Our Father in God, we thank you again for another Lord's Day, another day to rest from our labors and fellowship as your people and worship together and learn from your word. And we thank you for this. And we ask again that you would strengthen us now for this hour, that we would learn much about the Psalms and that you would be honored in it. We pray in Christ's name, amen. All right. Well, we have been, of course, making our way here through a brief overview of the structure of the Psalter, and we are in the midst of Book Three. And who then remembers the theme of Book Three? Try not to look. Say it loud. All right. Devotation. OK, now, what are the Psalms in Book 3? OK, Psalms 73 to 89. All right, and we started again, as we did with Book 2, by looking at some numbers, some statistics, and in particular, in regard to the name of God that is used. And we see, yet again, the name Elohim is emphasized. However, not for the whole book. Remember, it's just Psalm 73 to 83, where Elohim is the focal name. And then Yahweh returns as the focal name for the last six Psalms. So I think, depending on how far we get here today, I think we will see that, even as we look at some more of the structure. We also saw, then, the authorship here. Somewhat surprising, based on books one and two, David only has one psalm here in this section. And it turns out to be in the section of hope and so on. But David is not totally absent, but noticeably much less compared to what we've seen. And so Asaph and the Sons of Korah in particular, Ethan has the one, the last one there. All right, so after authorship then, we saw another handle, and it was the pyramid. And what, who remembers the central psalm here in the pyramid of Book Three? Do I remember? Eric? Yes, it is. Psalm 80 is the central psalm. There are three psalms on each side of it. And what's quite striking is that the central verse in Book 3 is in Psalm 80. The central letter in the whole psalms, all the psalms, is in Psalm 80. maybe less specific in certain ways, and more just, can you say, in God's providence, but not specifically by the arranger, of course, is that if you take the total number of verses in the Old Testament and subtract the total number of verses in the New Testament, you still end up in Psalm 80. Somewhat of a trivial point. But the point is, Psalm 80 is clearly the focal point of the Psalter, at least in certain ways. It is the central psalm. It's the central verse there in verse 13 in English with the central letter. Those particular verses where you find them, I'm not sure are all that profound, I guess you could say, but we are drawn to Psalm 80. Now the other thing that we talked about briefly last time is that we see here in this pyramid a focus on Joseph. Joseph is only mentioned five times in the Psalms, and four of the five are here in this pyramid, including Psalm 80. Even Ephraim is only mentioned five times and three of the five are found in Psalm 80. Manasseh found three times and one of them is in Psalm 80. So either in the pyramid or Psalm 80 itself we see an emphasis on Joseph. And so in Psalm 78 we see that God chose David or Judah over Joseph and his tribe to be king. but that does not mean God rejected them utterly. So here's where we ended last time, so let's look now a little more specifically at this pyramid. Let's turn to Psalm 77, and again, just by way of overview, we'll certainly see more details whenever I arrive there in the preaching part of it, but in Psalm 77, the first of these of the selection of the pyramid. Notice there's an individual focus here, the psalm, right? I cried out to God with my voice and so on and so forth. Very individually focused. The nations are oppressing, okay? The nations are oppressing. You see his trouble there, verse three and so forth. And if you just scan down here through the psalm, you can see about, the people's and God doing wonders and and so forth and and you see this emphasis on God's people here as well and and so these the psalm is emphasizing here basically you could say God's grace to Israel in the past there's an emphasis on the on the exodus and so forth. Again, I'm not wanting to get too involved in all the details here, but you can see some references to it. But what I do want to call your attention to is verse 20. Notice how the psalm ends by talking about either a shepherd or the sheep. And so here it says, you led your people like a flock, and so both ideas are there, the idea of shepherd and sheep, shepherd being emphasized. Alright, now if you look at Psalm 78 then, the next of these Psalms, this one emphasizes the choice of David as king. Judah in and not Joseph. So that was, let's see, verse 67. Yes, verse 67, he rejected the ten of Joseph and so forth. Verse 68, chose the tribe of Judah. Chose David a servant. Verse 70, and then notice, he took him from the sheepfolds, from following the ewes that had young. He brought him to shepherd Jacob, his people, and Israel's inheritance. So he shepherded them according to the integrity of his heart and guided them by the skillfulness of his hands. Not surprisingly, one of the longer descriptions of a shepherd