A Kiss to Long For

“We’ve been here before,” she said, pouring out a familiar tale of recurring failure. “How can we as a country ignore our history like this?” he asked, astonished by how far his society was slipping the Gospel moorings that had shaped it for so long.

This psalm is the cry of a people who can look back on the goodness and mercy of God (1-3), but see that as something in the past, not their present experience. Yet the cry of verse 4 is “Restore us again, God our Savior,” and this is a psalm full of hope. If in James’s letter we see the responsibility to restore brothers and sisters wandering from the truth, here is the penitent cry of the wanderers looking to the Master Restorer for their hope. Confidence comes not from looking at the people, for they are hardly mentioned, but from a close look at God himself. The questions of verse 5 and 6 are swiftly answered with the awareness of verse 7. God is a God of covenant and unfailing love–a God who delights in the creative work of salvation.

If the plea is for God to turn them, “restore us again” (4), “revive us again” (6), with the commitment “I will listen” (8), then the promised peace, which gives the psalmist such confidence, is on a scale beyond our expectations. As he looks ahead (8-12), watch the extraordinary harmonies he rejoices in. This is far more than some cosmetic “kiss and make up.” Too often our prayers, and our hopes, never extend beyond the individual, but here is a prayer far wider. Heaven and earth join hands, and land and people experience blessing in the taste of glory he leaves us to savor at the end.

“I will listen to what God the Lord will say” (8). Take time to immerse yourself in God’s promises about himself and for his people. Rejoice in them and him.