To the tired believer in Jesus Christ
You are worn out, ragged and weary. You feel tired and at times you think; “I am at the end of my rope.” You find yourself wondering… where is the hope?
To the church of today
You are a part of the corporate gathering of worshipers of Jesus Christ and you have watched as one fallen leader after another came crashing down. Wrecked lives and a path of destruction has been left behind. The church and it’s failures range from infidelity to fraud and everything else in between. You wonder… where is the hope?
To the Christian living in the world but not of the world
Ours is a day of rampant darkness. Culture invokes the name of God while living in opposition to Him. It is a culture that embraces the darkness and rejoices in it. You wonder… where is the hope?
Recently I turned to the Psalms in my reading. In particular I turned to Psalm 126. It is a Psalm of lament and a Psalm of hope. Amazingly, it spoke hope to God’s people 1,000’s of years ago and it still speaks hope to his people today.
Psalm 126
When the LORD restored the fortunes of Zion, we were like those who dream. 2 Then our mouth was filled with laughter, and our tongue with shouts of joy; then they said among the nations, The LORD has done great things for them.”3 The LORD has done great things for us; we are glad. 4 Restore our fortunes, O LORD, like streams in the Negeb! 5 Those who sow in tears shall reap with shouts of joy! 6 He who goes out weeping, bearing the seed for sowing, shall come home with shouts of joy, bringing his sheaves with him.
Psalm 126 is a Psalm of ascent that looks back to a time when God showed Himself faithful to restore His people (vs 1) and it is also a cry to the Lord to restore His people once again (vs 4). The Psalm leads us to do the same in our day. We are to look back to God’s past faithfulness in restoring His people to then inform our prayers that He might do that once again in our day!
Vs 1 says “When the LORD restored the fortunes of Zion, we were like those who dream.” Our God is a God who restores. The Psalmist tells us that He restores the fortunes. These are not material fortunes rather they are the fortunes that belong to the follower of Jesus Christ.
We are told in Romans 8:12-17 that we are heirs of Christ. We have an inheritance that is being preserved in heaven for us I Peter 1:3-5. God has much more for the follower of Jesus Christ than material fortunes! Furthermore, the Psalmist says that “he restores the fortune of Zion…” Zion is the OT way of saying “the people of God”. Have you read your OT lately? If not, let me remind you that the people of God in the OT were a messy, messed up people.
The Psalmist is looking back at those messed up people and recalling God’s restoration project of Zion (the people of God.) Now, here is what amazes me. They don’t look like Zion (the people of God) nor did they act like Zion. But Psalm 126 proclaims they ARE Zion. And because they are, they WILL BE restored. Wow!
Friends, this Psalm is a call to remember who you are. It calls us to remember our identity. Those OT people of God were not who they once were, or who they viewed themselves to be. They were the restored people of God. They were not the captured exiles, the oppressed and hopeless, they were not the downtrodden… They were Zion! Their suffering was not to be what defined them. God defines them, and they were Zion.
In other words, your experiences are to be processed through your identity. You are Zion, you are the people of God. In the New Covenant we no longer read that the people of God are Zion. We know it as…. “You are in Christ” – You are Christian!
Meaning, we join with the long list of messed up messy people of God. We join with others who have gone before us whom God did not treat as their sins deserved. We have been given a new identity. Through Christ, we are in Christ!
The Psalmist then in vs 2 expresses the joy of these truths. (2 Then our mouth was filled with laughter, and our tongue with shouts of joy; then they said among the nations, “The LORD has done great things for them.” 3 The LORD has done great things for us; we are glad.)
This then became the reason why the Psalmist cried out to the Lord to restore them again. The result? The person who is in Christ is restored and there will be joy in the midst of tears. Shouts of joy will arise in the difficult circumstances. Do you see it? I encourage you to go back and slowly read this brief Psalm of praise.
Christian, do you feel like your life is a mess, the church is a failure and the world where you live is in utter darkness? Psalm 126 calls us to gladness and shouts of joy in the face of the sadness. Why? Because God has and will restore His people!
You wonder… where is the hope? Look to God – He is the hope!
Hey Tim,
Another good, timely word. Nothing really dreadful in my life, just a back injury that’s been really painful. I’ve been trusting God for healing, praying through the sleepless nights, and finding spiritual comfort from Him. I went to a spine specialist yesterday, who explained what’s going on. The bottom line is that it should resolve itself in another 6-7 weeks, getting better little by little.
Reading your post reminded me that God is faithful, His timing is perfect, and His testimonies are sure. And He will see me through these upcoming weeks. I may have to wait and endure, but my hope is in Him, and He will not fail!
Hey John! Always good to hear from you – thanks for reading! So sorry to hear about the back pain – will be praying for you my friend. Amen…God is faithful, His timing is perfect, and His testimonies are sure!! Grace to you.