This morning, if you would, let's go to Psalm 10. Psalm 10. I want to remind you that the Psalms are not chapters. It's not a book. It's 150 individual Psalms, and they were songs that were sung by the Jews. And there is a division in the book of Psalms. There's five different books or five different scrolls in book one that we're in. The theme is human suffering and the need for God's deliverance. And Psalm 9 and 10, there's a lot of scholars that think they actually at one time went together partially because Psalm 10 doesn't have an introduction. musical instructions. For another thing, Psalm 9 and 10, they both deal with much the same type of language, but mainly asking God to arise and avenge the oppressed. And so certainly they are similar. I preach it separately simply because there seems to be a break in thought at Psalm 10. It's almost like a different conversation has started. If praise is the emphasis in Psalm 9, then prayer is the emphasis in Psalm 10. And just to give you a 30,000 foot view before we do read the text, the psalmist here feels as if God is far away. We just dealt with this recently, but the truth is there's actually, especially in the physical sense, there's nowhere that you can go to get farther away from God. If you're a child of God, He's indwelling you by His Holy Spirit, and we know that God is omnipresent. He is everywhere, at all times, all the time. And so even though we may feel like we're further away from God on some days as opposed to others, that's not technically true. As I've said so many times, feelings can be very strong, but feelings can be very wrong. And so, he feels as if God is far away. And what seems to be discouraging in this particular text is that there seems to be wicked men even within the Jewish community that are exploiting and oppressing their brothers and sisters. In fact, just look at verse 11 so you'll be with me on the same page here. It says, He has said in His heart, God hath forgotten. He hideth His face. He will never see. And so, whoever He's talking about acknowledges the one true God, Elohim. And so he just says that he's not going to do anything about it. He hideth his face. He'll never see it. And so it seems this may be an inward battle. And so, you know, in my opinion, I mean, obviously wickedness is always a horrible thing, but wickedness done in the name of God, in my opinion, it just goes to a different level. Because it misrepresents God. It misrepresents Christ. And some of the greatest pain that I've ever had to deal with as a pastor is having to, you know, encourage people and try to counsel people who have a background in which they were surrounded by people, maybe even in their own family, who claimed to be a Christian, and yet they horribly misrepresented Christ. And I have to come in there and try to say, yeah, that was horrible, but I want you to understand that's not the true Christ. That's not the real Christ. Here's the real Christ. That's a difficult span to make a lot of the time. It's an extra step to have to go. Wickedness is horrible, but when it's done in the name of God, it's much worse. It's a horrible thing for people to misrepresent Christ. But this leads the psalmist to ask a question, where is God? With that in mind and with that context in the background, let's read the Word of God together. I'll read the whole psalm and I'll attempt to preach through the whole psalm today simply because you can't really divide this thought here. He says, Why standest thou afar off, O Lord? Why hidest thou thyself in times of trouble? The wicked in his pride doth persecute the poor. Let them be taken in the devices they have imagined. For the wicked boasteth of his heart's desire, and blessed the covetous whom the Lord abhorreth. The wicked, through the pride of his countenance, will not seek after God. God is not in all his thoughts. His ways are always grievous. Thy judgments are far above out of his sight. As for all his enemies, he puffeth at them. He has said in his heart, I shall not be moved, for I shall never be in adversity. His mouth is full of cursing and deceit and fraud. Under his tongue is mischief and vanity. He sitteth in the lurking places of the villages. In the secret places doth he murder the innocent. His eyes are privately set against the poor. He lieth and waits secretly as a lion in his den. He lieth and waits to catch the poor. He doth catch the poor. When he draweth him into his net, he croucheth and humbleth himself, that the poor may fall by his strong ones. He hath said in his heart, God hath forgotten. He hideth his face. He will never see it. Arise, O Lord God. Lift up thine hand. Forget not the humble. Wherefore doth the wicked condemn God? He hath said in his heart, Thou hast seen it, for thou beholdest mischief and spite, to requite it with thy hand. The poor committeth himself unto thee. Thou art the helper of the fatherless. Break thou the arm of the wicked and the evil man. Seek out his wickedness till he find none. The Lord is King forever and ever. The heathen are perished out of His land. Lord, Thou hast heard the desire of the humble. Thou wilt prepare their heart. Thou wilt cause Thine ear to hear, to judge the fatherless and the oppressed, that the man of the earth may no more oppress. