Sep-17-0514-Oh, that my people would listen to me
514_Oh, that my people would listen to me Psalm 81 Sing aloud to God our strength; shout for joy to the God of Jacob! 2 Raise a song; sound the tambourine, the sweet lyre with the harp. 3 Blow the trumpet at the new moon, at the full moon, on our feast day. 4 For it is a statute for Israel, a rule of the God of Jacob. 5 He made it a decree in Joseph when he went out over the land of Egypt. I hear a language I had not known: 6 “I relieved your shoulder of the burden; your hands were freed from the basket. 7 In distress you called, and I delivered you; I answered you in the secret place of thunder; I tested you at the waters of Meribah. Selah 8 Hear, O my people, while I admonish you! O Israel, if you would but listen to me! 9 There shall be no strange god among you; you shall not bow down to a foreign god. 10 I am the Lord your God, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. Open your mouth wide, and I will fill it. 11 “But my people did not listen to my voice; Israel would not submit to me. 12 So I gave them over to their stubborn hearts, to follow their own counsels. 13 Oh, that my people would listen to me, that Israel would walk in my ways! 14 I would soon subdue their enemies and turn my hand against their foes. 15 Those who hate the Lord would cringe toward him, and their fate would last forever. 16 But he would feed you with the finest of the wheat, and with honey from the rock I would satisfy you.” A father once shared a story about his teenage son. The boy had grown increasingly distant, and was always with undesirable friends. The father warned him again and again—“Be careful. That road will only lead to pain.” But the son believed he knew better. Months later, the father received the kind of phone call every parent dreads. His son was in trouble with the law. Broken, guilty, and ashamed, the boy sat in the police station, wishing he had listened to his father. The father’s heart ached for his son. His pain was not because his son had flouted his authority, but for the loss of his son’s innocence, freedom, and inner sense of worth. That story echoes the cry of God in Psalm 81. This psalm is the cry of a Father longing for His children to listen and walk in His ways, and enjoy their rest and blessing. It is a lament, but also a promise. God’s voice speaks the same words to us today: “Oh, that my people would listen to me, that Israel would walk in my ways!” Psalm 81 was sung during a feast, most likely the Feast of Tabernacles. It was a time of remembrance of the marvelous deliverance from Egypt and God’s provision in the wilderness. Israel’s people gathered with joy to sing praise to God. The