Psalm 129
You’re now with me, Psalm 129. This is a song of ascents, and
it begins this way. Greatly have they afflicted me
from my youth. Let Israel now say, greatly they
have afflicted me from my youth, yet they have not prevailed against
me. The plowers plowed upon my back,
they made long their furrows. The Lord is righteous. He has
cut the cords of the wicked. May all who hate Zion be put
to shame and turn backward. Let them be like the grass on
the housetops which withers before it grows up, with which the reaper
does not fill his hand, nor the binder of the sheaves his arms. Nor do those who pass by say,
the blessing of the Lord be upon you. We bless you in the name
of the Lord. Amen. This is God’s word for
us. Isn’t it a little more helpful
to think about stuff that goes on in the service when we read
those catechisms that remind us of what is the reading and
the preaching and the sacraments and those things. So I pray that
the Lord will bless us more and more as we give our attention
to the word One of the ways that the Bible talks about God’s people
is with the little phrase, my son. Some of you will remember
that when Jesus was born, Herod asked the wise men, when you
find the Christ child, come back to me and tell me where he is
because I want to buy him a box of diapers. Right. That actually
wasn’t the case. What was the case? He wanted
to go see the baby for himself because he heard he was king
of the Jews. And what was a king of the Jews but a threat to the
governor? of the region, the Roman authority. And so he didn’t want to send
a baby package. He wanted to kill baby Jesus. And what did Mary and Joseph
do? They fled to Egypt. And the Bible tells us that’s
in fulfillment of Hosea, where it says, out of Egypt, I have
called my son. And you might think from Hosea,
he called his children out of Egypt in the Exodus. And that’s
what it means. Well, that is what it means. But it also has
great meaning when God The son goes to Egypt and is called out
of Egypt later when they settle in his hometown. And then he
grows up as a happy little boy because the threat of Herod and
death and sword is now gone. But this phrase, my son, is a
very common phrase for the people of God. And so throughout the
Old Testament, you’ll see God refer to his children, the whole
of the nation of Israel, as my son. And so I want you to think
about Israel or God’s nation oppressed as we look at this
psalm. Israel has been oppressed by sin and sickness and darkness. And it began in the Garden of
Eden when Adam and Eve took the fruit, they ate it, and then
soon after Cain killed his brother Abel. And then on and on we see
wickedness prevail until the flood. God rescues Noah and his
family. They’re put out of the ark and
they’re fruitful and multiply. People call on the name of the
Lord. They get stuck in Egypt. God rescues them and then God
puts them among the other kingdoms of the world with the exile to
Assyria, the exile to Babylon. They have enemies like the Philistines
and the Assyrians. And so God’s people for most
of their lives are oppressed. And that’s what we find in the
dead center of Psalm 129, where it says, well, verse three, the
plowers plowed upon my back and they made long their furrows. So I want us to think of this
psalm in two headings with that big heading in mind. Think about
Israel as an oppressed people. But the first four verses think
about the past. They look back and see what was
true, but also it’s a psalm that looks forward, what will be. And so look with me, if you will,
at the first four verses, we’ll look at the, the, the look back
at what is true. Greatly they have afflicted me
from my youth, let Israel now say. That’s a statement that
looks all the way back through the history of God’s people.
We’ve been oppressed by various people, various nations, and
at various times in our history. And then it’s worth repeating,
let Israel now say, greatly have they afflicted me from my youth,
but there’s good news. They have not prevailed against
me. And that’s something that the
church can say even to this day. We sing of persecution. We sing
that the church is one foundation, Jesus Christ our Lord. We see
the church hard-pressed. We see oppression, yet Christ
helps us be victorious. So Israel can say, the church
can say, we’ve been greatly afflicted from our youth and all the way
through, but our enemies have not prevailed against us, and
they won’t prevail. We know that to be true. Verse
three is a very interesting verse, especially given our day and
time and culture. The plowers plowed upon our backs. They have made long their furrows. The experience of Israel is oppression. And they’ve had more than enough.
