Pardon and Rescue (Psalm 130)
Notes
Transcript
A song of ascents.
1 Out of the depths I cry to you, Lord;
2 Lord, hear my voice.
Let your ears be attentive
to my cry for mercy.
3 If you, Lord, kept a record of sins,
Lord, who could stand?
4 But with you there is forgiveness,
so that we can, with reverence, serve you.
5 I wait for the Lord, my whole being waits,
and in his word I put my hope.
6 I wait for the Lord
more than watchmen wait for the morning,
more than watchmen wait for the morning.
7 Israel, put your hope in the Lord,
for with the Lord is unfailing love
and with him is full redemption.
8 He himself will redeem Israel
from all their sins.
A Psalm of Ascents
A Psalm of Ascents
There are 15 psalms with this title (120-134)
A psalm for going up...
There were 15 steps on the temple where the Levites would ascend to offer sacrifices
Some have suggested that the Levites would recite these every morning
Others have suggested (and many believe with them) that these psalms were recited by the pilgrims heading to Jerusalem during the 3 feasts that required them to go to the Temple.
They would recite them as an encouragement to each other along the way
They recount God’s mighty deeds and acts on a grand scale, but also on a personal level.
If this is the case, the pilgrims would be worshipping the Lord on their way to worship the Lord.
If this is the case, they would have their heart prepared for worship BEFORE they arrived at the temple. They would be reminded why it is they are doing what they are doing and would be prepared for God to do something great amongst their worship.
What a thought for us to consider that WORSHIP BEGINS in our hearts and lives BEFORE we gather for the worship service. There is thought to consider preparing our hearts BEFORE worship to hear what God has to say - not simply to show up...
The Psalm Recounts the Psalmists Need for Forgiveness
The Psalm Recounts the Psalmists Need for Forgiveness
1 Out of the depths I cry to you, Lord;
2 Lord, hear my voice.
Let your ears be attentive
to my cry for mercy.
3 If you, Lord, kept a record of sins,
Lord, who could stand?
4 But with you there is forgiveness,
so that we can, with reverence, serve you.
Because of these words this psalm is considered to be on of the penitential psalms - a psalm that admits sin and seeks to ask for forgiveness.
The Psalmist declares that he is overwhelmed within a situation or a scenario and he cries to God for help.
1 Out of the depths I cry to you, Lord;
2 Lord, hear my voice.
Let your ears be attentive
to my cry for mercy.
The deep was figurative language for a time of chaos and uncertainty - a time when rescue from God was necessary.
7 Deep calls to deep
in the roar of your waterfalls;
all your waves and breakers
have swept over me.
55 I called on your name, Lord,
from the depths of the pit.
1 From inside the fish Jonah prayed to the Lord his God. 2 He said:
“In my distress I called to the Lord,
and he answered me.
From deep in the realm of the dead I called for help,
and you listened to my cry.
3 You hurled me into the depths,
into the very heart of the seas,
and the currents swirled about me;
all your waves and breakers
swept over me.
4 I said, ‘I have been banished
from your sight;
yet I will look again
toward your holy temple.’
5 The engulfing waters threatened me,
the deep surrounded me;
seaweed was wrapped around my head.
6 To the roots of the mountains I sank down;
the earth beneath barred me in forever.
But you, Lord my God,
brought my life up from the pit.
7 “When my life was ebbing away,
I remembered you, Lord,
and my prayer rose to you,
to your holy temple.
8 “Those who cling to worthless idols
turn away from God’s love for them.
9 But I, with shouts of grateful praise,
will sacrifice to you.
What I have vowed I will make good.
I will say, ‘Salvation comes from the Lord.’ ”
10 And the Lord commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land.
From this place of chaos, the Psalmist calls to God for help and assistance.
But, as the stanzas continue, we come to realize that this was his/her own doing because of his/her sinfulness...
3 If you, Lord, kept a record of sins,
Lord, who could stand?
4 But with you there is forgiveness,
so that we can, with reverence, serve you.
We’ve all don this… We think something is a good idea and BOOM it blows up in our faces. We make stupid, sinful choices.
Or, we KNOW we are NOT supposed to do something and we do it anyway, and the results are tragic or chaotic
Or, we know we are SUPPOSED to do something, but we fail to heed that direction from God and ignore what God has called us to do. And, the results are not what we anticipated at 1st they would be...
Like a kid who runs in the house after s/he has been told not to...
The person admits his/her sinfulness and recognizes that God does not keep record of wrongs and sins. That although we commit sin, God is gracious to forgive SO THAT we can worship God and revere God and tell others of the rescue God has provided...
The Poet also declares that God is faithful to forgive
Some translate the word forgive as PARDON
This details that an offense has occured that one is guilty of and one is DEPENDENT upon a power greater than them (the magistrate, judge, official, KING) to PARDON them. Pardon DOES NOT mean we are not guilty, it means we are NOT held liable for our crimes.
This IS the heart of God!
23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.
11 Say to them, ‘As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign Lord, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live. Turn! Turn from your evil ways! Why will you die, people of Israel?’
