Psalm 118 – The Hallel (Part 6)

Psalms 113-118 are a collection of six psalms known as the Hallel which are recited at key Jewish festivals, including that of Passover. In this series of posts I will take a brief look at each of them in turn as we move through Lent. As I reflect on the Hallel I will have in mind the line that concludes both Matthew and Mark’s accounts of the Last Supper: ‘And when they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives’ (Matthew 26:30; Mark 14:26). It wouldn’t at all surprise me if the last hymn which Jesus sung was the Hallel…

Psalm 118 is magnificent and worthy of much deeper reflection than I can provide in a short meditation. My aim in this post is therefore to give some signposts and encourage you to spend time exploring it further. The psalm falls into two parts: vv1-18 describe the psalmist’s present difficulties, and vv19-29 describe the psalmist’s future hope. I will briefly unpack the two halves before concluding with some thoughts from Jesus’ final days in Jerusalem.

Verses 1-18 – Repetitive truth in present difficulties

The first half of the psalm describes the psalmist under pressure. Circumstances are clearly difficult with the psalmist in distress, surrounded by enemies and facing death. Significantly though, these verses are full of repetition:

• ‘His steadfast love endures forever’ (vv1-4)
• ‘The Lord is on my side’ (vv6-7)
• ‘It is better to take refuge in the Lord than…’ (vv8-9)
• ‘They surrounded me…in the name of the Lord I cut them off’ (vv10-12)
• ‘The right hand of the Lord…’ (vv15-16)

One of the compelling aspects of songs is that they are often full of repetition. How many times have you found the catchy chorus or the repeated refrain you hear in  the morning become an ‘earworm’ you have going around in your head all day? What is interesting about each of the repeated phrases here is the fact that they all focus on God. They point to His love, the safety and security He provides, His strength (right hand), and His victory. The psalmist embeds timeless truth about God – repeatedly – in the words of the psalm. This leads him, in the midst of difficult circumstances, to be able to say, ‘Glad songs of salvation are in the tent of the righteous’ (v15).

Isn’t there a lesson for us in this? Whatever our circumstances let’s fill our mouths and minds with repeated refrains about God, His greatness, His power, His victory, His love, and let glad songs of salvation spill out.

Verses 19-29 – Prophetic declaration of future hope

However, the psalmist doesn’t get stuck in the present challenges. He doesn’t find some random truths and then mindlessly repeat them so that he starts to feel a bit better. No! Instead he begins to speak out his hope for the future. He prophetically declares that what will come to pass is reversal when the Lord takes His victory.

The psalmist imagines himself worshipping again as he pictures the gates of the temple being opened so he can go and give thanks. Although currently under pressure, he will again praise.

But the reversal he envisages is so much greater. The rejected stone will become the defining stone, the cornerstone which will set the foundation and direction (v22). He sees salvation arriving (v21). He recognises that the blessed one who comes in the name of the Lord will arrive (v26) and God’s light will again shine on them (v27). The psalmist prophetically declares a hope-filled future.

———————————–

As Jesus sung these words at the Last Supper I am convinced that He had meditated on this psalm in the previous few weeks and their meaning was seared deeply into His thinking. Two verses in particular leap out and shout ‘Jesus!’ at us all these centuries later.

The first is verse 26: Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord. We cannot get this far in Holy Week and not connect this verse to that triumphal entry which ushered in the final week of Jesus’ life on earth. Given The Hallel would have been widely recited as pilgrims gathered in Jerusalem for the Passover Feast these verses would have been in their thinking too. The crowds’ choice of this refrain to welcome Jesus as he entered the great city seated on a donkey is both poignant and prophetic. Here He was, the King, riding His donkey in order to take the monumental steps to His throne. The crowd were right to expect this outcome, but wrong in their assumption of how the King would ascend His throne.

The second is verses 22-23: The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. This is the Lord’s doing; it is marvellous in our eyes. These verses are found on the lips of Jesus during His public teaching during that final week. Mark 11:27-33 recalls how Jesus was challenged in the temple by the religious leaders about the authority with which He taught. He followed up by ‘speaking to them in parables’ (Mark 12:1). The following ten verses are a prophetic description of what will happen to Him and a devasting critique of the religious authorities which culminates in the quotation from Psalm 118. The events which then unfold will prove that the stone was rejected but will become the glorious cornerstone, holding everything in place and setting a course for the kingdom of justice and righteousness. This will be nothing less than marvellous for those with eyes to see.

But this is all to come. Just pause for a moment and go back to that Last Supper on that Thursday evening. To think that the last words Jesus sung in that Upper Room before heading across the Kidron brook to Gethsemane may have been the final verse of this Psalm is incredible. He knowingly and willingly went to face the betrayal and brutality, desertion and denial, mockery and mistreatment, cruelty and crucifixion which were coming His way after singing:

‘Oh give thanks to the Lord, for He is good;

for His steadfast love endures forever!’ (v29)

This repeated truth bookends the psalm and in doing so transcends our present difficulties and future hopes.

What a Saviour we have in Jesus!