Psalm 78

A Maskil of Asaph

1 Give ear, O my people, to my teaching; incline your ears to the words of my mouth!

2 I will open my mouth in a parable; I will utter dark sayings from of old,

3 things that we have heard and known, that our fathers have told us.

The psalmist is a teacher and he is calling the class to attention: “Give ear my people to my instruction, lean in and listen to the words of my mouth!” The word translation “instruction” is the word “torah” which usually refers to the entire revelation of God (the Bible). But here it has the modifier “my” so we are talking about the psalmist’s teaching which will follow. He promises to open his mouth in a riddle, a dark saying from old. And while it is a riddle, it is something that we have known for quite a long time, our parents have taught us these stories. The psalmist is going to recite key elements of Israel’s history, remembering the past to give meaning to the present. In the present, things are not good for Israel. Historically speaking they are likely in captivity in Babylon, the temple destroyed, their land taken, the pressure to conform to their captor’s culture intense. In the midst of this, the psalmist summons the people to listen to these stories afresh. These ancient events are of modern day consequence. Again, these are not new stories. There is no new information here, just an emphasis on remembering, bringing the truths of these stories to the forefront of our minds and attention. Jesus will use the language of verse 2 to describe his teaching in parables. His parables were more riddle-like than what will follow here (Jesus often literally explained their meaning), but they required some contemplation and application. They brought the truths of God to the forefront of our minds by engaging our imagination. Story-telling does that, and this is the way that God has chosen to reveal himself and to accomplish things -- through words. The psalmist is about to unleash the power of story to help the people understand why they are in the situation they are in and how they can get through it. I’m ready to listen. 

4 We will not hide them from their children, but tell to the coming generation the glorious deeds of the LORD, and his might, and the wonders that he has done.

5 He established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel which he commanded our fathers to teach to their children

6 that the next generation might know them, the children yet unborn, and arise and tell them to their children,

These ancient stories are not meant to be locked up and forgotten, but rather to be actively transferred to future generations. We do this through telling the LORD’s deeds, might, and wonders to those younger than us. These deeds are found in his law which suggests that the law is more than a list of rules, rather it is the story of God. Parents have a responsibility to teach their children, Adults have a responsibility to pass the faith onto the next generation. The family is the primary way that God has chosen to pass the faith on to the next generation, parents teaching their children to teach their children. As the health of families declines, so does the general culture, and so does the culture’s commitment to truth. The mantra today is that everyone must live according to their “lived experience”, that is the truth for them. But what if we lived according to a revealed truth, an ancient authority that doesn’t change with time and personal experience? This may be the central issue in our modern world -- authority. Western society has traditionally looked to external sources of authority -- namely the Bible, believing it was revealed by our Creator. But that has changed in recent decades and the individual has assumed the authority to determine the meaning of most of the important things, redefining life, marriage, sex, and gender. What are you doing to confront these lies? Whom are you teaching? While it’s important to model a life of faith, there are also things that need to be made explicit and reasons for believing them need to be given. Don’t hide truth from the next generation out of a fear of offending them or hesitate because you don’t want to be a curmudgeon. The older generation does have much to teach, and the younger generations tend to think they know better -- it is the arrogance of youth. Find ways to break through those barriers. Their lives and future depend on it. A culture that rejects the authority of God looks a lot like the book of Judges “-- In those days, Israel had no king, and everyone did what was right in their own eyes.”

7 so that they should set their hope in God and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments;

8 and that they should not be like their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation whose heart was not steadfast whose spirit was not faithful to God.

The purpose of teaching the next generation is that they would do two things and avoid two things. They should set their hope in God and keep his commandments. They should not forget what God has done and they should not be like their fathers whose heart was not firm. These two positives and negatives are interwoven with one another for poetic effect. The temptation for each new generation is a lack of mindfulness when it comes to the past. When focused on the present, particularly when things are going well, it’s easy to forget about the past and where God has brought you thus far. This is what happened to Israel repeatedly. Their story is essentially a season of trial followed by prosperity followed by apostasy. No one seems to be immune to this. So set your hope on God. Look to Him for all that you need now and forever. Be satisfied in Him. Let Him be enough. Too often we want God plus this or that. Let God be enough and make Him your ultimate. Don’t forget the works of the Lord. Read of them often and tell the stories so they stay fresh and relevant. The Bible is the most amazing book and its stories never grow old. Keep his commandments, even when it’s not convenient or popular. Be careful to do everything written in them and then you will be prosperous and successful in God’s eyes. Don’t be like your parents. It’s unfortunate that some people have this experience. It’s not the way it’s meant to be. Some people need to be like their parents -- as it should be. But if one’s parents have been unfaithful, then learn from their mistakes and do not repeat them. Break the cycle. The script is not written for you even if you’ve been shaped by ungodly hands. Stubbornness, rebellion, an unfaithful heart and a teetering spirit are not the kinds of things that one builds a solid foundation upon, and yet if this is what you have had to learn from then you need to learn from someone else. Seek out mentors and role models who are the opposite of what you’ve seen, men and women who are faithful, who keep God’s commandments, whose hearts are steadfast. In addition, strive to be that mentor and role model that others are needing to see. The author is trying to set things right after his people have gone astray and as a result have suffered calamity. It’s never too late to do the right thing. 

