Restore us, O Lord God of hosts

Psalm 80      

To the leader: on Lilies, a Covenant. Of Asaph. A Psalm.

1 Give ear, O Shepherd of Israel, you who lead Joseph like a flock!
You who are enthroned upon the cherubim, shine forth
2     before Ephraim and Benjamin and Manasseh.
Stir up your might, and come to save us!

3 Restore us, O God; let your face shine, that we may be saved.

4 O Lord God of hosts,
    how long will you be angry with your people’s prayers?
5 You have fed them with the bread of tears,
    and given them tears to drink in full measure.
6 You make us the scorn of our neighbours;
    our enemies laugh among themselves.

7 Restore us, O God of hosts; let your face shine, that we may be saved.

8 You brought a vine out of Egypt;
    you drove out the nations and planted it.
9 You cleared the ground for it;  it took deep root and filled the land.
10 The mountains were covered with its shade, the mighty cedars with its branches;
11 it sent out its branches to the sea, and its shoots to the River.
12 Why then have you broken down its walls,
    so that all who pass along the way pluck its fruit?
13 The boar from the forest ravages it, and all that move in the field feed on it.

14 Turn again, O God of hosts; look down from heaven, and see;
have regard for this vine,
15     the stock that your right hand planted.
16 They have burned it with fire, they have cut it down;
    may they perish at the rebuke of your countenance.
17 But let your hand be upon the one at your right hand,
    the one whom you made strong for yourself.
18 Then we will never turn back from you;
    give us life, and we will call on your name.

19 Restore us, O Lord God of hosts; let your face shine, that we may be saved.

The cry of the psalm is repeated three times (vs. 3, 7, 19).

Israel can do nothing to save itself. It cannot defend itself for the walls of protection are knocked down (vs. 12) and even the wild animals can enter the cities since there is nothing to stop them (vs. 13). The image is of a burnt, cut-down vine (vs. 16). Israel is without hope, without a future.

The only hope is the promise of what God has done in the past. For Israel has been in such a desperate situation before. God brought the vine out of Egypt (vs. 8) – the exodus in which the people were freed from slavery in Egypt when they had no hope. And Israel was turned from a landless nation, into one who had property, filling the land (vs. 9).

If God could do the miracle in the past, saving the people of Israel from slavery and bringing them to the land of promise – the psalm asks why could God not do that again? If God has done it once, God can do it again. Thus, the cry of the psalm is “restore” – do it again. You did it once, do it again.     

God has done great thing in the past in our lives – in the lives of our families, our community, and so on. Yet, it is easy to forget God’s past actions in the crisis of the present moment and try to struggle in our own strength to fix the problem. But in all honesty the challenges of our world are bigger than us – bigger than human beings. And so we are left with the same cry as the psalm writer – “Restore us, O God.”

PRAYER:  

Restore us, O Lord God of hosts, our only hope is in you. In a world where plague and warfare, greed and destruction seem to have all power, we come to you, for nowhere else will we find hope. Do again what you did in the past, save us. Save humanity from destroying itself. In Jesus’ name, we pray. Amen.

Peter Bush