has to do with David specifically. And so we see this again, even back in verse 52, he made his own people go forth like sheep, he guided them in the wilderness like a flock, and so you see Again, this emphasis on the shepherd. God is faithful to his people, even in spite of their sins. That's part of the theme here, as well as the selection of David. Alright, then the third of these Psalms that precede the central one is Psalm 79, and another Psalm of Asaph, and this one emphasizes the invasion of Judah and its destruction in 586. Okay, so, O God, the nations have come into your inheritance, your holy temple they have defiled, they have laid Jerusalem in heaps, and so forth. So it's referring to the destruction in 586 BC. So, obviously devastation here. Look at verse 13, the final verse here, so we your people and sheep of your pastor will give you thanks forever, we will show forth your praise to all generations. Notice again, a shepherd is mentioned. Even in verse 7, it talks about a pasture. They have devoured Jacob and laid waste his dwelling place. That word is actually the word for pasture. So again, more evidence of pointing to the shepherd. So let me pause here. Any questions to this point? So now let's look at verse 80, spend a little bit more time here, or Psalm 80. And in this Psalm, we now have the invasion of the Northern Kingdom. Talking about Joseph, Ephraim, Benjamin, Manasseh there, verses one and two. Restore us, how long will you be angry, verse four. You've given us tears to eat and drink and so on. Restore us again, that refrain. you have brought a vine out of Egypt, okay, so referring that, spread everywhere, even to the river, verse 11, but then verse 12, why have you broken down her hedges, so that all who pass by the way pluck her fruit, okay, now you might remember that the word name Ephraim is the word for fruitfulness, so You can see that illusion there. The boar out of the woods uproots it. The wild beast of the field devours it. Remember, that's the central verse in the whole Psalter. Okay? And so here it's focusing on judgment. Return, we beseech you, O God of hosts. Look down from heaven and see and visit this vine and the vineyard which your right hand has planted and the branch that you made strong for yourself. It is burned with fire. It is cut down. They perish with the rebuke of your countenance. Let your hand be upon the man of your right hand, upon the son of man, whom you made strong for yourself. Then he will not turn back from you. Revive us, and we will call upon your name. And then again the refrain, restore us, O Lord God of hosts. Cause your face to shine, and we shall be saved." So we see here in some of these verses then the reference to the vine, Ephraim, here in particular being cut, broken down her hedges and uprooted and so forth. The Septuagint gives us a little bit of direction here in the title, if you look at the title there, kind of generic if you will, but the Septuagint adds the phrase, adds the word Assyria here. And so it has to do some with Assyria. And in the context of the psalm, it certainly points us in that direction, too. Notice again, then, the shepherd. Verse two. Sorry, verse one. You who lead Joseph like a flock. And even the first line, give Eros shepherd of Israel. And then if you look down to what I read there, verses 14 and following, notice that there is a promise here. There is a man, a son of man who will come and he will provide some help, you could say. And who is this man? And note again, especially verse 17, God's hand will be upon him. So, There is actually a Jewish tradition that comes from this passage that spoke of a Messiah that would come from Joseph. And the thought was that this Messiah would come and precede the Messiah that would come from Judah. But the Messiah from Joseph would actually die in battle. The Messiah from Judah would sit on the throne. That was part of the Jewish tradition. They're on to something, they just went in some wrong directions. Clearly you see about this man from Joseph and his importance, this idea of shepherding is here again. Let me read here now a moment from Palmer Robertson and what he says in regard to this point. He says, from a New Covenant perspective, right, from the New Testament, this tradition of two saviors from two different tribal lines finds its resolution in a single savior who combines in himself the major elements of both traditions. Because the ultimate Redeemer of God's people is so rich in significance, no one figure can encompass all the facets of his person and work. On the one hand, the royal image of a king with Davidic lineage depicts the perpetual sovereignty of the God-appointed Redeemer. On the other hand, the descent of a Joseph figure who goes down into the pit, down into Egypt, and down into a dungeon followed by an ascent up to the right hand of the Pharaoh, and up to the position of lordship over the nations, enriches the imagery of the Redeemer. So Jesus is the son of David, seated on his eternal throne. But in addition, Jesus deliberately chooses for himself the Son of Man title, and fills the phrase with imagery of both suffering