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Psalm 43[1]
1           Vindicate me, O God, and plead my cause against an ungodly nation; rescue me from deceitful and wicked men.
2           You are God my stronghold. Why have you rejected me? Why must I go about mourning, oppressed by the enemy?
3           Send forth your light and your truth, let them guide me; let them bring me to your holy mountain, to the place where you dwell.
4           Then will I go to the altar of God, to God, my joy and my delight. I will praise you with the harp, O God, my God.
5           Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God.
The Lord is our Joy!
·       The Lord is our joy because He is our advocate (verse 1)!
o   The Psalmist is praying for vindication from his enemies, who were ungodly, deceitful and wicked.
o   The Psalmist calls on the Lord to plead his case.
o   We have the Lord Jesus Christ as our advocate.  Hebrews confirms this.
·       The Lord is our joy because He is our protection (verse 2).
o   “stronghold” means “place or means of protection”
o   Since the Lord is our fortress—our protection, the Psalmist asks a rhetorical question: why must I go around mourning and oppressed.
§  He’s not asking in a complaint as if the Lord was abandoning him.  He asks in response to all that has come before: because the Lord is good, faithful, true, righteous, a friend to the down-trodden, why do I go around depressed?
·       He is our joy because He is our hope (verse 3-5).
o   Here’s our hope:
§  The Lord’s light will illuminate our path (Verse 3)
·        God’s truth and light is revealed in His Word—the Scriptures
o   Psalm 119:105 “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path.”
§  The Lord’s truth will fill our mind (verse 4)
·        Psalm 1:1-3 “Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked or stand in the way of sinners or sit in the seat of mockers. 2    But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. 3     He is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever he does prospers.”
§  A relationship with Him.  (verse 4)
·        We have the privilege of knowing Him in worship.
o   John 4:23 But the time is coming—indeed it’s here now—when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth. The Father is looking for those who will worship him that way. 24 For God is Spirit, so those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth.”
§  The Lord Himself (verse 5)
·        Our hope is based in HIS promise!  HIS word!  HIS faithfulness
o   Lamentations 3:23 Great is his faithfulness; his mercies begin afresh each morning

[1] Again, Psalm 42 and 43 most likely constituted a single Psalm.