Psalm 124 sung responsively10/4/2023 ![]() To claim to have God on one’s side is a bold and astounding statement in a world that has embraced religious pluralism. We can make a few observations at this point.įirst, this is a very controversial confession-at least in our day. He expectantly desires God’s people to say these words in order to exalt the Lord and to comfort their hearts. It is a confidence-building meditation and repetition. The bold assertion, simply put, is that Yahweh was on Israel’s side.ĭavid repeats this claim in the opening verses, and it is indeed a claim that bears repetition. In the opening two verses, we find David’s bold assertion: “‘If it had not been the LORD who was on our side,’ let Israel now say-‘if it had not been the LORD who was on our side, when men rose up against us’” (vv. It would be a way of saying, “The God we are going to Jerusalem to worship is a very great God indeed.” 2įor the purposes of our study, we will divide the psalm into four broad sections. It is easy to see how a psalm praising God’s protection from the early days of Israel’s national history might be incorporated into the songs pilgrims sang on their way to Jerusalem, which David had made his capital. Among the Psalms of Ascent, sung by the people of God on the way of faith, this is one which better than any other describes the hazardous work of all discipleship and declares the help which is always experienced at the hand of God.” 1 And, as Boice notes, Eugene Peterson summarises the burden of the psalm well: “Psalm 124 is a song of hazard-and of help. Let us learn it-learn it well-and then live it out. We can expect to be hated by those who hate God.Īnd yet we must also expect that the Lord will be on our side through it all. As we walk the Christian road, we can expect difficulties, enemies, hostility and even violence. This psalm therefore makes it abundantly clear that we will arrive having come through many toils and snares. This is one of the psalms of ascent, which means that it is a part of a genre reflecting on the spiritual pilgrimage of the Christian. ![]() ![]() Probably, these images are meant to be kept together: The trapped bird is about to become a meal for the hunter. 6–7 we see two other images: a ravenous animal (v. He pictures the danger of being completely devastated and destroyed by the depth of the flood (v. 4) and of torrential streams carrying God’s people away (v. ![]() Or, from what follows, perhaps he was thinking in terms of floodwaters, for he speaks of being overwhelmed by floodwaters (v. Perhaps he here is thinking, metaphorically, of a great dragon-like monster that would have swallowed them up. He speaks of being swallowed by wrath (v. Second Samuel 5 may provide a historical setting for the writing of this psalm, but we cannot be sure.ĭavid describes the threat with a few metaphors. 2), and from what follows it appears that David has in mind some type of militant opposition to them. We don’t know the exact circumstances surrounding the writing of psalm, but we can relate to the poetic description of the troubles that the ancient people of God faced. He calls the people of God to reflect on the question, “What if the Lord had not intervened?” He does so in order to drive them to hopeful worship as they are strengthened by what John Piper has called “future grace.” Future grace is the conviction that God will be just as faithful to sustain us in the future as He has been in the past. In this psalm David reflects on some event in which, had it not been for the Lord’s faithful preservation, the nation would have been no more. We can’t change the past and, as they say, hindsight is always 20/20. Generally, the question “what if?” is not very helpful.
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