9 The Ephraimites, armed with [armed and shooting] the bow, turned back on the day of battle.

10 They did not keep God's covenant, but refused to walk according to his law.

11 They forgot his works and the wonders that he had shown them.

The psalmist asks us to remember Israel’s failures, citing here the day that the Ephraimites (descendants of Joseph) turned back on the day of battle even as they were armed and shooting. They had the weapons and opportunity but they failed because of their lack of strength and courage. Their cowardice was rooted in their abandonment of the covenant with God. They failed because they did not keep God’s covenant. They refused to walk according to his law, and they forgot his works and wonders. Acting in our own courage and strength is a recipe for retreat. Keeping the covenant and walking according to God’s laws means living in relationship with God, in harmony with his ways and character. Remembering the wonders that he has done gives us courage to face the challenges before us knowing that God has done miracles in the past. These attitudes come directly from living in relationship with God, listening for his voice, reading his word, applying its truths to our lives and doing the work of obedience even when it feels like you are alone. We are energized by God’s promises when we recall them and bring them to the forefront of our minds. The Ephraimites simply forgot his works and wonders and as a result their courage failed.This text challenges us to be persons of courage by  being people of virtue. The word virtue is etymologically rooted in the idea of manhood and strength (vir, virus). The metaphor of a modern day virus is that a small, unseen thing can be powerful. The small, unseen acts of moral courage in our day can have a powerful impact if we will not turn back as the Ephraimites. There is a battle for truth in our culture and the most powerful voices will be those that live consistently what they teach. Surrender the private life to moral lies, and you will not be a person of power. You will shrink back on the day of battle.  

12 In the sight of their fathers he performed wonders in the land of Egypt, in the fields of Zoan.

13 He divided the sea and let them pass through it, and made the waters stand like a heap.

The psalmist reminds us of the wonders that God performed on behalf of his people, the very things that the Ephraimites in the previous verse had forgotten. He begins with the ten plagues, summarizing them all in one verse, reminding them that these were all done in plain sight of their fathers. There was no mistaking it -- these were acts of God. The temptation in these more modern times is to explain everything with natural phenomena, to “demythologize” the Bible. For example, the Nile didn’t turn to blood, rather it flooded and maybe the silt was red and contained toxins from soil upriver. This in turn caused all of the environmental and agricultural problems that followed -- insects, frogs, and then livestock disease as the ecosystem was disrupted. Or perhaps it was something the Egyptians brought upon themselves through poor environmental management and the economic downturn was mythologized into acts of God. Maybe the darkness was an eclipse and maybe the death of the firstborn was a plague of some infectious disease that struck children. Then there are the Red Sea crossing explanations that hypothesize an earthquake that raised the sea floor or caused the sea to flow back in some way. Or perhaps it wasn’t really a sea, but a Sea of Reeds (that is the actual name in Hebrew), and so the Israelites really just slogged through a muddy bog after a dry spell. The poetic will have none of this. YHWH performed wonders, bonafide miracles. He split the sea (the same word that he will use in verse 15 for splitting rocks) and let them pass through (another passover). He made the waters stand like a heap. The waters were piled up on either side, no mention of an earthquake or a dried up swamp. Of course these alternative explanations all have their challenges as well. If the sea was a muddy bog how did this destroy the Egyptian army? Or did their chariots just get stuck in the mud? Attempts to explain away miracles will always be there, even modern miracles. The eyes of faith see an invisible hand at work. Remember that. God works wonders to set people free -- whether that’s through the hard times that like the plague cause us to suffer and see God’s hand in it, or the unbelievable parting of the waters where God heaps up the deadly waters on both sides of us and invites us in faith to walk through in safety. Our God is a God who saves. 
14 In the daytime he led them with a cloud, and all the night with a fiery light.

15 He split rocks in the wilderness and gave them drink abundantly as from the deep.

16 He made streams come out of the rock and caused waters to flow down like rivers.

After getting them out of Egypt after pounding that nation with plagues, and after heaping up the waters of the Red Sea on both sides of the Israelites and then catastrophically pounding the Egyptian army, YWH proceeds to lead his people through the desert with a different show of power. First there is his presence -- a cloud to shade them from the blazing sun by day and a fire to keep them safe from attack at night and to provide some warmth during the cold desert nights. It must have been comforting to know that God was still with them, even if in less dramatic ways. This was a quiet presence that met their daily needs, a constant reminder that God was with them. Second, there was his provision. He split the rocks, just like he split the sea (save verb as in verse 13). But this time the waters gushed forth rather than being held back by his hands. They drank as if it were a never ending supply, like the supply that you find in the depths of the ocean. They didn’t have to ration or worry about where their next drink was going to come from, and that’s no small thing when you’re living in a desert. Streams came out of rocks, waters flowed down from the desert mountains like rivers. Again, the skeptic might say that the Israelites got extremely lucky. Perhaps it was an unseasonable weather year where the desert received record amounts of rain. Or maybe there just weren’t that many people that came out of Egypt and so the existing resources of the desert were enough for them. Maybe the cloud by day was just a season of unusual cloudiness and the fire by night was a passing comet. There will always be ways to explain away miracles. But if there is a God, miracles are simply not a problem. He can do miracles without violating any laws of nature. He is nature’s God. This story of God’s presence and provision is meant to remind us today that He is the same God. He is with us in the wilderness, sheltering us from the sweltering heat of suffering, warming us in the night and leading us always forward. He provides for us when it seems like the resources have dried up. He who brings water from rocks can meet our every need. In a small but important way, this metaphor of water from the rock points us to Jesus, the rock, the cornerstone, that was struck for our iniquities and from whom we drink and never thirst again. 

