by Teacher Maria José de Lima Stevão
By the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept when we
remembered Zion. There on the poplars we hung our harps, for there
our captors asked us for songs, our tormentors demanded songs of joy;
they said, “Sing us one of the songs of Zion!” How can
we sing the songs of the Lord while in a foreign land? (Psalm 137: 1-4)
The Psalms were grouped into 5 books and the number
137 belongs to the fifth group. It is said that that Psalm is of an anonymous author so his
name is not known.
Chapter 36 of II Chronicles tells that King Zedekiah
was stubborn, did not want to repent and return to the Lord. Like the kings who
preceded him, Zedekiah did things that are not pleasing to God and also did not
humble himself before the prophet Jeremiah who announced the Lord's message.
So God caused the Babylonian army to march against
them, killing young men, adults and old people, taking all the temple objects
and the king's treasures to Babylon. And the soldiers also burned the temple!
Jerusalem residents who were not killed were taken prisoner and became slaves
to the king and his descendants.
Then one of the exiles mourns the bitterness of
captivity.
The people of Israel were enslaved for 70 years. After
that, King Cyrus ordered all the people to return to Jerusalem. And it was in
Cyrus' reign that what the Lord had said by the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled.
(II Cr.36: 21)
Ezra, a scholar of the law of God, gives the list of
all who have returned to their beloved homeland, with the mission of building
the Lord's temple again. First a group returned, by order of King Cyrus (Ezra
1:1; 2:70), and years later, after the temple was built and inaugurated, another
group returned under the direction of Ezra (Ezra 7:1; 10:44).
The people of God had hung the harps and was
challenged by the people of the land: "Sing one of the songs of
Zion".
In Luke 19:40, we read that the people gave loud
praise, but the Pharisees asked Jesus to rebuke them. However, Jesus said,
"If these are silent, the stones themselves will cry out."
We have to praise God; we cannot expect the stones to
cry out, nor can the Pharisees of unbelief tell us to shut up.
Did the Babylonians in our text really want to hear a
song, or were they actually challenging the Israelites, and consequently, the
God they served?
Wouldn't it also be an opportunity for the Israelites
to show their confidence in the Lord and sing with joy, proving that their God
was real, faithful and just?
Reading the Word of God and knowing these stories is a
wonderful thing! We learned that, despite the rebellion of his people, at all
times, God always gives an opportunity for repentance. He saves and honors
those who are his.
That text came to my heart one of these days and I
imagined myself sitting, crying with longing, together with those people. But
hope filled my heart!
"Weeping stay for the night" (short time), "but
rejoicing comes in the morning." Psalm 30:5b
Our sadness must not impair the vision of a time when
we will sing joyful songs again.
If today, prostrated, we cry, nothing can take away the hope that tomorrow we will sing, with joy, a song of Zion.
