Read Psalm 89:38-45. 38But now you have cast off and rejected; you are full of wrath against your anointed. 39You have renounced the covenant with your servant; you have defiled his crown in the dust. 40You have breached all his walls; you have laid his strongholds in ruins. 41All who pass by plunder him; he has become the scorn of his neighbors. 42You have exalted the right hand of his foes; you have made all his enemies rejoice. 43You have also turned back the edge of his sword, and you have not made him stand in battle. 44You have made his splendor to cease and cast his throne to the ground. 45You have cut short the days of his youth; you have covered him with shame.
The psalm takes a sudden and dramatic turn here at verse 38 – But now.
Maybe the past was full of God’s love and faithfulness, but now? All of that is gone. The psalmist will launch into a series of accusations against God himself. You renounced. You defiled. You breached. You exalted his foes. You rejected him in battle. You removed his splendor and crown. You cut short his days. You covered him with shame.
You have renounced the covenant.
Intellectually our theology may make it so that we know God cannot and will not renounce his covenants, but our experience tells us something different. When the walls of your city are being destroyed and your king is being dragged off in slave garments, it’s natural to question the faithfulness of God in that moment.
But what if this stanza is about God not only as the rejecter, but also as the rejected? What if God is the renounced, the defiled, the breached, the defeated, the dethroned, the cut short, the shamed. What if this stanza is about Christ and his cross?
If it is then can we walk back our accusations against God? Can we see that the very things that appear to be the faithlessness of God are actually his faithfulness? Can we see the rejection that Christ endured so that we would never have to? Can we see that things aren’t always as they appear, and that the worst of circumstance is never rejection by God, for Jesus has already embraced that rejection for us?
When we can begin to see these things, then we will be ready to truly trust God and to embrace to live is Christ as the path of his humility without the rejection.
You: When have you felt rejected by God?
You in Christ: How does union with Christ prove that we will never be rejected?
Christ in you: How does your union with the cross help you to process through your current suffering?
Pray: Father, Christ took my rejection and gave me your perfection. Help me to see that my suffering is never a rejection by you. Amen.
To Live is Christ 