Psalms: The Long Memory, and the Court of the Gods (Psalms 78–83)
Scripture: Berean Standard Bible
Psalm 78
A Maskil of Asaph.
Give ear, O my people, to my instruction;listen to the words of my mouth.
I will open my mouth in parables;I will utter things hidden from the beginning,that we have heard and knownand our fathers have relayed to us.We will not hide them from their children,but will declare to the next generationthe praises of the LORD and his might,and the wonders he has performed.
For he established a testimony in Jacoband appointed a law in Israel,which he commanded our fathersto teach to their children,that the coming generation would know them—even children yet to be born—to arise and tell their own childrenthat they should put their confidence in God,not forgetting his works,but keeping his commandments.Then they will not be like their fathers,a stubborn and rebellious generation,whose heart was not loyal,whose spirit was not faithful to God.
The archers of Ephraimturned back on the day of battle.They failed to keep God’s covenantand refused to live by his law.They forgot what he had done,the wonders he had shown them.He worked wonders before their fathersin the land of Egypt, in the region of Zoan.He split the sea and brought them through;he set the waters upright like a wall.He led them with a cloud by dayand with a light of fire all night.He split the rocks in the wildernessand gave them drink as abundant as the seas.He brought streams from the stoneand made water flow down like rivers.
But they continued to sin against him,rebelling in the desert against the Most High.They willfully tested Godby demanding the food they craved.They spoke against God, saying,“Can God really prepare a table in the wilderness?When he struck the rock, water gushed outand torrents raged.But can he also give breador supply his people with meat?”
Therefore the LORD heardand was filled with wrath;so a fire was kindled against Jacob,and his anger flared against Israel,because they did not believe Godor rely on his salvation.
Yet he commanded the clouds aboveand opened the doors of the heavens.He rained down manna for them to eat;he gave them grain from heaven.Man ate the bread of angels;he sent them food in abundance.He stirred the east wind from the heavensand drove the south wind by his might.He rained meat on them like dust,and winged birds like the sand of the sea.He felled them in the midst of their camp,all around their dwellings.So they ate and were well filled,for he gave them what they craved.
Yet before they had filled their desire,with the food still in their mouths,God’s anger flared against them,and he put to death their strongestand subdued the young men of Israel.
In spite of all this, they kept on sinning;despite his wonderful works, they did not believe.So he ended their days in futility,and their years in sudden terror.When he slew them, they would seek him;they repented and searched for God.And they remembered that God was their Rock,that God Most High was their Redeemer.
But they deceived him with their mouths,and lied to him with their tongues.Their hearts were disloyal to him,and they were unfaithful to his covenant.
And yet he was compassionate;he forgave their iniquity and did not destroy them.He often restrained his angerand did not unleash his full wrath.He remembered that they were but flesh,a passing breeze that does not return.
How often they disobeyed him in the wildernessand grieved him in the desert!Again and again they tested Godand provoked the Holy One of Israel.They did not remember his power —the day he redeemed them from the adversary,when he performed his signs in Egyptand his wonders in the fields of Zoan.
He turned their rivers to blood,and from their streams they could not drink.He sent swarms of flies that devoured them,and frogs that devastated them.He gave their crops to the grasshopper,the fruit of their labor to the locust.He killed their vines with hailstonesand their sycamore-figs with sleet.He abandoned their cattle to the hailand their livestock to bolts of lightning.
He unleashed his fury against them,wrath, indignation, and calamity—a band of destroying angels.He cleared a path for his anger;he did not spare them from deathbut delivered their lives to the plague.He struck all the firstborn of Egypt,the virility in the tents of Ham.
He led out his people like sheepand guided them like a flock in the wilderness.He led them safely, so they did not fear,but the sea engulfed their enemies.He brought them to his holy land,to the mountain his right hand had acquired.He drove out nations before themand apportioned their inheritance;he settled the tribes of Israel in their tents.
But they tested and disobeyed God Most High,for they did not keep his decrees.They turned back and were faithless like their fathers,twisted like a faulty bow.They enraged him with their high placesand provoked his jealousy with their idols.
On hearing it, God was furiousand rejected Israel completely.He abandoned the tabernacle of Shiloh,the tent he had pitched among men.He delivered his strength to captivity,and his splendor to the hand of the adversary.He surrendered his people to the swordbecause he was enraged by his heritage.Fire consumed his young men,and their maidens were left without wedding songs.His priests fell by the sword,but their widows could not lament.
Then the Lord awoke as from sleep,like a mighty warrior overcome by wine.He beat back his foes;he put them to everlasting shame.He rejected the tent of Josephand refused the tribe of Ephraim.But he chose the tribe of Judah,Mount Zion, which he loved.He built his sanctuary like the heights,like the earth he has established forever.
He chose David his servantand took him from the sheepfolds;from tending the ewes he brought himto be shepherd of his people Jacob,of Israel his inheritance.So David shepherded them with integrity of heartand guided them with skillful hands.
Psalm 79
A Psalm of Asaph.
The nations, O God, have invaded your inheritance;they have defiled your holy templeand reduced Jerusalem to rubble.They have given the corpses of your servantsas food to the birds of the air,the flesh of your saints to the beasts of the earth.They have poured out their blood like waterall around Jerusalem,and there is no one to bury the dead.We have become a reproach to our neighbors,a scorn and derision to those around us.
