Worship: The Foundation for Joy
The reign of Ahaz, King of Judah, was a reign of chaos. He made images of Baal, promoted the worship of Molech, and offered child sacrifices. During his reign, Judah was invaded by a combined army of Syria and Israel. They killed 120,000 people of Judah and took 200,000 captives. Later, Judah was forced to pay excessive tribute to Assyria, lost captives to Edom, lost cities to the Philistines, and lost their port on the Gulf of Aqaba to Syria. By the time Hezekiah succeeded Ahaz as King of Judah, the people of Judah were distressed and unsettled.
In his book A Long Obedience in the Same Direction, Eugene Peterson tells of a lesson he learned while visiting a member of his church: “As I entered a home to make a pastoral visit, the person I came to see was sitting at a window embroidering a piece of cloth held taut over an oval hoop. She said, ‘Pastor, while waiting for you to come I realized what’s wrong with me—I don’t have a frame. My feelings, my thoughts, my activities—everything is loose and sloppy. There is no border to my life. I never know where I am. I need a frame for my life like this one I have for my embroidery.’”
That seems to have been the picture of Judah during the reign of Ahaz. The people needed something and/or someone who could pull them back together and give them a frame for their lives. But where were they to find such a frame?
Eugene Peterson continues, “How do we get that framework, that sense of solid structure so that we know where we stand…? Christians go to worship…and get a working definition for life: the way God created us, the ways in which he leads us. We know where we stand.” (p. 48-49)
Hezekiah also turned to worship. Nelson’s Illustrated Bible Dictionary reports, “In the first month of his reign, Hezekiah reopened the Temple doors that his father had closed. He also assembled the priests and Levites and commissioned them to sanctify themselves for service and to cleanse the Temple. Appropriate sacrifices were then offered with much rejoicing (2 Chronicles 29:3-36).”
Hezekiah brought a frame back to Judah by bringing Judah back to the habit of worship.
In Reversed Thunder, Eugene Peterson points out, “Failure to worship consigns us to a life of spasms and jerks, at the mercy of every advertisement, every seduction, every siren. Without worship we live manipulated and manipulating lives. We move in either frightened panic or deluded lethargy as we are, in turn, alarmed by spectres and soothed by placebos. If there is no center, there is no circumference. People who do not worship are swept into a vast restlessness, epidemic in the world, with no steady direction and no sustaining purpose.”
It is worship that provides the needed frame to our lives, and by providing such a frame, it opens the door to joy for us.
Leslie Weatherhead asserts, “The opposite of joy is not sorrow. It is unbelief.” No wonder, then, that worship opens the door to joy.
No wonder the restoration of worship brought such joy to the people of Judah. 2 Chronicles 29:35-36 reports, “Thus the service of the house of the Lord was restored. And Hezekiah and all the people rejoiced because of what God had done for the people.”
The lesson we can learn from King Hezekiah is to turn to worship and find a proper frame to life that becomes the foundation for joy.
A Bitter and Honest Psalm
Psalm 137 is a psalm of intense aching and bitterness. Derek Kidner remarks, “Every line of it is alive with pain, whose intensity grows with each strophe to the appalling climax” (where the psalmist speaks of dashing the enemy’s babies against a rock). The Rev. Thea Leunk comments, “The words of this psalm startle us; they throb with anger and grief.”
The psalm was composed after Babylon brutally conquered the nation of Judah demolished the city of Jerusalem, and hauled its citizens away to Babylon (perhaps even dashing children against rocks). Rubbing salt into their wounds, the Babylonian captors demanded that imprisoned musicians sing happy songs about their homeland: “By the rivers of Babylon—there we sat down and there we wept when we remembered Zion. On the willows there we hung up our harps. For there our captors asked us for songs, and our tormentors asked for mirth, saying, ‘Sing us one of the songs of Zion!’” (Interestingly, Kidner reports that “a relief from Sennacherib’s palace at Nineveh, in the neighboring land of Assyria, portrays a situation not unlike this, with three prisoners of war playing lyres as they are marched along by an armed soldier.)
Dr. Ryan Cook of Moody Bible Institute points out that the demand for happy songs about Jerusalem by those who demolished it “was the kind of request a bully would make to shame someone weaker than them.”
