When I became a pastor, the congregation I started serving had been on a slow but steady decline for more than 40 years. There had been no mass exodus along the way, but church records showed there had been a loss in attendance every single year for those four decades.
The congregation was aging and ailing so much so that when other pastors in town talked about the church softball league, I looked around the pews and could only come up with four people who could safely play. So, I prayed, “Lord, let the sign of your blessing on this congregation be that we have grown enough to field a softball team next year.” And we did.
Over the next seven years, the congregation grew larger and younger, almost doubling in size over that period. People entered into new faith. Discipleship deepened. Our triune God was worshiped. The Scriptures were proclaimed. Every generation was intentionally engaged. A major building renovation took place. There were kids and youth everywhere. We were firing on all cylinders. And all through it, I kept turning it back to God, saying, “This is your doing, Lord. Keep leading and I’ll keep following.”
If you’d have asked me to write a book on how to take a dwindling, aging congregation and breathe new life into them, I would have done it.
But then the eighth year hit us like a ton of bricks. Within a six month period, half of the congregation was gone.
There was no smoking gun. There was no sin I or others in leadership had committed. (Believe me, I examined myself intently, longing for something I could confess and repent of.) There were some deaths but not many. And there were some relational rifts, but those were few and not the main cause. Where most of our growth had come from families moving into our small town and connecting with our church, those same families were moving out of town now — all within a few months of each other.
Seven years in, we were flying high. Eight years in and we were struggling to keep going.
Why would God let this happen? Why would he let a thriving part of his kingdom simply fall off like that? How did this serve his purposes? Did I need to be humbled? Did we need to go away so something else could step into our place? It was so confusing.
Why would God give so much success and then pull the rug out from underneath us?
My story is an echo of the story of Israel, but it’s one that has been repeated so many times and in so many ways. Psalm 44 offers itself as a companion for the people of God in general and for each of us in specific as we struggle to pray our way through the disappointments of successes that have turned into failures.
Psalm 44 begins with old stories that fill the imagination with the glory days.
We have heard it with our ears, O God;
our ancestors have told us
what you did in their days,
in days long ago (Ps. 44:1).
We weren’t around to see the good old days, but we’ve heard plenty about them. They have a certain glow surrounding them from the stories that have been repeated.
Now, all it takes is five years to forget the difficulties of an experience. Sure, we remember some of them but with the edges worn off. We forget the day-in-day-out slogging through tough circumstances. Whether it’s a baby who won’t sleep through the night or a boss who makes work hellish, time softens the experience and we even become nostalgic for it. So, when we tell stories about it, they tend to highlight the best parts and laugh at the worst.
As the Hebrew people told stories of what God had done in the Exodus, in the taking of the land, and in the establishment of the monarchy, the highlights always won out over the lowlights. It’s always this way.
There’s nothing wrong with telling the highlights of what God has done for us. We want to do that. But the difficulties he pulled us up from can so easily be whitewashed by storyteller, listener, or both. We say what we want to say and hear what we want to hear.
With your hand you drove out the nations
and planted our ancestors;
you crushed the peoples
and made our ancestors flourish.
It was not by their sword that they won the land,
nor did their arm bring them victory;
it was your right hand, your arm,
and the light of your face, for you loved them (Ps. 44:2-3).
The psalm-writing sons of Korah reach back into Israel’s collective memory to the taking of the Promised Land. They don’t question the displacement of the indigenous peoples, believing the land hadn’t come to them by their own military efforts, but by the loving provision of God.
And in the process, the first of four uses of the word “victory” shows up. Victory. Success. It’s the same thing. We’re the winners here. Things are going our way. And it feels right that they should. It’s God who is taking care of us after all.
You are my King and my God,
who decrees victories for Jacob.
Through you we push back our enemies;
through your name we trample our foes.
I put no trust in my bow,
my sword does not bring me victory;
but you give us victory over our enemies,
you put our adversaries to shame.
In God we make our boast all day long,
and we will praise your name forever (Ps. 44:4-8).
There’s a lovely humility here. As much as it’s Israelite soldiers who fight in battle, the sons of Korah give all of the credit for victory to God. While I assume sincerity on the part of the psalmists, there are a several possible problems we face when we mirror them.
Beware of false humility. When I say something like “my sword does not bring me victory,” sometimes what I’m actually saying is, “Look at me! Not only did my swordsmanship bring the victory, but I’m being super spiritual and saying it’s God who did it. I am a great fighter, and I’m really humble, too.” I’ve seen it done far too often and I’ve done my fair share of it as well (which only makes me that much more aware when I see others do it).
Watch out for triumphalism. When we relish our victories too much, we create an expectation for victory that becomes so entrenched that when we finally have a set-back we’re crushed. I have a friend who’s a diehard Alabama Crimson Tide fan and watching football is tough for her because anything less that perfection is failure.
Lofty expectations make for crushing defeats.
Putting everything on God takes everything off of me. Now, that may seem good, but it’s not. If I give God all of the credit for success, guess who’s going to get all of the blame for failure? Yep, God. And that’s exactly what happens.
When we get to verse 9, we hit a major shift in the psalm. In vs. 4-8, we shifted from past victories to current victories. But starting in v. 9, we shift to current failures.
But now you have rejected and humbled us;
you no longer go out with our armies.
You made us retreat before the enemy,
and our adversaries have plundered us.
You gave us up to be devoured like sheep
and have scattered us among the nations.
You sold your people for a pittance,
gaining nothing from their sale.
You have made us a reproach to our neighbors,
the scorn and derision of those around us.
