I make promises all the time … and I always intend on keeping them every time I make them. But you know what? I don’t always keep them … not all of them … try as hard as I might. I’m going to let you down sometimes … disappoint you .. if I haven’t already. The one promise that I will always keep is that I’m not always going to keep all of my promises … and guess what? Neither will you.
We make promises all the time … and we break promises all the time. Sorry … that’s just a fact of life … a part of the human condition. Nobody keeps 100% of their promises. Nobody keeps every single promise that they make. Anybody here keep 100% of their promises? Know anybody who has kept every single promise they’ve ever made? Because I’d love to meet them.
Now, at this point you’re probably thinking that I’m going to say there is ONE person who keeps all the promises that He makes … and that One would be God … and you would be right. “I the Lord do not change,” God promises in Malachi 3:6. It is His nature to be faithful. He will never let us down. Yahweh … I AM … cannot be expanded or diminished. He remains the same yesterday, today, and forever, right? His characters, His nature never changes. He remains the same … consistent always. Unlike us, God isn’t capricious or fickle. He keeps His word down to the last jot and tittle. “He who is the glory of Israel will not lie,” writes the Prophet Samuel, “nor will He change His mind for He is not human that He should change His mind” (1st Samuel 15:29).
God is always holy … always just … always mighty … always merciful … always sovereign … always loving. Not sometimes. Always. God remains the same. What He is now, He will be forever.
We may lose our health … our job … our friends … but we will never lose God. He will never leave us nor forsake us. “I will love with an everlasting love,” He promises (Jeremiah 31:3). “The mountains shall be removed, but my loving kindness will not depart from you” (Isaiah 54:10). “I will never turn my back on you … whoever comes to me I will never cast out” (John 6:37).
“Well …., “ says Ethan the Ezrahite, “you gotta wonder about that sometimes.” In 1st Chronicles 15:19, we learn that Ethan the Ezrahite was a psalmist and royal musician. Until Solomon asked God for wisdom, Ethan was considered to be among the top four smartest men in the Kingdom of Judah. In 1st Kings 4:30-31, it says that “Solomon’s wisdom surpassed the wisdom of all the people of the east, and all the wisdom of Egypt. He was wiser than anyone else … wiser than Ethan the Ezrahite, and Heman, Calcol, and Darda, children of Manhol.”
Now … Psalm 89 is a lengthy psalm … 52 verses total … so I clearly don’t have time … and you all don’t have the patience, I’m sure … to go through every line, am I right? So I pray that you’ll indulge me if I only bring out the main argument that runs throughout the whole psalm.
Ethan starts out by saying that God’s love … God “hesed” or “steadfast” love … God’s mercy and God’s faithfulness go hand in hand. That’s something to sing about. Where would we be without the faithfulness and mercy of God, amen? It should make you tremble to think of where you and I would be right now without it. And so we begin Psalm 89 by declaring: “I will sing of Your steadfast love, O Lord, forever … with my mouth I will proclaim Your faithfulness to all generations.”
Why sing of the Lord’s steadfast love? Why make His faithfulness known to all generations? Why should we count on God at all? Verse 2 tells us why … because God’s love IS steadfast … forever. His faithfulness is as firm as Heaven … which is forever. God’s love is not fickle … here today and gone tomorrow. His love is constant … dependable. His faithfulness isn’t anything like the faithfulness that you find here on earth. It’s divine … it’s heavenly … and you can always count on it … right?
Verses 5 through 8 repeatedly ask: “Who is like the Lord?” And repeatedly the answer is: “No one!” The Heavens praise Him (v. 5). The Council of Holy Ones praise Him (v. 7). The “Who’s Who of Heavenly Saints” fear Him for He is incomparable. He is the most awesome … above all that are around Him (v. 7). He is the most mighty. His faithfulness, says Ethan, surrounds Him.
In verses 9 through 13, Ethan brings up the issue of God’s power. God rules the raging sea (v. 9). Rahab, the monster of the deep, is crushed and slain by Him (v. 10). He claims the heavens as His own (v. 11). The earth, which He created, is His (v. 11). The mighty mountains … like Tabor and Hermon … sing God’s praises (v. 12). His mighty arm and right hand are strong and exalted (v. 13). The foundation of His authority … His throne ... is righteousness and justice. Verse 18 assures us that we can count on God who is our shield and king.
