Blessed to Serve God
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PSALM 123
PSALMS OF ASCENT
Welcome back to our Proclamation Challenge where we are working our way through the Pilgrim Psalms. It is the beginning of May and the year is once again flying by as we find ourselves standing on the threshold of a change of season that will require an altogether different pace again. May God help us to adapt well. Thus far, we have studied, pondered, and memorized the first three ‘Songs of the Stairway’, as the Passion translation calls it. We have also learned from Eugene Peterson that as a metaphor for discipleship, these 15 psalms each has a distinct focus.
- Psalm 120 celebrates our first steps away from violence and deceit as we repent and turn our feet in the opposite direction, pursuing peace with God and receiving the peace of God!
- Psalm 121 is a psalm of trust, recognizing that no self-help worldly-wise short-term solutions will help us along the way. Only the evergreen promises of God’s ‘withness’ protection program and hands-on help will guard us from evil, calamity and difficulty on our journey!
- Psalm 122 is a song about worship, celebrating the ancient tradition of gathering together as believers at a specific place to worship our Creator-God and Founding Father, Jesus His beloved Son and the Holy Spirit. Which brings us to
PSALM 123
I lift up my eyes to you,
to you who sit enthroned in heaven.
As the eyes of slaves look to the hand of their master,
as the eyes of a female slave look to the hand of her mistress,
so our eyes look to the LORD our God,
till he shows us his mercy.
Have mercy on us, LORD, have mercy on us,
for we have endured no end of contempt.
We have endured no end of ridicule from the arrogant,
of contempt from the proud.
In Psalm 123, the first psalm in the second set of three psalms of Ascent, the writer faces trouble and problems in much the same way as Psalm 120. It is also the first time that the psalmist addresses God directly.[1] In the opening line, he lifts up his eyes, beyond the mountains of psalm 121 when he searched for help, beyond Jerusalem, the city of the Great King of psalm 122, to the heaven-dwelling God himself!
As we find the word “eyes” four times in these verses, it is also known as “the eye of hope” or “the psalm of the eyes” or “a psalm of weary eyes.”[2] The first mention of eyes is in the opening lines and recounts a simple action of the psalmist lifting his eyes upwards to the heavens. It means that his eyes are not on his circumstances or himself, but on God. It also reminds us that we do not look at him or down on him, but as servants we assume a certain position before God who lives in a high and holy place.
There is a real danger of becoming the master and treating God as the servant because God chose to present himself through Jesus Christ as a servant, writes Peterson. Thus, we cannot call him into action when we are too tired to do something ourselves or run to him when we find we are ill equipped to handle a specialized problem as if He is some kind of expert. “God did not become a servant so that we could order him around but so that we could join him in a redemptive work.”[3]
The psalmist compares this look of hope to God with the way a servant looks to his master and a maidservant to her mistress. Their attitude as they watch and wait on God is one of quiet trust and calm confidence, focusing their attention toward the LORD and specifically his directing hand, for
- The hand of the master supplies all that is needed, showing our dependence.
- The hand of the master avenges His people, bringing about our deliverance.
- The hand of the master directs the servant’s work, communicating our submission and role as we co-work with Him.
- The hand of the master corrects the servant, as He disciplines those He loves.
- The hand of the master blesses the servant, for He rewards those who diligently seek Him.
May God help us to look at Him in the same way as the psalmist looks at him – reverently, obediently, attentively, continuously, expectantly, single-mindedly, submissively and imploringly[4] — until He has mercy on us. It is this perseverance together with our pleas for mercy (repeated three times in two lines) that will arouse God from His holy habitation to enter our situation and redeem us. It is the psalmist’s intense plea for God’s intervention that stirs our hearts, for have we not been in similar situations?
Through the ages, in the ancient battle between light and darkness, holiness and sin, Christ and Satan, Christians have often been a minority, finding themselves at the mercy of those powers and people who oppose God. But even today in our relatively free Western societies, we have seen how power corrupts and how those in high positions can lord it over those under them. No wonder the longing for deliverance from oppression in Psalm 123 echoes in our hearts too.
But what exactly do we need deliverance from? In our restless society with its endless demands for produce there is a hopeless weariness and a despairing fatigue among everybody. ‘Never enough’ seems to be the anthem of our age in this modern showdown between God and the gods of this world, where urgent needs and constant cravings have enslaved a new generation of God’s people.
OUR GRACE CHALLENGE THIS MONTH
Eugene Peterson final plea is for reasonable service, and therefore he takes us to Romans 12:1 in the Message. So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. This last phrase, and place it before God as an offering, is translated in the NKJV as for it is your reasonable service.
As we attend to God as Lord, service to others will come naturally. May God help us to use our freedoms appropriately under the lordship of a merciful God.
Take Aways
Pharoah produced slaves, Moses followers and Jesus disciples. (Unknown)
A servant Christian is the freest person on earth. (Peterson)
In troubled times we must look upward, because God alone controls all things.
In troubled times we must look inward to realize our need for divine grace. (Barrick)
[1] http://drbarrick.org/files/studynotes/Psalms/Ps_123.pdf
[2] http://sermons.pastorlife.com/members/sermon.asp?USERID=&SERMON_ID=4102
[3] A Long Obedience in the Same Direction, Eugene Peterson, pg. 56
[4] David Guzik – ewm@enduringword.com
