Where Ordinary Become Worship
Psalm 118
Do you ever approach your daily prayer time or Bible reading time and just don’t “feel” spiritual? Surely you know the “ordinary days,” when you wake up early to exercise, rush to get to work on time, slog through another day at work where you have done the same things in the same place for the last decade, fight traffic to get home, eat dinner, and sneak a few moments to yourself before you wake up and do it all over again?
Nothing bad happened, nothing good happened, just…ordinary.
Sometimes, perhaps most days, I come to my daily times of prayer stuck in the ordinary. Not feeling especially spiritual, I often wonder, can the Lord meet me in the ordinary?
Psalm 118 serves as a good example of how the Lord can meet us in the ordinary and transform the normal slog of life into God honoring worship.
This psalm begins by calling us to give thanks to the Lord for His steadfast love (1), repeating that phrase four times in four verses. And for those who are stuck in the ordinary, this psalm reminds us of all the ways we experience the steadfast love of the Lord in the ordinary rhythms of life. Some examples of His ordinary grace include hearing our prayers (5), walking by our side (6), providing general help (7), providing refuge (8), empowering us to defeat our enemies (10-12), helping us when we are pushed so hard that we feel like falling (13), strengthening us (14), filling us with joyful songs (14), and even discipling us in His steadfast love (18).
All of these represent the various and manifold types of grace we experience in our daily, ordinary lives. We daily experience His steadfast love when He listens to us when we ask for help in the midst of distress. We daily experience His steadfast love when He strengthens us by His indwelling spirit so that when life pushes, we don’t fall down. We daily experience His steadfast love when He delivers us from the evil one as refuge from the attacks of the spiritual forces of darkness. We daily experience His steadfast love when He fill us with His joy. We experience His steadfast love when He lovingly disciplines us for His glory and our good.
In other words, this song reminds us that even in the slog of the ordinary days, we experience the abundance of His steadfast love all the time!
And then we hit verse 19.
There is a notable shift in this psalm in verse 19, which is why this psalm is one of the Hallel Psalms. This group of songs, Psalm 113-118, were used in the corporate worship life of the Jews during the Passover Feast. For example, this might be why the crowds used a phrase from Psalm 118 (“Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord”) to welcome Jesus into Jerusalem for the week of the Passover Feast. The phrase was on their mind because they were immersed in this psalm during this week.
We can see why this particular psalm was connected with the Passover celebration, especially verse 27. This verse speaks of the “festal sacrifice” on the altar of the Lord. Furthermore, the “blessing” that falls on the one who “comes in the name of the Lord” refers to the worshipping one who comes to bless the Lord from the house of the Lord (26).
However, even if we look at this psalm outside of Passover Week, the shift in verse 19 is a move from the ordinary, daily experience of the steadfast love of the Lord into worship, even corporate worship.
The psalmist calls for the gates to be opened for him so that he can give thanks to the Lord. He enters Jerusalem through the gates of righteousness (19), which is the gate of the Lord (20). He gives thanks for the Lord is his salvation (20), which is the marvelous work of the Lord (23). The worshipper rejoices in the “day” the Lord has made, the ordinary, normal, slog of a day, in which he has experienced the steadfast love of the Lord.
In addition, Psalm 118 is an excellent example of how the ancient prayers of the psalms continue to lead us to the promised Messiah, Jesus Christ our Lord.
The New Testament connects the hopes of this prayer to Jesus several times. Jesus identified Himself as the “stone the builders rejected” (see Matthew 21.42) as did Peter (see Acts 4.11 and 1 Peter 2.4-8) and Paul (see Ephesians 2.20-22). The crowds quote verse 26 as they welcome Jesus into Jerusalem (see Matthew 21.9). The apostle Paul identifies Jesus as the Passover Lamb (see 1 Corinthians 5.7), the festal sacrifice bound to the altar (27). John introduces his gospel with the image of God causing His light to shine upon us (see John 1.5). Not to mention that the way we are able to enter through the “gates of righteousness” (19) is through the marvelous work of the Lord (23), the One who has become our “salvation” (21).
I guess my point is this. Our daily experience of the steadfast love of the Lord can transform the daily, normal, ordinary, slog of life into worship when we allow the Scriptures to open our eyes to His daily grace and to remind us of the awesome grace we have found in Christ.
May the ordinary lead you to the extraordinary.