Thoughts for the Day

By the rivers of Babylon—
there we sat down and there we wept
when we remembered Zion.
On the willows there
we hung up our harps.
For there our captors
asked us for songs,
and our tormentors asked for mirth, saying,
‘Sing us one of the songs of Zion!’

How could we sing the Lord’s song
in a foreign land?
If I forget you, O Jerusalem,
let my right hand wither!
Let my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth,
if I do not remember you,
if I do not set Jerusalem
above my highest joy.

(Lectionary, New Revised Standard Version)

Thoughts

Yesterday we looked at Psalm 87, and 'Zion' as Jerusalem (Zion, City of God ), and today we continue with a similar theme, though the two psalms are produced in the wrong order here. Today's Psalm, No. 137, is the earliest, written sometime shortly after the Chaldeans destroyed Jerusalem in 597 BCE and deported thousands of its people to Babylon the capital of the Chaldean Empire. Whereas yesterday's Psalm, No.87, is written sometime after the return of the exiles from Babylon by Cyrus the king of Persia, and possibly even later after the second tranche returned under the Persian king Artaxerxes when the temple in Jerusalem was finally rebuilt.

Psalm 137 is ladened with pathos, with pain, and with despair. The exiles have lost Zion (ie Jerusalem) the home of Yahweh, the living God. The temple and the Ark of the Covenant which held the two stone tablets of the Law as given to Moses by God have all been destroyed, and its treasures looted by their captors. But worse than this is the underlying worry that God might not be with them in this strange foreign land where their captors try to ridicule them into singing and playing music. Perhaps Yahweh has deserted them!

As Christians we don't have such a worry, for Jesus said: "The Father himself loves you, because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God." (John 16.27).

Lord Jesus Christ,
You taught Your disciples that
the Father loved them because
they loved You.
Draw us closer to You and to the Father,
through the power of the Holy Spirit,
that we may always be confident
of Your presence in our life.
Amen.