17 Yet they sinned still more against him, rebelling against the Most High in the desert.

18 They tested God in their heart by demanding the food they craved.

God’s miraculous provision of water from the rock isn’t enough to satisfy the Israelites in the wilderness. And although the manna isn’t mentioned here, this bread from heaven wasn’t enough either. This miracle of food appearing on the ground every morning soon became old and they craved the food of their fancy. The Hebrew word describing “food” here is from the root word “soul”. “Soul food” as we use the term today doesn’t describe it, except that it is that food which you love because it’s near to your heart. It’s tasty, it’s got good associations, it’s special, hearty, comforting -- all the great things about your favorite food rolled into one. This is what the Israelites craved. They desired their own food, not God’s. They weren’t content with what God had freely provided for their survival in the desert, they wanted more. This is described as a testing of God in their heart and more generally as sin and rebellion. This is the same thing that we do today when we act as if what God is offering isn’t enough because it isn’t what we want. Perhaps it’s like a child who wants ice cream instead of broccoli. Parents know that a three-year old cannot thrive on a diet of ice cream and root beer, and so they don’t provide it. They provide what their child needs: a balanced healthy diet. Consequently, the child rebels and throws a tantrum and refuses to eat. We are no different when we reject the blessed life that God offers and instead worship the gods of our desires -- our appetites for food and drink, our hoarding of wealth, our indulgence of our sexual desires -- there any number of ways that we are just like the Israelites in the wilderness: offer what they needed, they complained because it wasn’t what they wanted. LORD, may we gratefully accept the gifts from your hands for what they are, the good things that we need to thrive. By your spirit alive in us, help us to temper our appetites for the things that would destroy us from the inside out. 

19 They spoke against God, saying, “Can God spread a table in the wilderness?

20 He struck the rock so that water gushed out and streams overflowed. Can he also give bread or provide meat for his people?”

The people of Israel must have looked back on themselves and seen how stupid they looked. They had just witnessed ten devastating plagues in succession followed by a walk across the floor of the Red Sea. Now they watch Moses (God?) hit a rock with the same staff that had commanded all of the above to happen. Water gushes out from a rock in the desert. Instead of glorying in that miracle and so many others, the people of God say, “Yes, but can you spread out a table of food in the wilderness? That’s what we’d really like to see right about now. We’d like some meat and bread, some solid, tasty food.” The audacity of commanding God is one thing altogether. The other is that they are doing this right after God has done all of these other miracles. Do they think he doesn’t know their needs? Do they think he is not able or willing to see them through this wilderness? When you are in a wilderness, all you can think about is survival. In particular you are forced to realize how poor you are. Modern wilderness experiences do the same thing. They reveal our poverty, our lack of spiritual resources, our lack of power to do much of anything. We are at the mercy of circumstance, and the only sure thing we can trust in is God and his word. So rather than accept the good things that God offers in the wilderness, we clamor for more of what we think we want. God has given us the water of Jesus so that we will never thirst again. Knowing Jesus satisfies every desire we might have but often it’s not enough and we hunger for bread and meat, the tasty substance of this world. God gives us the bread of heaven, the body and blood of Jesus, but this is not enough for us. We still want our stuff, our food, our appetites. May we be satisfied with Jesus, period, and cease our crying for lesser things. 

21 Therefore, when the LORD heard, he was full of wrath; a fire was kindled against Jacob; his anger rose against Israel,

22 because they did not believe in God and did not trust his saving power.

YHWH’s response to the complaints of his people is anger. That anger builds in each of the three lines of verse 12. “He was full of wrath...a fire was kindled...his anger rose”. The first of those verbs is actually the verb “pass over” in its root -- the very word that describes how God passed over Israel as his wrath came down on Egypt. It’s a rare form of the verb that in this case suggests that God caused himself to become angry. It is used somewhat frequently in this psalm perhaps because of its similarity to “Passover”. It is a way of God saying, “what I did to the Egyptians I can do to you.” The LORD’s anger rises because his people did not trust in him and in his saving power. This is the core issue: a failure of faith. In their journey through the wilderness, when all has been stripped away, the central question is “Do you trust me?” When the answer to that question is “no”, the next question follows, “If you’re not trusting in me, who are you trusting in?” It is a tacit call to evaluate the things in which we place our trust. We trust in our abilities, our skills that enable us to make a living and provide for ourselves and our families. We trust in our bodies to function for us, and when they give us trouble we trust in the medical profession to fix them. We trust in our wisdom and the things that have been taught and passed down to us to make decisions about what is best for us. We trust in the size of our bank account and the amount of our assets to keep us from poverty. The wilderness can take all of that away in a moment, revealing the folly of leaning on them ultimately. Do you believe in God?  Do you trust his saving power? The wilderness reveals the true status of the human heart. 

23 Yet he commanded the skies above and opened the doors of heaven,

24 and he rained down on them manna to eat and gave them the grain of heaven.

25 Man ate of the bread of the angels; he sent them food in abundance.

So finally God expresses his wrath upon the nation because of the wayward hearts. He does rain down fire from heaven. He doesn’t open up the earth and swallow them. Instead, he gives them exactly what they ask for: food, meat and bread in abundance. God commanded the clouds and opened the doors of heaven in the same way that he opened the windows of heaven in Noah’s day. But this time he rained down not torrents of destructive water, but food in abundance. It rained food! The Israelites experienced this as bread on the ground each morning and they said, “Manna” (What is it?) It was the grain of heaven, the bread of angels. God seemingly created sustenance out of nothing. Like creation itself, this seems to be ex nihilo. There’s really no reasonable scientific explanation for this one. There’s no natural way to explain how food could show up on the ground every morning. It was a miracle and a direct response from God to their complaint. God’s response to the unbelief of the Israelites is the same as his response to an unbelieving and disobedient humanity. He simply gives them what they ask for. He gives them the freedom to make bad choices and follow their own delusions. He’ll step back and let those choices play out. Paul describes this in Romans 1 as God “giving them over to their shameful desires.” In other words, God doesn’t stop people from sinning and thinking wrongly about him and themselves. He lets them experience the consequences of those beliefs and actions. When terrible things happen we call this God’s wrath when really it is just what happens when humans operate outside of the parameters for which they were designed. Here God gives them exactly what they ask for -- food in abundance, free and easy, convenient and nutritious. Jesus fed the multitudes with bread from heaven one time and they were ready to forcefully make him king, imposing their own understanding on God’s messiah, usurping God’s superior plan for him. It is but another example of humans taking the good things that God gives and turning them into idols. To the Israelites in the wilderness God gives food and they eat so much that they are sickened. To the modern world, God gives abundance and we consume so much we are miserable. He gives us what we want until we realize that what we are consuming does not ultimately satisfy. It only makes us hungry for Him. 

