Psalm 42:1-11 As the hart pants after the water brooks, so pants my soul after you, O God.… As the hunted hart; as the hart flying from the enemy, more dead than living; as the overrun, overborne, imperilled hart pants and cries for the water brooks, so... then we fill in our human experience; for if we are living any life at all we are hunted, persecuted, threatened. Until we are sensible of being hunted we cannot pray much. "As the hart panteth after the water brooks, so..." The "so" is balanced by the "as." These words of manner must be equal the one to the other; the hart will be ashamed of them if it should ever come to know that so quiet, tame speech addressed to heaven is supposed to represent its earnestness when it is hunted by furious hounds. "As the hart..." Then this soul-panting after God is natural. Whatever is natural admits of legitimate satisfaction; whatever is acquired grows by what it feeds on until it works out the ruin of its devotee. No hart ever panted after wine; no bird in the air ever fluttered because of a desire to be intoxicated. When we lose or leave the line of nature we become weak, infatuated, lost. says the natural response of the human heart is Christian. "So panteth my soul after Thee, O God." Yea, for nothing less. Man needs all God. Every sinner needs the whole Cross. Every flower needs the whole solar system. Herein is the mystery of Divine passion and love, that we can all have a whole — a mystery, mayhap a contradiction in words, but a sweet reality in experience. "For Thee, O God." Then for nothing strange. As the water brooks were made for the chased or panting hart, so God lives to satisfy the soul of man. Herein see the greatness of the soul of man. What does that soul need to fill it and satisfy it, and quiet it, and give it all it's possible consciousness of glory? It needs the living God. Atheists themselves are intermittently religious. Even God-deniers are in some degree in an unconscious sense God-seekers. (J. Parker, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: {To the chief Musician, Maschil, for the sons of Korah.} As the hart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God.WEB: As the deer pants for the water brooks, so my soul pants after you, God. |
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