Psalm 106 — We Have Sinned Like Our Fathers

Today’s Passage: Psalm 106

This psalm begins with thanks, and then it turns and makes a confession: we have sinned, just as our fathers did. From there it walks back through the long story of Israel, one failure after another. The sea was dried up before them so that they could cross, and soon they forgot. They made a calf at the mountain. They yoked themselves to Baal of Peor. They even shed the blood of their own children. And yet, over and over again, when they cried out He heard them, and He remembered His covenant. These are old events, real history, but the mercy running through them is the same mercy we still lean on: every time His people turn back to Him, He meets them with kindness.

As you read, hold this: We have sinned. Nevertheless He heard.

Psalm 106:1-5 (BSB)

¹ Hallelujah! Give thanks to the LORD, for He is good; His loving devotion endures forever. ² Who can describe the mighty acts of the LORD or fully proclaim His praise? ³ Blessed are those who uphold justice, who practice righteousness at all times. ⁴ Remember me, O LORD, in Your favor to Your people; visit me with Your salvation, ⁵ that I may see the prosperity of Your chosen ones, and rejoice in the gladness of Your nation, and give glory with Your inheritance.

Hallelujah, the psalm begins, and it gives thanks and asks the LORD to remember. Notice that the confession has not even started yet. Before a single sin is named, praise is what opens the door.

Psalm 106:6-12 (BSB)

⁶ We have sinned like our fathers; we have done wrong and acted wickedly. ⁷ Our fathers in Egypt did not grasp Your wonders or remember Your abundant kindness; but they rebelled by the sea, there at the Red Sea. ⁸ Yet He saved them for the sake of His name, to make His power known. ⁹ He rebuked the Red Sea, and it dried up; He led them through the depths as through a desert. ¹⁰ He saved them from the hand that hated them; He redeemed them from the hand of the enemy. ¹¹ The waters covered their foes; not one of them remained. ¹² Then they believed His promises and sang His praise.

We have sinned like our fathers, the psalm says, and then it shows us how. Even there at the Red Sea they rebelled, but God rebuked the sea and it dried up before them, and He led them through the depths while not one of their enemies was left behind. He did not save them because they had earned it. He saved them for the sake of His own name.

Psalm 106:13-23 (BSB)

¹³ Yet they soon forgot His works and failed to wait for His counsel. ¹⁴ They craved intensely in the wilderness and tested God in the desert. ¹⁵ So He granted their request, but sent a wasting disease upon them. ¹⁶ In the camp they envied Moses, as well as Aaron, the holy one of the LORD. ¹⁷ The earth opened up and swallowed Dathan; it covered the assembly of Abiram. ¹⁸ Then fire blazed through their company; flames consumed the wicked. ¹⁹ At Horeb they made a calf and worshiped a molten image. ²⁰ They exchanged their Glory for the image of a grass-eating ox. ²¹ They forgot God their Savior, who did great things in Egypt, ²² wondrous works in the land of Ham, and awesome deeds by the Red Sea. ²³ So He said He would destroy them—had not Moses His chosen one stood before Him in the breach to divert His wrath from destroying them.

How quickly they forgot. The ground opened and swallowed Dathan and Abiram. At the mountain they made a calf and bowed to it, exchanging the glory of the living God for the image of an ox that eats grass. God would have destroyed them, but Moses stood in the breach and pleaded for them. The psalm will not soften that trade or make it sound like anything less than it was.

Psalm 106:24-31 (BSB)

²⁴ They despised the pleasant land; they did not believe His promise. ²⁵ They grumbled in their tents and did not listen to the voice of the LORD. ²⁶ So He raised His hand and swore to cast them down in the wilderness, ²⁷ to disperse their offspring among the nations and scatter them throughout the lands. ²⁸ They yoked themselves to Baal of Peor and ate sacrifices offered to lifeless gods. ²⁹ So they provoked the LORD to anger with their deeds, and a plague broke out among them. ³⁰ But Phinehas stood and intervened, and the plague was restrained. ³¹ It was credited to him as righteousness for endless generations to come.

They despised the pleasant land God had promised them. They yoked themselves to Baal of Peor and ate the sacrifices offered to lifeless gods. A plague broke out among them, and it was Phinehas who stood up and stepped in, and that stand was credited (חָשַׁב) chashab, pronounced khaw-SHAV. Strong's H2803, to reckon, to count to one's account, to devise or plan. This is the same word that stands over Abram, back in Genesis 15:6, where he believed the LORD and it was credited to him as righteousness. That line still holds. And here the very same word is used again as God counts the stand of Phinehas. One word, two very different scenes, and in both of them it is God who does the crediting. to him as righteousness for all the generations to come.

Psalm 106:32-39 (BSB)

³² At the waters of Meribah they angered the LORD, and trouble came to Moses because of them. ³³ For they rebelled against His Spirit, and Moses spoke rashly with his lips. ³⁴ They did not destroy the peoples as the LORD had commanded them, ³⁵ but they mingled with the nations and adopted their customs. ³⁶ They worshiped their idols, which became a snare to them. ³⁷ They sacrificed their sons and their daughters to demons. ³⁸ They shed innocent blood—the blood of their sons and daughters, whom they sacrificed to the idols of Canaan, and the land was polluted with blood. ³⁹ They defiled themselves by their actions and prostituted themselves by their deeds.

At the waters of Meribah they angered the LORD once more, and then the psalm turns to something darker still. They mingled with the nations and took up their idols, until they were sacrificing their own sons and their own daughters to demons. Innocent blood was shed, and the land itself was polluted with it. We must not read past this or tidy it up.

Psalm 106:40-48 (BSB)

⁴⁰ So the anger of the LORD burned against His people, and He abhorred His own inheritance. ⁴¹ He delivered them into the hand of the nations, and those who hated them ruled over them. ⁴² Their enemies oppressed them and subdued them under their hand. ⁴³ Many times He rescued them, but they were bent on rebellion and sank down in their iniquity. ⁴⁴ Nevertheless He heard their cry; He took note of their distress. ⁴⁵ And He remembered His covenant with them, and relented by the abundance of His loving devotion. ⁴⁶ He made them objects of compassion to all who held them captive. ⁴⁷ Save us, O LORD our God, and gather us from the nations, that we may give thanks to Your holy name, that we may glory in Your praise. ⁴⁸ Blessed be the LORD, the God of Israel, from everlasting to everlasting. Let all the people say, “Amen!” Hallelujah!

Many times He rescued them, and many times they went straight back to their rebellion. And still the word that governs the whole psalm is that small, stubborn word nevertheless: nevertheless He heard their cry, and He remembered His covenant, and He relented in the abundance of His loving devotion. So the psalm ends where His people always seem to end, asking to be gathered home again, and closing with Amen and Hallelujah.

We have sinned. Nevertheless He heard.