through rejection and glory, when returning in the clouds. We tend to turn to Daniel for the Son of Man connection with what Jesus says. And that's good, we should. There's definitely connections there. But we also need to turn to Psalm 80. And this connection in this way. As significant as the promises that the son of David would be the Messiah, we need to see some of these connections with Joseph. In particular, how Joseph became a slave, but then ascended to the right hand of the power. There, of course, it was Pharaoh. And so here Jesus, the suffering Messiah, the suffering King, is going to go down into the pit and then eventually ascend to the right hand of God himself. So, Palmer Robinson here is trying to call our attention to the fact that Jesus combines these ideas. We see a separate idea here, and the Jews, in one sense, understandably, saw them as two separate people, but Jesus combines them into one. So, Psalm 80 here then is Very much messianic in this way. So even in the midst of the destruction of the northern kingdom, we see hope in a messiah who will come. A shepherd, in particular, is the language, of course, that we see here. All right, comments or questions here? Yes, Matthew. I'm sorry? Well, because of this language, especially in verse 17. Let your hand be upon the man of your right hand, upon the son of man whom you have made strong for yourself. And so they took that to be a reference to a coming Messiah. They went down the path of a separate Messiah, from the other passages that refer to being a descendant from David. And that's where they got off track. But they were on to something. They just didn't hold it together well. Which in some ways is understandable. With the coming of Christ, we have a lot more revelation and clarity. Yeah, Joe. Could be. Could be, yeah. Yeah. Any other comments or questions here? Yes, Cathy. Right. Right. And when he did, he went to the northern kingdom. Not specifically Ephraim or Manasseh, but certainly the area run by Joseph, or at least his sons. Yeah, definitely. I don't know. I think it's a good question. I don't know. Well, there's no question that Jesus' ministry was very intentionally toward the Northern Kingdom, not just the Southern Kingdom, including Samaria. And even after, with the early church, very intentionally Acts 8 going to the Samaritans, to Samaria, Philip, and then Peter and John. Yeah, definitely part of God, if you will, reclaiming his people. All right, well, let's then, again, just briefly looking here, let's look at Psalm 81. Here now, this psalm is another psalm of Asaph, and he's talking about worship there at the new moon and so forth. so on. And notice verse five, he established in Joseph a testimony. And so there's that reference to Joseph again. And as you continue here, especially in verse eight, here are my people, and I would admonish you, O Israel, if you will listen to me, there shall be no foreign God among you, and so on and so forth. The call here has to do with calling Israel to listen to God, and if he does, if they do, he will restore them as he did when he brought them out of bondage in Egypt. And so there's a reference to their idolatry fitting after Psalm 80 that speaks of the northern kingdom in exile. And so it makes mention of that. In Psalm 82 here, we see God the judge, especially verse one, he judges among the gods. How long will you judge unjustly and show partiality to the wicked? And so God the judge is judging human judges who are judging unjustly. But what is somewhat significant here is that Jesus quotes this. Anybody remember where he quotes it? Yeah, and he says, and the scripture cannot be broken in that context, yeah. So, in John 10, verses 34 to 38 in particular, he makes reference to this passage, and you'll see that in verse 1, also in verse 6, I said you are gods, and all of your children are the most high." And so his point here is the lesser to the greater. Since human gods render justice, how much more are God and God's Son who judge justly? And so Jesus puts it in that context for himself. But the original context has to do with, again, rebuking Israel for their sin. And so he's judging among the gods here, making reference to leaders in this context. All right, then in Psalm 83, you'll see a variety of nations are mentioned here. Verses 5 and following. I know verse 6, Edom, Ishmael, Moab, Hagrites, and so on and so forth, continues all the way down into, I guess, through verse 11. And so here are these nations who are conspiring against the people of God. They're trying to destroy God's people. And so Asaph here is calling on God to respond for his namesake. Note the word pasture is used in verse 12. So, it's interesting that the idea of shepherd is in 77, 78, 79, and then 80, but then we don't see it so much here in Psalms 81 to 83. And it's kind of building us up to this particular shepherd in Psalm 80. But there is the reference to pasture here in this one. All right, again, our point here is just a broad overview. We see how they're fitting together here in this way. Are there other themes? Yes. Are there other teachings in these Psalms? Yes. But these