Don’t Hang Up Your Harp
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Psalms 137:1 By the rivers of Babylon, There we sat down and wept, When we remembered Zion.
Psalms 137:2 Upon the willows in the midst of it We hung our harps.
Psalms 137:3 For there our captors demanded of us songs, And our tormentors mirth, saying, "Sing us one of the songs of Zion."
Psalms 137:4 How can we sing the LORD’S song In a foreign land?
I am in a series about river scenes, in the first message we looked at a river that brings life, and fruit and blessings from the book of Ezekiel. This river scene is quite a bit different. I think it could be at the river Chebar – means far off, where many of the exiles settled in Babylon.
In this one the Jews are captives, in a foreign land, they have stopped singing, and are being tormented with mockery. “How about you sing one of those victory songs now?” In response they ask this question found in verse 4: How can we sing the LORD’S song in a foreign land? Today we will address why you better be able to sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land, and some tips to help you do that if it is your life situation.
Psalm 137 is one that is pain filled and brutally honest. It was written by an unknown pilgrim who was taken prisoner to Babylon after Nebuchadnezzar’s crushing defeat of Jerusalem. Each line of this psalm drips with blood and tears for a dream gone bad, a way of life that has turned sour, and a beautiful homeland life lost that is nothing but a distant memory now.
There is a very sad irony in this psalm, they said they couldn’t sing, and yet they were singing. The Psalms are songs. They were singing a song of defeat. They were so down they were singing we will never sing joyful songs again; we have hung up our harps and have put that idea to bed.
We have before us a picture of some people that when conditions changed and surroundings changed, when they had turned in a way they didn’t like, they hung their harps on the willows. – they were for all intents and purposes fair weather singers. Some did it in anger and protest, some did it in depression and despair. No matter the reason, by their actions they were saying they would only sing for God when things were going the way they wanted.
The result of their hanging up their harps is simply this, the devil who couldn’t defeat them with a life controlling sin, has still defeated them by stealing their songs of faith from them. They have become demoralized, and are captives not just by location, but their souls have become captives of defeat, despair, and depression.
Before I get to singing in a foreign land, I need to address one of the most vilified verses in the bible, it is found at the end of this psalm, and it is a favorite of those who like to find fault with the bible and Christianity. Here are the last two verses of this Psalm
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Psalms 137:8 O Daughter of Babylon, doomed to destruction, happy is he who repays you for what you have done to us—
Psalms 137:9 he who seizes your infants and dashes them against the rocks.
How can we explain the horrific sentiments of this passage. Atheists would like to attribute the feelings expressed as how the God of the bible is IOW, He is a terrible person.
Psalm 137 8,9 are not the words of God, but of the Jewish people who have suffered unspeakable war crimes at the hands of the Babylonians. Here, in contrast, are the true feelings of God:
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Ezekiel 33:11 Say unto them, As I live, saith the Lord GOD, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked…
Psalm 137:8,9 is not the wish of an evil vengeful God, but the lament of a broken, revenge filled saint who has lost his way. This passage needs to be understood in the same way the book of Ecclesiastes is, especially in those passages where Solomon describes life as vanity, vanity, all is vanity. That is the view of life of a person who is not serving God. Without God, life has no purpose, no meaning, eat drink and be merry for tomorrow you die. What Solomon eventually figured out, is that eating and drinking didn’t bring him any true merriment.
Psalm 137:8,9 are not the words of God but of a people who stopped trusting God in the hard times, hung up their harps, and now their mouths are filled, anger, hatred, and cursing.
If you don’t control your words even in prayer, your words will get out of control. Psalm 137:8,9 are prayer filled words that are out of the control and direction of the Holy Spirit. Look at this verse of scripture in light of what I am saying:
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Leviticus 4:7 ‘The priest shall also put some of the blood on the horns of the altar of fragrant incense which is before the LORD in the tent of meeting…
Incense in the bible is representative of our prayer ascending to God. This passage in Leviticus reminds us that even our prayer need to be sanctified. Be careful about the pain you blurt out. Suffering does not give you a free pass to say whatever you want to God. Stupid words always produce stupid results. Once a word leaves your mouth you can’t retrieve it. And it can take a long time to heal the damage it does. Especially in relationships.