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we love You. We thank You so much for Your grace and mercy. Thank You for salvation in Jesus Christ. Lord, we do praise You for this church body and the unity You've given us, Lord. The love that You've given for one another. Lord, I just pray that You'd empty me of sin and self and fill me with Your Holy Spirit. Lord, if there's one lost today that doesn't know Jesus Christ in the pardon of their sin, Lord, I pray that You would draw them to saving faith today, God. That they would repent and believe in the death burial and resurrection for the forgiveness of their sin. Lord, if there's somebody just hurting, going through various trials, Lord, comfort them. God be with all the service today, both here and in Tremont, into me as sin itself and forgive me where I failed you. In Christ's name I pray these things, amen. So I want to preach on the thought this morning of, oh Lord, where are you? Oh Lord, where are you? It's going to be somewhat of an unorthodox message this morning. The reason being is because, understand again that the psalms are songs, and in these psalms, God allows the emotion to shine through. And even though the psalms are inspired Scripture, there's no doubt about that. Not all of them are deep theological discourses. And this psalm here, really until the very end is just full of questions that at some point in time we've probably all asked. And Psalm 10 does ask some really deep questions which allows us to ponder and seek the answers. And that's really the direction that I want to take today. I want to ask good questions. In fact, I'm going to try to answer the questions of the psalmist from Scripture itself. And in fact, really when I read these words and I really hear the heart of what's being said, it reminds me of a lot of people that I've counseled in the past asking these same types of questions and going through the same types of pain and doubt, and I'm so glad that we have an answer in Scripture. So I want to deal with the first question is, where is God in a world full of evil and suffering? I mean, if God was really all-powerful, and he's really all loving, then why doesn't he do something about the state of the world? Why doesn't he stop evil? Why doesn't he stop sin and suffering? Certainly we've all thought about that at some point in time. The Bible has answers for that. But here's the direction I want to take. You know that, I won't say this, I really do believe there's no such thing as a dumb question. That is asked in the spirit of wanting to genuinely learn the answer. I don't think there's anything wrong with that. But I do think there are questions that are framed in such a way that it indicates a problem and a misunderstanding on behalf of the person asking the question. And so I have learned even in my own life to ask better questions. Especially when it comes to who God is. Sometimes we just need to back up and ask better questions. And so the first better question that I would like to kind of present to the psalmist, if we could talk to him, is who are the wicked? Look at verse 1 here. He says, Why standest thou far off, O Lord? Why hidest thyself in times of trouble? And I do want to pause right there. I am so thankful that this is God's Word. And this is one of the reasons we know that it's God's Word, because if man had written it, this kind of stuff would have never made it in there. Most likely, this is David writing this psalm. We know that David was a man who loved God. He was a man after God's own heart, and yet he is questioning God, where are you? In fact, he even takes it a step further, because not only is it a question, he actually gives an assumption. He says, why standest thou far off of God? He doesn't just say, where are you? He says, why are you so far away? And I'm glad to know that a man like David could have the same struggles that I do sometimes. You know, the church that I got saved in was a big church. The pastor was a great man. But he was kind of the old school mentality that you can never show weakness. You can never communicate that you ever have any kind of flaws or problems. And as a young Christian sitting up under that, I used to think, man, I wish I could be a super Christian like that. And it really was something that I had to overcome and recognize there's no such thing as a super Christian. And so it's an encouragement to me to know that when I struggle with these things, hey, there's other good Christian people and people that love God that have the same types of struggles. No such thing as a super-Christian. But