
D. The emotions expressed here are appropriate for any believer fighting their last earthly battle with a disease
E. The covenantal promise of life in the land and corporate covenantal worship stops at death We can no longer bodily praise the Lord at our familiar place of corporate worship
F. God will not intervene to stop our death when it is our time to go home (Heb 9:27)
G. If God the Father would have stopped the death of Jesus, we could not be saved from the wrath to come and the everlasting fires of hell
H. This writer feels abandoned like an unknown soldier thrown into a mass unmarked grave
I. The word pictures of sinking in deep water and thrown into dungeons are lonely images
III. God is actively involved in this pain occurring (vs. 6–9a)
A. The sufferer states that it is Yahveh who is doing this to him
B. This statement makes this psalm clearly messianic, and the Father was directly involved in punishing His Son for His people's sin
This is the gate of the LORD; The righteous will enter through it. I shall give thanks to You, for You have answered me, And You have become my salvation. The stone which the builders rejected Has become the chief corner stone. This is the LORD'S doing; It is marvelous in our eyes. This is the day which the LORD has made; Let us rejoice and be glad in it. (Psa 118:20-24 NASB) (Matt 21:23–46; Mark 12:1–12)
C. God the Father punished his own Son to the point of death in the place of every believer
D. God does allow sickness to take His people home to heaven very often, but He is not actively involved in this sickness unless He is chastising them for continuing to surrender to a sinful practice after being given many opportunities to repent
If anyone sees his brother committing a sin not leading to death, he shall ask and God will for him give life to those who commit sin not leading to death. There is a sin leading to death; I do not say that he should make request for this. (1 John 5:16 NASB)
IV. A prayer for help as death approaches (vs. 9b–12)
A. The psalmist asks questions of God that also express his petition to God
B. The author is not denying life after death, he is viewing what we see on earth after a death and the loss of the activity of the human body and of the participation in the covenantal communities' worship and life
C. From the perspective of most family members and from life on earth, death is not
desirable because of all the separations it brings
For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. If I am to live in the flesh, that means fruitful labor for me. Yet which I shall choose I cannot tell. I am hard pressed between the two. My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better. But to remain in the flesh is more necessary on your account. (Phil 1:21–24 ESV)
D. Sadly, people are eventually forgotten on the earth
V. God is actively involved in this pain occurring (vs. 13–14)
A. For the third time (vs. 1, 9, 13) the psalmist states he is crying out to God for deliverance
B. Again he acknowledges God’s involvement in this suffering in some way
C. God in His sovereignty is indirectly behind things and allows things like the difficulty of this believer. These statements seem to refer to the Messiah
VI. Experiencing the pains of death while still alive (vs. 15–18)
A. The pain occurring from youth that results in such a severe rejection by men have led some to think this is a description of leprosy or skin cancer
B. The Messiah, Jesus, knew of His approaching death, and was about His Father’s business from His youth (Luke 2:49)
C. The Messiah bore the wrath of the Father in our place all alone on the cross. He spent part of the night chained in Caiaphas’s dungeon in the pit
D. A true believer can be chastised by the Father (corrective punishment) but cannot bear the wrath of God against sin. Jesus already bore the wrath we deserve in our place, once for all time
E. Jesus was alone in His suffering for us and finished his work. The believer will never be alone or separated from Christ or His love (See Rom 8:32–39)
Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you own, for He has said, "I will never ever leave you nor ever forsake you." So, we can confidently say, "The LORD is my helper; I will not fear; what can man do to me?" (Heb 13:5–6)
Lessons to live by:
• In the middle of tribulation, faith holds on to the God who saves
• We can pray when we feel all alone with great honesty. But since Jesus took our shame and abandonment in our place (My God, My God, why have you forsaken Me? [Psa 22:1]) we will never be alone, but it may feel like we are during dark and difficult days
• Not even death can separate us from the love and presence of Christ
• God allows suffering for a higher purpose. There are mysteries in life connected with suffering and death that we will not be able to understand until we get to heaven
