The Songs of Ascents

A Sermon Series

by

Jim Bordwine, ThD

Psalm 126

Introduction

Where would we be in this life without the gift of encouragement? How could we travel the road before us without the occasional word wishing us well, urging us to remain true, letting us know that our burdens are not ours alone? How much more difficult would it be for us to bear life's trials if we never received encouragement? Can you think of some painful time in your life when a brief word of encouragement lifted your spirit? Can you remember some trial during which someone spoke to you tenderly and provided some much-needed support? Can you recall a time when you were discouraged or uncertain or fearful and someone said something to you in a way that cheered you or gave you that needed direction or caused your fears to fade away? Encouragement is, without question, a gift from our Creator. Not only that, but when you consider what encouragement does, you can conclude that encouragement is a trait of Godliness.

What does encouragement do? When someone encourages you, they are helping you. You may be in an uncomfortable situation, or you may be restless due to the uncertainty of your circumstances, or you may be near the point of exhaustion due to some trial which has come upon you. And then someone says something intended to help you, something intended to give you confidence, something intended to redirect your focus to that which is true or to remind you of something you may have forgotten in your distress. However it comes, whenever it comes, encouragement has the result of lifting us up-it may not change our circumstances in the least-but a word of encouragement or an act of encouragement is unquestionably helpful. For that time, you are relieved, if only a in a small way, and whatever it is that you are experiencing is momentarily less troubling to you.

Isn't the encouragement we give to one another and the encouragement we receive from one another a picture of the way in which God deals with us? How many times have you opened the Scriptures and read His Word and found yourself filled with renewed strength when you thought you were almost finished or when you thought you could not go on due to some hardship? How many times have you sensed the Holy Spirit gently strengthening you and gracefully enabling you to carry on? How many times have you heard a prayer or a sermon or a teaching from the Word which was precisely what you needed at precisely the right moment? That is God encouraging us. That is God lovingly showing mercy to us when we are burdened. That is God, like our kind Heavenly Father, softly touching us so that we do not fall or fade away in despair.

And the difference between the encouragement we give to one another and the encouragement we receive from God is that His encouragement often takes the form of a change in our disposition or a change in our circumstances. God is not limited to “wishing us well” in our trials, but because He is God can change our lives and that is the ultimate form of encouragement and from that kind of encouragement flows the grateful praise of His people

The next Psalm in this series presents to us a picture of the LORD who encourages His people. The context envisioned in this Psalm is a time of utter despair and anguish which the LORD turned into laughter and joy.

Our text: Psalm 126:1 Song of Ascents. When the LORD brought back the captive ones of Zion, we were like those who dream. 2 Then our mouth was filled with laughter and our tongue with joyful shouting; 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 captivity, O LORD, as the streams in the South. 5 Those who sow in tears shall reap with joyful shouting. 6 He who goes to and fro weeping, carrying his bag of seed, shall indeed come again with a shout of joy, bringing his sheaves with him.

01. What does this Psalm teach us about God?

This Psalm reflects a specific event in the history of God's people. The event is the return of some of the Jews to Palestine after being held captive in a foreign land. The record which the Bible provides indicates that permission to return to the land came unpredictably. We can imagine that the people assumed they would be refugees for their entire lives. They had no expectation that their captors would set them free, no expectation that their dreadful and discouraging situation would change-but then the LORD “brought back the captive ones of Zion...” the writer says (v. 1). This Psalm opens with an explosive declaration regarding this very unusual and unexpected thing that the LORD had done. When it looked like their was no hope, when it seemed that the only thing to do was resign themselves to life and death in a foreign land, God provided encouragement in the form of a decree which permitted the people to begin returning home.

This Psalm tells us much about God. It tells us that He is capable of changing circumstances as He pleases. Regardless of how hopeless or severe or threatening a situation might appear, the LORD is Ruler over all. In this case, the people suddenly had reason for hope and thanksgiving. Without warning, their plight was altered for the good and they were on their way home. While this Psalm tells us that God is capable of such things, this is not the whole point that should be taken away from this text. The LORD “brought back the captive ones of Zion...” These were people who were beaten down, people for whom each day meant more sadness and struggle. In that state, they received the encouragement of the LORD. In that state of despair and captivity, in that state of exile where they longed to be in their own land, the LORD lifted them up and returned them to Zion, the place from which they had been taken. This Psalm tells us that God is a God of compassion and comfort and encouragement. God moves to do good for His people even when they are suffering for their sin against Him.

