The Next Generation

Psalm 78

A Maskil of Asaph.

¹Give ear, O my people, to my teaching; incline your ears to the words of my mouth!

²I will open my mouth in a parable; I will utter dark sayings from of old,

³things that we have heard and known, that our fathers have told us.

⁴We will not hide them from their children, but tell to the coming generation the glorious deeds of the Lord, and his might, and the wonders that he has done.

⁵He established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers to teach to their children,

⁶that the next generation might know them, the children yet unborn, and arise and tell them to their children,

⁷so that they should set their hope in God and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments;

⁸and that they should not be like their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation whose heart was not steadfast, whose spirit was not faithful to God.

⁹The Ephraimites, armed with the bow, turned back on the day of battle.

¹⁰They did not keep God’s covenant, but refused to walk according to his law.

¹¹They forgot his works and the wonders that he had shown them.

¹²In the sight of their fathers he performed wonders in the land of Egypt, in the fields of Zoan.

¹³He divided the sea and let them pass through it, and made the waters stand like a heap.

¹⁴In the daytime he led them with a cloud, and all the night with a fiery light.

¹⁵He split rocks in the wilderness and gave them drink abundantly as from the deep.

¹⁶He made streams come out of the rock and caused waters to flow down like rivers.

¹⁷Yet they sinned still more against him, rebelling against the Most High in the desert.

¹⁸They tested God in their heart by demanding the food they craved.

¹⁹They spoke against God, saying, “Can God spread a table in the wilderness?

²⁰He struck the rock so that water gushed out and streams overflowed. Can he also give bread or provide meat for his people?”

²¹Therefore, when the Lord heard, he was full of wrath; a fire was kindled against Jacob; his anger rose against Israel,

²²because they did not believe in God and did not trust his saving power.

²³Yet he commanded the skies above and opened the doors of heaven,

²⁴and he rained down on them manna to eat and gave them the grain of heaven.

²⁵Man ate of the bread of the angels; he sent them food in abundance.

²⁶He caused the east wind to blow in the heavens, and by his power he led out the south wind;

²⁷he rained meat on them like dust, winged birds like the sand of the seas;

²⁸he let them fall in the midst of their camp, all around their dwellings.

²⁹And they ate and were well filled, for he gave them what they craved.

³⁰But before they had satisfied their craving, while the food was still in their mouths,

³¹the anger of God rose against them, and he killed the strongest of them and laid low the young men of Israel.

³²In spite of all this, they still sinned; despite his wonders, they did not believe.

³³So he made their days vanish like a breath, and their years in terror.

³⁴When he killed them, they sought him; they repented and sought God earnestly.

³⁵They remembered that God was their rock, the Most High God their redeemer.

³⁶But they flattered him with their mouths; they lied to him with their tongues.

³⁷Their heart was not steadfast toward him; they were not faithful to his covenant.

³⁸Yet he, being compassionate, atoned for their iniquity and did not destroy them; he restrained his anger often and did not stir up all his wrath.

³⁹He remembered that they were but flesh, a wind that passes and comes not again.

⁴⁰How often they rebelled against him in the wilderness and grieved him in the desert!

⁴¹They tested God again and again and provoked the Holy One of Israel.

⁴²They did not remember his power or the day when he redeemed them from the foe,

⁴³when he performed his signs in Egypt and his marvels in the fields of Zoan.

⁴⁴He turned their rivers to blood, so that they could not drink of their streams.

⁴⁵He sent among them swarms of flies, which devoured them, and frogs, which destroyed them.

⁴⁶He gave their crops to the destroying locust and the fruit of their labor to the locust.

⁴⁷He destroyed their vines with hail and their sycamores with frost.

⁴⁸He gave over their cattle to the hail and their flocks to thunderbolts.

⁴⁹He let loose on them his burning anger, wrath, indignation, and distress, a company of destroying angels.

