The Journey Begins

Psalm 120

Immanuel – 10/11/26

          If you know me, you know that I love the mountains. And I don’t mean just looking at them from afar – though that is enjoyable too. I want to be in them: climbing them, traversing their ridges, experiencing the shadow of their valleys and the majesty of their heights. I want them in every season. I love the struggle of it, what you learn about yourself and others, the beautiful simplicity of it all. And from the pine moss at my feet to the spread of mountain grandeur, God has left a fingerprint on it all.

          I’ve always found a parallel to life in the mountains. Comfort and ease must be abandoned before the climb can even begin. There is struggle, but there is joy in the struggle. There is purpose in the ascent, and fellowship with those who journey alongside you.

          And isn’t this our spiritual life? We are pilgrims – travelers. We have left something behind, and we are journeying toward that which is greater. We lift our eyes from the things that are seen to the things that are unseen. And together, in our hearts, we ascend toward our God.

          Today we begin a new sermon series called, “Ascend O Pilgrims,” a journey through the Psalms of Ascent. It will take us to the end of 2026.

          There are fifteen Psalms of Ascent: Psalm 120-134. Why these are called the Psalms of Ascents isn’t entirely clear. Some associate them with the fifteen steps within the temple at Jerusalem. Others suggest they were sung by Jewish captives returning from their exile. But the most common explanation is that the Psalms of Ascents were pilgrim songs, sung by worshippers making their way to Jerusalem for the great festivals of Israel.

          When we read these fifteen songs together, they are not disjointed songs like a playlist on shuffle. They trace a journey – a pilgrimage. They begin in a distant and hostile land, and they end in the sanctuary of God, where his servants lift their hands in worship and bless his holy name. Between these two places are sorrows and hopes, dangers and deliverance, struggle and joy.

          On the chalkboards you see, “Let us go to the house of the Lord, for there the Lord has commanded the blessing.” It’s a mash-up of Psalm 122:1 and Psalm 133:3. In many ways, those words capture the movement of all fifteen Psalms of Ascent.

And notice how that movement is communal: “Let us go to the house of the Lord.” These Psalms are not about a journey undertaken alone, or some individual spiritual experience. These are songs for the people of God journeying together. Pilgrims streaming from earth’s hostile cities to take the narrow path of Mount Zion – together the saints ascend.

          The Psalms of Ascent are far more than ancient travel songs for Israel. They are our songs too. For we are pilgrims. We are exiles in a world that is not our home. We, too, are ascending towards Zion – not the earthly Jerusalem, but the heavenly city, the dwelling place of God, where Christ himself is seated as our King.

          Over the past five weeks we have considered The Gospel of Bread and Wine. We learned what it means to come to the Lord’s Table and feast upon Christ by faith, and to anticipate the great feast still to come.

But between this table and that feast lies a journey. The Psalms of Ascent give us songs for that journey, for pilgrims on their way home.

          Main Point

          In a world that is not our home, the journey to Zion begins by trusting God.

          Read vs 1-2

          Isn’t it interesting where this Psalm appears in our Bibles? It immediately follows Psalm 119 – the longest chapter in Scripture. For 176 verses, the psalmist celebrates truth, beauty, and the goodness of God’s Word. He has declared his love for God’s law and his delight in God’s commandments.

          Then, in the very next Psalm we meet a man deeply distressed because he lives among lying lips and deceitful tongues. God’s word is truth, but the pilgrim find himself dwelling in a land of lies.

We don’t know exactly what the psalmist experienced, but it could have easily taken the shape of slander, false accusation, and deliberate misrepresentation. Whatever the circumstances, he is surrounded by people whose words are deceitful and whose intentions are hostile.

          So many thousands of years later, and the distant land of Psalm 120 sounds increasingly like our own.

Deceptions proliferate in our society: Lies are celebrated while righteousness is condemned. Those who hold to biblical convictions are often accused of hatred and bigotry. Believe that Jesus is the only way to God, and you may be called narrow-minded and intolerant. When we hold to what Scripture teaches about marriage, gender, and sexuality, we are accused of hatred. And if you speak about sin or judgment, expect to be accused of thinking yourself better than everyone else.

