Finding God in Life's Unfairness: Lessons from Psalm 73

1. "I don't know about you, but I was cut to the quick by some of those confessions, but even as the sting hurts, God takes away the sting of death and sin. So hear this reminder, hear this good news. Who was in a position to condemn? Only Christ, and Christ died for us, Christ rose for us, Christ reigns in power for us, Christ prays for us. Anyone who is in Christ is a new creation. The old life is gone, a new life is life has begun, know that you're forgiven, and be at peace. Thanks be to God." [05:40] (33 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


2. "I want to remind you that no matter all the things you see, I know it's back to school season soon, people are buying new stuff, and before we know it, it's going to be Christmas, that the only thing that's worth desiring, the first thing that our heart really wants, should want, is God. All the other stuff, you get candy, you eat it, and it's all done. You get too much candy, you eat it, you get a tummy ache. The only thing that our heart should truly desire, the first thing, the most important thing, is God." [09:55] (32 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


3. "It's interesting that God takes a whole different method of his curation. Think of all the information that is available about God, about who God is. Right? There's books, there's poems, there's songs, there's histories, and God, through his Holy Spirit, inspired our scripture, inspired these authors, these songwriters, these historians, these disciples, these academics, and these regular people to go and to put, write these books of the Bible to give us guidance and to tell us about him." [23:08] (36 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


4. "God includes these laments or these complaints in the Holy Scriptures. God is not trying to hide the cries of humanity that vent to how difficult life is. God does not edit out his children's disappointment when things don't go the way that we think they should go. In Psalm 73, we read a song of wrestling from the author, Asaph. Asaph was a professional songwriter. David wrote many of the psalms, but some were professional singer-songwriters that were used in worship. They were worship leaders, and he lived in King David's time." [24:13] (36 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


5. "It's a reminder that we can be honest here we can be honest before God and one another from that what from our perspectives things don't seem to make sense we can be honest that we have sometimes plays for doubts sometimes faith is messy that our perspective is limited from our vantage point that our context has incomplete knowledge that in our humanity we can't understand we can't comprehend God's will we don't know why God is allowing things to happen in our lives but we come to the Psalms and join ancient believers before us who have to wrestled about when life seems unfair." [25:27] (44 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


6. "In lament, there's an honesty and even a confession of where we are with God, of where we struggle with God's plan. And we say it to God. It's not like gossip. We say to God, we say, hey, I know you're good, but I got tripped up because things were not good in my life, and I see other people doing amazing. And they're wicked people, they're evil people. They're people who hate. In lament, there's that honesty of the disharmony we experience. We're honest with God and ourselves." [28:53] (36 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


7. "God knows and hears that. He knows the sad song. your heart sings. He's aware of the tension you feel when you're doing the numbers and things don't add up. He knows the feeling when you're trying to live a good and faithful life. You try to make God a priority, and it looks like those people who are ignoring God, it looks like they're doing pretty well. And once again, God is big enough to handle this tension, right? This is Bible we're reading. This is God-inspired words, even as they share cares and concerns. He understands when we see life is not fair and does not sweep it under the rug or even ask you to deny your experience. God can handle your slippery seasons of doubt." [31:14] (45 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


8. "Where do you run to when you have these seasons of doubt, when you feel your feet are slipping, when you're casting your eyes on things you want, when you're envious of other people, when you're dissatisfied with your connection from God? Where do you run to? When life doesn't seem fair and faith seems out of touch, we can still go to God. We can find solace there. We can be reminded of God's love, of his holiness, of his justice. We're not to walk away, but we're to press in forward." [35:32] (35 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


9. "The godless life looks good for a moment. But the eyes of eternity show that it's a dead end. It's not worth pursuing sin and self. There is a day of judgment. There is an eternal reckoning. God is patient, but he's also just. So let us not keep our eyes on others. Let's not envy others. That's a sure way to slip. That's a sure way to lose footing by keeping our eyes on someone else." [36:50] (32 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


10. "Our incomplete understanding of life's unfairness is a three-second clip of eternity. So we have been our three seconds of life in the eternity timeline. It's hard to know who's coming in first, who's coming second, who's failing, who's on the podium. So we trust that God is holy and just. And in the timeline, in the race, in the race of eternity, it will be made clear and evident. We cannot envy someone's three seconds when we see how badly they lose the race." [37:40] (39 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)