Introduction
You can see from the title of Psalm 120 that this is a song of ascents. And if you take a look at the following psalms, you’ll see that each psalm up to and including Psalm 134 all have the same title. They are all songs of ascents.
So, there are fifteen of them and scholars think they’re arranged in two groups of seven with Psalm 127 in the middle. And it’s likely that were written for God’s people as they made their way up to Jerusalem for worship. As they ascended Mount Zion to go into Jerusalem, they might have sung these psalms together. Some scholars think they were written for the people who were returning from exile in Babylon. But it’s more likely that they were written for the people who made the annual pilgrimage to Jerusalem for the great religious festivals: the Passover; the Feast of Weeks or Pentecost; and the Feast of Tabernacles. And so, in the most well-known one — Psalm 121 — the pilgrims are on their way to Jerusalem, but there are dangers on the way. So, who will help them? And the answer is: ‘My help comes from the Lord.’
But today we begin the ascent with Psalm 120.
Verses 1 and 2
In verse 1, the psalmist says that he calls on the Lord in his distress. The word translated ‘distress’ means something like narrow place. So, he was in distress because he felt as if he was confined or hemmed in and there was no way out. He felt constricted. He was in a bind. Who was going to help him?
And so, he looked to the Lord for help. And, of course, he’s using God’s special covenant name, which appears in our English Bible as LORD in capital letters. So, he’s calling on the Lord, who has bound himself to his people with a promise to be our God and to help us. He knows he can always count on the Lord who has promised to love his people with a never-ending love. And sure enough, when he calls on the Lord, the Lord answers him.
He asks the Lord in verse 2 to save him from lying lips and from deceitful tongues. By referring to lying lips and deceitful tongues, he is, of course, referring to people with lying lips and deceitful tongues. He’s referring to people who are liars and deceivers.
These are the people who are causing him distress. He is perhaps surrounded by such people. They are all around him. He feels hemmed in by them and there doesn’t seem to be any escape from them and from their lies.
We don’t know who these liars were or what they were saying, but I’m reminded of David’s son, Absalom, who turned the people against David by standing outside Jerusalem. And whenever someone came to the city to seek David’s help concerning a dispute, Absalom lied to them and said his father was not interested in hearing their cases. And then he would say that if only he — Absalom — were appointed judge in the land, then everyone would receive justice. But with David in charge, there was no justice for anyone. And it says in 2 Samuel 15 that he stole the hearts of the men of Israel. He stole their hearts from his father.
I’m not saying that the psalm is about that, but that story of Absalom shows us the kind of damage a liar can do. They can destroy our reputation and they can stir up trouble for us. However, since this is a song of ascents, since it’s about travelling to Jerusalem, then perhaps we can imagine the pilgrims being deceived or misled by the people they meet on the way. And so, their journey has become difficult and they need the Lord to save them. The psalmist therefore called on the Lord in his distress and asked the Lord to save him from these liars and deceivers.
Verses 3 and 4
In verses 3 and 4, the psalmist addresses the liars and deceivers. He says to them: ‘What will he [the Lord] do to you…?’ What will he do to you? And what more will he do to you? What else will he do to you? And so, it’s as if he’s calling down a curse on them or he’s warning them to leave him alone or else they will have to answer to the Lord who acts on behalf of his people.
And then he answers his own question. This is what the liars and deceivers can expect from the Lord if they don’t leave him alone. And so, he warns them that the Lord will punish them with a warrior’s sharp arrows and with burning coals of the broom tree. The wood of a broom tree apparently burns easily. And it then retains its heat the way coal does. So, may they be punished with sharp arrows and with burning coals.
Notice, of course, that the psalmist is not taking matters into his own hands. He himself is not retaliating. He is not attacking these liars and deceivers. He is not taking revenge them himself. He’s leaving it to the Lord. Let the Lord repay them, but he will not. As it says in Deuteronomy 32 and in Romans 12, the Lord says: ‘It is mine to revenge; I will repay.’ And so, we ourselves are not to see revenge, but we’re to leave it to the Lord. Instead of being overcome by evil, we’re to overcome evil with good.
Verses 5 to 7
Verse 5 is puzzling, because the psalmist laments that he dwells in Meshech and Kedar, which were not part of the Promised Land. Since they are outside Israel, it’s unlikely that he was actually living in either of these two places, which are also far apart from one another. And so, the commentators suggest that because of his distress and because of the way the liars and deceivers have treated him, the psalmist feels it’s as if he’s living among foreigners who hate him instead of among his own people. He feels as if he’s living in a foreign city because of the way his own people are treating him.
And he laments in verse 6 that for too long he has lived among those who hate peace. So, these liars and deceivers have been stirring up trouble for him and for others. Instead of living in peace with their neighbours, they’ve been causing trouble. And the word he uses for peace is the Hebrew word shalom which conveys the idea of peace and contentment and that all is well. It seems to the psalmist that these people hate shalom. They hate peace and contentment and well-being. They are spoiling daily life. They are causing misery and pain.
On the other hand, the psalmist is a man of peace. Do you see that in verse 7? He wants peace. But they want war. They want trouble. I was watching the movie, The Big Country recently. It’s been on the BBC’s iPlayer. It’s set in the 1880s in Texas. And it’s about a feud between two families. And it seems that the heads of both families are always looking for an excuse to fight against the other. And they’re in dispute over access to a river where they want to water their cattle. But along comes James McKay, played by Gregory Peck, and he’s a man of peace. When Charlton Heston provokes him to fight, he will not be provoked. When they do eventually have a fist fight, Gregory Peck asks at the end what did it prove or accomplish? And then, when he had a chance to shoot his enemy, he refused. And since the two family heads were fighting over who had access to the river, he decided to buy the land around the river so that he could give equal access to both families. He was a man of peace, but the others were for war. I won’t spoil the ending in case you haven’t seen it, but it doesn’t end well for the men of war.
The psalmist was like Gregory Peck. He was a man of peace. But the liars and deceivers around him were for war. But instead of taking matters into his own hands, and seeking vengeance himself, he left it to the Lord. Let the Lord repay them for their wickedness. And let the Lord save me from my distress.
Conclusion
We, of course, are pilgrims like the psalmist. We are pilgrims because we’re on our way to the new Jerusalem to come in the new heavens and earth where we will gather with all of God’s people to worship and adore him for ever and for ever.
But there are dangers on the way and there will be people who hate us and who will seek to harm us. They might hate us because of our faith or they might hate us for other reasons. But they make our way difficult and perhaps they cause us trouble and distress.
And so, we can learn from the psalmist to call on the Lord in our distress and to seek his help. And instead of responding with violence and revenge, we can do as the psalmist did and leave it to the Lord. He will repay them in his own good time. And so, we can entrust ourselves to the Lord and we should seek peace and pursue it.
And we can turn to the Lord for help, because we’ve been reconciled to him through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave up his life on the cross to pay for our sins and to make peace for us with God.
The Lord Jesus is the perfect man of peace, who loved his enemies while he was on the earth and who prayed for those who crucified him. And he has established a lasting peace for us with God. And that means we can always look to God through Christ for the help and strength and protection we need. And we can trust in him to keep us on the narrow path that leads eventually to the new Jerusalem in the new heavens and earth where we will enjoy perfect shalom for ever and for ever.
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