This Psalm, from David, recounts the steadfast love of God for the people of Israel – the word is חסד or hesed. It is a story of redemption.
The initial redemption, the foundational rescue event that served as a sign for all the future redemption events, was the rescue of the people of Israel from Egypt and being brought into the Promised Land. This is a common theme throughout the Old Testament, of remembering God’s goodness in and through that moment.
But Psalm 107 looks at a continual redemption, an ongoing story in which God acts as redeemer. David does this through four characters: the wanderer, the prisoner, the fool and the ship captain.
The wanderer calls back to the time the Israelites spent wandering on the wilderness. They had been redeemed out of Egypt, but rejected God’s plan for them to enter the Promised Land and spent 40 years wandering in a circle in the desert. It is us, too, when we wander in our own spiritual circles,
The Psalm says that the Lord will make the way of the wanderer straight, and bring him into the city where he can have rest and safety. David calls these wanderers to be thankful, when we are brought out of whatever wilderness we have wandered in.
Next, we have the prisoner, imprisoned and oppressed because of their own wicked deeds. Again, it calls back to the history of Israel, when rebellion against God would result in discipline through foreign conquerors. The discipline is not there to harm them, but to reorient their perspective and bring them back to God.
Again, this is like us, whether situations of literal imprisonment, or spiritual imprisonment by sin, God is there to forgive and save us from our distress when we cry out to him. Has this happened to us? David instructs us to be thankful.
Then there is the fool, entirely devoted to his own pleasure and desires, even to the extent that they forego food and drink. The fool goes beyond the wanderer and the prisoner in their complete abandonment to sin. But when they hit bottom and cry out to God, once again He comforts, heals and forgives their sin. And again, we who have been the fool are called in to be thankful.
Next, we have the ship captain. Unlike the others, he seems to have things together, and his vice isn’t rebellion or depravity. Instead, it is overconfidence and pride, a belief that they are self-sufficient and is able to chart their own course. This is many of us in our Christianity, trying to live good lives in our own strength, with our own plans and towards our own goals.
But God wants dependent worshipers who live in love and relationship with him. And so he sends mighty waves and storms to remind us that we ultimately cannot survive under our own power. We call out to him and he again redeems us from the storm. Once again, we are to live in gratitude to the Lord who rescues is.
Then in verse 32, David goes into all the ways God works to bring his people back to him – turning rivers into deserts and deserts into pools of water, doing whatever is needed to bring us to redemption. God customizes our redemption to exactly what he wants for us in exactly the ways we need.
For us, we also look back to an original redemption, the salvation brought to us by the death and resurrection of Christ. And we also see ongoing redemption and rescue throughout our lives, whether as wanderer, prisoner, fool or captain. But the rescue is not from our situation, but primarily from our own self-dependence and rebellion.
The rescue will look different for different people. The wanderer is left to their own fumbling devices for a long period of time. The prisoner must have their rebellion crushed and their lives restricted to turn then around. The fool must hit rock bottom before they turn their eyes heavenward. The ship captain must fail on their own so they will depend on God.
This multifaceted, steadfast love has no limits. There is not a set number of redemptions on a cosmic punch card. God’s redemption is bottomless and never ending. We are a forgetful people, and so constantly need reminding of this.
Or maybe we are frustrated and confused that we don’t seem to be moving forward spiritually. We may be moving backwards, and the shame or frustration of that may be keeping us from actually moving forward again. But our spiritual life is not and was never promised to be a steady upward climb. It is a constant forward and back motion, confession and repentance and returning to God. But we cannot wait until we are better to turn to God. We must turn to him before we can get better at all.
Or maybe we have never sought the redemption of God. Maybe we are turned off from it by the public face of Evangelical Christianity on the news and in social media. If you reject the ugly, false pictures of God and Christ being portrayed, then good for you. Seek the God of the scriptures and understand the true Christ and the redemption he offers.
Wherever we are in this story, whatever the reason we need rescue today, we should turn to God and throw ourselves on his mercy. God loves us more than we love ourselves, which means we have a mighty hope.
– Sermon Notes, Brent Rood, Seed Church, November 26, 2017
Psalm 107
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