How long, O LORD?Will you be angry forever?Will your jealousy burn like fire?Pour out your wrath on the nationsthat do not acknowledge you,on the kingdomsthat refuse to call on your name,for they have devoured Jacoband devastated his homeland.
Do not hold past sins against us;let your compassion come quickly,for we are brought low.Help us, O God of our salvation,for the glory of your name;deliver us and atone for our sins,for the sake of your name.Why should the nations ask,“Where is their God?”Before our eyes, make known among the nationsyour vengeance for the bloodshed of your servants.
May the groans of the captives reach you;by the strength of your arm preserve those condemned to death.Pay back into the laps of our neighborssevenfold the reproach they hurled at you, O Lord.Then we your people, the sheep of your pasture,will thank you forever;from generation to generationwe will declare your praise.
Psalm 80
For the choirmaster. To the tune of “The Lilies of the Covenant.” A Psalm of Asaph.
Hear us, O Shepherd of Israel,who leads Joseph like a flock;you who sit enthroned between the cherubim,shine forth before Ephraim, Benjamin, and Manasseh.Rally your mighty powerand come to save us.Restore us, O God,and cause your face to shine upon us,that we may be saved.
O LORD God of Hosts,how long will your anger smolderagainst the prayers of your people?You fed them with the bread of tearsand made them drink the full measure of their tears.You make us contend with our neighbors;our enemies mock us.Restore us, O God of Hosts,and cause your face to shine upon us,that we may be saved.
You uprooted a vine from Egypt;you drove out the nations and transplanted it.You cleared the ground for it,and it took root and filled the land.The mountains were covered by its shade,and the mighty cedars with its branches.It sent out its branches to the Sea,and its shoots toward the River.
Why have you broken down its walls,so that all who pass by pick its fruit?The boar from the forest ravages it,and the creatures of the field feed upon it.Return, O God of Hosts, we pray!Look down from heaven and see!Attend to this vine—the root your right hand has planted,the son you have raised up for yourself.
Your vine has been cut down and burned;they perish at the rebuke of your countenance.Let your hand be upon the man at your right hand,on the son of man you have raised up for yourself.Then we will not turn away from you;revive us, and we will call on your name.Restore us, O LORD God of Hosts;cause your face to shine upon us,that we may be saved.
Psalm 81
For the choirmaster. According to Gittith. Of Asaph.
Sing for joy to God our strength;make a joyful noise to the God of Jacob.Lift up a song, strike the tambourine,play the sweet-sounding harp and lyre.Sound the ram’s horn at the New Moon,and at the full moon on the day of our Feast.For this is a statute for Israel,an ordinance of the God of Jacob.He ordained it as a testimony for Josephwhen he went out over the land of Egypt,where I heard an unfamiliar language:
“I relieved his shoulder of the burden;his hands were freed from the basket.You called out in distress, and I rescued you;I answered you from the cloud of thunder;I tested you at the waters of Meribah.SelahHear, O my people, and I will warn you:O Israel, if only you would listen to me!There must be no strange god among you,nor shall you bow to a foreign god.I am the LORD your God,who brought you up out of Egypt.Open wide your mouth,and I will fill it.
But my people would not listen to me,and Israel would not obey me.So I gave them up to their stubborn heartsto follow their own devices.If only my people would listen to me,if Israel would follow my ways,how soon I would subdue their enemiesand turn my hand against their foes!Those who hate the LORD would feign obedience,and their doom would last forever.But I would feed you the finest wheat;with honey from the rock I would satisfy you.”
Psalm 82
A Psalm of Asaph.
God presides in the divine assembly;he renders judgment among the gods:
“How long will you judge unjustlyand show partiality to the wicked?SelahDefend the cause of the weak and fatherless;uphold the rights of the afflicted and oppressed.Rescue the weak and needy;save them from the hand of the wicked.They do not know or understand;they wander in the darkness;all the foundations of the earth are shaken.I have said, ‘You are gods;you are all sons of the Most High.’But like mortals you will die,and like rulers you will fall.”
Arise, O God, judge the earth,for all the nations are your inheritance.
Psalm 83
A song. A Psalm of Asaph.
O God, be not silent; be not speechless;be not still, O God.See how your enemies rage,how your foes have reared their heads.With cunning they scheme against your peopleand conspire against those you cherish,saying, “Come, let us erase them as a nation;may the name of Israel be remembered no more.”
For with one mind they plot together,they form an alliance against you—the tents of Edom and the Ishmaelites,of Moab and the Hagrites,of Gebal, Ammon, and Amalek,of Philistia with the people of Tyre.Even Assyria has joined them,lending strength to the sons of Lot.SelahDo to them as you did to Midian,as to Sisera and Jabin at the River Kishon,who perished at Endorand became like dung on the ground.Make their nobles like Oreb and Zeeb,and all their princes like Zebah and Zalmunna,who said, “Let us possess for ourselvesthe pastures of God.”
Make them like tumbleweed, O my God,like chaff before the wind.As fire consumes a forest,as a flame sets the mountains ablaze,so pursue them with your tempest,and terrify them with your storm.Cover their faces with shame,that they may seek your name, O LORD.
May they be ever ashamed and terrified;may they perish in disgrace.May they know that you alone,whose name is the LORD,are Most High over all the earth.