Month: April 2018

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Day 120 — Psalms 106, 107 & 133

What a story Psalms 106 and 107 tell together, the former detailing the sins of God’s Old Covenant people, and the latter describing their consequent suffering and God’s salvation.

My approach to Psalm 106 is to list the ways in which the people sinned, for it gives us a better understanding of our own sin, ways that we offend God and allow our actions and attitudes to come between us and God. The list is full of things we don’t normally refer to as sin. This is important, because we need to understand that if our enemy can’t tempt us with the obvious sins, that is, we’re not vulnerable to the temptation to steal or commit adultery; then he will tempt us where we are vulnerable. That will be in some of these less obvious ways which we don’t often mention; perhaps we don’t even consider them as sin. Nevertheless, they will separate us from God, so we need to be aware of them and get them out of the way.

I’ll get the list started with what the psalmist said they did or didn’t do. They:

  • Did not consider God’s wondrous works that He had done on their behalf
  • Did not remember the abundance of His steadfast love

(Are these really sins? Recall how important remembering was to God: He made that clear in His requirements to observe holy days with remembrance. Not to do so when it wasn’t specifically commanded as yet might not be a sin for them at the Red Sea, but for us who know that our remembering is important to God, our failure to do so can’t be good for the relationship. A seeker, one who wants to know God, will be doing these things.) We see why considering and remembering are important, because their failure to do so caused them to rebel.

  • Rebelled against God by accusing instead of trusting
  • Did not wait for God’s counsel, but put Him to the test. Psalm 107 says that they “rebelled against the words of God and spurned His counsel.”
  • Exchanged the glory of God for the image of one of His creatures. That was an attempt to diminish His glory.
  • Forgot Him who had saved them so wonderfully in Egypt
  • Despised God’s good provision for them by having no faith in His promise
  • Murmured

I encourage you to continue the list through the psalm and prayerfully consider what God might be saying to you about your own attitudes and behavior, and what they reveal about your heart.

Hopefully you noticed the repetition of the key idea of Psalm 107 as you read: “Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble, and He delivered them from their distress… Let them thank the Lord for His steadfast love, for His wondrous works to the children of man!” Each time the key idea is repeated, it describes what God did each time to deliver them and why they should thank Him in light of what the deliverance reveals about Him. The way to look more closely at Psalm 107 is to make a list of the ways God delivered them, and understand what a hero He is.

  • He led them by a straight way till they reached a safe place to dwell (This demonstrates that He knows the straight way when we don’t even know which way is forward. His goal for us is a safe place.)
  • He satisfies the longing soul and fills the hungry soul with good things. Note this does not say that He fills the hungry person – it speaks of a hungry soul. Do you want to be filled with all the spiritual blessings God has for His New Covenant people? Then you need to be a hungry soul. If you don’t know what that looks like, if you’re not sure whether you are or what you should do to be a hungry soul, ask God and expect Him to answer you with blessed reassurance or conviction, for He wants you to know where you stand with Him.
  • He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death. He has done that for us as well, in a totally different way!
  • He burst their bonds apart. He has done this for us as well, not just freeing us, but obliterating those bonds of sin.
  • He shatters the doors of bronze and cuts in two the bars of iron. These were the toughest materials known in that day, impenetrable by the technology of the day. What looks impenetrable to you today that He has the power to shatter and cut in two?

Why don’t you continue the list?

Don’t miss that their cries to the Lord were the key to their getting delivered every time. If He reveals something to you in these psalms that needs to be made right with Him, please don’t delay in crying out to Him!

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Day 119 — II Samuel 5:1-10; I Chronicles 11 – 12

I wonder why the account of David’s mighty men is preserved in Scripture for us. What can you glean from these? If you have any ideas, please share them with me. Perhaps they are here to demonstrate to us what kind of leader David was, to sort of develop this character who was not only a giant of the Old Testament, but also one of the “Greats” of history. He inspired such loyalty from his men that three of them risked their lives to get a drink of water for him during a battle. However much he wanted the water, he did not want his men risking their lives for such a mission, and he showed that he meant what he said by pouring the water out rather than drinking it. He wasn’t demonstrating ungratefulness, but a great respect for their lives. He thus demonstrated that he was a leader who valued his subordinates as individuals and did not see himself as more important than them. He gave credit where credit was due by sharing the exploits of these men and identifying who were “the three” and who were part of “the thirty,” but note that Scripture does not give credit where credit wasn’t due. It was clear that some of these men were superior in might to others, and all received the recognition that they deserved.

