Psalm 123

Have you ever been in a situation where one or more people seemed to be against you?  It’s a rhetorical question, because we all have!  Sometimes it doesn’t sting as much as it does others. This song is a reminder to trust God when this happens and to not give up hope.  There is a small but very key word in this psalm that we can easily miss; today we are going to focus on it.

UNTIL

At the end of verse 2, the psalmist writes, until He shall be gracious to us.  This psalm is about prolonged trust despite not seeing results.  This is otherwise known as faith.  In our instant gratification driven society, we can very easily come to distrust God’s love and goodness simply because He doesn’t relieve us of our pain and heartache when we want Him to.  How long is long enough to suffer?  How long must we deal with those who oppose us until God comes and makes things right?  It might seem like forever, but it might be forever…until He returns again!

It doesn’t seem fair, I know.  But we must consider a few factors to be able to understand things within God’s context instead of our own.

1) It isn’t about us.  Our experiences on earth most often tend to me about us, instead of God or others.  It is important we shift this perspective.  Our purpose as saved followers of Christ is to glorify God.  It’s not a secondary byproduct of our salvation and subsequent journey, it is the main point!  So, amidst the trials and tribulations, we need to train ourselves to reframe our question from, “why me?” to “How can I glorify God in this?”

2) The part of these situations that is about us is an opportunity to grow in faith.  It strengthens our “trust muscles.”  Will we trust God despite our current circumstances?  The psalmist uses the imagery of a servant relying on his or her master.  They have no power over the situation, so they wait expectantly for God (i.e., the master) to do something.  But, they wait with patience.  When someone comes against us like this, we have little power to control the situation. Maybe we can avoid them, but we cannot change their heart.  Only God can do that. This might sometimes seem to be a Christian platitude, but it is true.  We could grovel about the situation in despair, or we could pray for them.  We can also pray for ourselves.  We can ask God for help.  It is an opportunity to learn to rely on God more.

3) There is a bigger picture that we cannot see.  We don’t know why God doesn’t deliver us right away, but there is a good reason for it.  I know that isn’t very comforting to us, especially when we are going through it.  However, it is important for us to keep in mind a universal perspective with an eternal timeline.  Our current situation is but a fleeting moment, like smoke in the wind, compared to eternal reality.  It doesn’t necessarily make the situation easier to deal with, but if we truly do trust God, then that means we trust in what He is doing.  Similar to point #1, maybe this isn’t about us at all, but instead the person who is causing us harm.  Maybe the Lord is doing a work in them through it and has called upon you to be a part of the process.  The story of Job is the easiest one to pluck out of the bible.  That story wasn’t really about Job at all!  It was about showing others (you and me included) what true faith looks like and how God rewards it.  Yet, he didn’t know that God would bless his life after the trial more than he was blessed prior to the devastation.

So, let us remember Psalm 123 when life seems to be coming against us, and our closest friends and family seem to turn on us, and we have no clue why it is happening.

May our eyes look the the Lord our God, until He shall be gracious to us.