Freedom to rest in God's work

Psalm 132 is a Psalm of ascent, a song that was sung on the way either to Jerusalem or up to the steps of the Temple. In 132:9 the Psalmist encourages, “Let your priests be clothed with righteousness, and let your saints shout for joy.”

While we know at a gut level that we ought to shout for joy at the scandalous goodness of the gospel, it can sometimes be more easily said, or prescribed, than done. Even while we are the people of God, the recipients of reckless love, the forgiven, and the loved, it can be difficult to see that love clearly, let alone shout with joy. The kind of joy that makes you shout, that wild, I-don't-care-what-anyone-thinks joy isn’t the sort of thing you can fake if you don’t feel it.

The good news is, we don't have to be the ones who manifest joy. We are free to be the recipients. God responds to David in Psalm 132, saying that it is God who will clothe us, his priests, in righteousness. It is God who will make us able to shout for joy.

Today, think about the ways that you feel obligated to be your own source, your own strength, or even your own righteousness. Where have you tried to accomplish God's work on your own? Where, today, can you rest in the reality that you are free to let God accomplish what he has begun?


Psalm 132