This account also shows that David was not the kind of leader to recruit men out from under the king while he was not serving as king; these men came to him. He may have started out leading the rabble of society, but good men wanted to serve under him. Under God’s orchestration, the best of men came, in time, to serve under him.

By the time David was crowned king of all Israel, all of Israel were glad to accept him as their king. They acknowledged that this was God’s choice for their king, and they were wholehearted in their support for him. The result was that all of Israel was unified under David’s rule, and there was joy in the nation for it. There were no more reservations about David’s being the true king of Israel. This is an important fact to establish; David was neither a usurper of the throne, nor was he ever seen as a usurper.

The capturing of Jerusalem and establishment as Israel’s capital is another key event in this passage that we shouldn’t fail to note. David made his residence in the fortress within the city and called it the City of David.

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Day 118 — Psalms 102 – 104

In making real and relatable to us the situations they address, the psalms should speak powerfully to us. They run the gamut of human experience, and in them we get to see real and God-honoring responses to those experiences.

Psalm 102 is an example from Scripture of one who has grown weak in affliction. Do you experience such times, or are you always strong in times of affliction? In his weakness the writer pours out a lament before the Lord. Note the words that describe his emotional state: distress, blighted and withered heart, no interest in food, groaning aloud, in a desolate place (that’s what the image of the owl is supposed to convey), lonely (like the bird on the roof), tears…. His emotional state is causing him physical pain. He feels thrown aside by God. Can you relate? As Christians, do we experience such times? If we do, should we be sharing that? The psalmist wanted his words “written for a future generation, that people not yet created may praise the Lord.” How did he get from lament to praise? He lifted his eyes to God. Note some of the things he wrote about God; could contemplating those have power to lift your sight above yourself in times of affliction and thus give you hope in God?

It’s easy to praise God for His greatness, but the writer of Psalm 104 does more by describing details about God’s greatness. I encourage you to contemplate what these all signify about God. That He wraps Himself in light, for example: think how impressive light can be, especially to a culture whose only source of light was the sun or a flame. Who can wrap himself in light like he wraps himself in a garment? What about each of the descriptions makes God great? Contemplating these can help one get to know God better.

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Day 117 — I Chronicles 8 – 10

The end of the genealogies! One of the main points of the genealogies in today’s reading is that temple worship was being restored after the Exile with great care for the choice of staff. God had designated the Levites as the only tribe to serve in the Tent of Meeting; there was no change of law when they moved worship from the Tent of Meeting to the Temple, so that practice continued until the entire nation was exiled from their land by the Babylonians (again, much later than David’s time). They understood when they returned from exile that re-establishing worship according to God’s design would require the service of the Levites. They were careful to ascertain that the Temple servants they employed were in fact qualified by their genealogy, as were those serving in the offices of priests and High Priest. This would have been very important to the recorders and first readers of these genealogies. It was because of their nation’s unfaithfulness that they had been punished with exile in the first place. Once removed from their land, they weren’t certain if they would ever be restored to it, if they would survive as a people, or if they would enjoy their special relationship with God again. When God gave them a second chance, they didn’t want to blow it by failing to observe all that God had commanded in the Law, just as their forefathers had been careful in Moses’s day.

The books of Chronicles relate the same history that the books of Samuel and Kings relate, but they are specific to the tribe of Judah. Some of the history is copied verbatim from Samuel and Kings, but some of the accounts are fleshed out. These books are some of the places in Scripture where people think they find contradictions in God’s word, but we must understand that Chronicles offers a closer view into the events. The effect is something like a close-up photo of a part of an object: the photo of the object as a whole and the photo of the part may not look like the same thing.

From the genealogies of the returning exiles, verse 9:35 zooms in on the tribe of Benjamin to focus on Saul’s genealogy – for the second time in this passage. Although the book of I Chronicles is all about David, his story starts with Saul, for the nation’s kingdom began with Saul. In case anyone wanted to claim that Saul’s heirs should have been the rightful kings, the writer was careful to cover that base and justify David’s becoming the second king of Israel. Saul had failed to keep the word of the Lord, and to even inquire of the Lord. David didn’t take the kingdom, but the Lord turned it over to him for good reason upon Saul’s death.