Let’s get back to our main thought, how can we sing the songs of Zion in a foreign land?
How?
1. By not letting circumstances circumvent your praise.
Has God changed? Is it still true He died on a cross for you? Then sing of that. Is it still true that He washed your sins clean in His blood, that He promised to work all things out together for good? That the Holy Spirit still brings the comfort of God. There is always good reason to worship God. Don’t be a circumstantial praiser!
2. Don’t let the fact that you are in foreign land cause praise to become foreign to you.
Let’s consider this phrase ‘foreign land’
A foreign land is a place away from home, an unfamiliar territory, a place of suffering, A place we don’t recognize, a place we feel out of place in.
Many times in life we feel out of place. America is feeling more like a strange and foreign land to me every day. I feel at times like we are living in some kind of bizarre spiritual twilight zone. Every day it seems we wake up and hear crazier stuff is going on in our country. Drag queens in elementary schools, boys in girls bathrooms, and playing in women’s sports, gender reassignment surgery for children, a military that is more concerned with being woke, than with being combat ready. Taking down statues of our founding fathers, the list goes on. We can never allow feeling out of place to become a justification to stop singing and praising God.
The simple fact is this, Christians have always been strangers in a strange land.
Abraham, after His encounter with God, spent his whole life in a foreign land. This world was never his home, looking for a city…
Our citizenship is in heaven
Where you live will never change one fact about God. He is worthy to be praised even when you are in a foreign land.
It doesn’t matter if it’s a foreign country, a foreign state of mind, or a foreign institution, when you’re in the foreign place there will be those who desire to make fun of your song. The Babylonians made fun of them and said, sing us one of those victory songs. It is in those times, with the enemy whispering mocking thoughts to your soul that we have to decide whether we’re going to sing or hang our harps on the willow tree. The foreign land, the far country, and the distant land, will test your faith, it will test your hope, and it will most surely test your commitment. It is in the foreign land where we discover what we really are, whether we really have a song or not, and whether we are his or not.
In the foreign land of suffering Job said, thou He slay me yet will I trust Him.
The 3 Hebrew boys in a foreign land were told when you hear our music bow and worship our God, they refused to join Nebuchadnezzars sing along. Saying God could save us, but even if He doesn’t we are not going along with your wishes.
3. By Not Letting the fact you are a captive, hold your praise captive.
You are a captive to your physical body. Your eye color, your height, your basic strength level, your attractiveness, all these are fixed. If you are short there is nothing you can do about it.
You are a captive in some measure to your financial circumstances. If you are on a fixed income, or unemployed, if the country you are in is in recession, all these can hold you captive.
You are a captive to the society you live in. If you are living in a communist, or Muslim nation, the society around you in some ways dictates how your life will be.
You are captive to the time in which you live. (War/peace/plague/famine, dark ages).
You can’t let living in a foreign land stop your praise, because you will always be living in one. And, you can’t let being a captive stop your praise, because in some way shape or form you will always be a captive.
Acts 16 praising when a captive releases the power of God. It broke them free of their own shackles, and it broke free those around them also. Your praise in a time of captivity will move God to do mighty things!
Praise brings God's presence. Refusing to hang it up your harp brings Divine reinforcement. God sent ambushments in the OT when the saints praised!
Finally, FOLLOW JESUS' EXAMPLE OF SINGING THROUGH THE PAIN
Only once in the New Testament is it recorded that Jesus sang (Matt. 26:30). When did He sing? He sang on the night in which He was betrayed. He sang after washing the disciples' feet. He sang as the shadow of a cross fell unmistakably across His pathway. He sang as Judas hurried to betray Him. He sang at the end of His Last Supper, and death was around the corner. He sang as He headed for the agonies in the Garden of Gethsemane and the hill called Calvary, the place of the skull. He sang a hymn as His outward world was falling apart. If Jesus could sing in the strange land of suffering, we have no excuse for hanging it up.
Close: I’m facing a situation where it’s hard to sing and praise God.
I put my harp down and I realize that is not the right thing to do.
I have said some things that were foolish God keep me from foolish words especially in times of anguish.
God bring back songs of joy, no matter what my circumstances may be.
I want to declare I am picking my harp back up again.