26 He caused the east wind to blow in the heavens, and by his power he led out the south wind;

27 he rained meat on them like dust, winged birds like the sand of the seas;

28 he let them fall in the midst of their camp, all around their dwellings.

The psalmist recounts the events recorded in Numbers 11. Although the people were receiving their daily bread in the form of manna each morning, they were tired of it. They cooked it every way they could, but after days, and weeks and months of the same thing, they craved something more. They craved meat. They fondly remembered the spicy food of Egypt - the fish, leeks, onions -- all free and tasty (as they imagined it, its flavor improved). This craving began to manifest itself in a desire to go back to Egypt, to return to their Egyptian overlords where they thought they would be received by a grateful nation who would be thrilled to enslave them once more to rebuild their plague ravaged country. It’s not like they were dying in the desert and desperate to live even in slavery. No, they were just tired of the same things every day. They had a boring diet and wanted some spice. They had forgotten the slavery of their former lives and were misremembering history. Our memories are not as accurate as we think they are. We all remember the same event a little differently and every time we recall it there is a bit of embellishment until in some cases the facts change entirely. So the people ask for meat, and God gives them meat. He caused winds from the east and the south to bring up flocks of birds and he rained meat on them like dust, birds like the sand of the seas. They fell in the midst of the camp and all around their dwellings to a depth of 3 feet. They asked for meat. God gave them meat. This is an example of how God gives us over to our desires. He lets us have it. Romans 1 states the principle of this. “He gave them over to their desires.” He allowed them to do as they wished and they received the natural penalty for their actions. God wasn’t punishing them in a special way, singling them out. They were punishing themselves. They brought this on themselves so they could not blame God. This is a classic example of “Be careful what you ask for. You may get it.” The prodigal son asked for his share of his inheritance, essentially wishing his father dead. And his father gave him what he asked, knowing how it would potentially destroy him. Hezekiah asked for 15 more years of life and it was granted. During that time he had a son named Mannaseh who became the most wicked king in Israel’s history. Maybe Hezekiah should have accepted his mortality. Maybe the Isrealites should have been grateful for the manna. Maybe the prodigal should never have left home. But they did, and they suffered for it. Learn from their mistakes and recognize that every good and perfect gift comes from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. 

29 And they ate and were well filled, for he gave them what they craved.

30 But before they had satisfied their craving, while the food was still in their mouths,

31 the anger of God rose against them, and he killed the strongest of them and laid low the young men of Israel.

The bounty of meat raining from the sky upon a hungry population resulted in the people gorging themselves to death. It’s not too hard to imagine what happened in the physiological sense. There are a number of medical explanations ranging from food poisoning due to eating spoiled meat that had been kept too long, poisonous seeds eaten by the birds and transferred to humans, a severe allergic reaction, or just general overconsumption. The issue in the text is most certainly that their greed was the cause and those who were the greediest suffered the most. Three times the psalmist refers to their filling and their craving, attributing their demise ultimately to their inability to control their appetite. This was perceived as the judgment of God upon them. His anger rose against them and he killed the strongest of them, even the young men. Perhaps it was the pride of the strong and the young that led them to think they could consume without self-control and experience no harm. Perhaps in their strength they took more than their share. We don’t know the specifics of what happened, just the lesson: greed kills. The people were not satisfied with the manna that God provided, and so they complained for more variety. God gave them exactly what they asked for, and they overindulged in it resulting in their death. We live in a risk-averse culture, as a year of mask-wearing and social distancing have demonstrated. We’ve gone to extreme measures to contain the spread of a virus that may be twice as deadly as the flu. A case can be made that the cure has been worse than the disease. Yet a more deadly plague afflicts the west than any virus. It is a plague of greed and over-indulgence. It is exemplified by our consumption of food and manifested in high rates of obesity. It is observable in our consumption of commodities -- our whole economy is built around consumer spending as advertisers convince us that we need more in order to be happy. It is perhaps most painfully clear when it comes to our lack of control of our sexual desires, rampant pornography and sexual activity outside of marriage are considered normal and natural. We are gorging on quail and it is rotting in our mouths. It is poisoning us from the inside out. The poisoning is not because God is angry and gets a kick out of punishing us. No, he is simply giving us what we asked, knowing that it may kill us or it may result in our turning back to him. What happened to Israel is a lesson for us. Find your satisfaction in God ultimately. Do not become a slave to your desires for they want to master you. 

32 In spite of all this, they still sinned; despite his wonders, they did not believe.

33 So he made their days vanish like [in] a breath, [vapor] and their years in terror.

Think about all that the Israelites had seen -- the plagues, the crossing of the Red Sea, water from rocks, clouds of protection, fires of guidance, food on the ground every morning and now flocks of quail driven by the wind and landing right outside their tents. What more could God have done? He met their every need and then some. How could someone complain? How could they disbelieve? We’d like to think that if we were in their sandals we would have behaved differently. Surely we would have received these gifts from God with humble gratitude and worshiped him all the more for his amazing deeds. Surely we would have trusted him for our future even though we couldn’t see the next step. But this is why the psalmist reminds us of their unbelief. We are no different. We would have done the same thing -- filled our stomachs with the good things God provides without acknowledging him as the Giver. While the psalmist is speaking of a specific people in a specific time and situation, this truth is universal. We are prone to wander, prone to disbelieve and supplant the reality of God with our own reality of ourselves as masters of the universe. But this truth is not THE truth, and when we live in an alternate reality we are hollowed out, emptied of meaning and significance like a vapor. Our days are like a vapor, here for a moment but lacking in substance, we disappear and are forgotten. And while we claim to be in control, we actually live in fear. “Our years vanish in terror.’ We live in fear because deep inside we know that our fantasy will come crashing down. We are mortal and one day our lives will end and we will face God and his judgment. Or, if we don’t believe in God, we believe that our consciousness will cease in that moment. If you work that thought back you come to the conclusion that nothing really matters: vapor and terror. This is life without God.   

