Ps. 72.6-7 (time is blessing)

May he come down like rain / upon fertile lands
as showers / that irrigate the earth
may righteousness sprout / in his days
and well-being abound / until the moon is no more. 

Our previous reflection focused on the perpetuity of the king and how this desire for the king’s longevity was rooted in the desire that he perpetually mediate God’s righteousness, justice and compassion to the earth. There, the blessing was one that made the king the recipient of perpetuity and longevity with the unstated premise that his perpetual reception will enable his perpetual activity. Here, that second portion—the king’s activity—is brought out. There, he was passive. Here, he is active—he ‘comes down like rain’ and ‘showers’. When the two verses are held together a remarkable image is achieved of the king’s perpetual receptivity of God’s blessing and his perpetual delivering of God’s concern for the world. And these are fused together in these cosmic images of sun, moon and rain. In the king’s perpetual reign he becomes the perpetual bestowal of life and vitality to the earth. This is crucial to grasp and something we have pointed to before—that the king’s reign is anything but static; it is, rather, dynamic, abounding and life-giving. It causes life (“may righteousness sprout in his day”). It is prodigal and joyous (“well-being abound”). There is a clear sense that the king’s reign is something that partakes of the abundant life of God. It crosses every boundary of ‘use’ and enters into the realm of festivity and joy. It is glorious. His reign begins in the ‘sprouting’ but soon erupts into an “abounding” of well-being. Further, these incredible, festive powers of life now expand to the very contours of the king’s reign: “in his days” and “until the moon is no more”. The previous verse already made clear that the king is to reign perpetually. We now see that this ‘abounding’ is one that, too, is to continue perpetually. The abundance of time now coincides with the abundance of blessing. Or, the perpetuity of time is now a perpetual blessing. Or, even more concisely, time is blessing. Again, however, we must draw attention to this fact: that all of this, as mediated by the king, is a theophany of God. This coinciding of time and blessing points us toward the One who, in the first verse, handed over these powers to the king. All of these originate in the God who is “forever” (perpetual) and is, also, in himself, “blessing”. The earth, through the king, is being brought up into and being remade according to the glory and presence of God. One cannot help at this point from avoiding reflecting upon John (the Word ‘coming down’ from heaven) and Revelation (the new earth coming down from heaven) and even Paul (Romans 8).