Broken Hallelujahs

Psalm 147:1-6
Praise the Lord! How good it is to sing praises to our God; for he is gracious, and a song of praise is fitting. The Lord builds up Jerusalem; he gathers the outcasts of Israel. He heals the brokenhearted, and binds up their wounds. He determines the number of the stars; he gives to all of them their names. Great is our Lord, and abundant in power; his understanding is beyond measure. The Lord lifts up the downtrodden; he casts the wicked to the ground.

 Praise the Lord - begins this psalm.  It is the second of five psalms - the last five (146, 167, 168, 149, and 150) psalms in the psalter.  They all begin and end with the words, “Praise the Lord,” or “Hallelujah” in Hebrew.  Five hymns of praise to finish the worship book of the Jewish people - a big finish, to be sure!

The Lord builds up Jerusalem.  One might ask why Jerusalem needs to be built up --- and so it seems the psalm was written post-Babylonian exile, and the city that lay in ruin after being conquered now needs to be rebuilt as the exiles return home.  The exiles, or outcasts (v.2) are returning.  Their broken hearts are being healed; their wounds are being treated.  These are all a cause for “Hallelujah!”

Singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen sings a somewhat mysterious song called “Hallelujah” and he sometimes includes descriptive words with this “praise” word.  Throughout the song it is a cold, lonely, or broken hallelujah.  There’s an element of pain and anguish in the voice as the song is sung - but nevertheless, he sings hallelujah.

Sometimes I think that’s what our hallelujahs are --- they are often broken.  Not that the hallelujah is broken, but that it is often coming out of broken experiences, or coming out of devastation, or coming out of hardship, difficulty and adversity, and these are the reason for lifting up the hallelujah, the words of praise.

For the Christian, we unleash our hallelujahs (alleluias in Greek) on Easter morning.  The resurrection of our Lord is the pinnacle of a hallelujah response - our salvation event.  Still, it too, is a hallelujah that rises up out of brokenness, literally out of death.  There is no resurrection from the dead if there has not first been a death.  Jesus died on a cross on Good Friday; he was raised from the dead on Easter Sunday.  Our hallelujahs rise up out of death and brokenness. The good news of our faith is that hallelujah always gets the last word.  Thanks be to God, and Hallelujah!