Resource 8-10

The Sin of Ingratitude—Psalm 107

Revised Standard Version unless otherwise noted

If you’re a careful reader of your Bible, you may have noticed that the Book of Psalms
is divided into five books. Psalm 107 introduces Book Five. Book Four reflects on the
disaster of Israel’s loss of nationhood as a result of its disobedience to God and the
resulting exile in Babylon. The last two psalms in Book Four recall God’s redemptive
deeds in Israel’s history—what God had done worthy of Israel’s praise. Psalm 105
announces its theme as a call to remember and give thanks.

Psalm 105 then rehearses God’s saving interventions in the history of Israel. Psalm
106 begins with the same words that open Psalm 107 (NIV)—
Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good;
his love endures forever.

But, sadly, it continues with a confession—Israel forgot to pray and failed to praise
God. Allow me to summarize: Both we and our ancestors sinned by failing to consider
God’s wonderful works. We did not remember the abundance of his steadfast love.
Instead, we rebelled and pursued our own ways. He delivered us from slavery in Egypt
and spared us at the Red Sea. But soon we forgot his works and rejected his
guidance. We exchanged the glory of God for idols and forgot God. Many times he
delivered us, but we persisted in our rebellion and suffered the consequences.
Nevertheless, he continued to hear our cries of distress and to show us compassion.

From the bitter depths of Babylonian exile, the psalmist closes his poem with an
intercessory prayer for his fellow captives (Ps 106:47, NRSV).
Save us, O LORD our God,
and gather us from among the nations,
that we may give thanks to your holy name
and glory in your praise.

Psalm 107 introduces the final book of Psalms, which celebrates God’s answer to such
prayers. It begins with an invitation to give thanks to God and testimony to others of
God’s unfailing love: “O give thanks to the LORD,” followed by two explanations why
thanks is required: “for he is good” and “for his steadfast love endures for ever!”

This is a call to offer thanks to God because of (1) who he is and (2) what he has
done. Thanksgiving is the appropriate response to God’s character and conduct. God is
good, and he continually shows unfailing mercy/love. The psalmist urges, “Let the
redeemed of the LORD say so,” as the King James tradition states. Some modern
translations, like the NIV, urge the redeemed to “say this.” Obviously, the psalmist’s
intention is not that we should say “SO” or “THIS.” It is rather that we should pray—
“Thank you, Lord!” and testify—“God is good!” “His love never fails!” This is an
invitation to thanksgiving.

Those invited to give thanks are called “the redeemed of the LORD.” This expression
appears elsewhere in Scripture in Isaiah’s identification of the exiles returned from
Babylonian captivity (Is 62:12).
• Thus says the LORD . . . : “Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you
by name, you are mine” (43:1).

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 • “Fear not, for I am with you; I will bring you . . . from the east, and from the
west . . . the north . . . and . . . the south . . . [I will] bring my sons from afar
and my daughters from the end of the earth” (vv 5-6).
• “I am the LORD, and besides me there is no savior . . . I am God . . . your
Redeemer . . . your Holy One, [your] Creator . . . your King” (vv 11, 13-15).
• And you are my “chosen people, the people whom I formed for myself that
[you] might declare my praise” (vv 20-21).

The setting of Psalm 107 is obviously congregational worship. People have “gathered
in from the lands, from the east and from the west, from the north and from the
south.” Men and women from every compass direction have come together to worship.
What they have in common is the experience of redemption—deliverance “from
trouble” of one kind or another (v 2).

What follows in the psalm are four matching pictures of redemption: The worship
leader invites the assembled worshipers to thank and praise God by recalling and
recounting how God redeemed them. He must have suggested a pattern to imitate
and they must have obliged. For verses 4-32 consist of four matching pictures of
redemption. Each has a nearly identical structure, highlighted by similar phrases.

Problems: Four descriptions of trouble, described in the past tense:

1. Some were lost in the desert (vv 4-5).
2. Some were in prison (vv 10-12).
3. Some were so sick they nearly died (vv 17-18).
4. Some nearly drowned in a storm at sea (vv 23-27).

Prayers: Four reports of prayers for deliverance:

1. “Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble” (v 6)
2. “Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble” (v 13)
3. “Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble” (v 19)
4. “Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble” (v 28)

Provisions: Four reports of specific answers to prayers:

1. “He delivered them from their distress” by leading them home (vv 6-7).
2. “He delivered them from their distress” by freeing them from prison (vv 13-
14).
3. “He delivered them from their distress” by healing them (vv 19-20).
4. “He delivered them from their distress” by calming the sea and bringing them
safely to harbor (vv 28-30).

Pleas for Praise: Four invitations to give thanks:45

1. “Let them thank the LORD for his steadfast love,
for such wonderful works to the sons of men!” (v 8).
2. “Let them thank the LORD for his steadfast love,
for such wonderful works to the sons of men!” (v 15).
3. “Let them thank the LORD for his steadfast love,
for such wonderful works to the sons of men!” (v 21).
4. “Let them thank the LORD for his steadfast love,
for such wonderful works to the sons of men!” (v 31).

