Seeing Jesus in the Psalms

Psalm 124 A song for pilgrims ascending to Jerusalem. A psalm of David. 1 What if the Lord had not been on our side?     Let all Israel repeat: 2 What if the Lord had not been on our side     when people attacked us? 3 They would have swallowed us alive     in their burning anger. 4 The waters would have engulfed us;     a torrent would have overwhelmed us. 5 Yes, the raging waters of their fury     would have overwhelmed our very lives. 6 Praise the Lord,     who did not let their teeth tear us apart! 7 We escaped like a bird from a hunter’s trap.     The trap is broken, and we are free! 8 Our help is from the Lord,     who made heaven and earth. Oh to be free! Free like a bird. Oh to have escaped the terrors of bondage. I knew immediately how to respond to Psalm 124. And as I write it I hear the voice of mockers who tell me I a...

  Psalm 98 Main Point: We can celebrate like we won the lotto when we know that Jesus remembers His promise and we have put our trust in that promise. I was at a concert of a Christian ska band back in the 90s, and as a youth pastor, I was invited to pray with the band before the concert. One of the band members shared the following verse with me: “For God is not unjust.  He will not forget how hard you have worked for him  and how you have shown your love to him  by caring for other believers, as you still do.” Hebrews 6:10 NLT I was deeply moved by this verse and by the young performer who ministered grace to me by sharing it. To this day I feel like it has the power of a magic spell. I know I used a bad metaphor but really it is hard to express the power of these words. You could call it a medicine. The truth is profound, deep, reassuring, comforting and moves me to tears even now as I type this. Although Psalm 98:3 has several different translations of what it is...

  Psalm 58 I’m starting this morning by comparing many many translations because the language and figures of speech are so interesting. I recommend you do that too. There are many ways to compare translations. You can have the books (Bibles) and open them and look at them, you can use the YouVersion Bible App on your phone and use the compare function in the app where you can add many versions from many languages and see verses in a scrollable list. Or you can use the website I’m using today to click through the versions, https://biblehub.com/esv/psalms/58.htm . I’ve dipped into the commentaries out of curiosity. As I suspected, the Hebrew here is very hard to translate and understand. Barnes Notes are particularly helpful (I'm not consulting that one alone, but don’t feel it is needed to mention every version or commentary that I am consulting) in pointing out the difficulties. I am not looking for answers, I’m looking for the agreed ideas that across the board are translated wit...

  Psalms 53 How refreshing that God is so open and clear about opinions and positions held among mankind. If there is anything I hate it is being lied to or being deceived. Society says there is no God. Society says that you can believe what you want as long as it doesn't hurt others. Society says a loving God won't judge people. Society says we have no reason to fear a loving God. These are all lies according to Psalm 53. So when God makes something absolutely clear and it flies in the face of commonly held views of society today, I know not to believe those lies. My heart wants to go after the people with such ideas but my spirit says focus on what God reveals about Himself here first. My pride wants to point fingers (other times it may want to defend people against such accusations as are found here). But I am looking for Jesus in the Psalms. I am looking for the teachings of Jesus and the previews of Jesus. MAIN POINT: There is a God who is seeking people who want to know H...

Lead me by your truth and teach me, for you are the God who saves me. Psalm 25:5 NLT   Psalm 25 As I copied the Psalm today I had three impressions.  The first is grace. I was taken aback by how loving, gracious, forgiving and helpful God was in the eyes of David.  The second was that David was concerned about his sin. He talks about it a lot, and all of his sin: past youthful sin and present sin too.  Lastly I noticed a preoccupation with problems, enemies and depression (a negative perspective).  I am going to explore all three and see if I come out with a unified central theme. My first question is possibly obvious for you. If God is so gracious, so loving and so kind, why does David have such a concern for his sin? Further, if the rescuing presence of God is with him, why does David have all these problems all the time? This is a common cry of David and it persists throughout the Psalms. Isn’t David chosen? Isn’t he anointed? Hasn’t he been rescued and does...