Scripture Daily

Context No. 1117 of 4322 · Psalms

Context · Reflection

Psalms 92:1-15: in context

1It is a good thing to give thanks to the LORD, to sing praises to your name, Most High, 2to proclaim your loving kindness in the morning, and your faithfulness every night, 3with the ten-stringed lute, with the harp, and with the melody of the lyre. 4For you, LORD, have made me glad through your work. I will triumph in the works of your hands. 5How great are your works, LORD! Your thoughts are very deep. 6A senseless man doesn’t know, neither does a fool understand this: 7though the wicked spring up as the grass, and all the evildoers flourish, they will be destroyed forever. 8But you, LORD, are on high forever more. 9For behold, your enemies, LORD, for behold, your enemies shall perish. All the evildoers will be scattered. 10But you have exalted my horn like that of the wild ox. I am anointed with fresh oil. 11My eye has also seen my enemies. My ears have heard of the wicked enemies who rise up against me. 12The righteous shall flourish like the palm tree. He will grow like a cedar in Lebanon. 13They are planted in the LORD’s house. They will flourish in our God’s courts. 14They will still produce fruit in old age. They will be full of sap and green, 15to show that the LORD is upright. He is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in him.

This is the psalm for the Sabbath day. It is good to give thanks to the LORD, it begins, to declare his love in the morning and his faithfulness by night, with music. The psalmist marvels at how great God's works are and how deep his thoughts, and notes that though the wicked flourish like grass, they are only doomed to destruction, while the LORD reigns on high forever. And then a lovely image of the righteous: they flourish like the palm tree and grow like a cedar, planted in the house of the LORD, still bearing fruit in old age, full of sap and green.

The image at the end is worth holding: the righteous still bearing fruit in old age, full of sap and green. In a world that treats the old as spent and done, the psalm insists the opposite about a life planted in God: it goes on producing, still fruitful, still fresh and green, in the years when everything else is fading. The secret is where they are planted, in the house of the LORD, in his courts; a life rooted in God draws its life from a source that does not dry up with age, so it keeps bearing fruit long after other things wither. This is a hopeful word about growing old faithfully. The palm and the cedar are long-lived, deep-rooted trees, and the promise is that those planted in God do not have a season and then decline but keep flourishing, and even their late fruit has a purpose: to show that the LORD is upright, that he is a rock. The fruitful old age of the faithful is itself a testimony that the God they trusted is faithful and sustaining to the end.

Am I planting my life deep in the house of the LORD so that I keep bearing fruit even into old age, my late fruitfulness itself a testimony that God is faithful and upright?

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