November 29 - Psalm 146 - "Songs of the Season: Hopeless?"

MPC 29th November 2020.

Jeremy Wales

2020 is nearly done... and if there's one thing I think we can all learn from this year... it's that things don't always turn out the way we planned. Is there any us of who can say: "all that's happened this year - that's how Iplanned it."

A global pandemic with panic buying, lock-downs, slow opening back up. None of us were planning for that to be our year, were we? To help process the disappointment, you can understand why many have turned to that most-trusted of psychological tools: Internet memes.

If 2020 was a pizza. Not how it's meant to be.

If 2020 was a beer. Not how it's meant to be.

If 2020 was a cereal. really not how it's meant to be.

Different ways of saying: this year wasn't how it was meant to be. It can help to try and see the funny side. But then the question is: After 2020, what hope is there for the future?

As humans we can't live without hope. But what basis do we have for it?

A positive thing in these memes is that they do put all the blame squarely on the year itself. So by definition, 2021 has to be better just because it's not 2020 any more. But is that a strong basis for hope? Beyond blind optimism, what guarantee is there really, that later years won't be more of the same... or somehow even worse?

Well, Psalm 146 is all about hope. False hope, true hope and the difference between them. What kind of hope will just lead to more and more disappointment? What kind of hope, if any, actually has a real basis? It makes sense that Psalm 146 is all about hope, because it comes from a time like ours when people really needed hope.

It comes right at the end of the book of Psalms. Actually, I should say the bookS plural, because what we usually call the book of Psalms actually contains 5 books. Each book ends with the same statement of praise to God.

Except the final book doesn't just have a single statement. It ends with 5 whole Psalms that each start and end with the command "Hallelu-jah": Praise God. 146 is the first of these final Psalms. And did you know? The Psalms in this 5thbook were actually still being selected and ordered right up close to the time of Jesus.

At the first Christmas, these were the songs on Israel's playlist. The ones that captured where Israel was at with God at that time. And like our time, it was a time they really needed hope.

If you trace through the arrangement of the Psalms, it actually tells the story why. Particularly if you zoom in on the Psalms at the beginning and end of each book.

Psalm 1 promises blessing to the one who trusts and obeys God. Psalm 2 says this blessing is guaranteed by the Messiah, the one God chose to be king of Israel, like king David. Because when Israel's king trusts and obeys God he'll actually rule the whole world and remove all the evil from it.

Then book 2 ends with Psalm 72. It says if a future king, like David's son Solomon, rules with God's own goodness, wielding power not for himself but for the needy and vulnerable, then the whole world will want in and the blessing promised to Israel will overflow to the whole world.

But then Book 3 ends with Psalm 89. Which laments that none of Israel's kings ever actually did that. So instead of blessing for Israel and the world, Israel is defeated, their cities are destroyed, they're exiled from their land, and the monarchy's in tatters.

Book 4 opens with Psalm 90, the only Psalm of Moses, who came long before Israel even had kings. As if to say, Israel, all we can do now is go back to our roots.

Book 5 celebrates that some people have now returned from exile. There's been some rebuilding. There's festivals again. But the reality is: it's not even as good as it was before, let alone as good the promise.

As this 5th book of Psalms is finalised, just before Jesus, Israel still lives under foreign oppression with no king of their own. And that leaves Israel asking: after all this, where on earth can we find some hope?

If that's how you're feeling after 2020, Psalm 146 is here to help. It tells you where you really shouldn't rest your hope. Before it tells you where you should. Where you shouldn't rest your hope is in human leaders. Though that's what we naturally do, don't we?

In hard times, you look for someone to lead you out of them. A lot of people blame the world's current problems on the leadership of people like Donald Trump. So they find hope in his replacement.

I saw editorial in the Guardian recently that says: "Joe Biden has won... renewing hope for the us and the world. After four years of turmoil [... ] the result of this historic presidential election offers fresh promise for democracy and progress."

So, fix the leadership, fix the world. It's normal to think that, isn't it? But see what the Psalm says. Read it with me from v3: "Do not put your trust in princes, in human beings, who cannot save. When their spirit departs, theyreturn to the ground; on that very day their plans come to nothing."

In the ancient world, princes were the ones with power. The ones in control. The ones who could get things done. For themselves and for others. But the Psalm says: In case you haven't noticed, even Princes die.

The words "return to the ground" actually recall Genesis 3. Where God had to curse humanity. Because we rebelled against him. God consigned us to death. Because we sinned against him. So death isn't meant to be here. It's not meant to break this world the way it does. But because of our wickedness. Because of our sin. It does.

Now, these days we don't usually look to actual princes to make us live happily ever after. But we do look to world leaders. Like the Guardian quote before. And this Psalm is warning you not to.

It's only going to lead to disappointment after disappointment. Why? Well, not because all leaders are deeply sinful and can't be trusted. Though that's probably true much more than we'd like to think. More importantly, in a world broken by sin and death, even the best leaders just don't last.

There was huge hope around the world for Barak Obama. Do you remember? But he had his two terms in office and his presidency ended. He was followed directly by Donald Trump, and no one who hoped in Obama would say their hopes were fulfilled in that. Of course, others put their hopes in Trump himself. But now he's not even getting two terms!

Now Joe Biden is the oldest ever elected "leader of the free world." You think he'll last long enough to make a dint in the world's problems?

As humans we need some kind of hope. Can't live without it. So it's natural to look to the most powerful among to fix things.

