Psalm 130
June 6, 2021
O Lord, how good you are that right out of the gate in prayer we can cry out to you from the depths. Our first words in prayer can be “Out of the depths I cry to you, Lord.” And so we do that just now—each of us, in our own circumstances. In what depths do we feel like we are drowning? What depths might we be apprehensive about bringing to you? What depths might we be ignoring, suppressing, or trying so hard to escape that we have forgotten your invitation to cry out to you right in the midst of them? In a moment of quietness we think of our depths and our hearts cry to you.
Lord, most of all we need to see and feel and cry out to you from the depths of sin and our struggle with sin. For it is sin and forgiveness and redemption that the writer of the psalm wrote about, and that ancient Israel sang about. Father, tune our hearts to feel the seriousness of our sin. Tune our hearts to engage the battle with sin. Align our hearts with this psalm: if you should keep a record of sins, Lord, who could stand? Humble us under the weightiness, the gravity, of sin. Open our eyes to its seriousness. Impress on us our own real and consequential guilt, the fallout that we ourselves cause, our inability to resolve this reality. Lord, if you were to keep a record of our sins, who among us—yes, us—could stand?
But there is forgiveness with you! With you is full redemption! How clearly we, who hear this psalm on this side of the life and death and resurrection of Jesus the Messiah—we, who hear this psalm from a New Covenant perspective—how clearly we can see your forgiveness and redemption, how firmly we can embrace your wiping our record clean and your redeeming work amid the consequences of our sins. We see the cross and we can sing more loudly than the psalmist, “With you is unfailing love, with you is full redemption!” Bring this truth home to our hearts deeply this morning, especially to hearts who may be struggling, who may have struggled all life long, to receive it as their own: with you is forgiveness and full redemption.
And bring home to our hearts, heavenly Father, what this psalm strikingly says about the aim and the result of your forgiveness: that we may serve you with reverence, with fear—with a holy, healthy fear. Father, this morning, do we need to repent not only of a feeble view of our sin, but of a feeble fear of you? A lame fear of you? A skewed fear of you? An unhealthy, cowering, hiding fear of you? Save us, Lord, from the absence of fear. Save us from faulty varieties of fear. May your forgiveness go deep in our hearts. May its rightful fruit of reverence and fear spring readily from our hearts.
How blessed we are that the word of forgiveness for which the psalmist waited and hoped has been resoundingly given by Jesus Christ on the cross: “It is finished!” May we hope in that word, wait for that word, wait for the Holy Spirit to bring it home to our hearts afresh when our hearts need it.
Father, the psalm assures us that you will redeem Israel from all their sins. The New Testament tells us that toward the end of the age all Israel will be saved. Hasten that day, Lord. The Jewish people, through whom the Messiah and all his promises have come to us: may they come to know him in ever greater numbers worldwide.
We who have been grafted into the covenants and promises of Israel—we echo the psalm’s confidence: you will one day redeem the church from all its sins as well. Redeem us in these days, Lord, as the times in which we live are exposing many sins in your church. Redeem us, renew us, revive us, call to us anew: “Israel, put your hope in the Lord.”
Through our Messiah Jesus we pray, and all God’s people said, “Amen!”