Pray the word with David Platt is a resource from radical dot net.

Psalm 126 verse 4

restore our fortunes oh lord

like streams in the negab.

So the picture here, so first like physically, geographically,

talking about the desert, the negab,

and the picture is we want streams in the desert.

Streams in the desert.

Now, the prayer is restore our fortunes,

oh Lord.

And if you look at the context here in Psalm 126, it's a picture of a time in the past

when God's blessing was on God's people in his land when their mouths were filled with laughter

and their tongues with shouts of joy and the nations were saying the Lord has done

great things for them and they are glad and all the great things

so it's a time of blessing, a time of closeness to God, walking with God, worship of God, and experiencing his blessing as they looked to God, trusted

God, obeyed God.

That's the picture that the Psalmus is looking back to when he says restore our fortunes in that way,

like bring us back to a closeness with you and blessing from you flowing in that closeness to you.

And as I read this, I think about places all throughout the Bible

when God's people were struggling and were distant from him and were experiencing his discipline and they're crying out for that closeness that they once had and the blessing they were experiencing in that.

And you know I want to be careful not to make a direct correlation between this picture of

the people of God and the Old Testament, the people of Israel, and

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