"Sacred Places"

Scripture Passage

Psalm 128; Psalm 129; Psalm 130; Psalm 132; Psalm 134; Psalm 135

Scripture Focus

LORD, remember David
     and all that he suffered.
              (Psalm 132:1 NLT)

Observation

Psalm 132 is another of the psalms of ascent—psalms that served especially as “Israel’s hymnbook” while the Israelites journeyed to Jerusalem for the various feasts celebrated as part of their covenant with Jehovah. They are beautifully poetic, deeply expressive psalms that capture the commitments and experiences of spiritual pilgrims.

Psalm 132 opens with an interesting prayer—

LORD, remember David
     and all that he suffered.
                (Psalm 132:1 NLT)

The psalm then celebrates David’s commitment in bringing the symbol of God’s presence—the Ark of the Covenant—into Jerusalem, and celebrates God’s choice of Jerusalem as the “home” He desired (vv 14-15).

In my imagination, as the people of God marched toward Jerusalem and sang this psalm, they must have been filled with both grateful nostalgia and spiritual longing—grateful nostalgia for the times and ways in which they had experienced God’s presence at the feasts in the past (as God inhabited His Holy City), and spiritual longing that God would be there to meet with them when they arrived again at their sacred destination.

And so this prayer by the Israelites—“Remember David”—is really a prayer that says, “Remember us!” In essence, “O God, you have chosen Jerusalem as your dwelling place—meet with us there again!  Be there in all your glory when we arrive!”

I pray that each of us has those kinds of places—those sacred places—where we know we’ve met with God. If that’s not yet true for you, I pray that God would give you those sacred places. I pray, as well, that we would each be filled with a deep and motivating longing to meet with Him in those sacred places again—that the memory of rewarding and strengthening times in His presence would draw us again to divine encounters with the Almighty God!

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