Sometimes these accusations come from misunderstandings, but increasingly, they are deliberate distortions – words meant to wound, to silence, to shame.

          And we grieve the loss of truth. We fear our children getting swept up in the advancing tide of falsehoods. We fear it because we see it happening all around us. Lies don’t just steal what is true, they take everything.

The lie in the Garden wrought death. The serpent questioned God’s Word, distorted it, then openly contradicted it: “You will not surely die…you will be like God.”

          Our first parents believed the lie and the consequences were catastrophic. Sin and death entered the world. The beautiful fellowship man enjoyed with God was broken. Paradise was lost.

          And ever since, the lie has been doing its destructive work.

          Jesus said of the devil, “He is a liar and the father of lies” (John 8:44). From Eden until now, lies have been doing their destructive work. And so the Christian finds himself living in a world that has been deceived – a land of lies that delights in what God condemns and condemns what God delights in.

No wonder the pilgrim is distressed.

          In 1974, Russian dissident Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn wrote an essay entitled “Live Not by Lies.” He lived under Soviet communism and knew a thing or two about living in a society built upon totalitarian falsehoods.

          He understood that the lies of a society could only be sustained if ordinary people knew the truth but were afraid to speak it; if they repeated what they knew to be false because it was easier, safer, more advantageous than telling the truth.

          So Solzhenitsyn issued a simple challenge: “Never knowingly support lies!” An ordinary person might lack the power to overthrow a dishonest society, but he could refuse to become a willing participant in its falsehoods.

“Live not by lies.” Certainly, there is wisdom in that for all of us.

There is even deeper wisdom in Scripture. The author of Psalm 120 doesn’t trust in his ability to resist the lies around him, he trusts in God for deliverance. For the Christian’s hope is not ultimately in our courage or fortitude or ability to discern truth. Our hope is in the God of truth, who hears the cries of his people and will deliver them.

          I love verse 1: I called to the Lord, and he answered me. Notice how, before the psalmist tells us about his enemies, he tells us about his God.

          He doesn’t tell us how God answered him. Perhaps the Lord delivered him from some particular trouble, or maybe he sustained him through his distress. But what is striking is that the psalmist knows his God is not deaf to the cries of his people.

          This is the confidence of the people of God. We do not cry into the void, hoping that someone out there might hear us. We cry to the ever-living God, who knows us, loves us, and has bound himself to us with covenant faithfulness.

And he hears. As we read in Psalm 34:17-18,

When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears and delivers them out of all their troubles. The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.

          Though God rests his presence on Mount Zion, and the author is in a distant land shadowed by deceit, God still hears! The pilgrim may be far from Zion, but he is never beyond the hearing of the Lord!

          That doesn’t mean God always removes us from distressing circumstances. Sometimes his answer is to sustain us through suffering. But still, his people can cry out with confidence.

And the psalmist is confident in something else: the deceit that surrounds him will not go unpunished.

          Read vs 3-4

What shall be given to you, and what more shall be done to you, you deceitful tongue? It’s a rhetorical question. What will become of those who speak lies? What awaits the deceitful? The answer is in verse 4: A warrior’s sharp arrows, with glowing coals of the broom tree!”

          These are images of judgment. The arrows pierce and wound. The burning coals of a broom tree burn long and intense. These are fitting judgments for those who have weaponized their tongue with lies.

          James writes, The tongue is a fire, a world of unrighteousness.    -James 3:6

          We know what words can do. Words can destroy reputations, fracture families, divide churches. Some of you have suffered false accusations or deliberately misrepresentation. Even after the truth comes out, damage remains. Words are powerful and deceit is destructive.

          But Psalm 120 reminds us that the deceitful tongue will not have the final word. God will judge. Jesus himself warned,

“I tell you, on the day of judgment people will give account for every careless word they speak,  for by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.”                                                           -Matthew 12:36-37

          Every lie, every slander, every distortion of the truth, all of it will be brought before the Judge of all the earth. What a great comfort to those who have suffered unjustly! The Lord sees and knows. He will judge rightly.

          But may Jesus’ words humble us too. Because if we are honest, we know that we have not always been truthful. We have lied, exaggerated, gossiped, misrepresented others, spoken words to wound. We have sometimes remained silent when we should have spoken the truth.