kind of circling back to our point, he says, why are you a far-off, O Lord? And then he says in verse 2, the wicked, in his pride doth persecute the poor, let them be taken in the devices that they have imagined." So he is praying that God would rise up and issue justice against the wicked. And man, it's so easy. When we read this stuff, we're thinking, yeah, God, get him. Get him! You know, we hear the description of the wicked here, and we say, get him, God, get him! Are there people in our life that we just, I mean, maybe we don't say it out loud, maybe we do. But we just say, God, get them. Get them. Listen, if y'all get quiet, I'm going to drop the plow here, okay? I have already hit a root this morning. We're not even past point one. But I've got a better question here. Who are the wicked? I mean, really, who are the wicked? Who is wicked? Before we get our torches lit and our pitchforks sharpened, who are the wicked? All of us, outside of Jesus Christ. You say, well, I don't believe that. Well, you will in a minute. Let's read this text here from verse 2 to verse 11. And I want you to underline any phrase that describes anything that you've ever done or thought. Let's begin in verse two again. The wicked in his pride, y'all have never been proud about anything, I know. Neither have I. That would be pride, wouldn't it? Doth persecute the poor. Let them be taken in the devices that they have imagined. You ever imagined any vain or wicked thing? The Bible says that God hates wicked imaginations. For the wicked boasteth of his heart's desire and blesseth the covetous whom the Lord abhorreth. The wicked through the pride of his countenance will not seek after God. God is not in all of his thoughts. I think about Romans 3 when it says, There is none righteous, no not one, that all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. And in Romans 3 and verse 11 it says, There is none that seeketh after God. There is no such thing as a God seeker in our natural state. That's everybody. That's why we need salvation. That's why we need Jesus Christ and His sacrifice for sin on the cross. Let's keep reading. Verse 5, His ways are always grievous. Thy judgments are far above out of His sight. As for all His enemies, He puffeth at them. He has said in His heart, I shall not be moved, for I shall never be in adversity. His mouth is full of cursing. and deceit and fraud under his tongue is mischief and vanity. Have you ever lied? Have you ever cursed? Have you ever cursed God? We're not doing very well on the litmus test this morning. So again, who are the wicked? Verse 8, he sitteth in the lurking places of the villages. In the secret places doth he murder the innocent. His eyes are privately set against the poor. Now you say, well here's one I've never done. I've never killed anybody. hated somebody so much in your heart that you wanted bad things to happen to them. You see, the Lord is more concerned, or I would say as much concerned with our motives as He is our methods. And so He sees the heart, He knows these things, and certainly all of us at some point in time have struggled with bitterness or malice towards somebody else. And it shows us really who we are. Verse 9, he lieth waiting secretly as a lion in his den. He lieth and waits to catch the poor. He doth catch the poor, and when he draweth him in his net, he croucheth and humbleth himself that the poor may fall by his strong ones. He is practicing deceit to fool those around him. Verse 11, he has said in his heart, God hath forgotten. He hideth his face. He will never see it. And isn't this true? That every time that we commit a sin, In that moment, we are living as if there is no God. We are living as if God doesn't see and hear what we're doing. And so, in the moment that we are sinning, at that moment in time, we are living like a practical atheist. And that's the attitude that is conveyed here in this psalm. So again, who are the wicked? All of us. Outside of Jesus Christ and His salvation and His forgiveness, that's who we are. in our hearts. And so, the better question is, who are the wicked? And now that we've seen this description of who the wicked are, you know, it kind of reminds me. I follow some of these, there's actually some Christian cartoonists on these different social media platforms and they like to convey truth by drawing different cartoons. I saw one the other day where this guy is looking up to heaven and he said, God, why don't you just get rid of all the bad people? And this angel floats down and doesn't say anything and just hands him a note and floats back up and he opens the note and it said, because he would have to get rid of you too. Isn't that true? And I'm sure you've probably heard the question asked, why do bad things happen to good people? Well, I love what R.C. Sproul said one time when somebody asked him that. He said, that only happened once and he volunteered. He was talking about