Those who have been the victims of such brutality and injustice understand well the anger and bitterness expressed in this psalm. Perhaps they have been told just to put the past behind them and to be happy now. Perhaps they have been told that “everything happens for a reason.” Perhaps they have been told that the spiritually mature thing to do is to “forgive and forget.” Perhaps they have been encouraged to bring a pretend heart to God rather than their true heart.
The Rev. Thea Leunk writes, “Perhaps we are troubled by this psalm because it is so honest. There are times we may feel just as angry and eager for justice. Perhaps voicing such thoughts and wishes in honest prayer is just what God wants us to do.”
It is liberating to discover that we don’t have to bury our true feelings and bring a “cleaned up,” pretend heart to God. It is hopeful to realize that we can trust God to handle justly an injustice that tears us apart inside. Dr. Ryan Cook shares, “It is good to know that when we walk through difficult times, we can be honest to God in our prayers. Be reassured that God cares about justice and will one day right all wrongs.”
God Does What Pleases God to Do
The God we worship is not an emotionless principle nor an apathetic force of life. The God we worship is the Creator of joy, the Inventor of creativity, the Maker of love.
Psalm 135:6 declares, “Whatever the Lord pleases he does, in heaven and on earth, in the seas and all deeps.” As I reflect upon that verse, I think of the exuberance with which God spun the galaxies into being, the thrill of creating the planets (some with moons and some with rings), the glee with which God caused mountains to spring up, with waterfalls spilling down, filling our earth with forests, valleys, deserts and jungles, the delight with which God splashed color on butterflies, tropical fish and flowers, and the ecstasy with which God made beings in God’s own image to share with God in the abundance of joy and love.
To say, “Whatever the Lord pleases he does,” is to declare that no one can force God to do anything God does not choose to do. No one can enforce their will on God.
Why, then, did Jesus die on the cross?
It was not that Judas sold him out. It was not that the Jewish high council caught Jesus in a trap. It was not that Roman soldiers imposed their will upon him. It is not that nails held him to that implement of execution.
It is that “whatever the Lord pleases he does,” and what pleased God was to die for us.
In Mark 10:45, Jesus announced, “For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” In Romans 5:8, Paul explains, “But God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners, Christ died for us.”
Christ’s death was not thrust upon him; it’s what he chose to do out of love for us.
While walking the stations of the cross one day, Brennan Manning came to the depiction of Jesus dying on the cross and found these words on a plaque: “Behold Jesus crucified! Behold his wounds, received for love of you! His whole appearance betokens love: His head is bent to kiss you; his arms are extended to embrace you; his heart is open to receive you. O superabundance of love! Jesus, the Son of God, dies upon the cross that we may live and be delivered from everlasting death!”
“Whatever the Lord pleases he does,” and what God pleased to do was to come into our world as one of us and to lay down his life to reconcile us to God!
Praise God from Whom All Blessings Flow
Psalm 134 is the last of the “Psalms of Ascent,” the psalms that were sung by Jewish worshipers on their way up to Jerusalem to celebrate the great holy days of Passover or Pentecost or the Feast of Booths. It was the last of the Psalms of Ascent, so it would have been natural for pilgrims to sing the psalm as they arrived at the house of God, to cheer on those who have faithfully served in the temple: “Come, bless the Lord, all you servants of the Lord, who stand by night in the house of the Lord! Lift up your hands to the holy place, and bless the Lord. May the Lord, maker of heaven and earth, bless you from Zion.”
Charles Spurgeon suggests that Psalm 134 could also be a picture of pilgrims departing Jerusalem in the darkness of early morning, calling out to the priests and Levites who stood watch at the temple throughout the night. As they begin their journey back home, the pilgrims shout out their blessing to the servants of the Lord who then shout a blessing back upon them. I like Spurgeon’s suggestion, for it reminds us that we don’t simply go to Jerusalem (or to church) to bless God, but that God’s blessing comes with us as we head back home.
Psalm 134 invites us to “Lift up your hands to the holy place.” This is a little bit of a play on words in Hebrew. The word for hand in Hebrew is yad. When this word is combined with a common abbreviation for the name of the Lord, ah, as in Jehovah, it becomes yadah (sometimes anglicized into Judah). Yadah literally means to “lift one’s hands toward God” or to “reach out one’s arms toward God.” It is one of the most common words in Hebrew for worshiping God or for praising God.
