This description of suffering in today’s text is graphic, but in a frightening way. Plowmen here are the executors of a court sentence. The punishment consists in the scourging of the back of the convict.

Literally, our Savior experienced this. Pilate had made a helpless attempt to exchange the innocent Jesus for the obviously guilty Barabbas. But he did not have the courage to stand up to the cries of the Jews, “Let Him be crucified!” His public declaration, “I am innocent of the blood of this just Person,” did not improve at all the flagrant injustice taking place here.

He had Jesus scourged. The Roman soldiers were now the plowmen who “made their furrows long” on Jesus’ back. And our Savior allowed this to happen; He did not try to escape this abuse of His back and His soul. It was part of the way He had to go, part of the will of God He had come to fulfill.

But besides this typical meaning pointing to the Lord, there is in Psalm 129 a reference to the history of the people of Israel. In a way, they too have been afflicted from their youth (vv. 1–2) and have experienced the “plowing” of enemies on their backs. The image used here is instructive: furrows are plowed to prepare for the subsequent sowing and even later the harvesting!

Sufferings which God allows in the lives of His own are not in vain. Through them, God prepares fruit later on. In the life of Jesus it was full, “hundredfold” fruit. In the life of Israel it is yet to come, but it will surely come. And in our life? Through “long furrows” our bearing capacity and patience may be intensely tested. But perhaps this view will help us: present experiences are necessary according to God’s assessment. They will not be in vain!