“I will sing of the Lord’s great love for ever;
with my mouth I will make Your faithfulness
known through all generations.
I will declare that Your love stands firm for ever,
that You have established Your faithfulness in heaven itself.”
“Righteousness and justice are the foundation of Your throne;
love and faithfulness go before You.”
Psalms 89:1-2,14 NIVUK
Psalm 89 is another Psalm written by an Ezrahite, this time a man called Ethan. He appeared in another place in the Bible, and is thought to be one of five brothers, a wise man, though not as wise as Solomon. He was a Levite, and apparently a cymbal player in a priestly worship band. From the text in the Psalm, it was written in the period of the kings, David and Solomon.
There is one word in this Psalm that appears seven times – “faithfulness”. This is a word of tremendous depth and meaning, and not one as popular today, in human terms, as it should be. Faithfulness is a word often associated with marriage but the high number of divorces betrays it’s lack of being taken seriously in society today.
But God is faithful. One hundred per cent. He will never, ever, not be faithful. So if He says something, or promises something, we can be assured that He will faithfully bring it to pass. God will never wriggle out of His commitments and promises. On His part there is no backing out of an agreement or a covenant. In fact, in verses 7 and 8 of this Psalm we read that in the Heavenly realms God is greatly feared. Why? Because of His faithfulness. And verse 3 tells us that faithfulness is so important to God that He has established it in Heaven.
So when God makes, ”righteousness and justice … the foundation of [His] throne”, we know that through His faithfulness this will be the case. One day. All nations will stand before Him, facing into judgement because of His righteousness. There will be no sin and wickedness in Heaven.
Jesus Himself taught about the importance of being faithful on several occasions. Perhaps the most remembered is the story about the Talents. In Matthew 25:21 He said, “Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master’s happiness!”. In Luke 16:10, Jesus said, “If you are faithful in little things, you will be faithful in large ones. But if you are dishonest in little things, you won’t be honest with greater responsibilities.” There is Kingdom importance in being faithful. So today, as we go about our business, whatever that might be, let’s align ourselves to God’s quality of “faithfulness”.
Being a Pilgrim 