34 When he killed them, they sought him; they repented and sought God earnestly.

35 They remembered that God was their rock, the Most High God their redeemer.

The psalmist summarizes the about face that took place when the people experienced judgment. “When he killed them, they sought him”. That’s a pretty direct way of assigning responsibility to God. There was no doubt in their minds that what they were experiencing was divine retribution for their greed, ingratitude and faithlessness. They repented and sought God earnestly. They were in the wilderness and they had nowhere else to go, so they came to their senses, and like the prodigal son realized that they were eating pig food when they could be dining at their father’s table. Then there’s that word “remember” once again which means to bring to the forefront, to make it of central importance. They once again framed their lives around the truth that God Most High was their rock and their redeemer (Psalm 19:14). He is their rock in the wilderness. Their source of security and sustenance (water came from the rock). He is their redeemer, the one who with his own capital purchased them out of slavery and then turned around and set them free. They were sentenced to death and he took the penalty so they wouldn’t have to. It is truly amazing and is one of the often forgotten aspects of the nature of God when atheists go after Him as being mean and vindictive. That is not the God of the Bible. Paul identifies Jesus as the Rock in the wilderness (1 Corinthians 10:4) and He is the lamb that was slain for the sins of the world (John 1:29), the redeemer. Jesus was present with the Israelites in the wilderness, and he is present in every wilderness we are experiencing today. He will be your rock. He will be your redeemer. Seek him earnestly. Return to him. Remember him. Place him before you in all things. 

36 But they flattered him with their mouths; they lied to him with their tongues.

37 Their heart was not steadfast toward him; they were not faithful to his covenant.

Just when we think the story is about to end with repentance and returning to God, the psalmist reminds us that in spite of their earnestness, the nation’s repentance was merely for show. They had mastered the art of pretending to repent and worship. They had said all the right things, but they were lying. The proof was in their actions. Their heart was not steadfast toward God and they were not faithful to his covenant. This is a human nature issue. Jesus said it this way, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments” (John 14:23). And quoting the prophets he said, “To obey is better than sacrifice” and “these people honor me with their lips but their hearts are far from me.” Talk is cheap, faithfulness will cost you. The silly thing about it all is that God is not fooled of course. It’s like a four-year old lying to his parents. He doesn’t have the wherewithal to lie well. God sees through our efforts to mislead him and one another with false shows of piety. He searches the heart (Psalm 139:1-6), and nothing escapes his view (Hebrews 4:13). So live a life of transparency and honesty before God and others. Live a life of faithfulness to his covenant regardless of the personal or social cost. This is evidence of genuine repentance, of actual transformation. 

38 Yet he, being compassionate, atoned for their iniquity and did not destroy them; he restrained his anger often and did not stir up all his wrath.

39 He remembered that they were but flesh, a wind that passes and comes not again.

Even though the people were insincere in their repentance, offering lip service to him but not faithfulness to the covenant, God atoned for their iniquity and did not destroy them. He restrained his anger many times and didn’t allow himself to get worked up. He kept in the forefront this fact: humans are but flesh, a breath, a wind, a spirit that passes and doesn’t come back. We are weak when it comes to temptation and we are mortal. These are two realities of human nature that are often lost on progressive thinkers today. They believe that humans are perfectible given the right conditions. They blame crime on poverty and policy, on systems of oppression, never on the individual. If they can fix all the systems or destroy the systems and place them with new ones, all will be well. But what this text has shown over and over again is that humans are not steadfast, they cannot be trusted, they are by nature prone to infidelity and lies. The second reality that is lost on progressives is that we are mortal. They seem to think that if they do all the right things they will not die. Wear a mask always to keep from getting sick, eat a certain diet and live longer. The wealthy look to computers to store their consciousness until the time when they can be once more embodied after their flesh has failed. (Read C.S. Lewis’ That Hideous Strength to see how that turns out). No, thankfully God treats us with compassion and he personally atones for and  covers our iniquity. This is the Hebrew word kaphar as in the Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. The atonement of our sins was not without cost. For centuries it was the blood of animals, but this animal suffering ultimately pointed to the suffering of God himself -- the suffering of the Son upon the cross and the suffering of the Father who stood passively by as it happened. Even the rebellion of Israel in the wilderness pointed out the compassion and longsuffering of God. Their unbelief magnified his grace. 

