Psalm 126 falls 7th in a series of 15 songs of pilgrimage, known as the songs of ascent. In particular, this song of praise also follows the return of the Jews from Babylonian and Persian captivity. For 70 years, they remained prisoners of war in a foreign land until God changed the heart of the Persian King Cyrus. After the fall of Babylon, he restored them to their great city. Jewish worshipers would begin their difficult climb up to the Holy City and progressively toward temple until they actually reached its courts and completed their worship. Their prayers and toilsome journeys become models for our own struggles through life’s grueling, trying moments.
Let’s face it. Sometimes the struggles of the present take their toll on us. Our inner flame of personal spiritual passion grows dim in the present. We’re asking, When will this be over? This struggle? This grieving? This sadness? This ordeal? This season? This passage of life?
I can imagine the Jewish traveler, who penned this song of ascent, as he takes one step after another up the mountain to Jerusalem. He’s tired and winded. The present for him is struggle and worship and prayer and labored breathing. He takes a break and finds a boulder to rest himself. He opens a leather canteen and takes sips of water. His quadriceps are burning and his calves begin to cramp, but his soul begins to remember…
When… …the Lord brought back the captive ones of Zion…
Rested and having gathered his breath, he recalls the return of the Jewish exiles. Those released exiles braved a journey across the same arid, rocky terrain and climbed the very face of this mountain up to the Holy City. Only a few weeks before, they had been held captive to Babylon, awaiting their release and, perhaps, thinking the day would never come. What seemed like a dream became the reality of joy and grateful worship.And, as the Psalmist reflects, It was the Lord, who returned exiled Jews to this place. It may have been the deeds and decrees of a benevolent and good king, but the King of Kings has brought us back to this place.
That kind of reflection doesn’t get into our hearts unless we take time to let God’s Word speak to us about both how He HAS acted and how He WILL act on behalf of His people. He delivers. He sets free. He changes situations of lingering hopelessness into a reality so blessed it seems like a dream.
And our only response is to worship with joy, to linger before the Holy One with praise and affection and songs of victorious gladness: Our mouths were filled with laughter, our tongues with joyful shouting…
G. K. Chesterton wrote:
“The worst moment for the atheist is when he is really thankful and has nobody to thank. It is the highest and holiest of the paradoxes that the man who really knows he cannot pay his debt will be forever paying it… …He will be always throwing things away into a bottomless pit of unfathomable thanks.”
Recall the past and give thanks what God has done. Gratefulness can inform our faith as it works through struggles today. Don’t quit climbing. Don’t quit believing. Only a proper view of the past will help us look rightly at the future.
The Psalmist moves his attention forward to what can lie ahead by rightly recalling the past. He remembers the future. Turning his head back to the desert, which he had just crossed, a thought enters his mind; a daring and courageous prayer: Bring back our captivity, O Lord, As the streams in the South. Think about the Negev desert; a place of immense, desperate thirst. That arid region to the south of Beersheba is utterly dry in the summer, but in the summer months, its streams quickly fill and flood with the rains of spring. The pilgrim calls to mind what has happened in the past and turns his focus to the future with expectation.
And it is our confidence from knowing both how God has acted and what He will do that strengthens our expectation.
- Those who sow in tears shall reap in joy. He who continually goes forth weeping, Bearing seed for sowing, Shall doubtless come again with rejoicing, Bringing his sheaves with him. (vv. 5-6)
The struggle of our labor to seek God now, to intercede now on behalf of others, will yield the joy and gladness of reward. We always see the future from the present. Our perspective cannot clearly see how, when, and, sometimes, even who. It is Jesus, our Immanuel, who remains faithful, true, and powerful to break open the shackles and lead us in freedom.
Let our hope in God fuel an enduring expectation. The present means sowing. The future means reaping. The present means praying. The present means tears, desiring, hungering, thirsting, wanting, waiting. The future brings rewarding, satisfying, fulfilling. The present means giving and sacrificing. The future means fullness and provision. Let faith transcend those struggles of the present to remain grateful for what God has done and expectant of what He will do to bring glory to His Name through and satisfy our earnest praying.