Look at the result of what God did: “we were like those who dream.” The writer means that the captives could hardly believe what was happening. It seemed to good to be true. Do you remember this part of Jewish history? Cyrus issued a decree allowing the Jews under his control to return to Jerusalem to rebuild the house of the LORD (cf. Ezra 1:1 ff.). That text says specifically that “in the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, in order to fulfill the word of the LORD by the mouth of Jeremiah, the LORD stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia, so that he sent a proclamation throughout all his kingdom” concerning the Jews. He ordered that they were free to return to their land. If you are one of those captive Jews, you have to ask: How could captivity become freedom without a war and without bloodshed? How could those who were carried away from their homeland by a superior enemy now find themselves released by that enemy for no apparent reason? The answer was that the LORD was ready to have mercy on His people and He was ready to encourage them in this most significant manner.

Further, the writer says “our mouth was filled with laughter and our tongue with joyful shouting...” (v. 2) When do captives laugh? When do those who are downtrodden, and those who know nothing but hard struggle shout for joy? When do those who have been dragged from their homes and forced to live in a foreign land rejoice? When they are no longer captives and when they are freed from struggle and when they are allowed to go home! The mercy of God took the form of a movement in the heart of the king; and that resulted in such encouragement for the Jews that they could not contain themselves. In a moment, their sadness turned to joy; in a moment, their fear turned to hope; and in a moment their eyes were lifted from the earth and turned toward Zion, the land of their forefathers, the land given to them by their God.

This is what God does for His people as it pleases Him. He will cause our circumstances to fall out so that what we feared does not come to pass, so that what we dreaded is removed, and so that what we assumed was a painful burden to bear simply vanishes. And when that happens, we can find ourselves momentarily incapable of doing much more than expressing joy and thanksgiving. And all of this is designed, of course, to bring glory to God: “then they said among the nations, 'The LORD has done great things for them.'” The mercy God shows us, the encouragement He provides for His people just when things seem so bleak, demonstrates just how wonderful and compassionate and powerful He is-and He is thereby glorified before us and before others who observe what the LORD has done.

This Psalm tells us that this is the kind of God we serve; this is the kind of God who has placed His name upon us. He is the kind of God who restores after chastisement, who comforts after a period of mourning, who takes us back when we have gone astray. And these are acts of encouragement from Him so that we do not fall away forever, and so that, though we are grieved, there comes an end to our grief. And the end is sweet and precious and it is something we would never trade away. When God's encouragement comes, it magnifies His great name and emphasizes His love for His people; and God's encouragement, when it comes, causes His people to love Him all the more and to appreciate His judgments all the more.

The writer echoes what others were saying: “The LORD has done great things for us; we are glad.” (v. 3) There is the recognition that He is the One who brought about the release from captivity and a recognition that what He has done was “great,” that is, it was something worthy of God. This leads the writer to add a petition to the song of praise and rejoicing: “Restore our captivity, O LORD, as the streams in the South.” (v. 4) It's known that the return of the Jews to the land was a lengthy process. The writer is asking God to turn the trickle of returning captives into a stream, as it were. In parts of Palestine, river beds remained almost dry for 11 months of the year, but when the rain begins to fall, those nearly dry river beds quickly became torrents of water. This is the image in the writer's mind.

It is also known that the first wave of returnees faced considerable opposition as they worked to rebuild the city of Jerusalem and the temple. As he continues to consider what the LORD was doing, therefore, the writer uses another image: “Those who sow in tears shall reap with joyful shouting. He who goes to and fro weeping, carrying his bag of seed, shall indeed come again with a shout of joy, bringing his sheaves with him.” (vv. 5, 6) What is the idea being conveyed here? The idea is that a time of grief or a time of difficulty may, indeed, come upon us. We may find ourselves going about our duties in tears; we may be wearied from our weeping. But, when the LORD determines to encourage us, the “harvest” of our grief, as it were, will be great joy. When the time comes for the encouragement of God, then what we have endured will fade away as what we have received begins to manifest itself.

Again I will say that this is the kind of God we have. This is what this Psalm teaches us about Him. He is the God of encouragement, the God who takes note of our anguish and the God who disperses it when His purposes are realized.

