How can this be anyone but Jesus? Really folks, did you read it? There is a dilemma in Psalm 89. On one hand it speaks often of forever and in such sure and stable terms you think this is unshakeable and unbreakable and then wallop it is all a mess and 180° turned around. For our puny minds is this a problem but for an eternal God with an eternal Son who becomes a God/Man, it is no problem at all. And here we can see the power of the hypostatic union at work. All at once Jesus is perfect and eternal and also bearer of sin and shame. Isn’t it great? I think people probably gave up pondering how this could all work out and choose to ignore the inconsistencies.
I want to take you into a realm you may not have spent much time thinking about. Light. What is light? Is it something tangible or is it energy in movement and intangible? Scientists discuss it by asking is it a particle or a wave? Well it is both.
Around the year 1900 it was understood that light was a wave, and electrons as well as atoms were particles. There were a few pieces of experimental evidence that hinted at something deeper. Over the next quarter of a century there was a major change in scientific thinking with acceptance of quantization of light as well as wave behavior of electrons, all of which led to the concept of wave-particle duality.
…. Both of these depend upon the energy, which in turn connects to the wavevector and the relativistic formulation of Albert Einstein a few years before.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wave particle_duality)
Why is this relevant you might ask? I think it is one of many natural illustrations that show us that something extraordinary can be two things and act in two different ways at once and according to two different laws.
Jesus the eternal son of God easily fulfils:
“‘I will establish your descendants as kings forever;
they will sit on your throne from now until eternity.’””
Jesus the man was born about 2000 years ago and so he is in time as we understand it. But Jesus, the second person of the trinity, the eternal son of God, exists beyond time as humans experience it. So Jesus is the place where God and man cross over and meet and intersect, the two untouchable parallel lines of divinity and humanity are joined at the cross and so to some extent what applies to one now through Christ applies to the other.
In these 52 verses of Psalm 89 we see many conundrums that can only be understood in Christ, the son of David.
28 I will love him and be kind to him forever;
my covenant with him will never end.
29 I will preserve an heir for him;
his throne will be as endless as the days of heaven.
44 You have ended his splendor
and overturned his throne.
45 You have made him old before his time
and publicly disgraced him. Psalm 89
I can imagine after good ol’ Ethan the Ezrahite wrote this Psalm his mother heard him read it and she said, “oh my boy has lost the plot.” He thinks he has heard God and has written a lovely little psalm but there are some glaring holes in my boy's logic. But Ethan the Ezrahite was sure he heard God right and that God could work this stuff out. And now we know the truth: it was never a problem for God. The solution to what seemed a conflict was always there.
Do you think Jesus might have laughed when he got ready to blow the minds of his best friends and stilled the storm, showing himself to be the one who could do what no one has ever be able to to:
“9 You rule the oceans.
You subdue their storm-tossed waves.”
Come on my friends, modern day scientific satellite supercomputer meteorologist folks can’t even reliably tell us what is going to happen with the weather and precisely where it will happen. But Jesus can calm the storm. If that isn’t God then what is?
And who else in all history has had it said about him by so many that He is the owner and maker of everything? As far as I know this is a Jesus exclusive.
11 The heavens are yours, and the earth is yours;
everything in the world is yours—you created it all. Psalm 89:11
For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist. Colossians 1:16-17 NKJV
Paul explains many of the mysteries of Psalm 89 in his letter to the believers in Jesus at the city of Colossae:
13 He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed [us] into the kingdom of the Son of His love, 14 in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins. 15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. 16 For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. 17 And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist. 18 And He is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things He may have the preeminence. 19 For it pleased [the Father that] in Him all the fullness should dwell, 20 and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross.
Colossians 1:13-20 NKJV
27 I will make him my firstborn son,
the mightiest king on earth.
You don’t even have to be able to see, to see that Jesus is the son of David whom Ethan the Psalmist is talking about; blind guys could see it:
“After Jesus left the girl’s home, two blind men followed along behind him, shouting, “Son of David, have mercy on us!””
Crowds could see it:
“The crowd was amazed and asked, “Could it be that Jesus is the Son of David, the Messiah?””
Foreign pagan mothers with demon possessed children could see it:
“A Gentile woman who lived there came to him, pleading, “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David! For my daughter is possessed by a demon that torments her severely.””
These blind guys keep popping up in twos and seem to know the real identity of Jesus even without sight.
“Two blind men were sitting beside the road. When they heard that Jesus was coming that way, they began shouting, “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on us!”
“Be quiet!” the crowd yelled at them. But they only shouted louder, “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on us!”
”
(How much more of a connection do we need? God provided a whole lot )
Conclusion:
Jesus is the only way that this extraordinary promise and sort of curse in Psalm 89 could be reconciled, and in Him it is eminently clear: Jesus is the eternal God/Man king, who is the keeper of God’s promises. There is so much more to say about this deep deep mine of truth. Enjoy the jewels and nuggets you will extract from the depths. I just found a few lying about the entrance to the mine.
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