God’s Word for You
Psalm 129:5-8 grass on the rooftop
by Pastor Timothy Smith on Saturday, March 28, 2026
5 May all who hate Zion be put to shame and turned back.
6 Let them be like the grass on the rooftop
that withers before it can be pulled up.
7 The reaper can’t even fill his hand with it.
The one who binds sheaves can’t fill his arms.
8 May those who pass by them never say,
“The blessing of the LORD be upon you.
We bless you in the name of the LORD.”
Psalm 129 turns now from God’s people protected from dangers, both seen and unseen, to a curse on the enemies of God. In a similar way that Psalm 128 ends with a blessing on Israel, this Psalm ends by a prayer that the enemies of God will not be blessed by anyone at all, even by mistake. “May those who pass by never say, ‘Bless you.’” Not ever.
The curse here is agricultural. The writer hopes that nothing that the wicked do will ever prosper (cp. Psalm 1:3). He takes us up to the rooftop of a typical contemporary home. This is what we would expect in Israel (2 Kings 1:2) or in a Canaanite village (1 Kings 17:9,19): a single-story home with a guestroom or private room on the rooftop. Here, the image must have been something like what we find growing in our sidewalks and driveways: a little grass seed (brought in on someone’s shoes) that found a little dirt (blown by the wind or also hitching a ride on some shoes) and sooner or later, there is grass growing where it’s not supposed to. The thought of the Psalm is this: May even their unwanted roof-grass be unproductive! May nothing that they do, intentionally or not, ever thrive or prosper.
Luther writes: “Destruction comes promptly to the ungodly. They will be “like the grass on the housetops, which withers before it grows up” (Psalm 129:6). And the ungodly are like thorns on a branch, because the thorn dies when it is still in fresh sap. These comparisons show that the ungodly come to naught in the midst of a plan, when they are absorbed in their supreme and most eager endeavor, just like premature fruits that are very promising but dry up before the harvest comes.”
When would the church take up this psalm and sing it? The answer is that it is here for us when God shows his power over oppression. What an unexpected and wonderful thing to see the difference between God blessing believers and withholding his blessing from unbelievers! When God’s enemies seem to get the upper hand, he withers their efforts before they achieve their purpose, which is to crush our faith and destroy the gospel. God may raise up a champion like one of the Judges of old, or a locust plague, or a sudden attack from a human enemy, but he always accomplishes his purpose by turning aside the blow about to fall, or slicing away the bonds before they ever get all the way around the wrists of God’s holy people.
Of course, Christ is truly the ultimate and greatest Savior. What enemy of God’s people is not stopped by Jesus? Even the most terrible enemies of the church—sin, death, and the snorting devil himself—were stopped in their tracks by the victory of Jesus our Savior on the cross. Is there even an echo of those enemies in our text? The weedy grass that grows where it shouldn’t is like sin in our lives, but our Lord stomps and withers it where it springs up. The reaper is of course death that comes for us all, but he cannot keep his grip on us. And finally the devil, like a man binding sheaves to be taken away into his eternal barn, cannot fill his arms enough to make it worth his while when he claws and grasps for the people of God. Keep putting your faith in Christ, and the curses of God will land everywhere else, and only the blessings of God will fall upon you, now and forevermore.
In Christ,
Pastor Timothy Smith
Pastor Smith serves St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in New Ulm, Minnesota. To receive God’s Word for You via e-mail, please visit the St. Paul’s Lutheran Church website.