A Maskil of Asaph.
Asaph- a prophet during the time of King David. David recognized this fact and placed Asaph among those who wrote songs for worship.
Maskil- Contemplative teaching
It’s important to remember that the Church existed in a real and technical sense in the OT. God’s called people have been present throughout all times in redemptive history and that fact makes the Psalms not only fitting for the OT Church but for the NT Church as well. They are not about Israel as a whole but about God’s people.
So, here we can and must rightly interpret this Psalm as referring to the Church. In ancient times, God’s people suffered at the hands of sinful men. They were taken captive and their lands destroyed. They endured times of struggle. When Jesus was born, they held in their arms the consolation of Israel and yet years later, Jesus Himself shed tears over the people because they would not repent and were like sheep without a shepherd.
Now we look around at the condition of the Church of Christ and see so much that is broken. This is what Asaph saw and he prays.
1. Our Prayer for the Struggling Church (74:1-11)
1 O God, why do you cast us off forever?
Why does your anger smoke against the sheep of your pasture?
2 Remember your congregation, which you have purchased of old,
which you have redeemed to be the tribe of your heritage!
Remember Mount Zion, where you have dwelt.
3 Direct your steps to the perpetual ruins;
the enemy has destroyed everything in the sanctuary!
4 Your foes have roared in the midst of your meeting place;
they set up their own signs for signs.
5 They were like those who swing axes
in a forest of trees.
6 And all its carved wood
they broke down with hatchets and hammers.
7 They set your sanctuary on fire;
they profaned the dwelling place of your name,
bringing it down to the ground.
8 They said to themselves, “We will utterly subdue them”;
they burned all the meeting places of God in the land.
9 We do not see our signs;
there is no longer any prophet,
and there is none among us who knows how long.
10 How long, O God, is the foe to scoff?
Is the enemy to revile your name forever?
11 Why do you hold back your hand, your right hand?
Take it from the fold of your garment and destroy them!
We are called here to see and even feel the reality of the struggling Church even in our day. If we look at the beginning of this passage, we see the word why used multiple times as God’s people cry out to Him in prayer because of the struggling Church.
why do you cast us off forever?
Why does your anger smoke against the sheep of your pasture?
Why is the first word in Hebrew here. It is the thrust of the Psalm. Why God are all these things happening to your Church and Your people and will this be forever?
So, it seems, at times, as if God has abandoned us. I’m sure just about everyone here has experienced this. Why does the Church suffer and the lost prosper and suppress God’s people?
10 How long, O God, is the foe to scoff?
Is the enemy to revile your name forever?
For us we may think that the world is holding control over the Church. The world is having great influence on the Church. The Lord’s Day becomes optional especially if something else is going on. There seems to be a lack of commitment among God’s people. If a Church has a large membership, it’s often because it’s focus is very similar to the world’s focus.
However, contained within this section are also words of hope. The Church is referred to as…
Why does your anger smoke against the sheep of your pasture?
2 Remember your congregation
There is hope in that we are called the sheep of Your pasture. We know Jesus is the Good Shepherd who lays His life down for the sheep.
We are called God’s congregation; God’s called out ones. We see that God has taken ownership of His Church.
We can also relate to the fact that the enemies of God are those who greatly oppose anything that stands for God. They are enemies of Jesus and the Church.
10 How long, O God, is the foe to scoff?
Is the enemy to revile your name forever?
If you’re a Christian then you are not fit for public service. It seems God’s enemies are winning. The Psalmist wonders why this is happening.
Is God not in control? Is God not good? Is it judgement upon God’s people that we are suffering this way?
Then something clicks for the Psalmist. Rather than looking with fear at the present condition as it appears to him and even the future, he does something very helpful. He looks back at the history of God with His people and discovers something he had almost forgotten…
2. A Resurgence of Faith Based on God’s Past Acts (74:12-17)
12 Yet God my King is from of old,
working salvation in the midst of the earth.
13 You divided the sea by your might;
you broke the heads of the sea monsters on the waters.
14 You crushed the heads of Leviathan;
you gave him as food for the creatures of the wilderness.
15 You split open springs and brooks;
you dried up ever-flowing streams.
16 Yours is the day, yours also the night;
you have established the heavenly lights and the sun.
17 You have fixed all the boundaries of the earth;
you have made summer and winter.
Yet God shows us that the Psalmist is reminded of God’s great acts of creation and power.
