A Man Who Almost Lost His Faith

We can do strange things when we’re under a lot of pressure. When you suffer severe long-term pain, for instance, you’ll have feelings that surprise and may even scare you, or it may not be pain in your body, but the burdens and the worries and the heartaches of life that leave your head spinning. You’ll have thoughts you never dreamed of thinking. You’ll say things you never intended to say and you’ll do things you wouldn’t have done under normal circumstances.

There are times when your body hurts so bad it’s hard to think clearly in the Bible. Job knew that better than any of us, but sometimes we bring stress on ourselves because of how we react to the world around us. For instance, the Bible tells us not to compare ourselves with other people. Paul warned that it’s not wise to compare yourself to other people. In Second Corinthians chapter 10, verse 12, he said, “For we dare not class ourselves or compare ourselves with those who commend themselves, but they measuring themselves by themselves and comparing themselves among themselves are not wise.” If you think too much about the life that others have or seem to have, there’s often a temptation to be jealous of them.

And what is jealousy? Isn’t jealousy the feeling that life has not been fair to you? That it’s not right when others have it better than you do? That’s one of the reasons why the Bible says to mind your own business and do your own work. Paul said in First Thessalonians chapter four, verse 11 “to aspire,to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business, and to work with your own hands.”

Envy is like any other sin in the Bible. It makes no sense. Think about the sin of pride on the other end of the spectrum. Some people compare themselves to others and they feel arrogant because they have more than other people do. But who other people are, what they have, or what they do has nothing to do with us unless we allow it to affect us.

One of the most dangerous forms of envy is for a Christian to be jealous of sinners. Now that certainly doesn’t make one bit of sense, does it? After all, sinners are lost. They are headed for eternal destruction. So how could and why would a Christian be jealous of that fate? But that feeling of envy can and does happen.

As a matter of fact, it has been a temptation for thousands of years for godly people. When a God-fearing person sees how sinful people enjoy their life while he is suffering for no apparent reason, the feeling of resentment can start to grow, and if we dwell on it and go down that road, we can end up being jealous of the people that ought to be envious of us as Christians.

More than that, if we dwell too long on this seeming unfairness of life, we can become so frustrated that we lose our faith in God. Am I exaggerating? There was a good man in the Bible who started down that road. His name is not as well-known as Job or Jeremiah or Moses, but the story he tells makes some powerful points about the age old problem of evil.

His name was Asaph. He was evidently talented in music. The Bible says that he played the symbols in the days of King David. The Bible also says in II Chronicles chapter 29, verse 30 that he was a seer. That means that he was a prophet. First Samuel, chapter nine, verse nine tells us that “he that is now called a prophet was before time called a seer.”

Now that means that he spoke by inspiration of the Holy Spirit. So it’s not surprising then that he wrote a dozen of the Psalms in the Bible. But all the music that he played could not comfort him when the unfairness of life weighed heavy on his heart. And even though he was inspired by the Holy Spirit and taught other people, he sometimes struggled with the problems of life in his own mind.

And in one of the Psalms, he tells about a time in his life when he almost lost his faith struggling with the injustice in this world. That Psalm is number 73. It reads, “Truly, God is good to Israel, to such as our pure in heart. But as for me, my feet had almost stumbled. My steps had nearly slipped. For I was envious of the boastful when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. For there are no pangs in their death, but their strength is firm. They are not in trouble as other men, nor are they plagued like other men. Therefore pride serves as their necklace. Violence covers them like a garment. Their eyes bulge with abundance. They have more than heart could wish. They scoff and speak wickedly concerning oppression. They speak loftily. They set their mouth against the heavens. Their tongue walks through the earth. Therefore, his people return here and waters of a full cup are drained by them, and they say, ‘How does God know, and is there knowledge in the Most High? Behold, these are the ungodly who are always at ease. They increase in riches. Surely I have cleansed my heart in vain and washed my hands in innocence For all day long I have been plagued and chastened every morning. If I had said, ‘I will speak thus,’ behold, I would have been untrue to the generation of your children. When I thought how to understand this, it was too painful for me, until I went into the sanctuary of God, then I understood their end. Surely you set them in slippery places. You cast them down to destruction. Oh, how they are brought to desolation as in a moment. They are utterly consumed with terrors as a dream when one awakes. So Lord, when you awake, you shall despise their image. Thus, my heart was grieved and I was vexed in my mind. I was so foolish and ignorant. I was like a beast before you. Nevertheless, I am continually with you. You hold me by your right hand. You will guide me with your counsel and afterward receive me to glory. Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is none upon earth that I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. For indeed, those who are far from you shall perish. You have destroyed all those who desert you for harlotry. But it is good for me to draw near to God. I have put my trust in the Lord God, that I may declare all your works.”

