Lamb among the wolves.
Psalm 120 - Songs of Ascent
Picture with me with a band of pilgrims. They're people from your village, heading up the road that leads to Jerusalem. You're on your way to Passover, or perhaps the Feast of Weeks, or the Feast of Booths. There's excitement in the air -- and joy and anticipation. As you grow nearer to the Holy City, you begin to meet pilgrims from other towns and villages as their paths converge with yours on the road up to Jerusalem. These bands of pilgrims sing as they walk, and you join in -- you, and all your friends As you journey, you sing the fifteen Songs of Ascent, which all seem made for community singing, and worship. Thus, these psalms are to be sung on the way to worship. They prepare us for worship.
Psalms 120 through 134 are called the Songs of Ascent because pilgrims would sing them as they traveled the sometimes steep road ascending up to Jerusalem.
Let's begin with Psalm 120. I have already done an "Introduction to the Songs of Ascents." earlier.
What a powerful way to begin the Psalms of Ascents. Psalm 120 provides a truthful perspective that is as appropriate today as when it was written. Despite the ruthless, barbaric nature of Israel’s unrelenting enemies, the Jewish nation was sure God hears their prayers and acts.
The psalmist was greatly pained on account of the hateful slander to which he was being subjected. In his distress, he appealed to God, looking for an answer that would bring him relief. His prayer was, “deliver me” (my soul) from “lying lips” and a “deceitful tongue.” He wanted to be spared from having to continue enduring the injurious effect of vicious slander and speech designed to trap him. The deceit may have involved flattery and the feigning of friendship.
What happens when you are deceived? . Truth matters, and this world is full of liars that cause much destruction to human souls. How can you know which teachers lie and which ones tell the truth?? In our world, deceptions, cults, and false teachings are everywhere. For that reason, your ultimate hope of being saved out of this world of untruth is found in God. “Deliver my soul, O Lord, from lying lips, and from a deceitful tongue!”
Wicked men are characterized by a lack of interest in the truth—the truth about God, the truth about other people, and the truth about themselves. They think of themselves as righteous, and they refuse to define right and wrong by the laws of God. They suppress whatever truth is available to them (Rom. 1:18). Then, they set out to deceive others through powerful mediums such as television, film, recorded music, and college classes.. What shall be done to the false tongue? God will judge. This is the message of the fourth verse.
When a pilgrim left home to go up to the Temple, he was going to worship the God of truth. He was leaving behind the realm of men, the cradle of liars.
One of the things that is so exasperating about dealing with slanderers and liars is not the fact of conflict with them. Rather it is that they feel free to use maneuvers that the righteous are prohibited from using. They are far more flexible in their construal of facts because they don’t need to go to the library to check them.
But a true man will not even touch the weapons that the slanderers resort to so readily. A true man will not return that kind of fire, trying to blacken the character of someone who is blackened enough already.
This Psalm reminds us that the reason we are pilgrims is because the world in its present state is not our home. And we must become fed up and dissatisfied with the world around us as it is if we are to be people who long for the better world that is to come. This psalm teaches us to express our frustration and anger and sadness to God and to look to him as the one who gives us hope and strength for the journey.
Many Psalms are happy, uplifting, but this one is not. We don't know the author, but we can picture his situation. He is upset.
This is such a simple, powerful reality expressed in one verse. That when we are in distress, when we walk through trial, when we need help, which let’s just put it out there, we all need help all the time, like all the time we need help. The reality is God has made us dependent creatures. God has made us people who need help. This isn’t just a result of sin in the world, a result of the fall of man and woman. This is the way we were created from the very beginning. Before sin ever entered the world, we were created with a need for God, and a need for others.
“In my distress I called to the Lord, and he answered me.”
If we had only joyful psalms, we wouldn't know how to bring our problems to the Lord. We would be afraid to talk to God about our deep troubles, because we might feel the need to be upbeat, positive, full of faith. But sometimes that can be a false understanding of faith. We trust God in the ups and the downs of life.
This psalm comes from a frustrated, tormented heart. This is what we would call a psalm of lament. The word "distress" in verse 1 derives from the verb, "bind, be narrow, be in distress." It describes the feeling of the walls closing in, narrower and narrower, so you can't seem to move. Your options are increasingly limited. You experience intense inner turmoil and anguish. The key the psalmist offers is prayer.
"I called to the LORD,
and he answered me." (Psalm 120:1)
So often we feel frozen by our circumstances, unable to do anything. Or we complain to anyone who will listen. But the psalmist calls out to God and reports that the Lord answers him, responds to him. The lesson is simple: when you are in distress, call out to the Lord!
Well, the picture here in Psalm 120 is not a Psalmist who is saying, in my distress I called to the Lord and he ignored me or he wasn’t available. The Bible never says that. But “in my distress I called to the Lord and he answered me.” Now let’s be clear, He doesn’t always answer us in the way we think we need, or even we always would like, but He always answers the way the most perfect, loving, heavenly Father would answer. And that, in the end, is better than what we would like, or what we think we need.
The psalmist's prayer is simple: Deliver me! Get me out of this situation!
"Deliver me, O LORD, from lying lips,
from a deceitful tongue." (Psalm 120:2)
His problem is a common one. In this case, liars and slanderers are trying to hurt his reputation in the community, turn people against him, diminish his influence, and frustrate his plans.
While we're examining this psalm, let me draw your attention to a very common element of Hebrew poetry that we see in this verse -- indeed, throughout the Psalms.