Consider the significance of this. What kinds of things prompt people to lift up their hands or to reach out their arms?
When we see someone we love dearly, someone whose embrace we long for, we run toward that person with outstretched arms. That’s the heart of yadah, the heart of worship. Worship is about moving toward (or running for) the embrace of God.
When a child feels scared or sad or lonely, that child looks up at her mother, with arms lifted up, longing to be picked up, longing to be held. That’s the heart of yadah, the heart of worship. Worship is about looking to God for comfort and care.
When something wonderful happens, we instinctively throw our arms up toward heaven in delight. That’s the heart of yadah, the heart of worship. Worship is about celebrating or cheering the wonderfulness of God.
Psalm 134 begins with a call to us, and to those serving in the temple, to “Come, bless the Lord.” It ends with a declaration of God blessing us: “May the Lord, maker of heaven and earth, bless you from Zion.”
Ray Fowler puts this in perspective: “How appropriate that this psalm, and indeed the whole Psalms of Ascent, ends not with us blessing God but with God blessing us. It is God’s blessing that makes our blessing possible in the first place. It is God’s grace that allows us to draw near to his presence…. Perhaps the best summary of this psalm are simply the words from the hymn: ‘Praise God from whom all blessings flow!’ ‘Praise God!’—that’s you blessing God. ‘From whom all blessings flow!’—that’s God blessing you.”
Learn to Listen to God
“The young man completed his form and sat down with seven other waiting applicants. After a few minutes, the young man stood up, crossed the room to the door of the inner office, and walked right in. Naturally the other applicants perked up, wondering what was going on. Why had this man been so bold? They muttered among themselves that they hadn’t heard any summons yet. They took more than a little satisfaction in assuming the young man who went into the office would be reprimanded for his presumption and summarily disqualified for the job.
“Within a few minutes, the young man emerged from the inner office, escorted by the interviewer, who announced to the other applicants, ‘Gentlemen, thank you very much for coming, but the job has been filled by this young man.’
“The other applicants began grumbling to each other, and then one spoke up, ‘Wait a minute—I don’t understand. He was the last one to come in, and we never even got a chance to be interviewed. Yet he got the job. That’s not fair.’
“The employer responded, ‘All the time you’ve been sitting here, the telegraph has been ticking out the following message in Morse code: “If you understand this message, then come right in. The job will be yours.” None of you heard it or understood it. This young man did. So the job is his.’”
Something similar happened in Judah around 911 B.C. A man named Asa, whose name means Healer, ascended to the throne amidst a great cacophony of noises from false worship, but he was able to tune out the distractive voices of false worship and listen to the voice of God, and to respond to the voice of God. 2 Chronicles 14:2-4 reports, “Asa did what was good and right in the sight of the Lord his God. He took away the foreign altars and the high places, broke down the pillars, hewed down the sacred poles, and commanded Judah to seek the Lord, the God of their ancestors, and to keep the law and the commandment.”
Neale Donald Walsch remarks, “God is speaking to us, all the time. [Like the telegraph kept tapping out the message to walk right in.] The question is not: To whom does God talk? The question is: Who listens?”
Asa listened. Because Asa listened, he lived up to his name and brought healing to Judah. 2 Chronicles 14:5 reports, “He also removed from all the cities of Judah the high places and the incense altars. And the kingdom had rest under him.”
No less than during the time of Asa, our nation and our world need to learn how to tune out the cacophony of noises that distract us from hearing the voice of God, for it is the voice of God that we most desperately need to hear.
F.F. Bruce put it succinctly, “The soul’s deepest thirst is for God himself, who has made us so that we can never be satisfied without him.” There is nothing that our soul needs more than to seek God.
In his autobiography Time Bends, Arthur Miller writes about his wife, Marilyn Monroe, “One night, as I looked down on her, I couldn’t help thinking to myself, ‘How I wish I still had my faith and she still had hers. What if I could say to her, ‘Darling, God loves you,’ and what if she could believe it?’ I wished so much that some miracle could happen for her. But I had no saving mystery to offer her.”
If only they could have or would have tuned out the cacophony of other noises and attended to the voice of God! If only we would do so!
