Psalm 87. How should we read these words? Very carefully. Why? Because they are the words of God. Okay, so let us hear the words of God. The psalm of the sons of Korah, a song. His foundation is in the holy mountains. Yahweh loves the gates of Zion more than all the dwellings of Jacob. Glorious things are spoken of you, O city of God. I will make mention of Rahab and Babylon to those who know me. Behold, O Philistia and Tyre with Ethiopia. This one was born there. And of Zion, it will be said, this one and that one were born in her, in the Most High Himself. shall establish her. Yahweh will record when he registers the peoples. This one was born there. Both the singers and the players on instruments say, all my springs are in you. sends us reading of God's word. So in the Hebrew, verse one and verse seven form bookends, what we would call an inclusio or a chiastic structure that give to the rest of the psalm a shape. And the reason I said in the Hebrew is because in the English, verse one is his foundation is in the holy mountains. But in Hebrew, the psalm begins earlier, where we began reading a psalm of the sons of Korah. The sons of Korah were from the tribe of Levi, which meant they were? Priests. Priests, that's right. And part of their job was to lead the worship, and from among them were singers and players. Verse seven. who would on their instruments say, all my springs are in you. They're leading the people of God in the public corporate worship of God to sing about the new birth. That yes, there was the visible people of God at the time, the nation of Israel, but there was also not just ethnic Israel, but there was also spiritual. Israel. And so Yahweh loves the gates of Zion, describing not just a physical city on top of a hill that the Jebusites used to own. but referring especially to the gates of Zion as the place where the people who trust in the Lord are gathered to him. And so in scripture, there would be this transition in which the word Zion and the word Jerusalem, which at first especially referred to a place on earth, and while also referring to a spiritual people, would come at last to refer primarily, especially, almost exclusively to that spiritual people that knew Jerusalem, that Zion that we heard about, the heavenly Zion in Hebrews chapter 12. and only infrequently and a lot less emphasis upon the place or the memory of the place that was built by David and sometimes called City of David. is not City of David, it is City of God. It is that city that we heard about when we were going through Hebrews 12 recently. So, the priests who lead the people of God in corporate worship, lead them in a song that says, Whether we were originally born in Israel or Rahab, which was a nickname for Egypt at the time, or Babylon, or Philistia, or Tyre, or Ethiopia. And of course, Egypt and Babylon and Philistia and Tyre and Ethiopia, those were places that when an Israelite talked about someone coming from that place, they would scowl. Because those were the dirty, nasty, God-hating places. You know, places especially that set themselves up against the Lord and against his people. But even from among them, there would be those who became citizens of heavenly Zion. members of God's holy city, Jerusalem. Which is good, because one of us at this table is 100% Egyptian, one is 0% Egyptian, and the rest are 50% Egyptian. And so praise God that whether you're Egyptian or whatever mom is, I think maybe English more than anything else, God only knows. She's so white, but actually ain't God and ain't Ellen, I think, no. And she does genealogy stuff. But although she may not have done a lot of Bowen genealogy stuff, probably just turn her side. Anyway, neither here nor there. The point is not where we get our first birth and in what family and what city and what country, but where we get our new birth. That to see the kingdom of God, to be part of the kingdom of God, we must be born again. Jesus is talking to Nicodemus in John 3 and he says, are you the teacher? And Jesus uses the definite article. He says, are you the teacher of Israel? And you don't understand these things? He was like, Nicodemus, did they not cover Psalm 87 in rabbi school? That you need a new birth to be part of the kingdom of God that you came to be asking about the kingdom and you don't even know about the new birth yet. Very important children. In order to be one of God's people that belong to Him forever and ever through faith in Jesus Christ, to be members of that heavenly Zion, you must be born again. You must have a spiritual birth. When we come into this world, we come into this world spiritually dead. We need God's Holy Spirit to make us spiritually alive. And when we see how God has loved us and chosen us and sent his Holy Spirit to us to make us alive and call us to himself, Do you think we say, yeah, God did all those things. Those are theological things that I knew had to be true because I learned good reform doctrine. No big deal. Or do you sing over the grace of God and do you rejoice over him who loved you and spiritually resurrected you and gave you that new birth and registered in his book This one, Ezekiel, was born in Zion. And Ezekiel says, no, I wasn't. I was born in Iowa. And this one, Carissa, was born in Zion. And Carissa says, I was? I thought I was born in Mississippi. And this one, Sophia, was born in Zion. And she says, I was? I thought I was born in Tennessee. but it is much more important that we have our new birth, that we rejoice and that the priest leads us in singing, all my springs, all the places where I came from are actually in you. The source of my new birth is in God's kingdom itself, that since he has made me spiritually alive, that is my primary citizenship. So, do the sons of Korah still lead this? Are they still priests? Okay, I guess technically in a way we're all priests. What priest leads the corporate worship of Zion now? That's right, the priest who came and there was a change in priesthood, who's priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. You remember talking about the forever priesthood of Jesus as we went through the book of Hebrews? So he leads us in singing that all our springs are in Zion, that the Lord has given us this new birth. out of his love and his choosing that we had to have in order that we might believe in him. Let us pray and ask God that he would have given us all the new birth and that he would make us to rejoice over it and sing of it as Jesus, our forever priest, leads in glory. Let's pray. Thank you, Lord, for this psalm. Thank you that you have sent Christ and taught us more plainly about the new birth and taught us about his priesthood and that we must be born again so that little children at a lunch table in Kalioka, Tennessee would be better instructed than the teacher of Israel. We pray, Lord, that just as this psalm holds before us, you would not only have made every member of our family to be born again, but that this would not be unto us merely a historical fact or a theological truth. but one of the great joys of our life that you have so loved us and have exercised your almighty power to give us that spiritual resurrection and that you have faithfully recorded, registered that by your will, by your choice, it is your pleasure to make us alive and give us a birth in Zion so that we are registered among your people there. We pray, oh God, that you would bless your church with rejoicing over such wonderful doctrines that you teach us throughout scripture and that they wouldn't just be things that people get right more, although we look out on the church around us in this age and this time and see so many who don't even acknowledge these truths. But Lord, we're called by your word here, not just to acknowledge, but to rejoice over this truth. We pray that you would bring reformation and grow your people and grow your churches spiritually so that there would be a rejoicing over the new birth. Do this, we ask in Jesus' name. And your children in this house say, Amen.