Jesus Christ when He came to the cross. Even Jesus Himself said, there's none good but God and we know that He's God. Only God is good. And so, where are the good people? You say, well, I've done good things in my life. Well, the problem is you've done a lot of bad things. And that has to be atoned for. So we're asking better questions here. Verse 2 and 4 are really very telling to me. It talks about the wicked and his pride doth persecute the poor. And then it goes on to say in verse 4, the wicked through the pride of his countenance will not seek after God. God is not in all of his thoughts. And so now that we are asking better questions, this is amazing to me. And this really goes back to even what we think about God. Because when we ask better questions in this instance, we're no longer focused on the perceived injustice of God in sparing others, we are focused on the grace of God in sparing us. Doesn't that change everything? That kind of takes our way, our get them Lord. Because we know by doing that, we're putting the target on our chest. Instead of focusing on the perceived injustice of God and how He deals with others, we're focused on the grace of God in sparing us. And instead of focusing on what other people deserve, we're focusing on what we deserve, which is hell. All of us deserve hell because of our sin against God. And you say, well, I don't believe that. That's because we look at God through a sinful lens. You know, we might compare ourselves to other people. And I'm sure that we can always find people that make us feel better about ourselves. But we won't be judged by our standard. We're not going to be judged by everybody else's standard. We're going to be judged by the perfect and ferociously holy standard of God. And so, that's what we have to keep in mind. What we deserve. And when we think in self-righteous terms, We have compared ourselves again with other people using our own selfish... I mean, imagine this. Thinking that we could use our own selfish and subjective standard to judge other people. Who are we? Who are we? We're always going to be okay by our own standard. So what we understand is and what we have to get is that we're all on level ground before God. We're all sinners lost and undone without the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's why we need His great salvation. And so, we have to ask better questions. God, where are you? And why haven't you done anything about these wicked people? Well, we need to ask, well, who's the wicked? It changes our whole perspective. But then number two, a better question that I would like to ask the psalmist here is, will God ever make things right? Look at verse 12. Arise, O Lord, O God. Lift up thine hand, and forget not the humble. The humble here speaks of the afflicted. Verse 13, Wherefore doth the wicked condemn God? He hath said in his heart, Thou wilt not require it. Thou hast seen it, for thou beholdest mischief and spite. To require it with thy hand, the poor committeth himself unto thee. Thou art the helper. of the fatherless. Break thou the arm of the wicked. Now that's not literally saying break their arm. He's talking about breaking their power. It's kind of like we use the term the long arm of the law. He's saying break their power. break the arm of the wicked and the evil man, seek out his wickedness till he find none. And so the psalmist here again is kind of questioning God here. He said, God, you see all these things going on. You see the wickedness of men. You see the deceit. You see how they oppress even their own brothers and sisters. Why are you letting them get away with this? It's the wrong question. The better question is, will God ever make things right? Well, the short answer is yes, but we'll get to that in a moment. Understand today that justice delayed is not justice denied. He's going to make everything right, but however, since we're trying to ask better questions, we should probably ask, can we find peace and joy in the Lord even before that day comes? Think about that for a second. I mean, if we have kind of made up in our mind and our heart that we can never have any peace and joy until God deals with this person, or until God avenges me, or until God answers my prayer, or until He takes us out of these troubling circumstances, I can never be satisfied until God answers my checklist. You may never be happy again in this life, You may never have peace again in this life. The better question is, can you have peace and joy in the Lord even when everything's not going right? And even when it hurts? And even when you can't understand and see what God is doing? That's the better question. Because I mean, really, the truth is that even though we can experience great heartache and pain in this life, we haven't seen anything like what other people and even other Christians face on a daily basis throughout the world or at different times. I mean, really. Listen, we've got