With all of this business taken care of, we are ready to resume the history of David’s reign over the nation of Israel. We intersperse the story with the psalms because this is the historical context of many of the psalms. David of course wrote many of the psalms, but many of the other psalms were either written in his day or in the context of the temple worship service he instituted for the nation. As a man after God’s own heart, meaningful worship of God was important to David; this became a passion of his life, as you will see, and he established practices for the temple worship. Since David was a musician, music was an important part of the temple worship he established. In his day the music program flourished, with psalmists like Asaph. You saw in the genealogies that the musicians were on duty night and day, and were so important that they lived in the rooms of the temple designed by David, and did no other work. Much of what David implemented became institutions of temple worship throughout the nation’s history up to the Exile, to be re-established by the returning exiles.

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Day 116 — Psalms 81, 88, 92, 93

Recall that Asaph’s name appeared in yesterday’s reading, listed as one of the Levites who was involved in the music of the Temple worship. This number he starts off with today invites the worshipers to “sing for joy to God.” I’m sorry to say that I have never before noticed how much joy is supposed to be a part of our knowing and worshiping God. I have confessed to Him my lack in that area and asked Him to transform me to make that as important a part of my relationship with Him as it needs to be.

Psalm 81’s account of how God interacted with His Old Testament people is a sobering reminder to us of the consequences of our choices. When they didn’t submit to Him, He gave them over to their stubborn hearts to follow their own devices. If you recall the history we have read so far, the result was not pretty, was it? But that is not God’s desire for His relationship with His children. Note what the end of the psalm says about what His desire is, and remember that that is His desire for you. In case you might forget that material prosperity is not promised to us New Testament people, recall also that Jesus said, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry.” He wants to satisfy us when we feed on Jesus. Can you imagine what that looks like?

Psalm 88 is written by another worship leader. Yesterday’s reading about the descendants of Levi tells us that the sons of Korah were part of the worship instituted by David. What is this writer’s situation? He addressed God as the God who saves him, and he was crying out to God; yet he said God’s wrath lies heavily on him. What can you understand about his situation? Can you find anything to apply to your own life?

The writer of Psalm 92 reminds us that it is good to praise God, and that melodic praise should spring from gladness at God’s deeds and admiration of His thoughts. Is this true of your knowledge of God? Do you express it to Him? He also speaks of the righteous flourishing. The cedars of Lebanon were famed trees that we are not able to appreciate today because they were decimated in ancient history. Their wood was so treasured by ancient powers throughout the Mediterranean that it was more valuable than gold. With that knowledge, think about the image the psalmist is conveying by comparing the flourishing of the righteous with the cedars of Lebanon. Do you see yourself flourishing spiritually? Are you continually bearing fruit, and do you see yourself as fresh and green? If you have difficulty understanding the imagery, think about the opposite of fresh and green: dried, brittle, drab, and barren. Which image describes you? I encourage you to be challenged by the psalmist’s example; use it to evaluate yourself. If this is God’s design for His people, how well do you conform to His design? If you don’t, please don’t wait to talk to Him about it. If you do, break out in praise to Him!

Psalm 93 is a great starter for praise. These should not be empty words to us! Think about what it means that the Lord reigns: how blessed we are that the reigning power is good and not evil. Think about what it means that the reigning power loves you and wants to enjoy intimate relationship with you. With the credentials given in this psalm, we can be assured that God’s reign isn’t going to end; think about the security offered in that. God’s house isn’t like any house we know, and one day we will be at home there; think about what that will be like. Is this substantial hope for you? I’m feeling pretty glad right now!

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Day 115 — I Chronicles 6 – 7

The genealogies in I Chronicles seem to go on forever; however, it should be obvious that they are far from complete. Likely they simply covered the names and relationships that were known to the returning exiles, which probably were the most notorious or most pertinent to the people who had returned and needed to establish their family relationships. Again, more time was spent in the tribe of Levi to establish who would serve where in the Temple, should they ever be fortunate enough to re-institute Temple worship. Possibly they were also establishing inheritance of the land to which they were returning. Remember how important that was to God?

Note that there wasn’t much to say about some of the tribes, and some of the tribes aren’t mentioned at all. That is because some tribes had no descendants returning from exile; they are considered lost tribes. Yesterday’s reading in Psalm 78 reminded us how many times God showed mercy to Israel, and how He was merciful despite their lack of sincerity toward Him. These genealogies show that there were limits to His mercy.

