"I'm living in a dream that's coming true"

Psalm 126 – A Song of Ascents
“I’m living in a dream that’s coming true”
Celine Dion, from “I’m Loving Every Moment With You”

v. 1 “When” the LORD restored the fortunes of Zion” [“When the LORD returned the returning of Zion”] is an “allusion” to Jewish captives returning to Judah in or around 536 B.C. Cyrus, king of Persia, is the instrument; however it is the covenant keeping LORD [YHWH] who restored their fortunes. The joy is so overpowering that they ask themselves if it could be real. Are they dreaming?

vv. 2-3 “Then” There was laughter. There were shouts of joy and gladness and affirmations from even the nations that the LORD had done great things for them.

v. 4 “Restore” [v. 1] “Turn our captivity.” The Psalmist is waiting for the full return from Babylon of the captives back to Judah not only under Cyrus but under Darius and Xerxes. Albert Barnes [1798-1870] writes, “As those streams when dried up by the summer heat are swelled by autumnal and winter rains, so let the streams of the returning people, which seem now to be diminished, be . . . kept full like swollen streams.”

vv. 5-6 “More” The backbreaking and painstaking toil and burden of planting seed on ground you’ve plowed, planting and seeing no results will be repaid harvest. So the bondage of captivity will “more” than be repaid with a harvest of captives going home. The temporal captivity and return of God’s people looks forward to our Jesus who finally and fully “led captivity captive” [Ephesians 4.8].