Due to my travel schedule this fall, I have not had time to post weekly. I will try to catch up. One will post today and another tomorrow.
In my last blog, we saw that David’s Psalm 122 discusses the house of the Lord. At that time, it was the Tabernacle. Psalm 127 also discusses the “house,” but now the Temple is built or in process. As you remember, God gave David the vision for building the Temple. However, his son Solomon was meant to carry it out. Now Solomon writes these beautiful words as a Psalm of Ascent.
I encourage you to read Psalm 127.
God is not alone in building His house or kingdom; He has called us to play a part. That is why this is a Psalm of Ascent. It reminds the children of Israel of God’s part and theirs. It further reminds them that they are working for the Lord, not the Lord for them.
Dr. George Wood wrote a short devotion for each Psalm of Ascent. To illustrate this point, he writes, “I am reminded of the man who sold his property to a developer. After the transfer of the title, the new owner showed up with bulldozers, a crane, and a wrecking ball. “What are you doing?” asked the former owner. “I thought you wanted this.” “Oh,” the new owner replied, “I don’t want the buildings, just the land. I’m going to put up something better.” (A Psalm in Your Heart, George O. Wood, 2008)
There comes a moment in every believer’s life when we realize a reconciliation is needed. What God wants for our lives and what we want for our own may not be the same. So, we must decide who the builder and assistant are. The work of the church is much the same. As a pastor, I may have a grand plan for the church’s future. However, we should not pursue it if it is not God’s direction.
God must be our central focus and our primary goal. I want to follow God in obedience more than I want to build a building or grow in numbers. This desire remains even if that means I sacrifice my plans. This remarkable fact remains: God does not want to do it alone, but often, we exchange our part for God’s.
Three themes emerge in these few verses: Trust, Rest, and Teach.
In verse 1, the theme of trust is illustrated in the words “unless the Lord builds.” We recognize that we cannot build anything truly lasting apart from God’s power and direction. That takes trust. It also reminds us that our priority must be building God’s Kingdom. Everything else is secondary.
Dr. Wood titles verses one and two as “Help from Above.”
Dr. Wiersbe asks the questions what and how are we building?
John 15:15 encourages us with these words. “I no longer call you slaves because a master doesn’t confide in his slaves. Now you are my friends since I have told you everything the Father told me.”
God does not leave us alone in this. We join hands with God and partner with Him. Together, we see our lives and His Kingdom built. The second half of this verse says, “unless the Lord protects.” Dr. Wiersbe writes, “Building and battling go together.” Noah built; God protected. Nehemiah built with a sword in one hand and a trowel in the other.
We move from our Trust in God to verse two, where we see our rest in God. He says, “It is useless for you to work so hard.” This is human nature. When we remove our trust in God, we also remove our ability to rest. It becomes our project rather than God’s.
Sometimes, we fear that all we’ve worked for will fall apart if we rest. Is it not God holding it together anyway? God taught me this lesson during my first two years as pastor. I was afraid to take a day off or vacation because we had momentum. I worried that if I left, it would fall apart. As the next part of verse two says, I had anxiety over it. But overconfidence leads to overwork.
The Holy Spirit asked me, “Who is building this anyway?” God used two ladies in our church to confirm the word the Lord gave me. I will tie this back in under the next point.
God offers rest to his workers. Rest is also an act of trust. Here, too, God has a part, and I have a part. I must prioritize taking a day off; then, it is up to God to bring rest. Admittedly, I work a lot, but I try to the best of my ability to guard my day of rest. Trust and Rest go hand in hand.
Subsequently, we are called to teach the next generation what we have learned. Teaching emerges in verses 3-5. First, God reminds us that our children are a gift. I love giving my kids a hard time, but I cannot imagine life without any of them. My most important role as a father is to teach them the ways of the Lord, including Trust and Rest.
Teaching is also an act of trust. We trust the Lord to care for our children because sometimes they reject His plan for their lives. You remember earlier in verse 1, we trust God to protect what we are building. That includes your kids. For a moment, think of who is writing this: Solomon…he had a few kids. This speaks to the generational hand-off of God’s plan.
In verse 5, Solomon uses the terms of physical confrontation. There is a battle raging for your kids. Too often, Godly parents fight against God rather than with Him. They compromise God’s standards to keep their kids “happy.”
Being a teacher also calls us to be teachable. That has always been a prayer in my life. As a young pastor, I learned a valuable lesson from those two ladies.
Solomon directs us to trust, rest, and teach. In each of these, we have a part, and God has a part. May we never confuse the two.
Through Time 