Notice how he starts out this Psalm. He starts out by saying that God is a good God. He says in verse one, “Truly God is good to Israel, to such as our pure in heart”. Now, remember, the age-old problem of evil says God is all good. God is all powerful, and yet evil exists. So Asaph right away says there’s no doubt that God is a good God. He had always believed that, and it’s not hard to say that when life is good to us. But when wicked people flaunted their sin in his face, he lost sight of that truth—at least for a while.

He said that he almost gave up. He said that he almost lost his faith. He came close. He said that he was near that point. Look again at the words in verse two. Even though he said in verse one that God was a good God and he believed that, he tells us what happened in verse two. He says, “But as for me, my feet had almost stumbled. My steps had nearly slipped.” What caused him to be so upset that he almost turned away from God? It wasn’t that he was in physical pain like Job. It’s not that he lost his children or his possessions. It’s not that somebody is in his face telling him that he’s a hypocrite. His pain is on the inside and he does call it pain.

In this Psalm, what he saw and heard on the outside was causing him great pain on the inside. In verse three, he begins to pour out his frustration. He makes a confession here. He said I was jealous in verse three. “I was envious of the boastful when I saw the prosperity of the wicked.” I was jealous of these wicked people because they just seem to have it so good.

It’s interesting in the book of Psalms that if you look at these numbers, Psalm 73, and you just turn those numbers around and go back to Psalm 37, that whole Psalm is telling us not to be jealous of wicked people. Psalm 37 starts out by saying, “Do not fret because of evil doers, nor be envious of the workers of iniquity, for they shall soon be cut down like the grass and wither as the green herb.”

Now that Psalm, Psalm 37, was evidently written by David, but here in Psalm 73, Asaph said I was guilty. I did that very thing. I was jealous of wicked people. It is unusual to hear anybody confess the sin of envy. How many times have you ever confessed that? How many times have you ever heard someone say I was jealous of someone?

But it is even more unusual to hear a Christian say I was jealous of wicked people. This man is a godly man. He’s a good man. And yet when he saw all the things that he was going through that were bad and saw all the good things and all the enjoyment of these wicked people, it made him jealous and it made him so jealous that he says, “My steps almost slipped.”

And that reminds us of Jeremiah the prophet. In Jeremiah, chapter 12 verse one. Jeremiah talked to God about this problem. He said, “Righteous, are you, O Lord, when I plead with you, yet let me talk with you about your judgments. Why does the way of the wicked prosper?” This is the age-old problem of evil. Why do good things happen to bad people?

It’s not just why do bad things happen to good people, but what about these bad people? Why do they have it so good? He says, “Why are those happy who deal so treacherously?”? He says, “You have planted them. Yes, they have taken root. They grow. Yes, they bear fruit. You are near in their mouth, but far from their mind. But you, O Lord, know me. You have seen me. You have tested my heart towards you. Pull them out like sheep for the slaughter.”

He says in verse four, “How long will the land mourn and the herbs of every field wither?” How much longer is this going to take place? Now, this is what Asaph is struggling with. Now, I’m not saying that Jeremiah almost lost his faith. He did reach the point where he said that he was going to quit preaching. He said that he was not going to speak anymore in God’s name, but in Asaph’s case Asaph said that he almost lost his faith. He almost lost it all. Now, why was Asaph jealous of bad people? Why was he envious of wicked people? He tells us in verse three “For I was envious of the boastful when I saw the prosperity of the wicked.”

What’s the first thing you think of when you hear the word prosperity? Wealth, right? But it means more than just having money. Prosperity means having it good as a whole in life. And that’s what Asaph is going to explain beginning in verse four. In verses four through 12, Asaph says here are all the benefits. Here are all the good things that these evil people enjoy. And he said that he just got jealous of them. He says in verse four that they don’t suffer when they die like other people. Verse four” “For there are no pangs in their death.” That means there’s no pain in their death, but their strength is firm.