But - it doesn't matter which side of politics you're on - in a world broken by sin and death, the world's real problems are too big to be fixed by temporary humans.

Now that might all sounds too cynical, like what's the point, like it's all hopeless. But then the Psalm does hold out some real hope.

Have a look at verse 5: Don't put your trust in people because even the most powerful don't last... instead, verse 5, "Blessed are those whose helpis the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord their God. He's the maker of heaven and earth, the sea, and everything in them-he remains faithful forever."

The blessing promised in Psalms 1 and 2 is still here, for those who hope in God alone. Why? Because God is the creator. God is the one who made this world.

Unlike us, he's not bound by its brokenness. Unlike us, god is the one who can fix it. Not only that, this is still God's world, no matter what we've done to it. He won't abandon it. It belongs to him. Not only can God fix it. He wants to. That's what the Psalm says from verse 7, read with me:

He upholds the cause of the oppressed and gives food to the hungry. The Lord sets prisoners free, the Lord gives sight to the blind, the Lord lifts up those who are bowed down, the Lord loves the righteous. The Lord watches over the foreigner and sustains the fatherless and the widow, but he frustrates the ways of the wicked.

The brokenness of this world is not how God wants it to be. He doesn't want people being hungry. Alone. Oppressed. The good things we miss out on in this broken world... God made those things for us to enjoy. What he wants gone - is all the wickedness. All the sin. Everything that ultimately strips us of those good things. This is his world. He's the one who can fix it. And he's the one who will.

A few years back, Lucy and I got some chickens. So we made a chicken run in the backyard with a strong fence to keep out the predators. But then chickens are so dumb. Of course it doesn't take them long to dig under the fence and get out. Which of course breaks their protection from predators. That's dumb. But just as dumb would be to expect them to fix it. We are the ones who can fix it. And because they're our chickens

and it's our chicken run, of course we're the ones who did.

In the same way. This is a world that we broke with our sin. Wrecked it with death. And we can't fix it ourselves. Only God can fix this world. And because he made it, he will.

Now, if the Psalm perhaps sounded a bit too cynical before. Maybe now you feel it's switched to pie in the sky optimism. It's really nice God is going to fix this world. But then why hasn't he?

It's a good question. To which the answer is: he has started to. Not too long after this book of Psalms was finished, Luke's account of Jesus tells us that an angel appeared to a teenage girl called Mary. Tells her God himself is going to give her a son. A son who'll have God's own nature. A while later she writes a song about it, here's a line from it: "God has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble. He has filled the hungry with good things."

Sound familiar? Now, I don't want to accuse Mary the mother of Jesus of plagiarism. At the first Christmas, Psalms book 5 was Israel's playlist. Maybe Psalm 146 was on repeat and it just crept into her song by accident. Or maybe you'd call it a 'sample.' Either way, any royalties she got for this should really have gone to the Psalmist. Because it's just the same, isn't it?

The difference is, in the Psalm, God is the kind of God who will fix this broken world. For Mary, it's past tense. He's already done it.

For Mary, at the first Christmas, if God himself is prepared to become human in Jesus, and enter this world himself, salvation is as good as done. We get a preview of that salvation in Luke 7.

Jesus comes across a widow who's just lost her son. So she lost her husband, now her son, there's no Centrelink, she's completely on her own. And Jesus raises her son to life again and gives him back to her. Saving the fatherless and the widow, just like God in the Psalm. That's a preview.

But the ultimate way Jesus saves comes at the end of Luke. As Jesus dies on the cross in our place. Takes the penalty for our sin. Then rises to new life himself, offering eternal life to all.

That's where Jesus turns people from wicked to righteous. That's where Jesus solves the problem of sin and death, the very problem the Psalm says breaks the whole world.

This year at MPC we've seen how the whole Bible tells God's Story in 5 Episodes. And Psalm 146 fits in that story. Good creation broken by sin and death.

God's response is his covenant agreement with Israel: he'll bless the world when they trust and obey him. That doesn't go so well, as we saw through the books of Psalms. Until God himself comes in Jesus to do what none of us could.

God's action in Christ shows God's commitment to fix this world. It's the guarantee that he will make all things new in the end. In the meantime, the world does continue broken.

But in the new covenant, by his Spirit, Jesus is already making new the hearts of people who follow him. Making their hearts more like his. Giving them his heart for this broken world.

Whether or not this gives you hope for next year and beyond depends a lot on what your plans are.

This year, some of my Christian friends planned to help others as much as possible. They have Jesus' heart for this broken world. And so 2020 actually didn't break their plans at all. It gave them way more opportunities to help people than they ever imagined!

And what they've been able to do for people in need has been amazing. It's like if Jesus gives you his heart for this broken world, and so your plans are about what you can do for others, there's hope for those plans. They have the backing of the creator himself.

But if your plans are more the normal kind we tend to have, I tend to have, more about yourself, the Psalm doesn't give any particular hope for those. Instead it gives a warning: don't put your trust in princes. And that includes being the prince or princess of your own destiny. You might completely master life, but then your life will end.

What the Psalm is saying is just what we should have learned from 2020. It's been like a swing, which starts off fine until... Or like a slide, which starts out fine until...

Which is really a picture of all life in a broken world, isn't it? Even if the ride is going fine so far, we're all headed for a sudden halt. Jesus is the only one who can give you life beyond death, the sudden halt. He's the one who should have all your trust and hope. Don't let false hopes stop you finding real hope in Jesus.