Psalms 137:2

We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof.

Harps on the willows

I. Every man has a harp. The harp was the well-known instrument for the accompaniment of song. Its music was sweet and delightful. When calamity fell upon the nation their harps were silenced, etc. And thus it is with all our lives. We have the elements of joy in them, the powers of song and gladness, and there is no man who has not the capacity and the occasion for delightful mirth.

1. Think of the constitution of our nature, wherein a place is secured for joy. The body is attuned to pleasure. How exquisitely has God harmonized the sound and the sense!

2. What a harp man possesses in physical nature if he would only let its music be heard. Every sight and sound, every scene and action, all things fair and good, and bright and godly, are but fingers of Nature’s skilful hand, which will touch the strings of the harp of our being, and wake their perfect tones of rapture.

3. Man has the harp for pleasant accompaniment of happy song in the region of the immaterial and the intellectual. The joy of learning--when it is indeed learning worthy of the name; the discovery of the unknown; the pursuit of the law which underlies obscure phenomena; the search for causes; the enumeration of effects--these and others afford keen and lasting delight.

4. The pleasure which belongs to the still higher sphere which we are privileged to enter.

(1) Let me remind you of that sacred melody which is attuned when the joys of the spirit are experienced. The sinner seeks his Saviour, and finds the pardon of Father and of Friend. The best music of all the Christian poets fails far short of the rapture which dwells within the forgiven heart. And with what language shall we tell of the occasions for harping that have occurred so often since the first forgiveness! Have there not been Bethels of a Divine covenanting, Horebs of refreshment, and Red Sea passages of deliverance and triumph? Prayer has had its blessed answers, and meditation its holy raptures.

(2) Remember, this harp must be tuned and practised on. Let Zion re-echo with your songs.

II. But sometimes the harp has to be hung upon the willows.

1. It is thus when disease invades our bodies or sorrow smites the soul. Songs are not suitable to funerals, and harpings in the house of mourning are out of place and impertinent.

2. There are some silences still more profound that fall upon the music of our life. The father whose eldest son forswears his father’s faith, and throws away his father’s virtues, and wins only a name that will be a dishonour among men--such a father has little heart for harpings, and is, indeed, in a silent land of bitter exile.

3. And then how useless is the harp when we ourselves are in the hours of spiritual distress. God is absent, and we know no gladness till He shows His face again. They sang a hymn when the Master was among them, even though when they rose from the supper it was to pass to Gethsemane, and Pilate’s bar, and Calvary. But their hearts had no desire for singing in the suspense and numb agony of the hour when the Christ lay dead. And so it is with the Christian still.

III. But though there is no heart or place for song, and the harp must be laid aside, it needs not to be cast away. They had been foolish and wicked men of Israel if they had flung their harps beneath the running river, and thus deprived themselves altogether of the means of melody when the days of joy came back again (Ezra 3:9). So, cast not away your harp. The weather will clear and the soul will awake to gladness when the sunshine comes. And the sickness will depart, and the strengthened frame shall recover its wonted sense of health and vigour. Yea, and there shall be some hours of gladness even for the wailing weary heart that sickens over the sinfulness of child and friend. It was a sad home when the prodigal was far away. But one day the father saw the returning son, ragged, worn, and disgraced, and that night there was music and dancing in the long silent homestead. And thou, too, depressed and cast-down Christian, throw not away thy harp. There shall be peace, and joy, and fulness of blessing yet for thee. God shall show Himself, and Christ will yet return. (Lt. D. Bevan, LL. B.)