When we are struggling with faith, don’t look at the present because we lack the ability to interpret it correctly. Don’t look to the future because we have no idea what events will transpire in our lives. We can look to the past and see God’s wonderful hand of providence. The past will show us how God has worked.
When we are struggling in this life the quicker, we can get back to God and His Word the quicker we will regain true reality.
Seven times Asaph reminds us and really first himself that God has already done great and powerful things.
Here these are seven times when the Psalmist uses a Hebrew emphatic which stresses YOU! Did these things. God, You and You alone in Your great power accomplished these wonders in time and space.
When we struggle in this life, often the last thing we want to do is read God’s Word. It’s easier just to continue pitying ourselves and wallowing in our misery. It’s easier to just blame everything else around us. However, we are the sheep of Christ’s pasture; we are His chosen congregation. We cannot stay there.
Grab your Bible and start reading and there will be a renewal of your mind and a restoration of your spirit.
The world is a mess but…
12 Yet God my King is from of old,
working salvation in the midst of the earth.
This section Asaph repeats God’s wonder creation and His amazing acts in the salvation of His people. It seems they come flooding into his mind with really no specific order. God has made everything He has set the boundaries of the earth and then Asaph tells us of God’s mighty works in His creation.
15 You split open springs and brooks;
you dried up ever-flowing streams.
God gave water to His people
God also dried up the water so His people could cross.
1 Corinthians 10:4 (ESV)
4 and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ.
Joshua 4:23–24 (ESV)
23 For the Lord your God dried up the waters of the Jordan for you until you passed over, as the Lord your God did to the Red Sea, which he dried up for us until we passed over, 24 so that all the peoples of the earth may know that the hand of the Lord is mighty, that you may fear the Lord your God forever.”
Notice why God did those mighty acts. Did you catch it? (24)
We must fear God and not the future.
The restoration of Christ’s Church and the restoration of creation is as sure as God is mighty. It’s sure and yet, we must pray for it. It seems that since God can do all He desires and He is good that there is then something that lays behind this broken sinful world… a purpose. I don’t pretend to know all of God’s purposes but one I do know is that He has a purpose for us in the restoration of this world. So, we see sin far off in others and we experience sin personally so that we will pray. Pray for the Church, pray that God’s will is done on earth as it is in heaven, pray for the coming of Christ and the restoration of all things and pray for the salvation of the lost. God desires that we pray and we do pray as the sinful world touches us personally. We are affected by sin and one purpose is so that through sin’s misery, we will pray all the more.
3. Arise, O God, Defend Your Cause…Pray for the Restoration of All Things (74:18-23)
18 Remember this, O Lord, how the enemy scoffs,
and a foolish people reviles your name.
19 Do not deliver the soul of your dove to the wild beasts;
do not forget the life of your poor forever.
20 Have regard for the covenant,
for the dark places of the land are full of the habitations of violence.
21 Let not the downtrodden turn back in shame;
let the poor and needy praise your name.
22 Arise, O God, defend your cause;
remember how the foolish scoff at you all the day!
23 Do not forget the clamor of your foes,
the uproar of those who rise against you, which goes up continually!
For the first time in this Psalm, Asaph uses the Covenant name of God, Yahweh which is translated Lord in our Bibles.
Remember Your enemies O Lord and remember Your covenant people. Lord, remember the suffering of Your covenant people…Remember Your suffering Church. Remember Your people. Remember Your enemies as well.
Here, and we too must remember this ourselves…Look at verse 22.
22 Arise, O God, defend your cause;
This world, the Church, God’s people, and His enemies are His cause. These things belong to the Lord and are His cause. He is responsible to bring all these things to pass and He will.
What is our responsibility? It’s not to fix this world because we can’t. Our responsibility is to PRAY
The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof. We are His sheep, His Church and God will work when it is the right time. Christ will return and set all things right. Until then, our responsibility is to first pray.
The Psalm closes as Asaph releases the responsibility of God’s kingdom back to God…
He stops feeling the weight of all the supposed injustices and work of the enemy. He assumes his role. He begins to pray.
When we feel overwhelmed how can we stop taking the weight of the responsibility upon ourselves?
God is powerful and good.
Look to the past. Especially look to God’s work through the pages of Scripture and experience your faith being strengthened.
Then stop trying to fix the world…you can’t. Pray to the One who owns it and can fix it.
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