"Lying lips" and "deceitful tongue" are different ways of saying the same thing. Biblical scholars call this "synonymous parallelism." We'll see it often in the Songs of Ascent.
Though we have no indication that this particular psalm was written by David, you could easily picture him in these situations. For example, when King Saul lies about David's loyalty and sends the entire army out to run him to the ground. Or when David's son Absalom slanders his father in order to undermine loyalty to the current king and gain the throne for himself. Perhaps you have experienced lies and slander designed to discredit you. It is ugly. It is underhanded. It is deceitful -- and it is repugnant to God himself (Proverbs 6:16-19). Now, after asking God for deliverance, the angry psalmist speaks rhetorically to the liars and slanderers.
"3 What shall be given to you,
and what more shall be done to you,
you deceitful tongue?
4 A warrior's sharp arrows,
with glowing coals of the broom tree!"(Psalm 120:3-4)
"You lying tongue, you should be shot full of arrows! You should be seared with the glowing coals of a fire made of a broom tree" (a common desert shrub in Palestine). You've probably had these sorts of thoughts about people who are trying to harm you and make your life difficult. Verses 3 and 4 are a mild example of calling down a curse on one's enemies, an "imprecation." Now we get a clue to the psalmist's actual situation. He imagines to be removed from the land of Israel.
"Woe to me, that I sojourn in Meshech, that I dwell among the tents of Kedar!" (Psalm 120:5)
“The Meshechites were presumably descended from Meshech, a grandson of Noah through Japheth (Gen 10:2; 1Ch 1:5). They were said to trade in slaves and copper (Eze 27:13), and may have invaded the Near East from the north. Often associated with the tribe of Tubal, they were infamous for their violence (Eze 32:26).
The tribe of Kedar, whose name may mean “black” or “swarthy,” were Ishmaelites (Gen 25:13; 1Ch 1:29, Isaiah 21:16 ; 42:11 ; 60:7 ; Jeremiah 2:10 ; Ezekiel 27:21 ). As nomads in the desert area to the east of Israel, they controlled the caravan routes between Palestine and Egypt, tending large flocks (Isa 60:7) and, it was said, living in black tents. One of Nehemiah’s enemies may have been a king of Kedar.”
-Nelson’s Commentary
Those who oppose God have no peace. The psalmist desires peace (and even expects it) from his enemies because He knows this is a characteristic of God. He believes that in the Kingdom of Heaven, peace reigns supreme. It is not referring just to people who get along with each other, but being at peace with a holy God
The irony here is that the Israelites were quick to judge the Gentile nations. Their desire much of the time was for God to destroy the surrounding enemies and ascend their nation to prosperity. But God over and over showed them that they were wrong. The books of Jonah and Nahum and other verses in scripture showed them that He had plans for the Gentiles also.. As Christians, we have found the truest peace, and wish to share it with the world even if that means death.
He complains that he must live in a foreign land, where sojourners don't experience the same rights as citizens, where people don't worship the true God, where neighbors don't share his values.
The psalmist cried, “My soul has dwelt too long with those who hates peace” (v. 6). He was assured, however, that at the appropriate time, God will use “sharp arrows of the warrior, with coals of the broom tree” to deal decisively with those practicing such deception and violence (v. 4). The coals of the broom tree are particularly hot and slow burning, which is why it was the wood most often gathered and used for heat in the Middle East.
The author was con?dent that God’s judgment would hit its mark like the sharp arrows of a warrior and with the intensity of a burning broom tree.
The psalmist longs for peace, but he seems to be living in the midst of a war-obsessed people. Perhaps his emphasis on peace, shalom, is the reason he is slandered and lied about by his neighbors -- we don't know.
Throughout the ages men and women of God have learned to handle the stresses and pressures of life by calling upon God, knowing that he hears and will answer.
When the believer is set among unbelievers, he finds himself in the tents of Kedar. He is a stranger among these people, and he knows it and they know it. His one desire is always to return to the fellowship of the saints wherever it is to be found.
Peacemaking is a mark of a true church. If a church has no spirit of forgiveness, confession, and humility, it is not a church of Jesus Christ. Also the ministry of reconciliation is a gift that comes through Christ. Reconciliation is the business of the local church. First it is reconciliation with God, and then it is reconciliation with our brothers and sisters.
It’s important to distinguish the calling we have as peacemakers in this world. We can stand up for truth while also standing for peace.
At the same time, God will pour out all His fury on liars. One of the Ten Commandments prohibits perjury against your neighbor (Ex. 20: 16). We must not lie to one another (Lev. 19:11). Lying is included in two of the seven things that God hates (Prov. 6:16-19). Because we have cast off the old man and his ways, we must not lie to one another (Col. 3:9). The lake of fire is reserved for “all liars” (Rev. 21:8).
We are servants of Christ, who is the Truth incarnate. This means that we must be men and women who speak the truth accurately.
We live in time that is dominated by the Lie. The Lie is the coin of the realm. The Lie comes at you from every direction. You are lied to in the movies, in the books you read, and on the Internet. You are lied to by our culture, you are lied to by our political authorities, and you are lied to by the devil.
Keep in mind that it is a sin to believe a lie. That is how our race fell into sin in the first place. God cannot lie (Heb. 6:18), and He told Adam to stay away from that tree. The devil wreathes himself in lies, and he is the one who told them to go ahead. The Fall was the result of believing a lie.
And one of the central ways to immunize yourself against believing lies is by resolving, before God, that you will speak the truth.