Proof: Four reasons to give thanks / invitations to testify:

1. “For he satisfies him who is thirsty,
and the hungry he fills with good things” (v 9).
2. “For he shatters the doors of bronze,

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 and cuts in two the bars of iron” (v 16).
3. “And let them offer sacrifices of thanksgiving,
and tell of his deeds in songs of joy!” (v 22).
4. “Let them extol him in the congregation of the people,
and praise him in the assembly of the elders” (v 32).

In verses 33-41 the psalmist picks up a number of key phrases from the preceding
pictures of redemption to offer some generalizations about the meaning of
redemption. It is a divinely initiated reversal of fortunes. The psalmist is persuaded
that disaster and blessing come ultimately through the permission or providence of
God. He realizes that judgment and deliverance are often two sides of the same coin.
God turns streams into deserts, stumbling blocks into stepping stones, and earthly
sovereigns into subjects so that he may redeem. To deliver Israelite slaves from
bondage, God brought judgment on Egypt. There is no redemption without judgment.
Heaven would not be heaven if rebels were allowed to enter there.

A Word to the Wise

Psalm 107 concludes in verses 42 and 43 with a reminder that when God acts in the
events of our personal and national histories, righteous people “see it and are glad,”
but wicked people are silenced (v 42). Then, the psalmist urges his readers to
consider how they will respond. “Let those who are wise give heed to these things,
and consider the steadfast love of the LORD” (v 43, NRSV).

In other words: If we are wise, we will study these stories of redemption and learn
from them how the Lord shows his love. So, before we respond to the psalmist’s
invitation to give thanks to the Lord ourselves, let’s take his advice and study these
stories of redemption more closely.

Wanderers Retrieved

The first group among the gathered redeemed are road-weary travelers. Their
pilgrimage to thankfulness had taken them through the wilderness, through
uninhabited desert wastes. Theirs was not a purposeful journey, but aimless
wandering. With no moral compass, they had been everywhere, but it had gotten
them nowhere. Lost and alone, they grew so hungry and thirsty that “their life was
ebbing away” (v 5, NJB).

Each of the four pictures of redemption uses the same two words to characterize the
point of desperation that drove these redeemed worshipers to their knees, to cry out
to the Lord—“trouble” and “distress” (vv 6, 13, 19, and 28). Both words in Hebrew
refer to the discomfort of cramped quarters—of narrow, tight places. Before these
worshipers thought to pray, they had gotten themselves into desperate straits. They
were in a real bind. Life seemed to be closing in on them. They were in a pinch.

But then they prayed. And God met them at their precise point of need and led them
straight to civilization, to society. He brought them out of the empty places by a direct
route to a city, to a community of faith, to the fellowship with other believers. Here
they became people of integrity and responsibility. And God satisfied their hunger and
thirst with “good things.”

Prisoners Released

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The second group of redeemed worshipers had come by way of the pits. Theirs had
been a life of darkness and gloom. Depression and hopelessness had left them bowed
down and guilt-ridden. It is not clear whether they had been prisoners bound with iron
chains in some real jail somewhere or only prisoners of misery. No matter. Their
sentence amounted to the same—untold years of hard labor. Whether on a literal
chain gang or only an assembly line, their work had been meaningless, grinding toil.
Perhaps they were breaking big rocks into little rocks, turning little rocks into gravel,
and moving piles of gravel from one spot to another and back, only to repeat the
whole process again, back-breaking day after bone-weary day.

Or, perhaps they were only wishing their lives away—as every Monday morning they
wished it was quitting time on Friday. And perhaps they lived only for the weekend,
when they drowned their sorrows, numbing their senses with another artificial high.
Slaves to addictions and surface relationships, they were left used, unfulfilled, and
slaves. They were bound in chains too strong to break on their own. They could not
count how many times they had said, “Never again,” only to fall again into the same
self-destructive patterns. And when “they fell down,” there was “no one to help” (v 12,
NRSV).

They could not protest that they had been unjustly charged and convicted. They knew
full well that their misery was self-inflicted. “They had rebelled against the words of
God” (v 11), they had rejected the guidance of the Lord. Confined and subdued in
gloom and despair they, like the innocent travelers lost in the desert, knew they were
in serious “trouble.”

But then they prayed. And the God they had been avoiding in their foolish rebellion for
the freedom of their own way, who had been there all the time, met them at their
specific point of need and brought them to the real freedom they had longed for.

Sick Restored

The third group who offered thanksgiving consisted of those who had come to God by
way of the hospital. The psalm leaves their diagnosis ambiguous enough to leave us
guessing as to their precise symptoms. In any case, they were so sick they no longer
cared to eat. And they nearly died.

The Hebrew word translated “affliction” (v 17) can mean simply to be over occupied,
too busy. It can refer to the experience of oppression, mistreatment, abuse,
humiliation, or shame. Or, it can refer to the resulting depression of such
experiences—being downcast, discouraged, in despair. Whether from excess stress or
sinful habits, they had brought their sickness upon themselves. Perhaps they had
suffered at the hands of others—physical, sexual, or emotional abuse—through no
fault of their own. But whatever had been done to them in the past, they were
responsible for what they had done to themselves in response. Their present “trouble”
and “distress” were no one’s fault but their own.