For over three decades, Asa sought God’s leading in his life. But at the end of his life, Asa became distracted by other voices. Sadly, the healing he had brought to the nation dissolved. 2 Chronicles 16:9 reports, “For the eyes of the Lord range throughout the entire earth, to strengthen those whose heart is true to him. You have done foolishly in this; for from now on you will have wars.”
May Asa’s life be an inspiration, and a warning, to us to tune our attention to the voice of God, and to seek the Lord with the whole of our heart.
Don’t Try to Impress God
We live in a world in which we think that we can make something of ourselves by impressing others. Indeed, we put ourselves under great pressure to adequately impress people. We even live under the illusion that we ought to find some way to impress God. But what could we do that would adequately impress the Creator of the universe?
Former Poet Laureate of the United States, Billy Collins, writes of a lanyard he made at summer camp one summer and gave to his mother, imagining, at the time, that it would impress her. The poem concludes with these stanzas:
She gave me life and milk from her breasts, and I gave her a lanyard.
She nursed me in many a sick room,
lifted spoons of medicine to my lips,
laid cold face-cloths on my forehead,
and then led me out into the airy light
and taught me to walk and swim,
and I, in turn, presented her with a lanyard.
Here are thousands of meals, she said,
and here is clothing and a good education.
And here is your lanyard, I replied,
which I made with a little help from a counselor.
Here is a breathing body and a beating heart, strong legs, bones and teeth,
and two clear eyes to read the world, she whispered,
and here, I said, is the lanyard I made at camp.
And here, I wish to say to her now, is a smaller gift-not the worn truth
that you can never repay your mother-
but the rueful admission that when she took the two-tone lanyard from my hand,
I was sure as a boy could be that this useless, worthless thing I wove
out of boredom would be enough to make us even.
Psalm 132 reflects a similar dynamic. The psalm opens by recalling how King David wanted to build a house for God. From David’s perspective, a temple would be the kind of gift that would adequately impress God. But the truth is that the most magnificent temple anyone could build is really no more impressive to God than a child’s lanyard. The gold which lined the walls of the temple failed to impress God, for the book of Revelation informs us that the roadways of heaven are paved with gold. Carved doors, ornate designs upon the walls, bronze pillar, and even golden cherubim that filled the temple with beauty are no better than a preschooler’s art project compared to God’s awesome masterpieces like Antelope Canyon, Half Dome in Yosemite, the Cliffs of Moher in Ireland, or Angel Falls in Venezuela.
Like Billy Collin’s Lanyard poem, Psalm 132 faces the huge discrepancy between the gifts we give to God, and the gifts God gives to us. Though David sought to build a fabulous house for “the Mighty One of Jacob,” verse 7 admits that this fabulous house is but a “footstool” for God’s feet. The great gifts mentioned in this psalm are not the things we give to God, trying to impress God, but the things God gives to us out of love.
It starts with David. David had wanted to build a house (a building) for God, but God turns it around and makes David and his descendants into a great house (a great lineage). Verses 11-12 tell us, “The Lord swore to David a sure oath from which he will not turn back: ‘One of the sons of your body I will set on your throne. If your sons keep my covenant and my decrees that I shall teach them, their sons also, forevermore, shall sit on your throne.’”
The Israelites, too, may have thought they were giving an impressive gift to God by making pilgrimages to Jerusalem to bless God with their presence at the temple (“Let us go to his dwelling place; let us worship at his footstool”—verse 7). But the truly great gift is that God commits to live among his people (“For the Lord has chosen Zion; he has desired it for his habitation: ‘This is my resting place forever; here I will reside, for I have desired it’”—verses 13-14).
Our gifts to God are like plastic lanyards. God’s gifts to us are astronomically greater, for they flow to us out of the fullness of God’s love and goodness! The essence of our faith is far more about what God pours out to us than about what we give to God.
Strength for What Purpose?
Many years ago, on a day-time television show, Merv Griffen, the host of the show, interviewed a professional body-builder, and Merv asked him, “Why do you develop those particular muscles?”
The body-builder simply stepped forward and flexed a series of well-defined muscles from chest to calf. The audience applauded, but Merv pressed his question, “What do you use all those muscles for?”
Again, the muscular specimen flexed, and his biceps and triceps sprouted to enormous proportions. “But what do you use those muscles for?” Merv persisted.