40 How often they rebelled against him in the wilderness and grieved him in the desert!

41 They tested God again and again and provoked the Holy One of Israel.

The psalmist describes the personal nature of Israel’s rebellion in strong terms. They rebelled, grieved, tested and provoked him. They rebelled, pushing back against him in spite of the repeated ways that God had saved them. They “grieved” him in the desert, in the sense of God feeling regret for having delivered Israel from Egypt in the first place. They tested him again and again by grumbling and complaining, doubting his providence. And they provoked the Holy One of Israel. The word translated “provoked” is only used here in the entire Old Testament, and it can mean to wound, or to cause pain.This sounds personal. We are made in the image and likeness of God, and thus it seems logical that if we experience emotions then God does as well. The grieving and wounding the God experienced is an emotion that we can all relate to. Parenting provides a great example of this. Good parents give and give and give to their children and sometimes those same children rebel, test, and grumble, grieving their parents. And yet as much as our children may wound us, they are still our children and we will not forsake them. Consider the stories of criminals imprisoned for heinous crimes and yet there is a mother who still calls them and comforts them like a child. It is a picture of God’s unfailing love. Consider the ways that you have rebelled, grieved, tested, and wounded God. Think of the times that you have chosen a bowl of porridge over your inheritance as a child of God. Remember the times that you have preferred food that wasn’t fit for pigs while your father offered you a sumptuous banquet. See sin for what it is and for what it does to the heart of God. Sometimes we think of God’s salvation as merely a transactional producer/consumer relationship. But this text reminds us that it is personal. Our lack of gratitude, our poverty of faith are an affront to a generous and steadfast God, the Holy One of Israel. Worship him today with reverence and awe. Submit to him today as a child who desires to please his father. 

42 They did not remember his power [hand] or the day when he redeemed them from the foe,

43 when he performed his signs in Egypt and his marvels in the fields of Zoan.

While in the wilderness, the Israelites forgot about where they had come from and what God had done, how he delivered them from their enemies. The implication is clear: God hasn’t changed. He will do the same for you now. “Forgetting” is one of the recurring themes of this psalm (and others). By “forgetting” we mean that they fail to take the past into consideration when making decisions about the present. They are living in the moment without regard to what God has done in the past as an indication of what he might do in the future. The logic on this one is clear: God went to all the work to devastate Egypt with plagues, to literally make a way through the sea, crushing the pursuing army, and to create food and water from nothing while they were in the desert. These are no small things, and yet the people have forgotten. The anthropomorphism is strong here. God did this with his “hand”. He got personally and physically involved. It’s no surprise then that when God performs the ultimate rescue of humanity his hands are involved. However, in this case, those powerful hands are pierced and constrained to a piece of wood. God’s most powerful act required the restraint of his hands. We would do well to remember his hands as well. Every time we drink from the cup and eat the bread of remembrance we do so with our hands, lifting these elements to our mouth. May our hands remind us of His hands and cause us to bring to the front of our attention this act that God’s hands performed for us, informing our present (who we are, how much we are loved, how much we owe, where we are going) on the basis of the past. 

44 He turned their rivers to blood, so that they could not drink of their streams.

45 He sent among them swarms of flies, which devoured them, and frogs, which destroyed them.

46 He gave their crops to the destroying locust and the fruit of their labor to the locust.

The plagues upon Egypt were a cascade of one disaster upon another. First the rivers turned to blood and became unfit to drink. This wasn’t just the Nile, but all her tributaries. The only clean water presumably was that which had been stored in cisterns or fermented as wine. There may have been attempts to purify the water (boiling), but it meant that all of sudden water was in very short supply and its value skyrocketed, causing an economic and social crisis. The lack of water no doubt brought about death in every level of the biome -- plants, animals, insects. As these died the flies whose maggots fed on the dead multiplied. Then the frogs who fed on the flies multiplied as well. They filled the streets and homes as they fled the putrid water. The crops in the field, weakened by drought, were further destroyed by caterpillars and locusts. The plagues were one environmental calamity upon another, all of them somehow related and feeding off each other. There are some naturalistic explanations to these environmental plagues, but the writer attributes them all to the actions of God. He turned, He sent, He gave. Those are the verbs. Nature operates according to fixed laws, so in a sense there is nothing that is random. Even the wandering destructive path of a tornado is still following the forces of the atmosphere. The psalmist here is recognizing the sovereignty of God, even if aspects of the plagues were merely nature taking its course. Everything that happened in the plagues is something that naturally occurs. It’s not like unicorns rained from the sky or dragons scorched the earth. This is one of the things that make the Bible believable. The plagues can be both natural events and things that were caused by God. He is the ruler of all nature. The psalmist is merely reminding the people that God is sovereign over the nations and sovereign over nature. He causes nations to rise and fall and nature to bless and to curse. He does so while simultaneously using the free choices of human beings. So great is his sovereignty that even in the exercising of their free will, men find themselves advancing His agenda. The plagues were acts of God as he commanded nature to do what comes naturally. 

47 He destroyed their vines with hail and their sycamores with frost.

48 He gave over their cattle to the hail and their flocks to thunderbolts.

49 He let loose on them his burning anger, wrath, indignation, and distress, a company of destroying angels.

After the blood, flies, frogs, and locusts, God destroyed their vines with hail and their figs with frost. He pounded their cattle with hail and ravaged their flocks with lightning. If the first four plagues arose from the ground and water (blood, flies, frogs, and locusts), the next ones came from the sky above. It seemed that both earth and heaven had turned against the Egyptians. The gods that they worshiped - the gods of the harvest, the river, and the sky - they were powerless. Or perhaps, the Egyptians at first thought that it was their own gods that were punishing them. Why would a god of slaves have any power? No, they must have assumed it was their own gods turning against them for their failure to love and worship them. They probably prayed all the more to them and sacrificed in order to find relief. But nothing worked. They had it all wrong. In fact, it was the god of the Hebrew slaves who was demonstrating his superiority to their gods and at the same time answering the prayers of generations of slaves by causing justice to roll down like a mighty river. God let loose his burning anger, wrath, indignation, and distress in the form of a company of destroying angels. This wasn’t a moment where God’s patience broke and he gave in to the rage within himself. No, it was simply time for justice. Having given the nation sufficient time and warning to repent, he did what he had to do to keep them from destroying themselves as others. He reminded them that He was God, and the lies that they believed were just that: fantasies, delusions, an unreal world. God shows up and demonstrates to the Egyptians that there is one God above all their gods. One God who deserves worship and obedience. The one God who made the gods of the Egyptians look like fools. God repudiated the gods of Egypt by sending a company of destroying angels. There are many types of angels mentioned in the Bible. Some are ministering angels, sent to serve those who are inheriting salvation (Hebrews 1:14). Others are destroying angels, sent to punish the wicked. There’s no resisting an angel of course, so it’s best to have them on your side. If they’re not on your side, you’re toast. History is replete with images of destroying angels, the ruins of civilizations that once stood proud, now crumbled and abandoned. The firebombing of WW2 and the mushroom clouds at Hiroshima and Nagasaki are modern images of destroying angels. Abaddon in Hebrew. Destruction. As Rich Mullins wrote, “When He rolls up his sleeves He ain’t just puttin’ on the ritz. OUR GOD IS AN AWESOME GOD. There is thunder in his footsteps and lightning in his fists. OUR GOD IS AN AWESOME GOD.” Natural disasters (and manmade wars) are reminders that we are not in control. God is, and he may very well use his company of destroying angels to do his bidding. 

