I'm back at Psalm 132. Thinking about those pilgrims, joyfully climbing that winding, upward trail to Jerusalem. Calling back and forth to each other with praises and thanksgiving to God. Focusing on how God answered their prayers abundantly, by promising them even more than they requested.
They would have been following the journey of the Ark of the Covenant as it was brought up to Jerusalem at the time of King David.
Verses 6-9 talk about that journey. It is of great historical significance. Remember when David originally tried to bring up the Ark?
He took 30,000 men to retrieve it. (It had been captured by the Philistines during the time of Eli and apparently no one searched for it, or maybe even thought about it, until David became King. Israel had lost 30,000 men in the battle with the Philistines when the Ark was taken [1 Samuel 4 gives us the story].The Ark didn't turn out to be valuable booty for the Philistines. In fact, it caused all kinds of trouble. So they brought it to a village in Israel and asked the Jews to come take it back! And then for 20 years it remained in one of their fields.)
When David arranged to have the Ark transported he gathered a corp of 30,000 soldiers to make the trip. They placed the Ark on a "new cart" (2 Sam. 6). We can't help but wonder why it was placed on a cart. Were the poles missing? God's instructions were clear -- place the poles through the rings on the Ark and carry it that way.
The Israelites were celebrating -- singing and playing harps and lyres and tambourines and cymbals. They began their journey. Then the predictable thing happened: the oxen stumbled, and the Ark tottered on the cart. Uzzah reached out to steady it. The LORD's anger burned against Uzzah and God struck him down.
Why did God do that? Well, why did the Iaraelites trivialize the transportation of the Ark? God had told them how He wanted it carried. They ignored His commands.
It was not dirt that would contaminate the Ark. It could have fallen in a great trash heap and not be defiled. It was human touch that contaminated the Ark.
David became angry at God and left it in the field of Obed-Edom. "How can the Ark of God ever come to me?" he asked. It stayed there for 3 months with Obed-Edom and "the LORD blessed him and his entire household."
Then in I Chronicles 15 we read how David figured it all out. He prepared a place for God's Ark in Jerusalem and arranged for the Levites to carry it up from Obed-Edom's land, "with poles on their shoulders as Moses had commanded with the word of the LORD." And "David told the Levites to appoint their brothers as singers to sing joyful songs, accompanied by musical instruments: lyres, harps and cymbals."
Kenaniah, the head of the Levites, was in charge of the singing, "because he was skillful at it." And there were trumpets and ram's horns blowing and everyone shouting and cheering!
Wow...what a festival! What a parade!
And David, dressed in fine linen, as were the Levites and the choirs, danced and shouted with joy as he, too, joined in the procession.
C. S. Lewis talks about this wonderful scene:
David danced before the Ark. He danced with such abandon that one of his wives thought he was making a fool of himself. He didn't care whether he as making a fool of himself or not. He was rejoicing in the Lord! The most valuable thing the Psalms do for me is to express the same delight in God which made David dance.
In the Psalms I find an experience fully God-centered, asking of God no gift more urgently than His presence, the gift of Himself, joyous to the highest degree.
The exuberant pilgrims in Psalm 132 remind us that we have even more reason to rejoice than they did! They anticipated what Christ would accomplish. But we are the recipients!
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