The body-builder never provided an answer other than to display his well-developed frame.
Sadly, some Christians have developed such spiritual muscles. They can step forward and spout a multitude of Bible verses; and they can belt out the words of a horde of Christian songs; and they can show off a library full of Christian books, but they don’t have any idea how to live our their faith with compassion, integrity, humility or joy. All they know how to do is to stand there and flex their muscles.
God is more interested in us developing a courage and strength that enables us to love the Lord our God with the whole of our being and to love our neighbor as we love ourselves.
In verse 13, Paul also instructs them, “Keep alert; stand firm in your faith.”
On April 17, 1521, the son of a German coal miner stood trial for heresy before an assembly of church and state rulers. As the Imperial/Ecclesiastical Inquisition began, this coal miner’s son, Martin Luther, was asked if he had written the books that were stacked beside him. He replied in a whisper, “The books are all mine, and I have written more.”
Then came the decisive question, “Are you willing to recant of what you teach in them?”
He whispered his response, “I beg you, give me time to think it over.”
He was given twenty-four hours.
That night, he prayed, “O God, Almighty Everlasting! How dreadful is the world! behold how its mouth opens to swallow me up, and how small is my faith in Thee…. If I am to depend upon any strength of this world, all is over…. O Lord, help me…. Forsake me not.”
Late the next day, Martin Luther returned to the assembly. At first, he tried to answer his inquisitors by giving a speech, but he was cut off. A simple answer was demanded of him: “I ask you, Martin, answer candidly and without horns, do you, or do you not, repudiate your books and the errors which they contain?”
With a strong voice, Luther replied, “Since your Majesty and lordships desire a simple reply, I will answer without horns and without teeth…. My conscience is captive to the Word of God. I cannot and I will not recant anything, for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe. Here I stand; I cannot do otherwise. God help me!”
Can we, too, stand firm in our faith?
In verse 14, Paul instructs the believers, “Let all that you do be done in love.”
In his first letter to scattered Christians, John stresses, “God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them” (1 John 4:16). If we desire to abide in God, and if we long for God to abide in us, let all that we do be done in love!
C. Neil Strait observes, “Love is the ingredient that makes every relationship in life, whatever it is, a little better. Love has a capacity to mend the broken, heal the hurting, and inspire the despairing. Love that reaches beyond the misunderstandings and the failures is a love that unites and encourages. Such a love is one of our world’s greatest needs.” If we hope to make the world around us a little better, let all that we do be done in love!
The great challenge and goal of the Christian life is to become more and more like Jesus. Is it possible to name one thing that Jesus did that was not motivated by love? I can think of none! Therefore, if we want to become more and more like Jesus, let all that we do be done in love!
Should We Give to the Lord’s Work?
Why should anyone give to a church or a Christian organization?
Near the end of his first letter to Christians in Corinth, Paul writes, “Now concerning the collection for the saints: you should follow the directions I gave to the churches of Galatia” (1 Corinthians 16:1). The concern Paul expresses here, that prompts his call to the Corinthians to take a collection, is the need of the “saints” in Palestine who were suffering from severe famine. The first reason for us to give is out of concern for others, and with a desire to meet a need. If a church or Christian organization is meeting a need you care about, then give to support it. That’s what love calls us to do. Harold Morris stresses, “How can we say we love Jesus if we do not care about the suffering people whom Jesus loves? We have excess wealth, yet refuse to share it with those who are starving. Being Christlike is caring about the hungry, the naked, the sick, and the imprisoned.”
In the next verse, Paul instructs them, “On the first day of every week, each of you is to put aside and save whatever extra you earn, so that collections need not be taken when I come” (1 Corinthians 16:2). In other words, Paul tells them that when they come together to worship on the first day of the week, as a part of their worship, they are to set aside a contribution. Giving is an aspect of our worship. Our English word worship is shortened from the word worth-ship. To worship someone is to acknowledge someone’s worth. How can we declare what God is worth to us while at the same time clinging selfishly and protectively to what we have? Giving to God is an expression of what God is worth to us, and it is a declaration of our trust in God.