it so good. I mean, you know, we had an exciting morning with what happened. But I mean, you know, in other parts of the world, they never would have gotten out of their seat because it's like an everyday thing. I don't think we really comprehend what churches and the underground church in China or churches in North Africa where the Muslims have so much free reign and they're so violent and, you know, what really means something then. I don't think we really understand that. But can they have peace and joy even in what they're going through? Can we have peace and joy in what we're going through? And I think about what Corrie ten Boom said, you know, Corrie ten Boom, was in the Robinsbrook concentration camp. In fact, her sister died in that concentration camp. When they were taken to that camp, her father had to go somewhere else and she never saw him again. And so, in that moment though, I absolutely love this quote by her. Corrie Ten Boom said, I've experienced His presence in the deepest, darkest hell that men can create. I have tested the promises of the Bible and believe me, you can count on them. That's coming from somebody who knows. The deepest, darkest hell that man can come up with and God's grace is sufficient. His presence and His promises are sufficient and they're all true. So again I ask, can you find peace and joy in the Lord until He makes all things right? I got to sit down and have a great conversation, got to council and try to help somebody this week. That man just had a hard life. And in the most specific reason I was there, their son was killed about two years ago. Somebody shot him and I'm not going to get into the legalities, whether it was murder, whether it was accident, really, you know, as far as the outcome doesn't matter. And that young man was three months younger than Wesley. So this was very personal to me as well. And I found myself, as I read this psalm, I thought about the conversation that we had and as I was trying to find out their greatest grief and their anger and the things that they talked about, their anger at God and their anger at the investigators for supposedly maybe botching the case. I don't know, but that was their perception. And all of these things that were talked about, what I found myself doing is I found myself going from the circumstances to the person of God. And I didn't even realize I was doing it until after I thought about it. And man, this is good to do even in our own life. And the psalmist does this here. Because in the trials of life, our relief isn't going to come from immediate change in our circumstances. Listen, our comfort comes from knowing and having confidence in the loving character of God. That's what we have to find our peace in. And we see this shift right here from the psalmist. He starts this at verse 14. Look at the very last line in verse 14. He said, Thou art the helper of their followers. So he's beginning to come away from the circumstances to the person and character of God. And so, three things briefly that I mentioned in this conversation with this person. I told this person, I said, you know, I can imagine your grief. I can imagine what you're going through. I don't know why God allowed that to happen to your son. I don't know why God didn't spare your son, but here's what I do know. He didn't spare his either. I took him to the cross, and without even realizing it, I was doing the same thing the psalmist is doing. He's going from the negative circumstances to the person and character of God. This man obviously was wanting justice, wanting somebody to answer, wanting some type of vindication. And I took him to the fact that God is the righteous judge and will hold men and women accountable. You don't have to bear that burden. And then I took him to what we deserve. I asked him, I said, you know, if you were to calculate all the bad things you've done in your life before God, what do you think you deserve? He was very honest. I was, again, taking him to the righteous judge. Again, that's a pillow that we can lay our head upon at night and find rest. By just simply trusting the person and character of God, we could have so much more peace and sleep so much better at night. Here's the thing, and I've got to move on. In the areas where we don't trust God, That's the areas that we're going to try to take control ourselves. And in so doing, we heap a burden upon ourselves that was only meant for God to bear. That's what we do when we don't trust God. So the question is again, will God ever make things right? Yes. But can you find joy and peace in Him in the meantime? The answer is yes. The answer is yes. We're going to talk about this this afternoon when I start going through the book of Philippians. But then number three, another question, another better question. Who is God? And that's really what we're getting to here, that's what we're dealing with. Verse 16, I love this. Boy, you know there's