Many people suffer a lot before they die. That’s just one of the natural processes of life. But he said when I looked at these wicked people, it just seems like that they held on well, that they were happy and that they were not in the pain that other people experience. He said it just seems like that they held onto their strength to the end.

He said their strength is firm. That is firm to the end. Now we can say that we know that that’s not true in every case. As a matter of fact, that’s not true in most cases. Evil people suffer. They have physical pain. They have disease and heart attacks and things like that that lead to their death. So why would Asaph say this?

Well, he’s gone down this road and he’s gone too far. He’s been thinking about the fact that evil people have it so good in life and that he and other people who are trying to do right have evil things and bad things to come their way, and he resents it. Sometimes when we resent something and we’re frustrated and we become angry, we can get things out of proportion, and that’s what Asaph is talking about here.

Now, another thing that he saw in verse five is that he says that these evil people that he was jealous of are not in trouble like other men are. “Nor are they plagued like other men.” That’s how he felt. That’s what he thought. But Asaph only saw a small part of these evil people’s lives. There was a lot that he didn’t see.

I think the same thing happens today. Sometimes good people look at the lives of the rich and famous, and they think that all the smiles that they see in the pictures and in the videos and in the movies represent what those people are really all about. But that’s not reality and that’s not the whole picture because many of those people are miserable.

And when you find out the details later about how they’ve lived and how they have died, you find out that they’re miserable and that they’re putting on an act. So Asaph is looking at these evil men and he thinks that they don’t have the problems and the troubles and the sufferings and the heartaches and trials that we do.

That’s how he felt in verse five, and he’s jealous of that. Then in verse six, he said that they were prideful. Because of that, he says, “Therefore, pride serves them as their necklace.” It’s like they’re wearing this as a badge of honor. They don’t have the troubles that other people do. They seem to have it easy in this life, and because of that they are arrogant.

And Asaph said I resented that. He said I was jealous of that. In the end, he says, violence covers them like a garment. Now the word “violence” here does not necessarily refer to physical violence. When you see the word violence in the Bible, that refers to people who take advantage of other people. They violate the right and the person of other people.

So Asaph said because they’re not in trouble like other men, they are arrogant and they take advantage of other people. He goes on to say in verse seven that their eyes bulge with abundance. They have more than heart could wish. So sometimes there are people that are good, honest, upright people and they’re doing their best to do right, and they can just barely make it. They can just barely get by. And on the other hand, you have these evil people that care nothing about anybody but themselves and they have more than heart could wish. That’s, as we would say, a hard pill to swallow, and it was hard for Asaph to come to grips with. He said I was envious because of that. He said in verse eight, “They scoff and speak wickedly concerning oppression.”

The word oppression here means that they mistreated other people and in their minds they had it good. They had more than they really needed. They didn’t seem to be in trouble like other people, and they had absolutely no compassion on their fellow human being. And so what they did was take advantage of them and so they would scoff and speak wickedly about that.

They would brag and boast about how they were going to take advantage of other people. He says they speak loftily, and notice what he says here in verse nine. “They set their mouth against the heavens and their tongue walks through the earth.’ They are so secure and self-confident because of their good life and their riches that he says that they set their mouth against the heavens and their tongue walks through the earth.

In verse 10, he says, “Therefore, his people return here and waters of a full cup are drained by them.” That seems to refer to the oppression that he’s been talking about. These people are the good people in verse 10, and they are drained. They are taken advantage of by these evil people.

He continues in verse 11 and says, “And they say, how does God know and is their knowledge in the Most High?” These people who have it so good in life have become so secure in their life that they’re not afraid to speak against God. They’re not afraid to make fun of the Bible. He points out in verse 12 that they just seem to keep getting away with it. He said these are the ungodly. These are those who are always at ease.

It just seems like that they have an easy life and the rest of us have a hard life, and they increase in riches. He says, it’s not simply that they’ve been handed riches in their life, but he says they just keep getting richer.

