Scripture Daily

Context No. 2102 of 4322 · Psalms

Context · Reflection

Psalms 85:1-13: in context

1LORD, you have been favorable to your land. You have restored the fortunes of Jacob. 2You have forgiven the iniquity of your people. You have covered all their sin. Selah. 3You have taken away all your wrath. You have turned from the fierceness of your anger. 4Turn us, God of our salvation, and cause your indignation toward us to cease. 5Will you be angry with us forever? Will you draw out your anger to all generations? 6Won’t you revive us again, that your people may rejoice in you? 7Show us your loving kindness, LORD. Grant us your salvation. 8I will hear what God, the LORD, will speak, for he will speak peace to his people, his saints; but let them not turn again to folly. 9Surely his salvation is near those who fear him, that glory may dwell in our land. 10Mercy and truth meet together. Righteousness and peace have kissed each other. 11Truth springs out of the earth. Righteousness has looked down from heaven. 12Yes, the LORD will give that which is good. Our land will yield its increase. 13Righteousness goes before him, and prepares the way for his steps.

This psalm, praying for the restoration of God's people, contains a line of surpassing beauty about God's saving work. Speaking of the salvation and peace God will bring, the psalmist says: mercy and truth meet together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other. Truth springs out of the earth, and righteousness looks down from heaven. In God's dealing with his people, qualities that might seem in tension, his mercy and his truth, his righteousness and his peace, meet and embrace, reconciled in his saving work.

The image of mercy and truth meeting, righteousness and peace kissing, points to a wonder at the heart of God's salvation. There can seem to be a tension between God's mercy and his truth: mercy would forgive, but truth requires that sin be reckoned with. There can seem to be a tension between his righteousness and his peace: righteousness demands what is right, but peace would reconcile. How can God be both merciful and true, both righteous and at peace with sinners? The psalm declares that in God's saving work these meet and embrace: mercy and truth meet together; righteousness and peace kiss each other. God finds a way to be fully merciful without setting aside truth, fully righteous while granting peace. This wonder is fulfilled supremely in Christ. At the cross, God's mercy and his truth meet: he forgives sinners, showing mercy, while truth is honored, for sin is not overlooked but borne. His righteousness and his peace embrace: he remains righteous, not winking at sin, while granting peace to those who were his enemies. God shows himself, Paul says, to be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus, both upholding what is right and justifying the sinner. In Christ, mercy and truth meet; righteousness and peace kiss. The Word became flesh, John says, full of grace and truth, the two held together in him. There is deep comfort in this. We might fear that God's mercy and his truth are at odds, that for him to forgive us he must somehow ignore our sin, or that his righteousness stands against any peace with us. The psalm and its fulfillment in Christ answer otherwise: God has reconciled these, showing mercy without setting aside truth, granting peace without compromising righteousness. We are forgiven not by God overlooking our sin but by his mercy and truth meeting in Christ, who bore it. This assures us that the God who saves us is fully merciful and fully true, fully righteous and at peace with us, all reconciled in his saving work. Mercy and truth have met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other; and in Christ we receive a mercy that does not set aside truth and a peace that does not compromise righteousness, the wonder of a salvation in which all of God's character is honored and we are freely forgiven.

Do I fear that God's mercy and his truth are at odds, that to forgive me he must overlook my sin, or that his righteousness stands against any peace with me, and can the psalm's image of mercy and truth meeting and righteousness and peace kissing, fulfilled in Christ where God shows himself both just and the justifier, assure me that I am forgiven not by God ignoring my sin but by his mercy and truth meeting in the one who bore it, so that I receive a mercy that honors truth and a peace that honors righteousness?

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