Some of the names of the men David put in charge of the music in the house of the Lord will be seen in the introductions to the psalms. Asaph is one. He was the worship leader’s right-hand man. The worship leader Asaph served was a grandson of the prophet Samuel. I like knowing these connections, as they make the reading seem more real. That is another reason to value these genealogies, tiresome as their reading may be.

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Day 114 — Psalms 73, 77, 78

I appreciate Asaph’s brutal honesty to admit that sometimes life’s ugly realities, such as injustice, leave us troubled, grieved, and even embittered. Sometimes God’s goodness just doesn’t seem like enough to overcome the unbearable burden of the ugliness of those realities, and we want to give up on God. Can you relate to that? Is it okay to say that? My experience tells me that taking my honest thoughts to God, disappointing though they may be, is my only hope for getting them addressed effectively.

Asaph’s testimony in Psalm 73 is another example to us of our need to take our cares to God. Speaking our ideas aloud to others has the psychological effect of cementing a commitment to an idea. If Asaph had spoken his doubt to others before bringing it to God, he may have been less willing to give that care to God and instead might have clung to his error. Further, if he had voiced his dissatisfaction to others, he might have caused them to doubt God and suffer unbearable discontent as well. They may have turned away from God. It is so much better to take our burdens to God, is it not?

Do you, like Asaph, find yourself envying the wicked for their seeming prosperity? Satan has only the temporal prosperity of this world with which to lure us, but sometimes it feels like a significant lure. But giving in to that lure would be sheer ignorance; for although Satan tries to deceive us into thinking that God is not good, He is actually the only source of goodness there is. Truly, this world offers nothing desirable in comparison to the glories that the future with God holds. Until we reach Heaven, we have blessings to sustain us on the way: God’s powerful presence to comfort and protect, His counsel and His guidance. In times of desperation like Asaph described in this psalm, those words may seem empty, like merely the correct Sunday school answer. Only when we hear them from God will they become true enough to us to matter in those desperate times. Only when we take the doubts to God will He respond with that convincing answer.

Do you know what it is like to cry out to God for help and find nothing? Asaph suffered that unsatisfied need, and chose to take comfort in recalling God’s mighty deeds from the past. It doesn’t say that he found the answer or the comfort he sought; what do you think? I think he hung in there and wrote Psalm 78….

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Day 113 — I Chronicles 3 – 5

The reminder about Reuben losing his birthright as the firstborn son is important because that explains why sometimes in poetry and prophecy Israel is referred to as Ephraim. The reason for that is the poet doesn’t always want to use the word “Israel”; that’s not very satisfying to the creative writer, to use the same word all the time. To enjoy some variety, Israel is sometimes referred to by the name of the firstborn son. Even though history says that was Reuben, Jacob removed that honor from him and gave it to Joseph. But also recall that at that same time Jacob decreed that Joseph’s sons Ephraim and Manasseh would be reckoned as his. This effectively gave Joseph double the honor normally given to a firstborn son! So that is the reason Israel is sometimes referred to as Ephraim. When you see it in poetry or prophecy, know that the name is referring to the nation of Israel and not just the tribe of Ephraim.

These chapters tell us that the expulsion of the land’s previous inhabitants continued well into the days of the kings; Hezekiah was a later king. Also note that some of the tribe of Simeon settled in land outside of what God had promised them, and they were missed when the other Israelites were forced into exile. They were still living there at the time these genealogies were written, upon the Jews’ return from exile. This is significant because it means that this tribe was not lost as some of the other tribes were after failing to return from exile. That is a word of hope!

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Day 112 — Psalms 43 – 45, 49, 84, 85, 87

The life of intimacy with God is not always a life of easy circumstances. Some of these psalms aren’t written from the perspective of the resolution of the hardest times, but in the midst of them. As difficult as spring is for me, I am at that place we read about in Psalm 142 last week, so sad that there are no words, and like the writer of Psalm 43, I can’t say the reason why. What do I do with that? Psalm 43 feels like balm to my soul; it gives me words: “Send me your light and your faithful care, let them lead me, let them bring me to You,” in that set-apart place where you dwell. It reminds me that I do indeed have hope, and it’s a substantial hope, for it’s hope in God, the God who has already saved me from self and sin’s enslavement. Can you appreciate what a powerful thing hope is? Can you honestly say that your hope is in God?

