Psalms 94:19

Meanwhile, having no other help only drives a person to God all the more. And the soul knows what help He has already given. If it had not been for this, he would already be dwelling in silence. He had realised that his foothold was already gone. Even then, One stronger than he supported him — with heart, not merely hand. So, with a multitude of anxieties inside him, the comforts of God soothed his soul. The vivid picture he uses is that they "caressed" it.

The mind has no certainty. It holds a multitude of thoughts that lie beyond the range of our natural powers, and those powers can only decide what lies within them. There are a multitude of thoughts within us. We cannot reach a conclusion, yet the thoughts are there, and something or other suggests them, while the heart has no answer.

But there is a refuge and a resource. It is not in explaining everything to the mind, which would only keep it in its mad and wicked claim to judge God. It is in bringing the positive good that is in God into the soul. Then the soul knows it has blessedness and truth, whatever part of its multitude of thoughts it cannot solve.

So we bring our sufferings to the LORD. Then we not only get "rest from the days of adversity"; we also find the "comforts of the LORD." We learn that He is with us, to help us in all our sufferings and to hold us in all our weakness. So the "anxious thoughts," which would pull the soul apart, give place to the comforts of the LORD that delight the soul.

What we need so much is closeness of soul with God, resting quietly in Him though everything around us is confusion and uproar. The man here had God near his heart. So although wrongdoing was everywhere, it only became the means of making God's "comforts" known to his soul. Our portion is not only to know the riches of divine grace. It is to know the secret of the Lord — to have intimate communion with Him in His holiness. Then, however hostile the circumstances, the soul rests quietly and steadily in Him.

But sadly, we too often enter into fellowship with the sorrow itself. We turn our souls to thoughts of sorrow, and this leads us to distrust God's ability to meet it. Instead of saying, "In the multitude of my thoughts within me your comforts delight my soul," we turn round and round in our own thoughts. We wonder what to do. We busy ourselves with circumstances, or with what we find inside ourselves, and so we shut God out altogether.

So the position overflows with comfort. Many things must fill our minds. But let us truly be able to say with the Psalmist, "In the multitude of my thoughts within me Your comforts delight my soul." Then, delighting in this way in what God is to us, may we be able in power to comfort others "with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God."