I’ve had many conversations as a Pastor with individuals who need the
reflection of this Psalm of Ascent. They
come in troubled by something they’ve done, or not done, and they keep
re-living the pain of their actions.
As the pilgrim walked along towards his God-celebration time, he must
have had times when old decisions, actions, came back to haunt his mind. As he did, he learned to reframe those
thoughts into truth. So should we.
Psalm
129:1-8
1 “Greatly have they afflicted me from my youth”— let Israel now say—
2 “Greatly have they afflicted me from my youth, yet they have not prevailed against me.
3 The plowers plowed upon my back; they made long their furrows.”
4 The LORD is righteous; he has cut the cords of the wicked.
5 May all who hate Zion be put to shame and turned backward!
6 Let them be like the grass on the housetops, which withers before it grows up,
7 with which the reaper does not fill his hand nor the binder of sheaves his arms,
8 nor do those who pass by say, “The blessing of the LORD be upon you! We bless you in the name of the LORD!”
2 “Greatly have they afflicted me from my youth, yet they have not prevailed against me.
3 The plowers plowed upon my back; they made long their furrows.”
4 The LORD is righteous; he has cut the cords of the wicked.
5 May all who hate Zion be put to shame and turned backward!
6 Let them be like the grass on the housetops, which withers before it grows up,
7 with which the reaper does not fill his hand nor the binder of sheaves his arms,
8 nor do those who pass by say, “The blessing of the LORD be upon you! We bless you in the name of the LORD!”
The journey
of a pilgrim means there are many times where we reflect “back” on life.
Missed
opportunities
What if’s?
I regret…
We can’t
help but look back at times and wonder about the choices we have made. It’s a natural thing to do. Pain?
The Psalmist knows it’s true: afflicted…plowed my back… it certainly
has happened to many. The past is full
of times that we find difficult to forget and painful to remember.
What I do
say to some people who are “stuck” in the past is simply this:
You cannot change the past, so reflect upon it to learn, and
make amends if something needs to be done, but realize that the future is yours
to live and you don’t have to live controlled by the past.
The answer
is in vs 4… “The Lord is righteous; he
has cut the cords of the wicked.”
One of the greatest
gifts given to us (if not the greatest) is the gift of repentance and
forgiveness.
Romans
2:4 …(it is) the riches of his kindness and
forbearance and patience, … knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to
repentance?
Ephesians
1:7 In him we have redemption through his blood,
the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace,
These
represent God’s favor for us…the ability to get out from under, literally
become Un-stuck from it and the ability to walk in confidence of the freedom of
forgiveness because of the riches of his grace.
We can’t
avoid all of the pain of the past, but we can allow God to break it off. It is truth that Jesus said, “I have come that you might have life, and
that life to the fullest.”
I would
simply say, “Get Un-Stuck”… Learn,
Leave, Live…
“The blessing of the LORD be upon you! We bless you in the name of the LORD!”
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