So notice what we’ve covered so far in Psalm 73. In verse one, he says God is good. That’s a fact and there’s no doubt about that. But he says there was a time in my life where I almost lost my faith. That’s verse two. Then in verses three through 12, he admits that he was jealous at one point of these wicked people who were in such prosperity, and he describes what he’s talking about and what he had seen in verses four through 12. And then beginning in verse 13 he shows us how that he crossed a line.

He makes this admission. He says in verse 13, “Surely I have cleansed my heart in vain and washed my hands in innocence.” In other words, what good is it for me to live a good life? If evil people have it the best in this life, then why should I make all these sacrifices? Why should I try to do right? I have tried that and it didn’t work. I’ve tried to live a good life and all I got out of it is trouble.

Verse 14: “All day long I have been plagued and chastened every morning.” That’s how he felt. And aren’t there people who become Christians who are like that today? They are baptized into Christ. They live the Christian life for a while, and then troubles come and then they say, “Well, I didn’t expect this. I thought that the Christian life was going to be easy, or I thought that it was going to be better than it is. This is not working.” And so they give up. They quit. Asaph is almost to that point, and remember he’s sharing his thoughts with us here. This is not something that he talked out loud to people about.

We know that because of verse 15. He said, “If I had said, I will speak thus,” in other words, if I had gone ahead and voiced and put into words and told people what I was thinking and how I was feeling, “behold I would haver been untrue to the generation of your children.” These are his private feelings. This is his internal struggle that he has put down by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit for you and I to read about.

So sometimes when you struggle within your mind and you’re somewhat ashamed of what you have thought and how you have felt, but you come out on the right side, you come out still believing in God, then you can relate to what you’re seeing here in Psalm 73. Look again at verse 15. Asaph said, “If I had said, I will speak thus, behold, I would have been untrue to the generation of your children.”

He said if I had said this, if he had said what he was thinking, he would’ve been untrue to God’s people. Now the Jews were God’s chosen people. God told them to be holy in Leviticus chapter 19. That means they were to be separated or set apart from the ways of the world, but Asaph was feeling jealous of the people of the world.

If he had told this to Jewish people, his brethren, it would’ve offended them. They would’ve been disappointed. He would’ve offended their cherished belief about being a separated people. Now, Asaph thought this way and he felt this way. He didn’t confess it to other people, but he did write about it, and because he wrote these words by the inspiration of the spirit, God’s people have benefited from reading this Psalm for 3000 years.

Then he tells us how intense this internal struggle was. He knew that God was a good God. He knew that sinners were wrong, but things were just so unequal and unfair that he had trouble accepting it. He said in verse 16, “When I thought, how to understand this, it was too painful for me.” It was just too painful to think about.

And even after he tried to understand it, he didn’t feel any better. He couldn’t find an answer that really satisfied him. He’s making a very important point here. The pain, the suffering, the sin and the injustices of life are so great and overwhelming at times that it’s too painful to think about them.

We can only think about this problem so long before we feel the weight of the world on our shoulders. We’re not made to comprehend all the evil and suffering throughout the world. Our minds and our hearts are not big enough or strong enough to stand it. Only God has the strength to behold all the evil that is in the world.

We are not that strong. That’s why we have to be careful about using modern media. It’s good to be aware of the suffering and the tragedies of other people to a point, but we cannot think about those calamities all the time. We cannot entertain those thoughts constantly. Our minds will break if we do.

There’s so much bad news on television and radio, and especially the internet. Our minds can become filled with the world’s evils continually. There is a psychological limit as to how much of this we can bear. So in looking at the problem of sin and suffering, one principle we need to remember is that we are not able to understand this problem to our satisfaction because as Asaph says it is too painful.

A second principle, by the way, that we need to remember is what David taught in Psalm 139. He talks about the knowledge of God being beyond our comprehension. He said the omniscience of God is too high for us. It’s way beyond our ability to understand. This is perhaps one reason why God didn’t explain to Job why he was suffering the way that he did.

So these are two simple things to remember. When we try to grapple with this perennial issue, we are out of our league because it is just too painful and it is too high for us, but we can understand the problem to a certain extent. Now that’s what Asaph says in the next verse. Up to this point, he has described the struggle within. He’s very open and honest about what went through his mind.

