From Darkness to Light

Meaning in Psalm 78

by Alfred D. Byrd

LISTEN, children of God, to the news
Of what our Maker, our King, has done.
Our God has called us from darkness to light,
Has spoken a law to guide our steps,
And told us to teach the law each day
To those who are new to the way of the truth.
While we keep the law, we stand secure.
Forgetting, however, we stumble and fall.
Our God remembers. Our God reacts.
Our God will strike us to make us come back.
Our God forgives when we turn from our shame
And answer a call to come home to the Throne.
To help us remember how going astray
Can lead us to grief, but also to hope,
Our God has written a work for all time—
The news of children of God as slaves
Redeemed by God to give birth to kings.

The children of God had left the Land.
A famine was raging. Egypt had food.
The children got fed, but paid a price.
The king of Egypt — a god, some called him—
Sentenced the children to serve him as slaves.
The children, grubbing the earth in the sun,
Were crying to God, but losing their heart.
They feared that they served a god that forgets.

Nothing, however, escapes our God.
To the sound of cries there came a prophet,
Moses, wielding the might of the King.
With signs from the Throne, the prophet shattered
Egypt's glory to rescue its slaves.
The flow of the Nile was changed into blood.
From its stench arose a swarm of flies
And a sheet of frogs that covered the land.
A cloud of locusts gobbled the harvest.
Pellets of ice, begotten of tempest,
Pummeled the ground and killed what was left.
Confusion, sickness, darkness, and death—
The sentence of Egypt troubles the thoughts
Of those who received the blessing of God.
When they drink their wine at a feast each year
To recall that blessing, the breaking of chains,
They spill some drops as a rain of tears
For masters who suffered. In joy there's grief.

The children escaped through the midst of a sea
That opened before and closed behind them.
Masters who followed, hunting their slaves,
Were drowned when they saw the water return.
A cloud by day and a fire by night
Would lead the children through wastes of sand.
The children grew thirsty. Our God provided
Water that sprang from a rock split apart.
The children arrived at a hill of fire
And heard the voice of their God command them,
"Listen to law and live by its light!"

How soon we forget! (Let's tell the truth.
If we'd lived back then, we'd have done what they did.)
Children of God allowed their bellies,
Growling with hunger, to lead them astray.
"Our God," they said, "has led us this far,
But, now, we're going to starve in the sand.
What fools we were for leaving Egypt!
Onions and garlic seasoned our food.
Our work was hard, but our meals came on time."
Our God responded, raining from heaven
Manna, a bread unknown to humans.
(Listen to experts explain what it was,
And you'll learn how little the "wise" may know.)
Along with bread, our God provided
Banquets of meat. A bevy of quails—
A cloud that banished the sun from the sky—
Came down on a camp and covered the ground
So deep that one had to wade through birds.
A man or a maid would gorge on meat
Until it oozed from one's nose, some say.

Can we blame our God for getting angry?
Patience is long, but judgment will come.
The children were stuffing their faces with quail
As they faced accounting for lives in arrears.
Our God responded, sending a plague
That silenced the groans of a crowd of whiners.
Neighbors witnessing judgment called out,
"Our God, You are great. We've sinned. Forgive us!
Lead us along in the light of Your law."
Our God, desirous at heart to forgive,
Accepted the children and headed onward,
Leading the lost to the land they'd left.

In the land, a pattern, sadly, repeated.
Trusting their God, the people prospered.
Looking away from the light from the Throne,
The people, however, stumbled and fell.
A judge would rise, but judgment would fail.
A dwelling for God, the tent of meeting
Standing at Shiloh, was burned to the ground.
It takes a king who builds a temple—
David enthroned on the heights of a hill—
To change a hope to promise fulfilled.

Our God is the King on the Throne on high.
Our God provides the light for our lives.
Our God, the Shepherd Who loves the sheep,
Will guide us safely to pastures of joy.
If we stray — if we close our eyes to the light—
We'll wander in darkness and taste the grief
Of missing our God in the wastes of the world.
Our God, however, is always nearby.
When we bleat in distress, our God will hear.
Our God will turn us and open our eyes.
At the sight of God, we'll be renewed.
We'll praise our Maker, our Shepherd, our King.

If this poem spoke to you, you may enjoy my Biblical epic poems

A Song of the One, the age-old account of Creatlon, Fall, Redemption, and Glory retold in verse for a new millennium, and

The Stars Bow Down: An Epic of Joseph, the timeless tale of a favorite son whose brothers sold him into slavery, but whom God raised from a prison to save the known world from famine.