Summary
"This Is the Day the Lord Has Made"
Psalm 118:24 is among the most familiar verses in all of Scripture: "This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it." It adorns greeting cards and bookstore plaques, opens countless worship services, and is invoked at weddings, anniversaries, and even on a sunny morning. But the verse asks a sharper question than its popular use suggests: technically speaking, which day is "the day"?
Scripture records many good days. The parting of the Red Sea was a good day, when God delivered His people on dry ground. The night the angels sang over Bethlehem and the Savior was laid in a manger was a good day. Even now, heaven rejoices whenever a sinner repents — a good day indeed. Yet none of these is the specific day Psalm 118 has in view.
Psalm 118 belongs to the Hallel, the six psalms (113–118) sung at Passover. The first two were sung before the meal and the last four after — making Psalm 118 almost certainly the final psalm Jesus sang with His disciples before going to the cross. It was Luther's favorite psalm, and its words echoed on Palm Sunday when the crowds cried "Hosanna" — the very plea of Psalm 118:25-26, "Save us, we beseech you, O Lord… Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord." Even Palm Sunday, however, is not yet "the day."
The clue lies in the verses just before. The psalmist pleads, "Open to me the gates of righteousness" Psalm 118:19 — that is, the gates of heaven, shut to sinners who deserve God's condemnation. Then comes the answer: "The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. This is the Lord's doing; it is marvelous in our eyes" Psalm 118:22-23. Both images point directly to Christ. In John 10:9 Jesus declares, "I am the gate." In Acts 4:11, Ephesians 2:20, and 1 Peter 2:6-7, He is the chosen and precious cornerstone.
The Old Testament background is the Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur Leviticus 16, Israel's highest holy day. On that day Aaron performed three acts: one goat was killed as payment for sin; the people's iniquities were confessed over the second goat as a transfer of sin; and that goat was led into the wilderness for the removal of guilt. Payment, transfer, removal — the whole pattern of atonement.
"The day," then, is the day all of this was fulfilled in Jesus Christ. He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins 1 John 2:2, who, unlike the priests who must offer sacrifices again and again, "offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins" and sat down at God's right hand Hebrews 10:11-12. On that day the gate was opened, the cornerstone was laid, payment was made, sin was transferred to Christ, and guilt was carried away. It is Good Friday — the day we call good precisely because of what was accomplished there. This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.
Video citations
- "The Day" 4-2-23 — You open your Bibles, please, with me for our time of study to the book of Psalms Psalm 118. If you're using a Pew edition, you're going to find that on page 100 or 528, 528 in the Old Testament.…