50 He made a path for his anger; he did not spare them from death, but gave their lives over to the plague.

51 He struck down every firstborn in Egypt, the firstfruits of their strength in the tents of Ham.

God’s anger was directed, on a path toward the firstborn in Egypt. I don’t know how such a plague might have worked in the medical sense. Firstborn children come in all ages, and it’s not a typical class of people. One might speculate that the Egyptians themselves killed their firstborn as offerings to their gods, but there is no mention of that in any of the texts. And the Bible is clear that God struck them down, God himself, with an outstretched arm. The psalmist describes it as a plague and the account in Exodus describes it as happening in one night as the Jews were observing the Passover, their doorposts swathed in lamb’s blood. The use of the name Ham reminds the reader of the origins of the nation of Egypt, their ancestor was the  disgraced son of Noah. I’m struck again by the clarity in which the psalmist ascribes the actions to God. He made a path, he did not spare them from death, he gave their lives over to the plague, he struck down every firstborn in Egypt. Of course this language makes us think of Isaiah 53, the suffering servant of YHWH, identified in the New Testament as Jesus himself. Just as God struck down the firstborn of Egypt He struck down his own firstborn. He gave Jesus over to death, not sparing him from the plague of sin. He who knew no sin became sin for us. The judgment that God brought on Egypt is a metaphor for the judgment that he brought on his own firstborn, the blood of the lamb on the doorpost reminding us of Jesus, the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. As God moves through the cities of Egypt, striking down the firstborn with his destroying angel, he must have known that he would one day strike down his own son and then turn his face away in utter rejection. While the Israelites were fearfully celebrating in their homes, the Egyptians were weeping and wailing. What was God doing? He was certainly weeping as well, both for the Egyptians but also for all of humanity that suffered under the weight of sin. God doesn’t delight in the punishment of the wicked. It is heartbreaking to him, and to all who love God and his ways. The pain of that night, the wailing that must have gone up -- unforgettable. And yet the people of God would forget. They would eventually even forget to observe the meal for a season in their history. Ignorant of their history, they thought they could make a new utopian future without God. That never works out well. But perhaps God was even weeping for himself in a sense, in this foreshadowing of another city, another midnight in the middle of the day, another firstborn who would fall to the plague of sin. His life was not taken from him, but laid down of his own accord. This is the difference. 

52 Then he led out his people like sheep and guided them in the wilderness like a flock.

53 He led them in safety, so that they were not afraid, but the sea overwhelmed their enemies.

Leaving a plague ravaged Egypt, the Israelites were led out like sheep, guided in the wilderness like a flock. God led them in safety so that they were not afraid, even as the sea overwhelmed their enemies. There has got to be some hyperbole here because I can’t imagine walking between two walls of water and not being afraid. It was an act of faith that moved them forward. But it was an act of faith based on reason. Behind them was certain death and enslavement at the hands of the Egyptians, ahead of them was uncertain death from the walls of water on either side. The logical choice was to move ahead, particularly given the season of miraculous plagues upon Egypt that they had witnessed. And so they moved forward, led by an invisible shepherd. God calls us to move forward not in a safe space, but in safety. The middle of the sea was certainly not a safe space. The walls of water could collapse at any moment bringing a quick death. No, it was far from safe. But it was also the safest place to be. God leads us through the sea. He leads us through the wilderness. He doesn’t avoid danger or steer us around it by way of a safe space. He leads us through the dangerous place in safety. There is much talk today in our culture of “safe spaces” and “safety-ism”. We are being conditioned to expect a risk-free environment. The pandemic has only exacerbated this expectation, particularly among the youth. But God calls us to move forward into the sea, into the wilderness with the confidence that our shepherd is guiding us in safety. I can’t help but think of Jim Eliot who dared to do dangerous things because he was confident of the security that came from dwelling in the presence of the Most High. Israel’s experience in the sea and in the wilderness are meant to be a historical example of God’s shepherding us. The safest place to be is in the center of God’s will. 

54 And he brought them to his holy land, to the mountain which his right hand had won.

55 He drove out nations before them; he apportioned them for a possession and settled the tribes of Israel in their tents.