so many Psalms where the Psalmist begins and he's just so discouraged, just so down in the dumps, acting like he won't make it another day, but by the end of the Psalm he gets to praising God and the whole atmosphere changes. Verse 16, the Lord is King forever and ever. The heathen, that's the Gentile nations, are perished out of His land. Lord, Thou hast heard the desire of the humble that will prepare their heart, that will cause their eye to hear, to judge the fall of us and the oppressed, that the man of the earth may no more oppress. And so here the psalmist deals with perhaps the greatest question of all and then he answers his own question. Do you see how the psalmist again shifts his focus from the problems around him to the God above him? Listen, that's what we have to do. When we get in our trials and we're just overwhelmed by the circumstances and we can't think about anything else, listen, I'm telling you, we have to get our thoughts away from the problems around us and get them on the God above us. That's where our comfort comes from. Who is God? I love this because compare how this psalm begins with how it ends. Look at verse 1. Why standest thou far off, O Lord? Why hidest thou thyself in times of trouble? So he's basically saying, Lord, where are you? And then he tells us in verse 16, the Lord is king forever and ever. The heathen are perished out of his land. So, Lord, where are you? Well, he's on his throne. What a comforting thought to know that. Notice how the psalmist goes from asking where God is to answering who God is. See, when we ask the wrong questions, it will lead us to wrong answers and wrong conclusions. And in this life, we deal with pain that we have. Listen, I know that we like to have answers. I know that we like to understand everything. I mean, don't we? We want to know everything. But I'm going to tell you right now, there's some things that we're going to face in this life that we're never going to get the answers for in this life. And you're going to be miserable if you sell out to try to find those answers and those solutions. It's just not going to happen in certain situations. And if you keep on and keep on and just obsess with it, you're going to be just gravely disappointed. But if we put our trust in God and His loving character, that's where our peace comes from. Proverbs 3 verses 5 and 6 says, Trust in the Lord with all thine heart, lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct thy paths. And so when your mind becomes overwhelmed by your circumstances, begin to remind yourself of who God is. And I'm telling you, this will help you. I mean, when you're just down in the dumps and you just cannot get your mind off of everything you're dealing with, if you have to, get out a sheet of paper and begin to write everything that you know to be true about God. Who He is. Maybe His titles. Maybe His names. It'll help you. Listen, it'll change the whole atmosphere from complaining and hopelessness to praise and hope. So I want to just give you a chance to exercise that. Just somebody speak up and say who God is. Who is God? He's Savior. Creator of all things. Eternal. Holy. Omniscient. Sovereign. Unchanging. Consistent. Just. Faithful. Gracious. All-powerful. Loving. Isn't that wonderful? Listen, that's who He is. And the only times that we don't know that or we don't feel that is because our circumstances make us feel like He's not those things. You look at the Bible. Every time Satan tried to tempt somebody, he tried to make them doubt who God is. When he tried to tempt Adam and Eve, he said, God's a liar. And He doesn't want you to eat because you'll be as God's like He is. He's holding out on you. Do you see how he tried to get them to question the goodness of God? when he dealt with Jesus in the wilderness. He said, if you're really the Son of God, turn these stones into bread. And what he was saying is, God wouldn't do this to one of His children. You've got to prove it. Nobody's going to believe you. And so, again, if that was even possible, to try to make Jesus doubt the goodness of God the Father, it really is pitiful. But that's how He does. Our feelings can lie to us. And we have to go back to the promises of God because listen, the Christian life is not based on feeling. It's based on faith of the facts of what He said. That's hard to do. But listen, wrong thinking leads to wrong beliefs, which lead to wrong emotions, which leads to wrong actions. It's like a domino effect. And so we have to go from unbiblical thinking to biblical thinking and just trust the promise of God and what He said. We know how it ends. We win because He wins. Eternity with Him forever with no more pain, suffering, sin, all that stuff. We live in the here and now. But we have to focus on what He said. We can rejoice and we can trust God and we can praise Him. He's a just God. And we can have peace and joy in Him even in the midst of our trials.