9 The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.
God’s desire is that we seek forgiveness, we repent, and we request God’s pardon as we turn from our sinfulness to NEW LIFE in God and God alone.
The Poet declares his/her deep dependence upon God for God’s pardon and forgiveness. EVEN when the poet is in this situation of chaos and uncertainty because of his/her own stupid, sinful choices.
But the Poet also Recognizes the Need to NOT take that Pardon for granted, and to wait in HOPE for God to do something
But the Poet also Recognizes the Need to NOT take that Pardon for granted, and to wait in HOPE for God to do something
5 I wait for the Lord, my whole being waits,
and in his word I put my hope.
6 I wait for the Lord
more than watchmen wait for the morning,
more than watchmen wait for the morning.
He waits, expectantly, for God to come and declare PARDON over his/her sinful mistakes.
Maybe there is the question running through the background, “Will the Lord forgive this mistake? Will the Lord pardon me?”
It is not as though he doubts God’s ability to forgive, but maybe questions God’s willingness.
Now, we KNOW that God has promised to forgive our sins and our iniquities, but don’t we do the same? “God can’t or won’t forgive this offense… God won’t pardon this wrong…” And so we wait for the forgiving word from the Lord.
Yet, we wait with CERTAIN HOPE and ASSURANCE that God WILL Work!
Like a watchman who waits for morning...
A sleepless night where we toss and turn. We KNOW morning is going to come, so we have that certainty, but we still wait for it.
The watchman does the same thing. He keeps the city safe, but he waits for the morning when his shift is over, and when he can retire home to rest.
But, the watchman is CERTAIN that morning will come. The pattern of setting sun to rising sun will continue. Life will go from darkness to light - it always has...
The term watchman could also be translated temple guards. Temple offerings could only happen during the day, so the guards would wait through the night until morning would dawn and the offerings and worship of God would continue.
The point is that in our waiting we have the certain hope that God will act, just as we have the certain hope of the dawn of a new day! Forgiveness will come, pardon will be granted, IF ONLY we seek the forgiveness and pardon from the Lord for our failures.
And the Psalmist then declares that His/Her community would also have the same rescue he has experienced from his turmoil
And the Psalmist then declares that His/Her community would also have the same rescue he has experienced from his turmoil
7 Israel, put your hope in the Lord,
for with the Lord is unfailing love
and with him is full redemption.
8 He himself will redeem Israel
from all their sins.
To the community the Psalmist encourages them to put their hope and trust in the Lord.
The Lord has proved time and time again to be faithful according to his unfailing love (chesed) - his faithfulness to the covenant even when the people would commit their stupid, sinful mistakes.
God can be trusted to pardon, and forgive, but BEYOND that - God can be trusted to REDEEM/RESCUE/RANSOM
We ALL need help from an outside force that is greater than us to pull us out of the pit of our sinfulness...
We ALL need help from an outside force that is greater than us to pull us out of the pit of our sinfulness...
Examples...
Baby Jessica in the well
Jessica McClure Morales (born March 26, 1986; widely known as "Baby Jessica" in 1987[1]) fell into a well in her aunt's backyard in Midland, Texas, on October 14, 1987, at the age of 18 months.
Over the next 56 hours, rescuers worked to free her from the 8 in (20 cm) well casing, about 22 ft (7 m) below grade.
The incident occurred in Midland, Texas, where firemen and police developed a plan to drill a parallel shaft to the well where Jessica was lodged—and drill another horizontal cross-tunnel to rescue her. Enlisting the help of local oil drillers, officials hoped to free McClure quickly. But they then discovered that the well was surrounded by rock. The rescuers' jackhammers were also inadequate, as they were designed for downward rather than horizontal drilling.
A mining engineer eventually arrived to help supervise and coordinate the rescue effort, and a relatively new technology, waterjet cutting, was ultimately used to cut through the rock.[3][4]
Forty-five hours after Jessica fell into the well, the adjacent shaft and cross-tunnel were complete. During the drilling, rescuers could hear Jessica singing "Winnie the Pooh."[5]
A roofing contractor, Ron Short, volunteered to go down the shaft. He had been born without collarbones and could collapse his shoulders to work in tight confines. The team considered his offer,[6][7][8] but ultimately EMT/paramedic Robert O'Donnell was the one who descended the shaft, inching his way into the tunnel and wresting Jessica free from her position pinned inside the well with one leg above her forehead. O'Donnell then returned with Jessica to the parallel shaft, handing her off to fellow EMT Steve Forbes, who carried her up to safety before giving her to another firefighter who carried her to a waiting ambulance.
Chilean Miners
The 2010 Copiapó mining accident, also known then as the "Chilean mining accident", began on 5 August 2010, with a cave-in at the San José copper–gold mine, located in the Atacama Desert 45 kilometers (28 mi) north of the regional capital of Copiapó, in northern Chile. Thirty-three men were trapped 700 meters (2,300 ft) underground and 5 kilometers (3 mi) from the mine's entrance, and were rescued after 69 days.[1][2]
After the state-owned mining company, Codelco, took over rescue efforts from the mine's owners, exploratory boreholes were drilled. Seventeen days after the accident, a note was found taped to a drill bit pulled back to the surface: "Estamos bien en el refugio los 33" ("We are well in the shelter, the 33 of us").
