Don't Hang Up Your Harp (Part 1)

Psalm 137:1-4 "By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we remembered Zion. We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof.

For there they that carried us away captive required of us a song; and they that wasted us required of us mirth, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion. How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?

Psalm 137 is one that is perfectly beautiful but completely honest.  It was apparently written by an unknown pilgrim who was taken prisoner to Babylon after Nebuchadnezzar’s crushing defeat of Jerusalem.  It is an imprecatory prayer of cursing his enemies. David also prayed several of the imprecatory prayers throughout the Psalms. We should only use these type of prayers against our spiritual enemies today.This Psalmist, whoever he was, sang his lament with a broken heart and a crippled spirit.  Each line of this psalm drips with blood and tears for a dream gone bad.              

The most telling part of this psalm to me is when the Psalmist writes, “We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof.”  The Jerusalem prisoners, being carried away captive to Babylon, refused to play their music and refused to sing their song in that strange land.  They left their lyres or harps upon the limbs of the willow trees.            

Like the Psalmist the circumstances of life often times cause us to "hang it up" or "silence our song."  We either do hang up our harps, or, we are at least sorely tempted to do so. Yet, God has a message for all of us who have felt we are trapped in a foreign land away from God. That message is simply this today:

Don’t hang up your harp! 

-Remember you still have music to play!

Psalm 150:3-5 "Praise him with the sound of the trumpet: praise him with the psaltery and harp. Praise him with the timbrel and dance: praise him with stringed instruments and organs. Praise him upon the loud cymbals: praise him upon the high sounding cymbals."

The harp of David brought comfort to Saul when he was troubled by the evil spirit. David believed in the power of music to celebrate and worship the Lord. In times of discomfort he would play and praise the Lord with music that was God given. You have a song to play that the devil wants to stop before you can start. If he can silence the praise and worship in your heart then he can control your mind and spirit. In those times when you feel like hanging up your harp on the willow trees or that God is a million miles from you lift up your hands and declare His glory. The music is still inside of you in spite of the territory you inhabit. Just open up you heart and let it flow. Discouragement is rampant, but God's grace is bigger and better.

-You still have a song to sing.            

Psalm 96:1 "O sing unto the Lord a new song: sing unto the Lord, all the earth."

If your song has lost it's joy maybe it's time to sing a new one. Sometimes we hold on to songs that don't bless us or bring us encouragement and we feel trapped in a place that seems to have no escape. My advise to you is to change your song. Quit singing songs of lamentation and start singing songs of praise. I love the old songs and the new ones as well, but I know the songs that depress and the songs that express the joy of the Lord. Don't stop singing in your valley; just change your tune and let the words of comfort flow.  God's got a song for you-just open up your heart and receive it. When you get it sing it out loud to yourself and listen to the words. Let the song of the Lord ring out and put your discouragement and despair at bay.