The Joy of Restoration

“He who goes out weeping, bearing the seed for sowing, shall come home with shouts of joy, bringing his sheaves with him.” Psalm 126:6

May 6, 2024

Psalm 126 has a meaning for the nation of Israel that Gentile Christians may not fully appreciate. The occasion was the exuberant thanksgiving for having been restored to the Promised Land after seventy years in Babylon. Israel went to Babylon in 586 B.C. in tears but returned to Jerusalem in joyful shouting. For centuries Jews have sung this psalm out of a lingering longing that one day they would be reunited as one nation in Zion. It was this impulse that drove the Zionist movement of better days to come in a “homecoming.” Pray for the Jews that many will look to their Messiah who has come and will one day draw them to the land of promise in joyful belief. Monday, May 6, is Holocaust Remembrance Day. Six million Jews were killed by the Nazis in Europe. Evil’s plague can only find solace in knowing that it was God the Son who declared God’s love hanging on a cross between two thieves.
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“Thank you, O Righteous God, for declaring your goodness in the death of death in the death of Christ.”