When Heaven Kisses Earth
What’s Psalm 85 about?
This psalm captures Israel’s desperate longing for God to show up again after a season of judgment, painting one of Scripture’s most beautiful pictures of what happens when divine mercy and human faithfulness finally meet. It’s about that ache we all feel when we know God seems distant, and the hope that maybe—just maybe—things could be different.
The Full Context
Psalm 85 emerges from what appears to be the post-exilic period, when Israel had returned from Babylonian captivity but life wasn’t quite the restoration they’d dreamed about. The temple was rebuilt, but where was the glory? The people were back in the land, but where was the prosperity? This psalm captures that in-between space—no longer in active judgment, but not yet experiencing the fullness of blessing. The psalmist speaks for a community that remembers God’s past favor but desperately needs His intervention again.
The psalm’s structure moves brilliantly from memory (Psalm 85:1-3) to petition (Psalm 85:4-7) to hope (Psalm 85:8-13). It’s both deeply personal and thoroughly communal, addressing the gap between what God has done and what His people still need. The closing verses contain some of the most poetic imagery in all of Scripture about God’s character and the restoration He brings.
What the Ancient Words Tell Us
The Hebrew word shub appears multiple times in this psalm, and it’s doing heavy lifting. We usually translate it as “restore” or “return,” but it carries this beautiful double meaning—both God returning to His people and His people returning to Him. In Psalm 85:1, when the psalmist says God “restored the fortunes” of Jacob, the Hebrew literally says God “returned the returning” of Jacob. It’s like a cosmic reunion.
Grammar Geeks
The phrase “steadfast love and faithfulness meet” in verse 10 uses two of the most loaded words in Hebrew theology—hesed (covenant love) and emet (truth/faithfulness). When these meet, it’s not just a nice greeting—it’s the collision of God’s unbreakable commitment with His absolute reliability.
When the psalmist describes righteousness and peace “kissing” each other in verse 10, he’s using nashaq—the same word used for romantic kisses and the holy kiss of greeting. This isn’t a polite handshake between abstract concepts; it’s an intimate, joyful reunion between things that belong together but have been separated.
What Would the Original Audience Have Heard?
For post-exilic Israel, this psalm would have hit like a lightning bolt. They’d experienced the “wrath” and “anger” mentioned in verses 3-5—seventy years of exile, Jerusalem in ruins, the temple destroyed. They knew what it meant for God’s face to be hidden.
Did You Know?
Archaeological evidence from the Persian period shows that life in post-exilic Judah was economically harsh and politically uncertain. The grand restoration many expected hadn’t materialized, making this psalm’s cry for revival deeply relevant to their daily struggles.
But they’d also experienced restoration—they were back in the land! The psalm’s opening celebration of past deliverance (verses 1-3) would have resonated with anyone who remembered the decree of Cyrus or the rebuilding of the temple. Yet the petition that follows reveals the gap between return and revival, between being geographically restored and spiritually renewed.
The imagery of verse 11—“truth springs up from the earth, and righteousness looks down from heaven”—would have spoken powerfully to people working the often-stubborn soil of Judah while longing for heaven to break through into their everyday reality.
Wrestling with the Text
Here’s what gets me about this psalm: it’s simultaneously looking backward, crying out in the present, and hoping for the future. The psalmist remembers God’s past favor as motivation for present petition, but then receives what sounds like a prophetic vision of future restoration. It’s like watching someone hold their entire spiritual life in their hands at once.
“When mercy and truth finally meet, when righteousness and peace actually kiss—that’s not just poetry. That’s the promise that what feels impossibly broken can actually be made beautifully whole.”
The tension between “Show us your steadfast love” in verse 7 and “Steadfast love and faithfulness meet” in verse 10 is fascinating. The psalmist asks for what he then prophetically sees as already accomplished. It’s like praying for something and then watching God answer in real time.
How This Changes Everything
This psalm reframes how we think about waiting on God. It’s not passive resignation—it’s active remembering, honest petitioning, and expectant listening. The psalmist doesn’t just complain about God’s apparent absence; he recalls God’s past faithfulness as grounds for present hope.
Wait, That’s Strange…
Notice how verse 8 says “Let me hear what God the Lord will speak.” The shift from petition to listening is abrupt and striking—as if the psalmist suddenly realizes that maybe God wants to say something in response to all this crying out.
The vision of reconciliation in verses 10-13 isn’t just about Israel’s restoration—it’s about cosmic harmony. When God shows up, everything that’s been at odds gets reconciled. Mercy and truth, righteousness and peace, heaven and earth—they all find their proper relationship again.
This changes how we pray in difficult seasons. Instead of just asking God to fix our circumstances, we can ask Him to reveal His character in ways that bring heaven and earth into alignment. We can pray for the kind of restoration that doesn’t just change our situation but reveals God’s glory.
Key Takeaway
True restoration isn’t just about getting back what we lost—it’s about experiencing the kind of divine encounter where God’s character becomes so evident that heaven and earth feel like they’re finally working together again.
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