God led his people through the sea and through the wilderness and into his holy land, a land that had been set apart and promised to their ancestors some 600 years earlier. He led them to the mountain, to Zion, which his right hand had won in battle, taking it from the Jebusites. He drove out the nations before them through military conquest (and fear). The battle of Jericho was not so much a battle as a demonstration of God’s unassailable power. As word spread among the Canaanites, their courage failed and they either surrendered or became refugees in other lands. Then God divided the land among the 12 tribes and gave it to them as their inheritance. He settled them in their tents. They inhabited houses and cities that they had not built. They tended vineyards and olive groves that they did not plant. They traveled on roads that they did not build. These were all gifts from God, further demonstrations of his grace. These are the actions of God on behalf of his people -- He brought, He won, He drove out, He apportioned, He settled. This is a summary description of the conquest, fully described in the book of Joshua. Behind these words is the violence of a nation invading the city states of the Canaanites. Just as Egypt suffered for the liberation of the Jewish people, so the Canaanites did as well. Entire books have been written to deal with this issue of the nature of a God who brought such destruction on people and how that can be reconciled with a just and loving God. I don’t have any trouble reconciling it with the fact that I’m not God, and a God that I can understand is not a God that is worthy of my worship. For if I could understand Him, I would be greater than him. I can rest in the reasonable arguments for why God’s just wrath came down on the Egyptians and Canaanites, and trust that in the end, we’ll all understand and praise God for his just mercy. Suffice to say that both the Egyptians and the Canaanites had an opportunity to repent. They were eyewitnesses to the superiority of YHWH over their gods, and yet they still chose poorly, clinging to false worldviews that would result in their destruction. So today we have evidence of God’s power, goodness, and justice all around us, and yet we choose to go our own way instead of trusting his. Follow him to his holy land. He will make a way before you and his just mercy will be magnified. 

56 Yet they tested and rebelled against the Most High God and did not keep his testimonies,

57 but turned away and acted treacherously like their fathers; they twisted like a deceitful bow.

58 For they provoked him to anger with their high places; they moved him to jealousy with their idols.

This litany of God’s favor in the previous verses should have been met with unqualified worship and devotion, but it was not. The people tested and rebelled against the Most High. They didn’t keep his testimonies and they turned away from God just like their fathers had in the wilderness. The psalmist highlights the personal nature of their betrayal by describing it as treachery. They twisted like a deceitful bow. The metaphor is of a bow that appears to be strong and true, but when tension is applied, it twists and proves useless. The specific sin of the people was the worship of other gods, idolatry. They built high places to other gods, moving God to jealousy with their idols. The sin of the Israelites was not that they stopped worshiping God. Worship at the tabernacle continued throughout the period of the judges, but so did the worship of other gods. YHWH had demanded (and deserved) exclusive worship, and yet the people were valuing others before Him. This was no doubt something they picked up from the Canaanites still living in the land, otherwise where would they have learned of these gods. Because they didn’t drive them out completely, practitioners of false religions remained and influenced the nation of Israel. This was one of the reasons God told his people to drive them out. At the same time, it’s likely that the Israelites would have worshiped other gods anyway -- it is human nature. If there weren’t named gods in the land already, the people would have made some up. It’s what we do. It’s easy to look at texts like these and think, “I would never do that!” But of course I do. I built high places for other things in my life and set them before me and gave my time, money, and talent to them in worship. In the ancient world, these gods often functioned as means to an end. They promised material blessings, a good life, to those who sacrificed to them. What am I sacrificing for the “good life” that advertisers promise? What idols am I worshiping alongside my worship of God? In what ways am I acting treacherously, pretending to be a strong bow while in actuality I am twisting dangerously? God is a jealous God. Not that he is selfish and wants us all to himself. Rather, he is jealous for our good. He loves us in a way that places our very best above all else. He is jealous when he sees us spending our lives on that which is worthless while the greatest treasure, God himself, is available for our ultimate good. Choose God. Reject the idols you’ve made. 

59 When God heard, he was full of wrath, and he utterly rejected Israel.

60 He forsook his dwelling at Shiloh, the tent where he dwelt among mankind,

61 and delivered his power to captivity, his glory to the hand of the foe.

The historical narrative fast forwards several hundred years, encapsulating centuries of cycles of rebellion and return. Finally, God had enough, after centuries of patience that demonstrated God’s forbearance, he utterly rejected Israel. He was full of wrath -- the level of wrath that God once reserved for Israel’s enemies, for Egypt, for the Canaanites, he now pours out on his own people. He abandoned his dwelling among them. Referred to here as his dwelling at Shiloh, this is a poetic way of referring to Zion, the temple in Jerusalem with its ancient roots in Shiloh. The utter disaster this was is indicated in the terms that the psalmist uses for Israel -- God’s power and glory. Israel was to be a living demonstration of God’s power and glory. Their storied history of rescue from slavery and conquest of the promised land -- this was meant to demonstrate the greatness and ultimate superiority of God over all other gods. But when God’s own rescued people exchanged him for images carved by their own hands, his temple for the high places where they sacrificed their children to false gods, YHWH had had enough. In order to preserve what was left of his people, he sent them into captivity to purify them and to forever rid them of idolatry, refining them like silver in the fire. How painful was it for God to give his power and his glory to the hands of their enemies? How much did it grieve him to watch his beloved people slaughtered, raped, and plundered by pagans whose allegiance was to Marduk, an utterly false and non-existent deity? That is hidden in the text, but we know it was the case. This is how a parent feels when they have to administer tough love to a wayward child. They risk alienation, but they must do what is best for the child, and sometimes that is simply to allow them to experience the consequences of their own rebellion. This is further evidence of how God deals with our own rebellion. He allows it, and he grieves as we suffer the consequences of our own rejection of his laws. Of course God did not utterly reject Israel. He did not forsake them, although this is certainly what it felt like to them. This is the theme of Book 3 of the Psalms, and this psalm is central to their processing of their apparent rejection by God as they languish in Babylonian captivity. This psalm is evidence that they owned up to their own culpability in their demise. They recognized that what happened to them was nothing new. In fact, it was entirely predictable based on history. Why can’t we learn from the past? Why, like dogs, do we return to our vomit? Why, like pigs, do we return to the mud? Our hearts have not been circumcised. They have not been cut and marked as belonging exclusively to God. God save us from ourselves, from our rebellion, from our habits of turning to other gods for satisfaction when you are all we need.