seem to be the ones that tie them together. in this pyramid, as he calls it. Alright, comments or questions? It's Elohim. I don't know if I can fully answer that, but I can say that the term Elohim can be used for leaders of some kind. Sometimes it refers to kings, or judges or powers. Sometimes it refers to angels. You just have to look at the context. That is not saying that they are divinity. It's just meaning that they are over and above. Elohim is this idea of sovereignty over. And so they are, in that sense, over people. But they're not THE Elohim, of course. And so that's what he is. saying there in verse 1, God stands in the congregation of the Elohim, the mighty. He judges among the Elohim, the gods. Yeah, as I'm looking at my footnotes here, they're saying that the mighty is El, and gods are Elohim. But, regardless, it's still making the same point, that the true god is over all of them. But yet, even in this lesser way, they do exercise authority and sovereignty. No. No. It's a, in this case, the lesser to the greater is the point. And Jesus, of course, makes the same point. It is, in some ways, you could say, anthropomorphic kind of language. We think of our leaders as kind of God-like, you know, powers or something like that. in comparison to God, they're nothing. So, it is not establishing a pantheon or anything like that. Now, if we had multiple verses that would say things like that, that would be different, but we don't. We just have some like this that stand out, that fit it into the broader theology that the rest of the scripture teaches us. Alright, anything else? Okay, well the next handle for us to grab onto here, or book three, are the Seam Psalms. The pyramid clearly dominates everything, but the Seam Psalms are very instructive. So, let's come back to Psalm 73 then, the first of this Seam, the first in this book. And let me say this first. You remember in book two, we had Psalms 42 and 43 together. They were originally one psalm. And then Robertson says, it appears like we should include Psalm 44 as part of the scene. So you have three, but again, it's really two psalms there, because the first two originally were one. And in Psalm 42.3, there's an individual focus about distress and lament. Psalm 44 is a corporate focus. Well, as we come here to book three, Robertson argues that we should see the same thing here. Don't just see Psalm 73, but also Psalm 74. Psalm 73 has an individual focus. This Psalm of Asaph. truly God is good to Israel such as are pure in heart, but as for me, my feet had almost stumbled, my steps nearly slipped, and so forth. So basically the rest of the psalm is about Asaph struggling with the wicked prospering. And in light of our, can you say, global focus here in this book, It probably does not refer to the fellow Israelites who are prospering, but referring to the nations, to the unbelievers outside of Israel who are prospering and Israel is suffering. It seems to be that that's his focus. But notice done on an individual level. So if you're sitting in Jerusalem, for example, and the Babylonians are coming in and they're surrounding the city, or something to that effect. It appears to be some of Asaph's mindset here, contextually. But then if you look at Psalm 74, here we see the corporate focus. Note, oh God, why have you cast us off forever? Why does your anger smoke against the sheep of your pasture? Remember your congregation, and so forth here. The emphasis here now is more on the nation, not the individual within the nation. You'll see more of the we language or us language, see there verse nine and so forth. This most likely is a reference to the fall of Jerusalem in 586 BC. It's not as clear as we saw earlier in, what was that, Psalm 79. Let's see, where's my paper here? Yeah, Psalm 79. But it does appear that that's the case here as well. Notice, especially verses two and following, remember your congregation, which you have purchased of old, and so on. The enemy has damaged everything in the sanctuary. Your enemies roar in the midst of your meeting place. They set up their banners for signs, and so on and so forth. They set fire to your sanctuary, verse seven, defile the dwelling place. Sounds like total destruction, doesn't it? Now, remember, Israel was invaded three different times. In 605 BC, Babylon came in, and that's when they took Daniel and his friends. They came again in 597, somewhere in there, and that's when they took Ezekiel, among others, and then they came back in 586 and destroyed everything. So, this is probably referring to the last one of those invasions, but it may be possible referring to something before that. But again, the point here is, Look at this devastation. All these enemies are opposing God's people. So an individual responds to those ideas in Psalm 73, and now here the nation is responding, written by Asaph, of course, in both cases, and yet with that focal point. All right, so let's now turn then to the last of the Psalms here. And that would be Psalm 89. It's the final one here in the book. But Robertson argues that we should see Psalms 88 and 89 as part of the same Psalms here for similar