And then, in verses 19 through 37, Ethan begins to speak of God’s covenant … the promise that He made … to His servant David. “I have found my servant David … with my holy oil I have anointed him” (v. 20). “My hand shall always remain with him,” God promises David and the nation of Israel. “… my arm also shall strengthen him” (v. 21). In other words, God will be with him and give him strength so that David can “crush his foes before him and strike down those who hate him” (v. 23). His throne, God promises, will endure for as long as the heavens endure. God’s faith in David … God’s promises to David … give confidence and faith to Ethan the people of Israel.
In fact, God’s promises to David will continue long after David is dead. God swears that He will establish David’s line forever (v. 29). Even if David’s children forsook God’s law … which many of them did … even if they violate God’s statues … which many of them did … even if they do not keep His commandments … which many of them did not … God promises David that He will not remove His steadfast love from him or be false to His faithfulness (v. 33). “Once and for all I have sworn by my holiness.” says God. “I will not lie to David. His line shall continue forever and his throne endure before me like the sun. It shall be established forever like the moon, an enduring witness in the sky” (v. 35-37).
But …
Look at verses 38 through 45. There’s a sudden and major shift in tone. Ethan goes from praising God for His faithfulness to David to questioning where that faithfulness went. When did it end? Why?
Historically speaking, we believe that Ethan wrote this psalm during the Babylonian exile. God had said that He would establish the line of David forever but now it seems that God has gone back on His promise … that He has now spurned and rejected David (v. 38) … and renounced the covenant that He had made with David and his ancestors (v.39). “You have defiled his crown in the dust,” Ethan laments. “You have broken through all his walls; You have laid his strongholds in ruins” (v. 40) … referring to the complete destruction of Jerusalem, David’s palace, and the Temple. Israel’s enemies plunder David’s once great kingdom (v. 41). His enemies rejoice (v. 42). He has become the scorn of his neighbors (v. 41).
Ethan is understandably devastated. “God,” he cries out, “it appears as though You are exalting the right hand of David’s foes” (v. 42). And now they are rejoicing over the demise of David’s kingdom and David’s line. “It is as though you rendered the sword of David powerless and You, O Lord, have withdrawn Your support from him in battle” … much like David had ordered that his men withdraw from Uriah in the heat of battle so that Uriah would be slain. “You promised to establish his throne forever but now it appears as though You are putting an end to it. You set David upon the throne but now it looks as though you’ve taken his scepter away and smashed his throne into a thousand pieces. I don’t get it. Why does it feel like You’re hiding Yourself from us … forever. Why does it feel like Your love has turned to wrath … a burning fire? Lord, where is Your steadfast love of old,” Ethan laments, “which by Your faithfulness You swore to David?” (v. 49).
After just listing all the ways that God has shown His faithfulness to David, Ethan is struck by the contrast to his present situation. Israel and its kings have been beaten … destroyed … and Israel’s enemies are rejoicing and celebrating. How do you square that with God’s promises to be faithful to David forever?
First, let’s talk about the devastation. Pastor and author Warren Weirsbe once observed: “God is faithful in His chastening.” The devastation that Ethan is seeing is, in fact, proof of God’s faithfulness to His word, His promises, and His commandments. Did not Ethan himself say in verses 30 to 32 that God promised to punish David’s children if they forsook His law … if they did not walk according to His ordinances … violated His statues … or did not keep His commandments? “I will punish their transgression with the rod and their iniquity with scourges” (Psalm 89:32).
But …
“Even though they forsake my law … even if they don’t walk according to my ordinances … even if they violate my statues … do not keep my commandments (v. 30-32) … “even then,” God promises, “I will not remove from him my steadfast love or be false to my faithfulness. I will not violate my covenant or alter the word that went forth from my lips” (v. 33-34).
God is not the author of confusion. God makes His desires known. Remember what the Prophet Samuel said: “He who is the glory of Israel will not lie, nor will He change His mind, for His not human that He should change His mind” (1st Samuel 15:29). And this is what God had promised regarding sin and rebellion: “I am slow to anger … abounding in steadfast love … and forgiving sin and rebellion. Yet I will not leave the guilty unpunished. I will punish the children for the sin of the parents to the third and forth generation” (Numbers 14:8). As harsh as that may sound, God also promises to bless His children to the tenth generation … so His love and mercy are greater than His anger and wrath.