Three separate drilling rig teams; nearly every Chilean government ministry; the United States' space agency, NASA; and a dozen corporations from around the world cooperated in completing the rescue. On 13 October 2010, the men were winched to the surface one at a time, in a specially built capsule, as an estimated 5.3 million people watched via video stream worldwide.[3][4][5] With few exceptions, they were in good medical condition with no long-term physical effects anticipated.[6] Private donations covered one-third of the US$20 million cost of the rescue, with the rest coming from the mine owners and the government.[7]
Previous geological instability at the old mine and a long record of safety violations for the mine's owners, San Esteban Mining Company, had resulted in a series of fines and accidents, including eight deaths, during the dozen years leading up to this accident.[8][9][10] After three years, lawsuits and investigations into the collapse concluded in August 2013 with no charges filed.[11]
Apollo 13
Apollo 13 (April 11–17, 1970) was the seventh crewed mission in the Apollo space program and the third meant to land on the Moon. The craft was launched from Kennedy Space Center on April 11, 1970, but the lunar landing was aborted after an oxygen tank in the service module (SM) ruptured two days into the mission, disabling its electrical and life-support system. The crew, supported by backup systems on the lunar module (LM), instead looped around the Moon in a circumlunar trajectory and returned safely to Earth on April 17. The mission was commanded by Jim Lovell, with Jack Swigert as command module (CM) pilot and Fred Haise as lunar module (LM) pilot. Swigert was a late replacement for Ken Mattingly, who was grounded after exposure to rubella.
A routine stir of an oxygen tank ignited damaged wire insulation inside it, causing an explosion that vented the contents of both of the SM's oxygen tanks to space.[note 1] Without oxygen, needed for breathing and for generating electric power, the SM's propulsion and life support systems could not operate. The CM's systems had to be shut down to conserve its remaining resources for reentry, forcing the crew to transfer to the LM as a lifeboat. With the lunar landing canceled, mission controllers worked to bring the crew home alive.
Although the LM was designed to support two men on the lunar surface for two days, Mission Control in Houston improvised new procedures so it could support three men for four days. The crew experienced great hardship, caused by limited power, a chilly and wet cabin and a shortage of potable water. There was a critical need to adapt the CM's cartridges for the carbon dioxide scrubber system to work in the LM; the crew and mission controllers were successful in improvising a solution. The astronauts' peril briefly renewed public interest in the Apollo program; tens of millions watched the splashdown in the South Pacific Ocean on television.
An investigative review board found fault with preflight testing of the oxygen tank and Teflon being placed inside it. The board recommended changes, including minimizing the use of potentially combustible items inside the tank; this was done for Apollo 14.
This IS the GOSPEL of Jesus Christ\
Like all these examples, we are stuck in the pit of our sinfulness.
We need an outside hero to come and rescue us.
The rescue came from Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ/Messiah who not only freed us, as a drastic rescue effort, but he paid the price of our redemption!
Redemption= the freeing of slaves. Usually this takes place with a form of payment where a slave is freed from one owner and given as property to the new owner. That slave is redeemed from slavery to one master. But, there is another picture. People were often made slaves because they had debts. They could not pay off their debt. Maybe they were widowed, or orphaned. They would be taken advantage of by the wealthy. Knowing how people would oppress one another, God made certain that the People of Israel had a system in place where a family member could REDEEM another family member out of slavery. Someone in the family would step up and pay the price to buy someone out of service to another who had taken advantage of them by debt or by force.
This is our situation! We may have been held captive by sin; but our captivity led us to SERVING SIN! We need someone to come and REDEEM us from serving THAT MASTER and bring us back to our rightful place in God’s Family. ULTIMATELY THIS IS A PICTURE OF THE WORK OF CHRIST. He payed the price to buy us out of service and captivity to sin!
Jesus not only promised this redemption; HE PROVIDED IT!
He sets us free and gives us a new way to live
3 At one time we too were foolish, disobedient, deceived and enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures. We lived in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another. 4 But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, 5 he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, 6 whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, 7 so that, having been justified by his grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life.
11 For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people. 12 It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, 13 while we wait for the blessed hope—the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, 14 who gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good.
6 You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. 7 Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. 8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
12 Therefore, brothers and sisters, we have an obligation—but it is not to the flesh, to live according to it. 13 For if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live.
14 For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. 15 The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.” 16 The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. 17 Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.
We are Rescued and Redeemed to LIVE a NEW LIFE where the waves and tumult of sin are done away with!
ACCEPT THAT REDEMPTION AND PARDON!
May we call on teh pardon of the Lord so He can forgive us, rescue us, redeem us, and set us free to declare HIS Deeds among those we encounter...