Now he tells us what brought him to his senses. He said he had this feeling “until I went into the sanctuary of God, then I understood there end” (verse 17). That’s the key verse in this story. That’s the turning point. That’s what he had forgotten all this time.

The reason he became jealous of evil people and thought that life was so unfair that he almost lost his faith was because he was not looking at the bigger picture. He was looking at what these people enjoy in the short run, not the long run. He was getting in a hurry. In his mind, he evidently expected God to punish these evil people instead of letting them enjoy life, or at least he expected God to deprive them of the good life they seem to enjoy.

But Asaph learned patience through all this. When did this happen? He said this occurred to him when he went into the sanctuary of God. They were living in the Old Testament when the sanctuary of God in Jerusalem was a solemn place to gather. While he was there meditating on the glory of God, he was reminded of the power and the wisdom of God.

He saw the bigger picture that brought him to his senses. He remembered that evil people do reap what they sow in this lifetime, and just because they’re not getting what they deserve at the time you’re watching them does not mean that they will never reap what they sow. Even though he didn’t understand completely why things are unfair in this life, why bad things happen to good people and why good things happen to bad people, he did understand one thing. He understood that in the end, even in this life, people eventually get what they deserve. They reap what they have sown. So this tells us that as we look at the evil in the world and we feel frustrated because bad people seem to have it so good, we are overlooking the fact that God will repay even in this lifetime.

He just doesn’t do it when we think he should, and that’s the problem. Then Asaph tells us what happens to the same wicked people that he was jealous of. He said that God cast them down and utterly destroys them. In verse 19, he said, “You cast them down to destruction. O, how they are brought to desolation, as in a moment.”

Now, if he had thought about this before he looked at these evil people, or while he was watching them, he wouldn’t have been tempted to be jealous of them. But that is what sometimes happens to us. We momentarily forget things that we know, and that’s why we have to be reminded by reading the Bible, by hearing the Bible, by listening to preaching and teaching, and by exhorting one another as Christians.

Sometimes it is very easy to get things out of perspective. How did Asaph feel after he thought about these things? He felt ashamed. He said “My heart was grieved and I was vexed in my mind” (verse 21). In verse 22 he said, “I was so foolish and ignorant.” It was foolish to feel jealous of sinners. He said that he was thinking on the level of an animal and not a man.

Now, that may sound like an overstatement, but sometimes we say the same thing today. When a man rejects the plain truth of the Bible, we say that he’s stubborn as a mule or dumb as an ox, and that’s no reflection on his intellect. It’s just a fact about his moral condition. So don’t be surprised when you go down this same road or a similar road in your heart. We all have struggles within ourselves. We have thoughts and we have feelings that we wrestle with, and sometimes it takes us a while to think things through and come back to the truth that we know that we temporarily lose sight of when we’re being tempted.

But Asaph didn’t beat himself up too long. He didn’t feel like a fool forever about this. He made a mistake in his heart, but he repented and he learned better. After he felt so ashamed of himself, he went back to his faith in God and he rejoiced. He said in verses 23 through 25, “Nevertheless, I am continually with you. You hold me by my right hand. You will guide me with your counsel and afterward receive me to glory. Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is none upon Earth that I desire beside you.” In his final words, he comes full circle back to God. In verse 28, he said, “But it is good for me to draw near to God. I have put my trust in the Lord that I may declare all your works.”

That is the simple key to the whole problem. Put your trust in God. By the way, this Psalm reminds us of the book of Habakkuk, which we’ll look at next. Habakkuk the prophet thought that God was taking too long to do something about all the corruption in Judah. God told him that he was going to answer his prayer.

He was going to send the Chaldeans into Judah to punish these people, but Habakkuk thought that that was not just because the Chaldeans needed punishing worse than the Jews. And after God put him in his place, the prophet rejoiced instead of complaining. That is what Job did. That is what Asaph did. And although God doesn’t speak to us from heaven today, we go through this same cycle as Christians.

Asaph emerged from this experience with even more faith, and he became stronger. So can we.

Thank you for listening to My God and My Neighbor. Stay connected with our podcast on our website and on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever fine podcasts are distributed. Tennessee Bible College, providing Christian education since 1975 in Cookeville, Tennessee, offers undergraduate and graduate programs. Study at your level. Aim higher and get in touch with us today.