All you have to do is read the two books of Kings or the two books of Chronicles to know that many of David’s sons … starting with Solomon … were bad kings and rebellious sinners and that the devastation that Ethan is lamenting is the evidence of God keeping His promises in verses 30 to 32. And if the devastation of verses 38 to 45 is proof of God’s faithfulness to His own word then His own promises of verses 33 through 37 must also be true … amen?
After all that Ethan had said about God’s steadfast, eternal love … His faithfulness … His power … His covenant promise to continue the line of David ... it must of all felt irrelevant to the psalmist given all that befell his beloved Judah. It now lay in ruins. The king … now blinded … was led off in chains … an exile among many. What was the psalmist to do? How was he going to make sense of this seemingly irreconcilable contrast?
It is in the crucible of moments like these … when our faith in God is being tested … that our faith is either refined and strengthened or destroyed. We either grow closer to God or we walk away … disillusioned. Either God is the same yesterday, today, and forever … or He is as capricious, unreliable, inconsistent, untrustworthy, dishonest, and as conniving as the people sitting next to you. Either God is always holy … or He is not. Either God is always just … or He is not. God is either mighty … merciful … and sovereign … or He is not. He is always loving … or He is only loving sometimes … or not at all. Either God keeps His promises … or He is a liar.
Ethan struggles with what appears to him to be God’s lack of faithfulness. What do YOU do when you struggle with God’s apparent lack of faithfulness in your life? Do you question His character? Do you deny His existence? Do you question God’s faithfulness without looking at your own faithlessness? What about all the promises YOU’VE made to God over the years?
For Ethan, the line of David appears to have ended … forever. The throne of David no longer exists. No more Judah. No more kings of Judah. No more nation of Israel. And in Ethan’s lifetime, that’s how things remained. There is no resolution. There is no easy answer to his crisis of faith. For Ethan … and for us … the tension continues on. And yet, Ethan ends his song by rejoicing in God’s faithfulness. “Blessed be the Lord forever, amen and amen!” (v. 52).
Ethan’s conclusion is a beautiful and powerful lesson on faith for us. While it “appears” that God is not being faithful to His word … that God is not keeping His promise to David or the people of Israel … Ethan still has faith in God because … well … after all, God is God! Ethan has faith in God because God never changes … because God is the same yesterday, today, and forever … because God is always holy … God is always just … God is always mighty … God is always merciful … God is always sovereign … God is always loving … not sometimes … not once in a while … but when? Always! Amen?
Ethan’s faith comes from his faith in a faithful God. “God’s faithfulness will never cease,” says Warren Weirsbe. “Wait for Him!” Although Ethan finds no resolution to the tension between God’s promise and God’s delay in fulfilling His promises in Psalm 89, we know that God DID indeed fulfill His promise to David don’t we? The line of David did not end in the exile. It continued on to Jesus … Son of David, Son of Man, Son of God … who fulfilled God’s promise to punish our sins by taking on the punishment for our sins upon Himself.
The only way to have ultimate peace is to see God as Ethan did and to forsake any preconceived ideas that you may have of God. Open your mind to the teachings of the scriptures and you will encounter a God who is forever faithful … a God of infinite love and pure justice. You will experience the peace of God when you see His love through Jesus Christ, the Son of David, who is the fulfillment of this psalm.
Turn to Him now … Turn to Him by doing what Ethan did:
Sing of the mercies of the Lord …
Make known His faithfulness …
Praise Him for His wonders …
See that no one compares to Him …
Fear Him and hold Him in reverence …
Look at creation and ask yourself: “Who is mighty like Him?”
Walk in the light of His countenance …
Rejoice in His name …
Exalt in His righteousness .. .
See Him as the glory of your strength …
See Him as your shield …
See Him as your King …
Speak to Him about your problems …
Pray to Him for mercy …
Tell Him that you desire to see His favor …
And always, always bless Him forever …
Double amen it! Amen it with your voice … amen it with you life. God is faithful to you … now be faithful to Him! Amen and amen.
Let us pray …
