Psalm 138 Commentary

In the film The Godfather Part II, we see in flashbacks the rise of the mafia kingpin Don Vito Corleone back in the early 1900s.  At one point a friend of Vito’s wife was being kicked out of her apartment because she had been keeping a dog against the apartment rules.  So Vito talks to the landlord and pleads the widow’s cause.  At one point he says, “And she got rid of the animal that caused all the trouble.”  But no, the landlord has already rented to someone else who will pay more rent per month.  So Vito takes a wad of money out of his pocket and pays the rent difference for the next six months if the landlord will let her stay.  He finally agrees.  But then suddenly Vito says, “Oh, and the dog can stay too, right?”  (The landlord flies off the handle at this but then after finding out who Vito really is—a man who became the neighborhood’s mafia leader after violently murdering the previous mafia kingpin—both the widow and the dog get to stay.  He returns Vito’s money.  He even lowers the rent $10 a month from its previous amount!)

“Oh, and the dog can stay too, right?”  That is not where anyone thought that conversation would end.

The last line of Psalm 138 is like that.  This entire psalm expresses nothing but utter confidence in God.  God is praised for God’s faithfulness, for the wisdom of all God’s decrees.  All the kings of the earth are called upon to join in singing to Israel’s true God.  Then it is noted that despite how lofty and grand God is, he always manages to notice even the lowliest people.  Even those who live on the margins of society, those who are invisible to the eyes of so many people who pass by them: even these people are seen by God, cared for by God.  The psalmist then says that if he walks in the midst of trouble, God is with him.  God will vindicate the psalmist before all his enemies because God’s love endures forever.

And then: “Do not abandon the work of your hands.”

Where did that come from?  After almost 8 whole verses of utter confidence and effusive language about God suddenly there is this plaintive plea to not abandon him?  It’s almost as though the writer is saying, “You know all that great stuff I just wrote about you?  Well, please don’t stop being that way!”  But the whole premise of this song is that God never stops with his loving care, his faithfulness, his presence in all seasons of life.  That was the whole point here: God does not change.  God’s care extends forever.

So then why is the final line a request for God to not stop being who the rest of the psalm describes God to be if in fact all the prior claims of God’s lovingkindness extending forever were true?  Did a doubt suddenly pop into the writer’s mind?  Or despite believing everything he had just written did he think taking out just a little extra insurance was not a bad idea and so decided overtly to prod God to not abandon him or any of God’s works?

Most poets revise their poetry extensively before settling on a final version.  The poet Jane Kenyon was known to revise many of her poems dozens of times, sometimes scores of times.  You have to think those who composed the psalms did something similar, editing, tinkering, adjusting the language, taking some things out and adding other lines instead.  So let’s just say that perhaps in an early version of Psalm 138—or maybe in its very first version—the poet slapped on that last line because perhaps a little doubt did arise momentarily in his heart, perhaps he decided to just give God a last nudge in this song to ask him to keep on keeping on with everything that this psalm celebrates about God in the first place.  It occurred to him so, boom, he wrote it down.

But that line did not need to stay.  In subsequent revisions the poet could have thought, “Well, that’s not a great way to end such a confident song.  I mean, I know why I put it in there the first time but I’ll take it out because the prior line of ‘Your love, Lord, endures forever’ is a much nicer ending anyway.”

But no.  That last plaintive line stayed.  It survived the editing and revising process.  Scholars also believe that the Hebrew Psalter as we now have it was arranged and edited by someone—or by several people—who also redacted and edited a bit and they surely also could have removed that line.  Such edits happened over time in the transmission of Scripture.  We know in the history of biblical manuscripts across all those centuries when monks and others made copies of copies of copies (all by hand of course) that at times they editorialized a bit too, smoothing out the wrinkles on some of the more difficult sayings of Jesus, let’s say.  This is why one of the cardinal rules in trying to determine what the original text said when you have multiple copies of the same passage but that they do not all match is that if you have an easier-to-understand version of something Jesus said and a harder-to-understand version, you go with the more difficult one because if anything, some well-meaning scribe along the ages simplified it for the sake of clarity.  It’s the rule of lectio difficillior, the “harder text” is probably closer to the original.

But if so, then those who redacted and edited Psalm 138 did not remove that surprising last line either, even though it may make for a more difficult text.  And I think we can all guess why no one took this line out: because it’s so honest.  Even those of us who are praying people can feel this way.  Even those of us who are praying people because we so very much believe in the goodness and mercy and love of God can feel this.  You offer up your most ardent prayers but after you say “Amen,” the thought quietly arises in your heart, “Not sure if that will do any good.”  Or, “I sure hope God is listening to me today.”

Or we recall some past petitions for someone’s healing that were not answered the way we had hoped and in recalling that while now making yet another similar request to God we cannot but help think, “Oh, Lord, please don’t ignore me.  Please don’t abandon the work of your hands.  Not again!”

The last line of Psalm 138 is honest and it’s human and we all know this because we have all at one time or another thought the same thing.  What’s more, that line’s presence in the psalm also signals to us that God knows we all feel this way sometimes but also that that’s OK.  And there is more than a little comfort in that thought.

Illustration Idea

In a clever episode of the 1980s re-booted version of the TV show The Twilight Zone we witness a salesperson named Bill Lowery experience an utterly disorienting event.  It begins slowly.  One late-morning just before he heads home to have lunch with his wife and son, Bill is approached by a younger colleague who has asked a woman from the office out for a date.  He wants to take her out that noon hour and so wondered if Bill knew any good restaurants for dinosaur.

“Dinosaur?” Bill replies.  “Yeah, just wondered if you knew of any good places.”  Well, Bill kind of laughs it off.  Younger people often have their own slang after all.  But then he goes home where his wife is making lunch but she tells him that their son Donny was not feeling well and that he had not touched his dinosaur that noon.  Bill’s mouth falls open.  “You’re saying Donny would not touch his dinosaur?”  “That’s right,” his wife replies, “and it’s his favorite, tuna fish.”  “Kathy,” Bill exclaims, “the word is ‘lunch’!”   “What does lunch have to do with it” Kathy asks incredulously.  “OK, what does ‘lunch’ mean?” Bill asks.  “It’s a color, a red, a kind of light red.”

Within hours after Bill goes back to the office every word in the English language that Bill knew changed.  Even his name was no longer Bill Lowery but Hinge Thunder.  When he got into his car a red light with a seatbelt icon on the dashboard flashed “Fasten Stepdad.”  In utter disorientation he races back home only to discover Donny is desperately sick and they need to take him to the E.R.  But now he and his wife cannot communicate at all.  Long story short, the little boy comes through OK and then we see a close-up of Bill gazing heavenward as he says, “Thank you, O God.  Thank you for my boy.”  And then he pauses before saying, “I hope you can understand me.”

So this is a bit goofy and all but on some level don’t we all experience it eventually that when we pray to God, we hope God hears, we hope God’s listening, we hope God can understand us.  And every once in a while we more or less conclude that maybe God doesn’t hear or understand us.  For true believers such doubts pass in time but we know the feeling.