⁵⁰He made a path for his anger; he did not spare them from death, but gave their lives over to the plague.

⁵¹He struck down every firstborn in Egypt, the firstfruits of their strength in the tents of Ham.

⁵²Then he led out his people like sheep and guided them in the wilderness like a flock.

⁵³He led them in safety, so that they were not afraid, but the sea overwhelmed their enemies.

⁵⁴And he brought them to his holy land, to the mountain which his right hand had won.

⁵⁵He drove out nations before them; he apportioned them for a possession and settled the tribes of Israel in their tents.

⁵⁶Yet they tested and rebelled against the Most High God and did not keep his testimonies,

⁵⁷but turned away and acted treacherously like their fathers; they twisted like a deceitful bow.

⁵⁸For they provoked him to anger with their high places; they moved him to jealousy with their idols.

⁵⁹When God heard, he was full of wrath, and he utterly rejected Israel.

⁶⁰He forsook his dwelling at Shiloh, the tent where he dwelt among mankind,

⁶¹and delivered his power to captivity, his glory to the hand of the foe.

⁶²He gave his people over to the sword and vented his wrath on his heritage.

⁶³Fire devoured their young men, and their young women had no marriage song.

⁶⁴Their priests fell by the sword, and their widows made no lamentation.

⁶⁵Then the Lord awoke as from sleep, like a strong man shouting because of wine.

⁶⁶And he put his adversaries to rout; he put them to everlasting shame.

⁶⁷He rejected the tent of Joseph; he did not choose the tribe of Ephraim,

⁶⁸but he chose the tribe of Judah, Mount Zion, which he loves.

⁶⁹He built his sanctuary like the high heavens, like the earth, which he has founded forever.

⁷⁰He chose David his servant and took him from the sheepfolds;

⁷¹from following the nursing ewes he brought him to shepherd Jacob his people, Israel his inheritance.

⁷²With upright heart he shepherded them and guided them with his skillful hand.

One of my favorite moments with my grandsons are the “story times.” They will regularly ask me to tell them stories of their ancestors (my grandparents, my parents, my brother, their aunt, their mom . . .) and they generally love the ones about our childhoods the most. What they don’t realize is that even in the telling of those stories we are creating another sweet memory.

In this long prayer, Asaph is recounting the goodness of God and the fickle nature of man. It is a stark contrast and one with which we can relate if we are self-aware at all. It is shocking to me that we would look out upon the mess that is our world and be mystified as to how it got this bad. We “tsk” our tongues and shake our heads and nothing changes as we trip along through life largely without God. The first 6 verses probably capture our imagination most deeply for they strike at our role as parents and teachers of the faith. We bemoan the fact that God is disappearing from the way that we live and yet we are ones who are killing His presence. We are the ones who do not discuss Him with the children. We are the ones who do not see the world through the lens of His love. We are not adequately painting a picture of our lives surrounded by a loving and Saving God. Then we wonder why the children have no faith. It’s because we’ve failed to tell the children of God’s hand at work in our own lives. Maybe that’s because we’re just too busy to see Him at work and thus have nothing to tell. That’s a little tragic too.

While the psalm is a long one, the immediate message is brief but critical. Our children won’t know what we don’t tell them. The name of Jesus needs to be on our lips when we speak to the children (and to our fellow adults). And I don’t mean as a curse or swear word. I mean as a testimony to His great love for us. I do a fair amount of public speaking and often I can be stymied by the fact that I don’t have any new information to share!!! Wait – why am I looking for new information when the Gospel of Jesus Christ never gets old? As I prepare for these events I almost always have to remind myself that sharing the Good News of Jesus is exactly why I'm there speaking in the first place. Telling others that He died to save them from their sins is forever appropriate to share with the audience. We cannot hear it enough. Just as my grandsons love to hear the same stories again and again, so too do we love to hear the truth of our salvation in Christ. Recounting what God has done for me is the best story to tell, over and over again.