Theological Commentary: Click Here
The first
half of this psalm seems to be in line with the other maskils of Korah that we’ve
read thus far. It is through the Lord
that we accomplish anything. The psalmist
truly knows where the source of life, power, and protection resides. It isn’t us, it is God. He is the one who does wonderful things
through us. That much is clear.
However,
when we get to the second half of this psalm it takes on a much more ominous
tone. The psalmist has seen his people
fail. He has seen them fall in
battle. He has seen them live under the
persecution of others. He has seen them
seemingly rejected by God.
What’s worse
is that the psalmist can’t understand why.
From his perspective, the people aren’t falling away. They aren’t rejecting God. They aren’t turning to other gods. They haven’t broken the covenant. Had any of these things happened, the
psalmist would accept the fate and acknowledge their worthiness to receive such
a fate.
This can
tell us at least two things. Not being
in the context, it is impossible to know which is correct. It is possible that the people are being
faithful. If this is correct, then God
simply hasn’t decided to move against the evil in the world around His
people. God could be giving the other
people time to grow, mature, repent, or hang themselves and deserve true
judgment.
More likely,
however, I think the psalmist is a bit blind.
How many of us can honestly say that we’ve kept God’s commandments? How many of us can say that we don’t chase
other gods in our life? Can we really believe
that we are innocent in every way?
Not being
there, I really don’t know what is going on.
But this psalm reminds me that I have a firm belief about
repentance. When things go poorly in my
life, my first instinct should be to look within. What is going on within my life that isn’t
worthy of God? When I find such a thing,
I should focus my life upon repenting over that and asking for God’s
forgiveness. In such humbleness will God’s
presence truly be found.
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