Psalms of David

At last, a song of praise. This is the last of 15 Psalms by David, which have been arranged in three sets of five. It started with confession, the prayer of David when he was confronted about his Adultery and Murder, and continued through psalms based on mostly events from David’s life. These prophetic laments conclude with a song of praise.

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Psalms in Book 2 are like Book 1 in that they are mostly lament and distress although they now include a communal voice in addition to the singular voice of the first book.

The books of Psalms are roughly themed like this:

Book 1: Psalms 1 – 41: God is beside us.
Book 2: Psalms 42 – 72: God goes before us
Book 3: Psalms 73 – 89: God is all around us.
Book 4: Psalms 90 – 106: God is above us.
Book 5: Psalms 107 – 150: God is among us.

To the choirmaster. A Psalm of David. A Song.

65 Praise is due to you, O God, in Zion,
    and to you shall vows be performed.
² O you who hear prayer,
    to you shall all flesh come.
³ When iniquities prevail against me,
    you atone for our transgressions.
⁴ Blessed is the one you choose and bring near,
    to dwell in your courts!
We shall be satisfied with the goodness of your house,
    the holiness of your temple!
⁵ By awesome deeds you answer us with righteousness,
    O God of our salvation,
the hope of all the ends of the earth
    and of the farthest seas;

⁶ the one who by his strength established the mountains,
    being girded with might;
⁷ who stills the roaring of the seas,
    the roaring of their waves,
    the tumult of the peoples,
⁸ so that those who dwell at the ends of the earth are in awe at your signs.
You make the going out of the morning and the evening to shout for joy.

⁹ You visit the earth and water it;
    you greatly enrich it;
the river of God is full of water;
    you provide their corn,
    for so you have prepared it.
¹⁰ You water its furrows abundantly,
    settling its ridges,
softening it with showers,
    and blessing its growth.
¹¹ You crown the year with your bounty;
    your wagon tracks overflow with abundance.
¹² The pastures of the wilderness overflow,
    the hills gird themselves with joy,
¹³ the meadows clothe themselves with flocks,
    the valleys deck themselves with corn,
    they shout and sing together for joy.

Psalm 65 ESVUK

Psalm 65 is a song in three parts:

Part 1, verses 1 to 5, is praise to God who atones for the things we do wrong.
Part 2, verses 6 to 8 is about the awe of God.
Part 3, verses 9 to 13 is a song about the harvests.

Part 1: Forgiveness is a lovely idea.

C S Lewis said in his book ‘Mere Christianity:’

Everyone thinks forgiveness is a lovely idea until he has something to forgive.

When I did my Lectio Divina on this passage the first thing that caught my eye was.”to you shall all flesh come,” together with, “you atone for our transgressions.” (verses 2 and 3). Forgiveness is universal, it is offered to all. But forgiveness is not easy: In the Lord’s prayer we pray, “forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” That is the only verse in the prayer that Jesus commented on. If you don’t forgive you will not be forgiven. No exceptions to it.

Forgiveness is difficult because forgiveness costs. To forgive others we need to face the hurt they have caused. To ask for forgiveness we need humility, to take ownership of our actions. To the Israelites of David’s time to be forgiven cost them. They had to offer an unblemished animal from their flocks or herds, one of the best, or if they were not farmers, to buy one. To God to forgive meant becoming human as Jesus the Messiah, and giving his life. Forgiveness is a nice idea but both giving and receiving forgiveness is difficult. No-one ever said trusting God would be easy.

But there will be people who will appear before God and find they were never as sinful as they thought. Sin is what we have done and also what we have failed to do; sin is a falling short. But sin takes intent. We must have intended to do something, or known we could have helped and did not do it. Things done accidentally are accidental not deliberate, that is why we call them accidents. We are asked to forgive things that people do aginst us deliberately. I have to confess that I have difficulty forgiving accidental hurt never mind the deliberate stuff.

We often ask for the wrong thing when we ask for forgiveness. We expect God toexcuse us, we want other people to excuse what we have done. That is why we make excuses for what we have done. But forgiveness is not about being excused, it is about being wiping away the sin, and being accepted, but there is still a penalty. Verses 2 and 3 sats that God atones for our sins. God pays the penalty in forgiving us. Forgiveness costs, when we are forgiven it costs the person forgiving, when we forgive it will cost us.

Also by C S Lewis

The Christian does not think God will love us because we are good, but that God will make us good because He loves us.

Part 2: Who stills the roaring of the seas?

I don’t have a weak stomach. On a ferry between Zeebrugge in Belgium to Hull in Yorkshire there was a bit of a storm. Despite taking travel sickness tablets I was unwell, the journey which was flat going out was tossing about like an Alton Towers ride. Judging by the strength of the projectile vommiting, my stomach was very strong. Eventually I fell asleep through sheer exhaustion. The next morning in the calm of the Humber Estuary I ate a hearty breakfast. It’s amaving how quickly traval sickness goes away when the movement goes away.

During a storm on a lake, a group of men which included seasoned sailors, fishermen by trade, were scared. This storm was more than they could stand. So they woke Jesus, who after first rebuking their lack of faith, told the storm to be still. Everything went still. These men, disciples of Jesus, were amazed at this demonstration of the power of God.

David was writing about a millennium before the time of Jesus. He talks about the awe of God, the power of God over creation not as something he once did then took a back seat, but as power that is still active. He also mentioned ‘the tumult of the peoples’ as being somrthing God has power over.

A prayer:

Awesome God, use your power to bring calm in the world, to comflicts in Isreal amd Palestine and in Ukraine and Russia, and wherever there is conflict. Amen*

Part 3: Seasonal weather

In Britain we complain about the weather. Winter is too cold, Summer too hot, spring and Autumn are too wet. We love to complain about seasonal weather.

The seasonal weather in Israel in David’s day was not like that. The Mediterranean climate meant long dry spells but also two rainy times, called in the Bible the former rains (October and November) and the latter rains (March and April). If either of these failed crops would be ruined and livestock impoverished. The nation’s finances, and those of the countries around them depended on the former and latter rains. To some extent they still do.

The third part of Psalm 65 is about the weather. Verses 9 and 10 on the former rains, 11 and 12 on the latter rains and verse 13 is a celebration of God’s fulfilled promises. God fulfilling his promises is a sure as the weather changing seasonally. Trust in God, he will do what he said he will.

The former raind come at the season when seeds are sewn and is necessary so that the seeds may germinate. The latter rains come at the end of the growing season and ripens the grain. The former rains bring new life, the latter rains bring harvest. The Church has long taught about the Holy Spirit in terms of the rains-the Spirit gives us new life and brings us to maturity. In the context of Psalm 65 alone the rains are a symbol that the promise of God to all peoples of God’s atonement will be fulfilled.

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*Written on 18th October 2022 as US President Joe Biden visits Israel and Arab countries to negotiate for peace in the conflict between the Israeli authorities and Hamas.