The great sorrows of this world can leave us longing for – what? Hopefully our sorrow will direct us to God. He has designed us for intimacy with Him, but His design has been corrupted. Even though we are not in a place to enjoy that intimacy, we still long for it, although we may not recognize it and often look for other things to satisfy that longing. God’s wonderful salvation makes a way for us to enjoy that intimacy. That salvation is what these psalms speak about.

Psalm 44 points us to Jesus. Presumably the writer wasn’t just directed by the Holy Spirit to write about something he didn’t understand as he wrote these words that are quoted in the Gospels in reference to Jesus, but he and the nation were suffering what he wrote about. Perhaps in his corner of the country there were people whose hearts had not turned back from following God and so were justified in feeling like they were suffering unjustly, but the history books show that the nation was justly punished by God. Has man ever suffered unjustly as Jesus has? It’s interesting that at the end of the psalm the writer asks God to “rescue us because of your unfailing love,” and through the Messiah referred to in this psalm, He has, in a most heroic way!

The introduction to Psalm 45 tells us that it is a wedding song. Recall that the New Testament teaches about our relationship with Jesus by using the husband-wife relationship. One of the loveliest moments of that relationship is the wedding. Read this psalm with that in mind: that Jesus is the king and bridegroom, honored for His heroic deeds, righteous character, and just rule; and the church – that includes you! – is the bride. Can you appreciate the sense of beauty and celebration in this psalm?

Psalm 49 speaks of the inevitability of death – no one can rescue us from it. BUT – did you catch the verse that is quoted in the New Testament in reference to Jesus? He has accomplished the impossible; He has rescued us from hopeless death.

Is there anything in this life that makes you yearn, even faint, for the courts of the Lord, like the writer of Psalm 84? I have to count my spring sorrow a blessing, because it is one thing that does make me yearn for the courts of the Lord. This longing promotes such a gratefulness for hope, and for salvation that makes it possible. This is where my sight needs to be set – not on present circumstances, not on what makes me sad, but on this hope.

A sad reality of our intimacy with God is that sometimes it needs restored and revived. If that is where you are, can you appeal to God as the writer of Psalm 85 did, on the basis of His unfailing love? He has taught us through His word and His dealings with His Old Covenant people that He is more than faithful to His promises because He is loving. He wants His people to enjoy a relationship with Him in which they rejoice in Him. If you need a revival of your love for God, can you pray this prayer to Him?

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Day 111 — I Chronicles 1 – 2

What dull reading! Those names are impossible to follow, aren’t they? But each one represents a soul treasured by God. One day our names will be as meaningless to anyone who might read about us; but we will not be forgotten by the One who treasures each of us!

The books of I and II Chronicles were written in a time far distant from the beginning of the kingdom of Israel about which we are currently reading. They were written after the end of that kingdom, after Israel was destroyed as a nation and its people punished with exile. The Chronicles were written on the return of the exiles to their homeland.

The purpose of repeating these genealogies at the beginning of Chronicles was to establish and record the lineage of the families of God’s chosen people returning from exile. This would have been important to establish things like who should serve the nation as priests and Levites, as High Priest. They would also have been interested in who the rightful king should be, if they were ever fortunate enough to be an autonomous kingdom again. Where should that record start? Obviously, at the very beginning!

Imagine what happened to the records of the nation whose capital city was burned to the ground: its records would have been destroyed. That has important consequences for the One who has made a promise the fulfillment of which those records could prove, if they had only been preserved. We may not enjoy these genealogies, but they are reminders of God’s faithfulness to Adam and Eve and all their descendants to raise up a son of Eve to crush Satan’s head as He promised. They are reminders of God’s faithfulness to fulfill His promise to Abraham that through him all nations of the earth would be blessed. They are reminders of God’s faithfulness to His promise that David’s throne would be established forever. To a nation returning from exile following God’s punishment, uncertain whether there existed any longer a covenant relationship between them and God, these genealogies were precious. We will see them yet one more time in Scripture – in the New Testament, where they will remind us of all of these promises and God’s faithfulness to them. So even though we don’t enjoy them, we can rejoice in the reality they represent!

These genealogies are pretty quick reading for me.