We’re tired of being kicked, is what they say. My history,
my experience. is oppression, but people haven’t
been able to get the best of us. But it culminates there in
verse 3. They have been humiliated. They’ve
had no dignity. Some suggest that the plowers
plowed upon my back, they have made long their furrows, that
it refers to the lashes of the Egyptian slave masters. in some people’s minds refers
to the lashes on Jesus’ back when he was scourged before his
crucifixion. But God’s people as a whole,
over their history, have been humiliated. And this phrase,
they have made long their furrows, God’s people have been, well,
they’ve been oppressed thoroughly. The furrows are long, they’re
straight, they’re consistent, they are As a good farmer would
put in his crops, he would make straight and make long his furrows
and get every bit of soil tilled for the maximum benefit of his
farm. And so that’s a bit of what is
going on in the life of Israel when they look back and remember.
But look at verse 4. It’s a happy ending to this remembrance
section. The Lord is righteous and he
has cut the cords of the wicked. He has set free those who were
under the yoke of oppression and humiliation. This is a turning
point in the psalm. The enemy has failed. Some say
it means no more is their harness upon me. The cords of the harness
have been cut and no longer are God’s people yoked in slavery.
And you can think back to the metaphor of the Exodus from Egypt. They were under Well, how does
the preface to the Ten Commandments go? I’m the Lord your God. I
brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery,
out from under the bondage of Egypt. And so no longer are they
in bondage to wicked Pharaoh. And the same is true when Christ
redeems us. We are set free from Satan, our
wicked taskmaster, and we are freed to follow the Lord Jesus.
So no more does Satan’s harness have us. and no longer does the
enemy prevail against us. Yes, they can taunt us and make
life difficult, but no longer. So that’s the first section.
It’s a look back. It’s a peek at the past. It reminds us of what is true. Yes, life is hard. Just to think
for a brief moment about the present times we’re living in,
there are indeed people all around the world, even in our own country,
that have been oppressed by others. There have been the weak and
the strong, oppressor and the oppressed. It’s not just happened
in our nation. It’s all over the world. Sometimes
through wicked tyranny and government. Sometimes it’s through tribal
issues in the continent of Africa or in the East. But there are
people all around us that we remember are suffering under
various forms of oppression. And don’t you think this would
give them hope? Don’t you think this might offer them great hope
as Christians? I remember several years ago
knowing a man who was under the wicked rule of the nation of
Eritrea, and they were under great persecution for loving
the Lord Jesus and preaching the faith. And it cost them much. It cost them even their lives
in some ways. But to be freed from that and
to pray that their country would have its harness of oppression
broken as a mighty prayer to make. And so our hearts and our
minds, our souls want to be sensitive to those all around the world
who suffer under other people’s tyranny. It’s not fair, it’s
not right, but until Christ comes, it may be the case for many people
throughout the history of the world. Well, the second section
of the psalm looks to the future. And it’s verses five through
eight. And in this look to the future,
it really has a Well, a prayer of imprecation. Y’all remember
that, that fancy word? Um, I think I’ve told y’all before
we had a joke growing up that, uh, we, we said of our enemies,
we hope they get the hemorrhoids, right? Uh, they’re, they’re mean
to you. They’re unkind to you. That’s,
that was our prayer of imprecation. It was sort of a family joke.
Um, but, but that’s, that’s the prayer here is Lord hurt, hurt
my enemies, uh, give them shame. So beginning at verse five, may
all who hate Zion, In a sense, may those who oppress Israel,
may those who hate the church, may they be put to shame or may
they grovel and may they be turned backwards. Or it’s another way
to say, may they be frustrated. And then it goes on, let them
be like the grass on the housetops, which withers before it grows
up. with which the reaper does not
fill his hand, nor the binder of sheaves his arms, nor do those
who pass by say, the blessing of the Lord be upon you. We bless you in the name of the
Lord. So here’s a look forward. And
the look forward is a prayer that God would judge those who
oppress the people of Israel. We don’t think about it very
often, but in the Bible, very often, life is looked at through
blessings and curses. We want our lives to be blessed,
right? I don’t doubt any of you want
to be unblessed. You might even hope you win the
lottery. So that’s pretty typical, right? And we want others we
like to be blessed. And in fact, that’s our prayers
when we say our prayers at night. Dear God, bless mom and dad.
