Psalms 135-137

Psalms 135-137

            Notice in Psalms 135 and 136 how the psalmist recites God’s mighty actions, especially in the Exodus. For Israel, the Exodus was the foundational act of God, His great act of deliverance. Throughout the psalms we have heard references, allusions, and echoes of that act. This is what praise is: the recitation of God’s saving acts. For the Christian, the focus is on the personal exodus of Jesus Christ, passing over from the death of the cross to the new life of the resurrection. In this action, all of humanity was redeemed from the death of sin, so we recount it constantly.

            Psalm 137 expresses the longing of the exiles in Babylon to return home. The poignant question, “How can we sing the songs of the Lord while in a foreign land?” resounds. In the midst of grief and the troubles of life in a fallen world, we ask a similar question: “How can we be joyful under these circumstances?” The psalm doesn’t really offer an answer, except to remember Jerusalem, to remember the Lord’s past goodness, His fulfilled promises. In Christian terms, we cling to the cross and resurrection of Jesus, and remember Paul’s words in Romans 8, “He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?” (v. 32).