reasons. Psalm 88 is an individual focus. O Lord, God of my salvation, I have cried out day and night before you, and so on and so forth. So there's an individual lament The emphasis on this Psalm is death. Death is near, horrors are around, and easy answers and pious platitudes are not very comforting. In the end, death is an individual event, isn't it? Now, we may die with other people around us, but I'm the one dying. And so note this individual focus of death. And then in Psalm 89, this is the psalm of Ethan. And the key question in the psalm is why is the Davidic covenant failed? Israel is an exile, both Northern Kingdom and Southern Kingdom. So what happened to the promises of God? Verses 1 to 31 basically recounts the Davidic covenant. So lots of wonderful ideas here about God's promises to David. But everything turns then in verse 38, but you have cast off and abhorred, you have been furious with your anointed, you have renounced the covenant of your servant, and so forth. And so Ethan is lamenting the end of the monarchy here at the end of Psalm 89. So you see how these same psalms are emphasizing this idea of devastation. An individual focus on the devastation, a corporate focus on the devastation that God has brought against his people. So not surprisingly then, right in the middle of it all, is this promise of some kind of man that will come and shepherd the people of God. You see why Psalm 80 then rises to the forefront here in this context. All right, questions. Dale, you look like you're pondering something here. Yeah. It is. It is. But even before that, we could say that the Psalms that precede 88 give us lots of encouragement. And that is my next point. But go ahead, Kathy. Yeah. Well, possibly, remember, Jeremiah was taken to Egypt, so it could be referring to something like that. That he is not actually there at that particular moment. Maybe it's just a general statement that the prophets have all gone false, they've been killed, You know, there may be an exception to that. But yeah, as I study the psalm more carefully going forward, I might be able to answer your question better. All right, now there are two more parts here to book three. And the first one are the kingship psalms. in Psalm 75 and 76. Yes, the nations have conquered the people of God, but God is still king. Psalm 75, in the midst of these global powers, God is still the true king. Psalm 76, Septuagint also adds something here in reference to Assyria. And most people think that verses five and six make reference to when Sennacherib attacked Jerusalem. But then you remember the Assyrian army basically were totally wiped out. Israel got up the next day, and they're all gone. So though invaded, Elohim is still the ruler of the nation. So in the midst of death, in the midst of devastation, there is this hopeful theme, God is still king. Elohim is still king. And then, a specific section later that maybe we can just summarize as hope, here are Psalms 84 to 87. And if you recall what I had said before, this is where the Elohim name changes to Yahweh. God rules over all still, but notice the switch to Elohim here in Psalm 84, or to Yahweh, to Psalm 84. And that's the one where, boy, it's really great to worship God in his temple. He's yearning for the temple. He's wanting to come back to Yahweh's presence. Even the birds have a place there. And so clearly there's this emphasis on being away from there, but one of the sons of Korah is speaking of the peace and hope and blessing that is found in Yahweh's presence. Now let me just briefly say, Psalms 85, 6, and 7 are continuing this theme of hope. So to what Dale, what you were saying a moment ago, it shows us that they're not arranging the Psalms in a nice chronological format, but the same Psalms emphasize devastation, individual corporate emphasis, but there are other themes, the hope of the shepherd in Psalm 80, the hope of the King here, and the other hope here with Yahweh and so forth in Psalms 84 to 87. So even in the midst of this, it's not all dark. Psalm 88 is pretty dark, but it's not all dark. And so it's not just what we see at the beginning of Psalm 89 that follows, but what precedes Psalm 88 too. I'll say a little bit more in detail about these psalms next time, and then we'll move on to Book 4 and the emphasis of this selection of psalms. All right, well, we'll have to conclude here today and pick up next time. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you for your word and the beauty of it and the fact that nothing is accidental. Everything is placed here according to your plan and purpose to teach us about yourself, ourselves about sin and judgment, also grace and salvation, and pointing us again to Christ in various ways. And we thank you for this, Lord. We thank you that Christ is this combination of the son of man from Joseph and the son of David, our king. And we praise you that you have fulfilled your promises in him. We pray now that we would Focus our hearts and minds on our worship of you. Strengthen us, Lord, by your spirit, and that in all things your name would be exalted. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.