“In another psalm (Psalm 73) the speaker tells us that he had put a hard, puzzling question to himself: ‘Why on this earth good fortune usually comes the way of the wicked, while misfortune dogs the good?’
Then he speaks of the house of God: ‘I tried to solve the problem, but it is too hard for me until I enter God’s holy place, and understand what the end must be (Ps. 73:16-17).’
For there, in God’s holy place, in God’s house, is the spring of understanding. There that psalmist understood what the end must be, and solved his problem about the happiness of villains and the travail of the just.
What was his solution? He saw that while the life of the wicked is prolonged here, they are being reserved for punishment without end, but while the good struggle along they are being trained until they are ready at last to gain their inheritance.
This is what the psalmist understood in God’s holy place: he under stood the final outcome. He climbed up to the tent, then arrived at God’s house. Yet it was while he marveled at the members of that company in the tent that he was led to God’s house.
He was drawn toward a kind of sweetness, an inward, secret pleasure that cannot be described, as though some musical instrument were sounding delightfully from God’s house.
As he still walked about in the tent he could hear this inner music; he was drawn to its sweet tones, following its melodies and distancing himself from the din of flesh and blood, until he found his way even to the house of God.
He tells us about the road he took and the manner in which he was led, as though we had asked him, ‘You admire the tent on earth, but how did you reach the secret precincts of God’s house?’ ‘By the voice of exultation and praise,’ he says, ‘the sounds of one celebrating a festival.’
When people celebrate in this world with their various forms of indulgence, they usually set up musical instruments outside their houses, or assemble singers there, or provide some kind of music which enhances the pleasure of the guests and entices them to immoderate behavior.
If we are passing by and happen to hear it, we say, ‘What’s going on?’ And they tell us that it’s some kind of party. ‘It’s a birthday party,’ they say, or ‘There’s a wedding reception.’ They tell us this so that the songs may not seem out of place, and the lavish expenditure may seem to be justified by the festive occasion.
In God’s home there is an everlasting party. What is celebrated there is not some occasion that passes; the choirs of angels keep eternal festival, for the eternally present face of God is joy never diminished. This is a feast day that does not open at dawn, or close at sundown.
From that eternal, unfading festival melodious and delightful sound reaches the ears of the heart, but only if the world’s din does not drown it. The sweet strains of that celebration are wafted into the ears of one who walks in the tent and ponders the wonderful works of God in the redemption of believers.”
-Saint Augustine, Expositions of the Psalms 33-50, ed. John E. Rotelle, trans. Maria Boulding, vol. 16, The Works of Saint Augustine: A Translation for the 21st Century (Hyde Park, NY: New City Press, 2000), 247-248. Augustine is commenting on Psalm 42:4.
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