02. What does this Psalm teach us about those who worshiped God?

This song was composed long before it was ever sung by pilgrims on their way to Jerusalem for an assembly before the LORD. The Psalm was composed during the time of the return from exile when the city and the temple had to be rebuilt. Israel was being re-established in the land after a period of chastisement from the LORD. The words of this Psalm, therefore, tell us that these people were overcome with gladness when they heard news of their release. They had their joy in the LORD restored when He undertook to encourage them. They were captives in a far-away place. They had no expectation that deliverance would come as suddenly and dramatically as it did.

This Psalm tells us that these were, therefore, a grateful people. Just reading the text reveals how happy they must have been and how astonished they were to find themselves set free to return to their homeland. These were worshipers of God who had been taken from the land He gave them, worshipers who longed to return to Zion and resume life under the LORD's oversight. And then, although it seemed impossible, it happened. Word came of the decree of Cyrus and the people could hardly believe their ears. They immediately directed their voices to the LORD and confessed that He was bringing back the captive ones of Zion. This Psalm tells us that these were insightful people. They knew that no army had liberated them and they knew that no rebellion had resulted in their freedom. God turned the heart of the king so that he released them and these people knew without doubt that the LORD, therefore, was to be praised.

This Psalm also tells us that those who lived through his incident were happy people-and their happiness was grounded directly in what the LORD had done for them. Moreover, this Psalm tells us that those who sang this song sometime later did so in order to be reminded of how God operates and what His encouragement accomplishes when it comes. Later worshipers who sang this song during their pilgrimages would have been edified to hear how some before them reacted when the goodness of God was turned toward them. They would have been more content with their own circumstances as they rehearsed the reaction of the captives who were delivered by God's doing.

The worshipers who sang this Psalm would have been optimistic people because the words of this Psalm testified to a marvelous deliverance of God's people at a time when circumstances seem so grim. They would have been reminded of where true joy comes from-it comes from contemplating the goodness of the LORD and it comes from experiencing the encouragement He gives to those who are suffering. The worshipers who used this song would also have been reminded that the works of God on behalf of His people magnify His great name and cause those around them to marvel. Any reading of this text, any use of this text in preparation for worship would leave a man humbled and amazed at what the LORD is willing to do when His people are in need.

This Psalm teaches us also that those who sang it would have been bold in their prayers to the LORD. This Psalm acknowledges what good the LORD had done, but then it asks Him to make that good even greater: “You have caused us to begin returning to the land, O LORD, now we call upon You to turn our few into a mass of Your people coming back into the Promised Land.”

And finally, this Psalm teaches us that those who sang it and those who believed it were people of perseverance. The necessity of perseverance is one of the leading themes in this Psalm and it comes out plainly in vv. 5 and 6. The people of God often have had to endure lengthy trials and long periods of testing and have emerged as those who know the reality of God's presence and power to sustain. Certainly this would have been true of the captives who endured such opposition when they returned to the land of Zion; and certainly this would have been true of their brethren later who experienced their own share of testing. As this song was sung, therefore, it was a lesson taken from one of the most important periods in Israel's history-it was a song that, at the same time, brought to mind a dark time, a time of suffering, and a time of restoration, a time of great encouragement from the LORD above.

03. What does this Psalm teach us about our worship of God?

This Psalm teaches us that when we gather here on the Lord's Day, we are coming before the God who encourages His people. We are coming before the God who has provided us with many, many stories in the Word which illustrate to us that He is the God of comfort and encouragement. We are coming before the One who throughout history has been willing to encourage and lift up His people when they were in distress. So, the first question for you is this: Do you come here with this knowledge of God in mind? And, even more to the point, do you come here each Sunday to worship the God who has encouraged you during times of distress? Are you here to give thanks and praise to the One who has lifted you up when you were about to fall? Are you here to give thanks and praise to the One who strengthened you when you thought you could not endure? Are you here to give thanks and praise to the One who heard your cry and sent you relief?

You see, with this perspective on God, this gathering each week becomes true worship. When we come here remembering the ways in which God has sustained us and the ways in which He has provided us hope when things seemed dreary, then we are ready to worship Him in truth. And I realize that what I'm saying is particularly applicable only to those who have known God's encouragement. What I'm saying right now will have little meaning to the younger ones in our congregation because they haven't faced life's bitter trials and they haven't had to endure periods of mourning or times of despair. But most of us, those of us who are adults, those of us who are parents, have known such days. And we will know more such days. The example we set, therefore, is critical to those who are coming behind us. The time will come when our children will endure hardships and the time will come when they will need the encouragement of the LORD. What they see in us, therefore, is critically important.