The call to the Corinthians to give “on the first day of every week…so that collections need not be taken when I come” is a call to them not to take up a special collection the next time he is in town, but to make giving a habit of their lives. Paul encourages us to make giving a natural part of our lifestyle. Indeed, those who make generosity part of their lifestyle live more contentedly. Erich Fromm asserts, “Greed is a bottomless pit which exhausts the person in an endless effort to satisfy the need without ever reaching satisfaction.” Harry Emerson Fosdick points out, “The Sea of Galilee and the Dead Sea are made of the same water. It flows down, clear and cool, from the heights of Hermon and the roots of the cedars of Lebanon. The Sea of Galilee makes beauty of it, for the Sea of Galilee has an outlet. It gets to give. It gathers in its riches that it may pour them out again to fertilize the Jordan plain. But the Dead Sea with the same water makes horror. For the Dead Sea has no outlet. It gets to keep.”
An unknown writer offers this perspective on the matter of giving:
“I’m a reasonable person, Lord. You know I work hard for my money, and I’m doing pretty well. Yet, I’m not as young as I used to be, and old age can be expensive. If I give you shares of all my blessings now, how will it come out for me at the end?
“‘Freely ye have received, freely give.’
“Well, if you look at it that way, I have received much:
- Life and breath (in this time and space),
- Help and hope (when all else failed),
- Grace and mercy (on such a sinner).
“And I have given:
- Grudgingly (when I had plenty to spare),
- Unevenly (holding back the best),
- Selfishly (for I am number one).
“Lord, you are serious about giving. Make me serious in giving like you, not a share, but myself, lavishly and wholly, in the name of Christ who gave everything for us.”
No Pit Is Too Deep for God’s Presence
The opening words of Psalm 130 seem to crawl out of the soul of one who is drowning in agony, hopelessness, and despair: “Out of the depths, I cry to You, O Lord.”
The cry of Psalm 130 matches what Ginger Zee confides about her struggle with depression: “Depression, for me, has been a couple of different things—but the first time I felt it, I felt helpless, hopeless, and things I had never felt before. I lost myself and my will to live.”
“Out of the depths I cry to You, O Lord. O Lord, hear my voice. Let Your ears be attentive to my cry for mercy.”
Depression can sneak up on us from various directions. Verses 3-4 suggest that it may have been guilt that provoked depression in the heart of this psalmist, but no matter what the source may be, the devastation it brings can be debilitating. (It may be vital for a person to seek professional help when one’s soul is being pummeled by depression.)
One of the great things about Psalm 130 is that it invites us to pour out to God whatever frustration, agony, or depression may be wallowing in our souls. In his assessment of this psalm, Eugene Peterson writes, “By setting the anguish out in the open and voicing it as a prayer, the psalm gives dignity to our suffering. It does not look on suffering as something slightly embarrassing which must be hushed up and locked in a closet (where it finally becomes a skeleton) because this sort of thing shouldn’t happen to a real person of faith. And it doesn’t treat it as a puzzle that must be explained, and therefore turn it over to theologians or philosophers to work out an answer. Suffering is set squarely, openly, passionately before God. It is acknowledged and expressed. It is described and lived.” (A Long Obedience in the Same Direction, p. 134)
Psalm 130 is a lament (“a passionate expression of grief or sorrow”), and, because God cares deeply for us, God pays careful attention to our laments. In his book Bounce: Learning to Thrive through Loss, Tragedy, and Heartache. Aaron Fruh shares, “When my son, Nathan, was five years old, my wife and I were drinking coffee in the living room early one morning when we heard a cry coming from his bedroom. When Sharon went into his room, she screamed out to me because Nathan was having a seizure. She came running down the hall carrying the twitching and flailing body with his little brown eyes rolled back in their sockets. I ran into the kitchen to call 911, slid across the kitchen tile, and scraped my knee. The ambulance took my son to a children’s hospital, and I slept next to him in his room for the next five days while the pediatric neurologists treated him.
“When he had his seizure, Nathan was afraid…so he cried out for his mother and father. It was a lament, a complaint: ‘Help me! Something isn’t right! Come quick! I’m afraid!’ And what did I do as a father? I ran across the kitchen floor and skinned my knee. In the hospital I drew closer to my son in his distress. That’s what a father does because of the covenant bond he has with his child. A lament is a form of speech that releases us, even encourages us to complain about injustice and call on God to hear our cries of suffering. And what does our Father in heaven do when we raise a lament His way? He runs across the kitchen floor and skins His knee.”