Bless grandma and grandpa. And that’s the word we use, right?
Bless them, bless them, bless them. We want them to be happy,
holy, healthy, all the rest. But how many of you as a kid,
or maybe you lead your kids in prayer, dear God, smite our enemies
from the face of the earth. Let them be like grass on the
rooftops, which withers before it grows up. Did any of y’all
do that? It would be okay, it’d be biblical. Somehow we got taught
to pray for our enemies through hemorrhoids. I think that was
dinner table humor in our household. But we don’t do that, right? But it’s in there, it’s in the
Bible. Somebody oppressing you, plowing
long furrows in your back, pray that God would not only stop
it, but he might curse them. But notice the progression of
curses. May all who hate Zion be put
to shame, make them grovel, make them be confused or frustrated
and turn backwards. Let them be like the grass on
the housetop, which withers before it grows up. I don’t know about
y’all, but I can’t get grass to grow where I want it to grow,
but where I don’t want it to grow, it grows, and it never withers
like this says. I got a quibble with this passage.
It grows in your driveway cracks, but it doesn’t grow out in the
middle of the yard where you got the bear spot. Isn’t that the way it works?
It’s always the way it works, so I’m not so sure here. I don’t
know. No, but we know how it is. It sprouts. Maybe the spring
has come this year, and we had some rain, and because of COVID
and quarantine, we got to tend our yards. We went to Lowe’s
1,900 times like the rest of the world did without face mask,
and we bought plenty of stuff and kept Lowe’s in good business. got our yards looking nice and
about now the sun’s getting hotter and well the grass is starting
to die in a few places and it’s not prospering and that’s what
he’s speaking of here but they had you know they had in these
times thatched roofs and what would inevitably happen in a
thatched roof it would have a little seed in it and what would happen
when a little moisture got in it that seed would grow uh you’ve
you’ve bought uh straw hay right at the garden market to fix a
patch in your yard and you intend to use that bale of straw hay
that day, that weekend to get the job done. But what does it
do? It sits over here. A week passes by, two weeks pass by,
and what does that bale of straw begin to do? It begins to produce
grass. You’ve seen it, right? That’s
the idea here. But it will fade as soon as the
sun gets hot. In a sense, he’s saying, don’t
give them success. And success was everything in
this day and time, right? No grapes, no wine. No crops,
no food. No crops, no money. No milk. Maybe the cow goes barren and
dries up. No sustenance, no chickens, no
eggs. You get the picture. Let them
not prosper. Let them starve to death. I mean,
it’s like saying, let Walmart run out of groceries and close
down. That’s how it would hurt us. And then in verse seven,
the reaper does not fill his hand or the binder of sheaves. This is a pretty serious curse. upon the enemies of Israel, let
them go without, let them be without. And then the, what do
you call it? The granddaddy of all curses,
right? This is the coup d’etat. This is the big one. Let no one
who passes by say the blessing of the Lord be upon you. No benediction from neighbor.
No word of praise. And there’s a sense where we
see this in the New Testament in the more ultimate sense. of God’s people. There is a day
when Christ will return, and it says of the wicked in the
book of Revelation, they will cry out for the hills to fall
in on them, lest they have to face the fear and the wrath of
God and his people as they come in judgment. And so you might
say of this psalm, like I put the title for the message tonight,
The Lord to the Rescue, but you might say, A good title for this
passage is, Don’t Mess With God’s People, because you’re going
to get it one day. Let’s pause and give thanks to
the Lord and ask for his help. Lord, we bless you for this word
from Psalm 129. We’re mindful of how many people
hurt and are under the thumb of oppressors. We pray for relief
for them. We pray that for our part in
our lives, we would treat others with kindness, we would be godlike
towards others, loving and serving others, to help those who are
in need, those who are under great hardship. And we thank
you that you rescue us from sin and death and darkness, but you
even rescue us from our enemies, for our enemies are your enemies,
and one day they will all kiss the sun lest he be angry with
them, or else they’ll be cast into utter and everlasting judgment. We make our prayer in Christ’s
name. Give us your comfort. Amen.