And so in pain they prayed. And God heard their cry and “sent out his word and
healed them, and delivered them from destruction” (v 20, NRSV). Although the first
two groups are exhorted only to thank the Lord for their experience of redemption,
this group is specifically encouraged to testify to their deliverance—to “tell of [God’s]
deeds with songs of joy” (v 22, NRSV).

Storm-tossed Rescued

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The fourth group of gathered worshipers had been spared from disaster in the pursuit
of their occupation as sailors. They were hapless victims of circumstances beyond their
control. These were no novice Saturday sailors. These were seasoned seamen. They
knew and respected the sea as a place where God’s awesome power was displayed (v
24). And they had survived other storms that had only proven and improved their
skills as mariners. But this storm was different.
They mounted up to heaven,
they went down to the depths;
their courage melted away in their calamity;
they reeled
and staggered
like drunkards,
and were at their wits’ end (vv 26-27, NRSV).

Only then did they learn to pray. The expression “at their wits’ end” in Hebrew is
literally “all their wisdom was swallowed up.”46 Only when they realized that their own
wisdom was inadequate to the impossible task that faced them did they turn to the
wisdom that comes from above. They learned that the storm they could not navigate,
God could calm. The psalmist challenges such salvaged sailors to thank the Lord for
his covenant-keeping love (v 31). Once only awed by the power of God in the storm—
“his wondrous works in the deep” (v 24, NRSV)—they learned in the experience of
redemption to see the hushed quiet of the winds and sea (29) as even more
“wonderful works” (v 31, NRSV).

The psalmist will hear nothing of private gratitude. These rescued sailors are urged to
offer thanksgiving publicly—“in the assembly of the people . . . in the council of the
elders” (v 32, NASB).

Conclusion

Psalm 107 illustrates the experiences of four groups of redeemed people—wanderers

retrieved, prisoners released, sufferers restored, and sailors rescued. Redemption for
the lost and lonely is home. Redemption for the oppressed and depressed is help.
Redemption for the sick and suffering is health. Redemption for those in danger and
despair is haven.

This song of thanksgiving and its brief case histories teach how faith is sometimes
born and tested. Many come to worship God only after they have recognized through
dire personal straits that God guides in the wilderness, frees from bondage, heals from
self-inflicted wounds, and stills the storms of life.47

Such things as home and help and health and haven are sometimes not appreciated
until they are lost and recovered. Friends and freedom and feeling fine and fair
weather are not seen for the blessings they truly are until we have lost them. These
blessings, once lost and restored, quite naturally lead us to give thanks.

What if it didn’t take a disaster to teach us to appreciate our homes? Is it only dumb
cattle who strain at the fence, longing for greener pastures, and fail to notice the lush
fields in which they already reside. Has the failure to give thanks contributed to the
tragic epidemic of divorce that is sweeping through our churches?

What if we learned to enjoy life as it is, without going through all the pain and trouble
described in our psalm in order to appreciate it? What if we learned to be truly
thankful to God for the life he has given us?

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It is important to note that the psalmist “does not confront the problem of undeserved
and unrelieved evil.”48 He has nothing to say of the wanderers, who through no fault
of their own, never found their way home, who lie buried in an unmarked grave under
some unknown sand dune. He offers no consolation “for the victims of political
oppression or religious persecution who slowly rot away in their jails,” or for those
who remain hopelessly chained to self-destructive addictions. The psalmist “does not
seem to think of those who were born, or struck . . . with an incurable disease of body
or mind,” of babies born with AIDS or born to die with bloated bellies in some two-
thirds-world famine, or of young, God-fearing mothers who die of cancer, leaving
grieving children and husbands behind. “He ignores all the courageous and unsung
heroes ‘lost at sea.’”

But we should not fault the psalmist for this. His purpose was not to puzzle over the
insoluble mystery of evil—the perplexing problem of unjust suffering in this fallen
world. His words are addressed to us, the living—not to the dead.

He sings on behalf of those returned from aimless wandering. He sings for those who
know the fresh air of freedom that only Christ can bring.
He breaks the power of canceled sin.
He sets the prisoner free.
His blood can make the foulest clean.
His blood availed for me.49

The psalmist “sings on behalf of those who returned from the jaws of death,”50 of
those spared from would-be disasters. This psalm reminds us of the wonder of just
being alive. O Lord, “So teach us to count our days that we may gain a wise heart” (Ps
90:12, NRSV).

Psalm 107 also reminds us of the wisdom of living in daily dependence on God. There
is never a time when we do not need God. Crying out to the Lord, living in
dependence on him, should not be simply an emergency measure, but a way of life.
“True wisdom is to cry out to God, to acknowledge one’s utter dependence upon God
and to know that God’s steadfast love is sufficient for even the worst [case]
scenario.”51

What if we took the psalmist’s advice and seriously considered the mercy/love of the
Lord displayed in these matching pictures of redemption? Could we ever again take for
granted our home, our health, our freedom, or our haven? How can we ever again be
guilty of the sin of ingratitude?

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