Not only does Psalm 130 free us to pour out our lament to God, it also invites us to lean toward God in our troubles. Verses 5-6 tell us, “I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in His word I put my hope. My soul waits for the Lord more than watchmen wait for the morning, more than watchmen wait for the morning.”
The Hebrew word for watchman is tsaphah. Literally the word has to do with leaning forward to peer into the distance. Historically watchmen were appointed to keep vigil upon the city walls throughout the night. The watchmen would lean forward at their post, peering into the darkness, watching for any sign of danger, and waiting for the sun to rise in the east. They could do nothing to hasten the rising of the sun, but they leaned forward, looking ahead to the arrival of a new day that would relieve the darkness.
Psalm 130 begins with a cry from the depths. Verse 7, near the end of the psalm, gives us the affirmation that God’s love is unfailing, reaching all the way to the depths and beyond: “O Israel, put your hope in the Lord, for with the Lord is unfailing love and with Him is full redemption.”
The depths are agonizing, but we never face them alone. God’s unfailing love meets us even in the depths. Corrie ten Boom, who lived in the depths of a German prison camp during World War II stressed, “There is no pit so deep that God’s love is not deeper still.”
Death is but the Route from Earth to Heaven
His son said to him, “No, no, Father. You are dreaming.”
“No,” said Moody. “I am not dreaming. I have been within the gates. I have seen the children’s faces.”
A short time later he spoke again, “This is my triumph. This is my coronation day. It is glorious.”
When the time comes for each of us to die, will death be dreaded or welcomed?
Many believers in the city of Corinth seemed to be afraid of death. They feared that there was nothing more to look forward to when death should call their name. But Paul spends 58 verses in 1 Corinthians 15 establishing the argument that Jesus rose from the dead and that we will, too.
One of the great messages Paul shares with us in these verses is that death is but the means by which we make the vital transition from a world of pain and suffering and sin to a world of glory.
In verse 50, Paul writes, “What I am saying, brothers and sister, is this: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.”
The word translated here as “perishable” is the Greek word phthora. It has to do with decay, corruption, ruin. Phthora is the root word in the disease diptheria, which is a deadly disease caused by a bacterium (Corynebacterium diphtheria) that produces a toxin causing inflammation of the heart and nervous system.
Paul applies phthora to us, implicating not only that our bodies are prone to die but that there is sickness, brokenness and corruption that fills us and fills this world. Such sickness, brokenness and corruption do not fit in heaven. These things must be left behind on earth and not be carried into heaven. Death is the means by which sickness, brokenness and corruption are left behind on earth so that we can enter the glory of heaven unencumbered.
Max Lucado offers a helpful illustration of this in his book He Still Moves Stones: “As a young boy I had two great loves – playing and eating. Summers were made for afternoons on the baseball diamond and meals at Mom’s dinner table. Mom had a rule, however. Dirty, sweaty boys could never eat at the table. Her first words to us as we came home were always, ‘Go clean up and take off those clothes if you want to eat.’
“Now no boy is fond of bathing and dressing, but I never once complained and defied my mom by saying, ‘I’d rather stink than eat!’ In my economy a bath and a clean shirt were a small price to pay for a good meal.
“And from God’s perspective death is a small price to pay for the privilege of sitting at his table. ‘Flesh and blood cannot have a part in the kingdom of God…. This body that can be destroyed must clothe itself with something that can never be destroyed. And this body that dies must clothe itself with something that can never die’ (1 Corinthians 15:50, 53, emphasis added).
“God is even more insistent than my mom was. In order to sit at his table, a change of clothing must occur. And we must die in order for our body to be exchanged for a new one. So, from God’s viewpoint, death is not to be dreaded; it is to be welcomed….
“When we see death, we see disaster. When Jesus sees death, he sees deliverance.”
Benjamin Franklin had a similar perspective. He chose carefully the words that appear at his grave: “The body of Benjamin Franklin, Printer, like the cover of an old book, its contents torn out, stripped of its lettering and gilding, lies here, food for worms. Yet the work itself shall not be lost; for it will, as he believed, appear once more in a new and more beautiful edition, corrected and amended by the Author.”
Because of what Jesus did between the cross and the emptied tomb, death need not be feared but can be welcomed, for it is through death that we come into the glory of heaven.
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