2/21/2012 9:22:48 AM
SPIRITUAL DIARY
My Worship Time Focus: Worshiping the LORD
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Psalm 47
Message of the verses: When we looked at the introduction of Psalm 46 in the SD a couple of days ago I mentioned that different commentators that I looked at had different ideas of who wrote that psalm, and that Warren Wiersbe said that Psalms 46-48 was a trilogy of psalms that were probably written by Hezekiah after the Lord killed 185,000 Assyrians that was recorded in the books of 2Kings, 2Chronicles, and Isaiah. I wish to look at these three psalms with that in mind.
Dr. Wiersbe writes in his introduction to Psalm 47, “The promise of Psalm 46:10 is fulfilled in 47, ‘I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth.’
“If this psalm was written to celebrate the defeat of Sennacherib (46), then it describes the people of Israel proclaiming to the surrounding Gentile nations the glorious victory of their God, a victory won without their having to fight a battle!”
He goes on to say that “This also is a Messianic psalm with an emphasis on the coming kingdom. As the people of Israel praise their God to the Gentiles around them, they make three affirmations about Him.”
The people of Israel would use this psalm on their New Years day celebration (Rosh Hashanah, and the church would use it on Ascension Day. Verse 5 of Psalm 47 says “God has ascended with a shout, The LORD, with the sound of a trumpet.”
Our God Is an Awesome King (vv. 1-4): “1 ¶ «For the choir director. A Psalm of the sons of Korah.» O clap your hands, all peoples; Shout to God with the voice of joy. 2 For the LORD Most High is to be feared, A great King over all the earth. 3 He subdues peoples under us And nations under our feet. 4 He chooses our inheritance for us, The glory of Jacob whom He loves. Selah.”
In Psalm 46:10 we read, “Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth.” As stated this verse is fulfilled in Psalm 47, but we can also see that the people of Israel went from being still before the Lord to shouting in praise to the Lord for the great victory that He had given them. The people of Israel worship the Lord in an enthusiastic way by clapping their hands and even dancing before the Lord. Sometime in the 1990’s while attending Moody Bible Institutes Founders Week I purchased a CD from their bookstore after hearing an interview on their radio station with the man who sang most of the music on the CD was Paul Wilbur and he was a Jewish believer in the Lord Jesus Christ who had a church in Chicago. The name of the CD was “Shalom Jerusalem” and the music on this CD is one of my wife’s and mines favorite CD. Later on it came out on VHS and we found out that it was performed in Jerusalem and as we watched we could see how the Jewish people wor
shiped God in their singing along with the music and their clapping and also their dancing. What I could see as I viewed this was authentic worship to the Lord; these people were truly worshiping the Lord and each other who were participating with them. I am not saying that this is the kind of worship that has to happen in a church service every week, but there was certainly nothing wrong with this kind of worship for we can see it in Psalm 47 as the people celebrated a great victory from the Lord worshiping their awesome King.
Our God Is a Triumphant King (v. 5): “5 ¶ God has ascended with a shout, The LORD, with the sound of a trumpet.”
Let us first take a look at Psalm 68:18 and compare this verse with it: “You have ascended on high, You have led captive Your captives; You have received gifts among men, Even among the rebellious also, that the LORD God may dwell there.” The apostle Paul quoted this verse in Ephesians 4:8-10, applying it to the ascension of Jesus Christ. These verses are very similar and one of the things that I thought of as I first looked at Psalm 47:5 when seeing the words “shout” and “the sound of a trumpet” was 1Thes. 4:13-18 which says, “13 ¶ But we do not want you to be uninformed, brethren, about those who are asleep, so that you will not grieve as do the rest who have no hope. 14 For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus. 15 For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. 16 For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with
a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord. 18 Therefore comfort one another with these words.” In every chapter of both 1st and 2nd Thessalonians is the mention of the second coming of Jesus Christ and this is one of those.
Dr. Wiersbe writes in his commentary on this section that there are times in Scripture when it speaks of the Lord “coming down” and most of those times when He came down to earth in the OT was to make judgment. We saw this in the book of Genesis at the tower of Babel in confusing the languages, and in the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, and also the killing of 185,000 Assyrians. After coming down to judge these events He returned in great victory.
Jesus Christ came down to earth as a baby, born of a virgin, and then grew up and for the last 3 years of His life preached, healed, and chose 12 men to carry out His work on earth after He was crucified. From the human point of view His crucifixion was a great defeat, but not in the viewpoint of God. “In His sacrifice on the cross, Jesus won the victory over the world and the devil and satisfied the claims of God’s holy law so that sinners could believe and be saved. What a Victory! He then ascended to heaven, far above every enemy, where He sits at the right hand of the Majesty on High (Heb. 1:3).” And as we look at the verses in I Thessalonians we also see that He will descend again at the “Rapture” and take His bride back to heaven with Him.
Our God Is King of Kings (vv. 6-9): “6 Sing praises to God, sing praises; Sing praises to our King, sing praises. 7 For God is the King of all the earth; Sing praises with a skillful psalm. 8 God reigns over the nations, God sits on His holy throne. 9 The princes of the people have assembled themselves as the people of the God of Abraham, For the shields of the earth belong to God; He is highly exalted.”
We see in this section of Psalm 47 the kings of all the earth praising the Lord. The psalmist looks ahead to when this will happen and this is prophesied in different places in the Scriptures and will certainly happen one day. We must understand that the God of Israel is God of all the earth, and deserves our praise and worship. We know that the people of Israel have been the most persecuted people ever to live and yet God chose them to be a blessing to all the earth, and they have been for they gave us the Scriptures, the knowledge of the one true and living God, that gave us Jesus Christ, the Savior of the world. Today we see both Jews and Gentiles in the Church, and this will also happen in the glorious kingdom where both Jews and Gentiles will praise the Lord.
Dr. Wiersbe ends his commentary on this section with these wise words, “For God’s people, everyday is Ascension Day as we praise and worship the exalted and ascended Lord.”
Spiritual meaning for my life today: I must confess that there are many times when I get involved in the everyday things of life that I forget to praise the Lord for being my Savior and Lord, for dying on the cross for me, and then for ascending into heaven to prepare a place for me.
My Steps of Faith for Today:
1. Praise the Lord for who He is and for what He has done for me and for all who have believed in Him as Savior and Lord.
2. Praise the Lord for the Scriptures.
3. Praise the Lord for giving me the Holy Spirit as a down payment, and will someday take me to heaven.
4. Praise the Lord for the presence of the Holy Spirit in my life to teach me and to guide me, to convict me of sin, and to led me to confessing that sin.
5. May I not grieve the Holy Spirit of God.
6. May I continue to learn contentment.
2/21/2012 10:44:27 AM
No comments:
Post a Comment