You have made us a byword among the nations;
the peoples shake their heads at us (Ps. 44:9-14).
The pointing finger is out and the accusations are flying. You rejected us. You humbled us. You made us retreat. You gave us up. You scattered us. You sold us. You made us a reproach. You made us a byword.
There’s a laundry list here and it’s God who got it dirty. All of it.
The false humility is gone. The triumphalism is shattered. And everything is put on God.
The first half of the accusations point to military failure, the second half to the resulting shame.
Being sold for a pittance makes me think of old treasures sold at a garage sale for mere pennies. And the neighbors give a quick glance at what’s being sold only to turn up their noses at such junk. We’ve become worthless.
Psalm 44 reeks with self-pity. But that’s what I love about the Psalms. They can go to the least attractive parts of what it means to be human and turn it into prayer.
Anywhere can be a starting point for prayer. Good feelings on good days are a good place to start. But whiny self-pity is an excellent place, too.
The deeper we go into ourselves, the more important it is to pray, to turn ourselves outward, to turn ourselves God-ward.
I live in disgrace all day long,
and my face is covered with shame
at the taunts of those who reproach and revile me,
because of the enemy, who is bent on revenge (Ps. 44:15-16).
Shame over failure is brutal.
When I went from being a golden child pastor who was known for turning around a dying congregation to being a pastor whose church shrank on him overnight, I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t want anyone to ask, because I didn’t want to say anything.
And like the psalmists, I kept think, “But this isn’t my fault!”
All this came upon us,
though we had not forgotten you;
we had not been false to your covenant.
Our hearts had not turned back;
our feet had not strayed from your path (Ps. 44:17-18).
So, if it’s not my fault, whose fault is it? Right. It’s God’s fault. He got all the credit, so here comes all the blame.
But you crushed us and made us a haunt for jackals;
you covered us over with deep darkness (Ps. 44:19).
That deep darkness is the pre-creation darkness of Gen. 1:2. God has unleashed the chaos on us. The Spirit of God hovering over the face of the deep is nowhere to be found.
If God is the only active one, he’s the source of our failure. He didn’t just allow it. He caused it. It’s all on him.
If we had forgotten the name of our God
or spread out our hands to a foreign god,
would not God have discovered it,
since he knows the secrets of the heart? (Ps. 44:20-21)
And just to make things clear, the sons of Korah say, “God knows we didn’t do anything wrong. If, for instance, we’d worshiped other gods, he’d know. And he knows we didn’t. Our hands are clean. Our consciences are clean. It’s not on us.”
But not only did God do this to us, we’re still willingly suffering for his sake, for his reputation, for his purposes, for his glory.
Yet for your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered (Ps. 44:22).
We’ll come back to St. Paul’s use of this verse in Romans 8, but here in Psalm 44 it’s a thumbing of the nose at God. “You’ve stopped caring for me, but I’m still serving you. So, which one is the better person? You owe us.”
Awake, Lord! Why do you sleep?
Rouse yourself! Do not reject us forever.
Why do you hide your face
and forget our misery and oppression? (Ps. 44:23-24)
Where Psalm 121 asserts that God never slumbers or sleeps (Ps. 121:4), Psalm 44 not only assumes he’s fallen asleep on the job, but tells him to get up and get on with that job. He’s either asleep, hiding, or forgetful. And none of those are confidence-building qualities.
So, as the psalm winds down, it concludes with a final assessment and plea.
We are brought down to the dust;
our bodies cling to the ground.
Rise up and help us;
rescue us because of your unfailing love (Ps. 44:25-26).
I’m a failure. But there’s one thing in all the world I know won’t fail. That one thing is your love, God. So, please, let that love spur you on to action, because I can’t hang on any longer.
In a lifetime filled with failures of all kinds, knowing that God’s love never fails is the only real source of hope any of us can cling to.
God may even be the cause of our failures. He may have pulled the rug out from under me after that glorious seventh year as a pastor. He may have pulled the plug on plans and projects we’ve been counting on and it may feel like he’s rejected us, forgotten us, or merely fallen asleep on us. But somehow, the failing and the flailing it brings with it is all within the unfailing love of God.
In his song, “How He Loves,” John Mark McMillan reflects on the painful and unwanted ways God expresses his love for us.
He is jealous for me
Loves like a hurricane
I am a tree
Bending beneath the weight of His wind and mercy
When all of a sudden
I am unaware of these
Afflictions eclipsed by glory
And I realize just how beautiful you are and
How great Your affections are for me
No tree appreciates the wind of a hurricane. There’s nothing gentle or comforting about it. It batters and breaks.
Later on in the song, he sings, “So heaven meets earth like a sloppy wet kiss,” and we all cringe. It makes me think of Aunt Bertha placing an unwanted smooch on little Jimmy’s face which he can’t wipe off until she turns the other way. Or of that dog which is so affectionate with his licking, you’ve get slobber all over your face. It’s unwanted, but it’s love nonetheless. In fact, it’s the only way love can really be expressed in that moment.
This brings us finally to St. Paul’s reference to Psalm 44 in his quoting of v. 22. Like McMillan, Paul knows the love of God not in spite of pain, but through pain. These harrowing experiences don’t show that God’s love has failed. Rather, they prove the unfailing love of God which can never be separated from us.
Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?As it is written:
“For your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers,neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord (Rom. 8:35-39).
The cross of Jesus has shown that what looks like failure is the way our Lord brings victory, that what feels most painful is the road to joy, that was takes us down into death is the way to resurrection and life unstoppable.
Because his love doesn’t fail.