Those who have not yet faced serious adversity should see in those who have a demonstration of trust in God-not a blind trust as if we don't know what God will do, but a trust grounded in those times when the LORD has encouraged us and has lifted us up and has sustained us through our troubles. Once again, worship is where our testimony to the LORD's encouragement is chiefly going to be manifested. Our zeal for worship, our preparation for worship, our attitude during worship-all of these things reflect the degree to which we are thankful for God's encouragement and support during those difficult periods in our lives. Worship is where we get to express the joy in our hearts for what He has done for us. We get to sing hymns to Him and we get to pray to Him and we get to listen to His Word as He provides us with instruction. Worship is where we get to smile in God's presence remembering how kind He has been to us and remembering those times when His encouragement turned worry into confidence.

This Psalm tells us much about our worship. It tells us that our worship of God should be filled with gladness and thanksgiving. When we gather here, we have every reason to rejoice, every reason to express our gratitude to God. This Psalm tells us, in fact, that such elements are not to be seen only occasionally in our worship, such elements are essential parts of worship. Worship is based on God's character and God's character includes the fact that He encourages us when we are in distress. And our worship must reflect that fact and the way to reflect that fact is with gladness in the heart and cheerfulness in the voice.

I don't know what kinds of trials you have experienced in this life. But I do know that God is the God of encouragement. You may be experiencing a time of distress right now-if so, then this sermon is for you. Listen to what the Word teaches about God. Listen to this record of how He took people in a most troubling circumstances and brought them out in a way that left them speechless. Pay attention to the way they responded-they responded with joy and praise to Him.

Whether you must reflect upon some difficult period in the past when God sent you encouragement or whether you are, right now, enduring a trial in which God's encouragement is needed, there is one thing certain for all of us-God offers us a supreme encouragement, a supreme example of His comfort and His willingness to help His people in the sacrament. I wonder, do you see the Lord's Supper as an encouragement from your Heavenly Father? Do you see this sacrament as that regular, weekly reminder that God in heaven knows about you and knows about your trials and knows about your worries? This sacrament declares to us that God is not only aware of us and our circumstances, but that He has bought us with the blood of His Son. This sacrament represents an encouragement from God which ought to leave us astounded. This sacrament sums up every act of kindness ever shown to us by God, every promise of blessing ever made to us by God and puts it all on the Table before us.

The coming of God in the flesh was the supreme encouragement from God, the ultimate act of comfort and help. Whatever you have faced, whatever you will face, whatever you currently are dealing with in your life, here is the picture of what God is willing to do. Here is an example of mercy and concern and care which should leave us speechless. When we look at the Table, we should have the same reaction those exiles had-we should feel as though this is too good to be true. Our hearts should be filled with a reverent joy and words of praise should come from our mouths.

Let this sacrament encourage you. Let this sacrament testify to you of God's love and compassion. Remember what Christ did for you and don't stop remembering what Christ did for you when you do find yourself in one of those stressful periods in life. This Table sits here throughout our whole service. It sits there declaring to us: “Look at what God did for you. This is why we are here to worship.” And then the time comes when we actually get to partake of the Table and have confirmed to us everything represented there. What an encouragement this is!

Jesus appointed this means of encouragement on that last night. The Scripture says that He took bread, broke it and gave it to His disciples saying, “Take, eat, this is My body.” And then the Word says that the Savior took the cup, gave thanks, and also gave it to the disciples saying, “Drink from it, all of you, for this is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for forgiveness of sins.” There is, once again, the supreme example of God's encouragement of His people. There is the supreme example of the last portion of our Psalm: “Those who sow in tears shall reap in joyful shouting.” Here is the innocent Christ preparing to suffer and die for us. Here is the sowing in tears, the labor in sorrow and grief. But this same Savior persevered and overcame and now there is the harvest of joy-the joy of reconciliation to God, the joy of having Him as our Heavenly Father, the joy of knowing we have His help in this life every day.

Let's pray...

The sacrament is given...

Conclusion

Psalm 127, the next one in this series, has to do with recognizing a simple Biblical truth-blessings in this life, be they general or specific, come from the LORD. Take time to reach Psa. 127 this week.