Psalm for Today =
130:3-4, 7-8
3 If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities,
O Lord, who could stand?
4 But with you there is forgiveness,
that you may be feared...O Lord, who could stand?4 But with you there is forgiveness,that you may be feared...7 O Israel, hope in the Lord!
For with the Lord there is steadfast love,
and with him is plentiful redemption.
8 And he will redeem Israel
from all his iniquities.
For with the Lord there is steadfast love,and with him is plentiful redemption.8 And he will redeem Israelfrom all his iniquities.
Comments:
After making a request of the Lord in v.1-2, the psalmist makes a confession in v. 3-4 that there is a great difference between the Lord and the
people. Rhetorically, he admits that if God is keeping track of our screw-ups, then no one can stand before God. This is bad news because God is
omniscient—he knows everything about us. Read this as “He is keeping track.” Yet
he is also the one who desires to forgive us.
Because the Lord is the source of forgiveness, the psalmist
looks for him more than a watchman for the dawn 5-6, and in 7-8 exhorts the
people of God to put their hope in Yahweh. Two parallel characteristics are used to
support Israel’s putting their hope in the Lord. With him, there is:
1. Steadfast
love, and
2. Plentiful
redemption.
And as a result, he will redeem Israel (his people) from all
his iniquities. How many will he forgive? All. Not some, but all! But sin must be confessed to the Lord. Confessing is a simple agreement with God's righteous judgment that we are not God and that He is. He is holy, and we are not.
We need to be willing to confess our own sins and be forgiven
rather than denying our sins and dying in them. The New Testament complement to
this psalm is 1 John 1:8-9, which says,
“If we say we
have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess
our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from
all unrighteousness.” (1 John 1:8-9)
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