          Certainly, there is a world of deceit that surrounds us. But there is a deceitful heart beating in your chest.

          The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?

                                                                                      -Jeremiah 17:9

          And that presents us with a terrible problem. If God will judge every deceitful tongue, what hope do we have?

          We hope in our Deliverer – Jesus Christ.

          Listen to what Peter writes about Jesus, He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly.                                                                      -1 Peter 2:22-23

          Jesus’ innocence is astounding! Yet he suffered at the hands of deceitful men. False witnesses testified against him. He was mocked, slandered, and reviled. But he did not retaliate. He entrusted himself to the One who judges justly.

          And then Peter tells us, He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed.

                                                                                      -1 Peter 2:24

          The sinless Savior bore our sins. He took the judgment our deceitful tongues deserve. He died for liars and slanderers – for people like us, who have exchanged the truth of God for lies. Now, through faith in Jesus Christ, sinners can be forgiven, given new hearts, and reconciled to God.

          You see, we have not become pilgrims because we are better than the world around us. We are pilgrims because God opened our eyes to the truth, saved us from our sins, and called us to a different kingdom.

          Since we belong to his kingdom now, we are called to put away falsehood, to speak the truth, and entrust ourselves to the one who judges justly.

          But the pilgrim of Psalm 120 longs for more than just judgment on his enemies. He longs for peace.

          Read vs 5-7

          Meshech was a land north of Israel, in modern day Turkey. Kedar was to the east in the Arabian Peninsula. These were places far from the Promised Land – and far from one another. The psalmist doesn’t mean he literally lived among both peoples. Rather, Meshech and Kedar function as symbols for feeling alienated, and his sense of living among strangers far from the covenant community of God’s people.

Though he lives there, he knows he does not belong there – and he is weary of it.

          Too long have I had my dwelling among those who hate peace. Can’t you hear the longing? For too long he has endured the lies, the deceit, and the hostility; and now he longs for something different.

          Then comes verse 7: I am for peace, but when I speak, they are for war!” What a heartbreaking statement. He desires peace, even seeks to make peace, but those around him hate it.

          This is exactly how God calls his people to live. He calls us to love our neighbors, pray for our enemies, and seek peace with all people. Paul tells us in Romans 12 that we are not to be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

          Brothers and sisters, we must not answer lies with lies or hatred with hatred. Even in a hostile world, we are called to be people of truth and peace.

          Still, the psalmist longs for a peace that this fallen world cannot provide. The Hebrew word for peace, shalom, means wholeness, harmony, flourishing. Shalom is life as God intended it to be.

          No amount of human effort can manufacture this kind of peace. It cannot be secured by political power, economic prosperity, or social progress. True shalom is only found in the presence of God.

          So the pilgrim longs for Zion. He longs for the city of God – the place where the Lord has commanded the blessing.

          Brothers and sisters, this is our longing too. The writer of Hebrews says,

For here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come.  

-Hebrews 13:14

But there is a pilgrimage before us. For our destination is Zion. This is no earthly city, but a heavenly one – the dwelling place of the living God.

                But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, and to the assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant.

                                                                             -Hebrews 12:22-24

          That is in past tense – you have come to Mount Zion. Through Jesus, we already belong to that city. Christ has purchased our citizenship there. Through his death and resurrection, he has reconciled us to God. Now, through faith in him, we who were far off have been brought near!

          We belong to Zion, and Zion to us! But we are not yet home, not fully. Sorrows still surround us. We feel the deceit and hostility of this land. We struggle with sin, we suffer, we die.

But God has made a promise. Listen to the description of your homeland:

And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.

                                                                             -Revelation 21:2-3

          Fellow pilgrim, this is where the journey is leading.

The thing about climbing mountains is that you have to come down. You can’t live on the summit. But the Christian pilgrimage is different.

          We are ascending toward a city from which we will never depart. God dwells there, and we shall be with him. He will wipe away every tear, and death will be no more, neither will there be mourning nor crying nor pain.

The journey begins in distress; it ends in glory. It begins among those who hate peace, it ends in the kingdom of the Prince of Peace. We are not home yet. So live not by lies. Trust in your Deliverer. Set your heart on a better kingdom. Christ has opened the way. He will bring us safely home!