Psalms (Program #9) – What Kind of Man May Dwell with God for His Heart’s Desire and Good Pleasure?

Two trees were there in the Garden of Eden before Adam. Two trees that signify two sources and two lines that run throughout all of Scripture. The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil is one line and the Tree of Life, with God Himself as the source, is the other. The human thought perfectly matches the line of good and evil, while the divine thought always brings us back to the line of life, the line of Christ. David, the psalmist, often teetered back and forth between these two lines- one minute declaring the superiority of keeping the law and doing good, while at other times he would abandon that altogether and flee to take refuge in Jehovah or as we would say in the New Testament, coming to Christ.

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Psalms (Program #8) – David’s Concept Concerning God’s Judgment on David’s Enemies Among the Nations and Concerning Man’s Condition Before God

The Psalms beloved by all of God’s people are composed of the expression of the sentiments, feelings, impressions and experiences of godly men. Many of the psalms express primarily the concept of the writer. David, for example, in a number of the psalms was frequently in grave danger being pursued by his enemies those who were desiring even to do away with him. And so we see his crying out to Jehovah for safety and deliverance. Other of the psalms exult and uplift the law of God connecting God’s blessing with our ability to keep the law. There are however, many psalms that express a much higher thought, even the divine thought. Psalms which present the very Christ of God maybe not in direct reference but in unmistakable clarity. These are psalms which convey God’s deepest feeling and His heart’s desire for man that Christ would occupy the center in our lives as He occupies the center of God’s own economy.

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Psalms (Program #7) – David’s Concepts Concerning a Godly Life in Comparison a Godly Life in Comparison with His Inspired Praise of the Excellency of Christ (2)

The psalmist David had a particular perspective or point of view when he wrote the 8th psalm. After being intensely occupied with his own desperate messy situation in Psalms 3 through 7, his gaze turns to the heavens and his language and his psalm becomes equally heavenly. “When I see the heavens”, he writes in verse 3, “the works of Your fingers – the moon, the stars which You have ordained…”. Well at this point, David utters one of the great lines in all of Scripture, “What is mortal man that You remember him? And the Son of Man that You visit him?” This is a line so central to God’s eternal plan that Paul quotes it in the New Testament.

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Psalms (Program #6) – David’s Concepts Concerning a Godly Life in Comparison a Godly Life in Comparison with His Inspired Praise of the Excellency of Christ (2)

The early Psalms, many of which were written by David, present us with two very strikingly different concepts; Psalm such as 3 through 7 give us David’s idea of what it is to live a godly life. But the language, the content and surely the inspiration expressed in Psalm 8 is altogether different. “Oh Jehovah our Lord, how excellent is Your name in all the earth, You who have set Your glory over the heavens!” Here the language is heavenly and the thought does not convey the human concept of godliness but rather brings us to the divine concept and the divine thought where Christ is exulted and uplifted to the uttermost. Clearly though this Psalm was also penned by David, it was initiated by God Himself and full of His heart and thought.

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Psalms (Program #5) – David’s Concepts Concerning a Godly Life in Comparison a Godly Life in Comparison with His Inspired Praise of the Excellency of Christ (1)

In Psalms chapter 1, David, the beloved King of Israel, extols the value of God’s law and exults the law to the uttermost. This is wonderful. But, recall the story of 2 Samuel when the same King David so grossly abuses his kingly authority to have an innocent man, even one of his generals murdered, so that he could steal away his beautiful wife, Bathsheba. In the span of this one sin, David breaks two of the most serious commandments, those which he exulted – murder and fornication. How could this happen, we ask? Well the answer comes from the apostle Paul in the New Testament – where the Bible reveals that although the law is good and holy and righteous, it is also powerless to help us because though it may motivate us to keep it, it cannot supply us with the life supply to meet its demands. So its demands fall upon the flesh for their strength. Both David in the Old Testament and Paul in the New Testament discovered this harsh reality the hard way. The question is, have we?

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Psalms (Program #4) – Christ in God’s Economy versus the Law in Man’s Appreciation (3)

In our natural common mentality, the law of God easily assumes a preeminent position.  We can relate to the notion of keeping a high moral standard of conduct.  And surely this seems in line with what must be God’s plan and desire for mankind.  After all God Himself gave the commandments to Moses to pass on to His people, the children of Israel.  But there is a fundamental problem; when we afford the law the central position in our relationship to God and that is although it is good and righteous and holy, the law is powerless and must rely on man’s fallen flesh to carry it out.  Try as we may and regardless of how much desperate prayer expressing our earnest desire to carry it out we add to it,  the result is inevitable, an utter failure, leaving us defeated and condemned and spiritually dead.  Oh that our eyes would be open to see that this righteous law that so vividly portraits God’s holy nature has never occupied the central place in His plan.  For that place throughout eternity is reserved unchangingly for the Christ of God alone.

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Psalms (Program #3) – Christ in God’s Economy versus the Law in Man’s Appreciation (2)

The Bible is not an ordinary book.  Though it surely contains a lot of history, we should not read it as a history book. It also contains scores of moral and behavioral imperatives but we should not take it as a book of ethics.  Neither should we approach the Bible as a book of philosophy . Because beyond all of these things, history, ethics, philosophy, The Bible is in its’ essence, God’s own breath revealing the Christ of God enable to convey God Himself as life into those who come to seeking nothing else but His very person.

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Psalms (Program #2) – Christ in God’s Economy versus the Law in Man’s Appreciation (1)

Many of the 39 books of the Old Testament touched the matter of the law. The law generally refers to the commands that God delivered to Moses on Mount Sinai after the children of Israel had their exodus from Egypt. And the impact that these laws has had not just on God’s people but on all of western civilization is hard to overstate.

God’s people both in New and Old Testament heirs treasure the law of God.  But there is a key word in the New Testament that reveals something crucial concerning God’s entire economy and how the law relates to it.  In Rom 5:20 it says, “And the law entered in alongside that the offense might abound”  What does it mean that the law entered in alongside?  Well, we will discuss this in many more items relate to the law and the central focus of God’s economy on today’s program.

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Psalms (Program #1) – An Introductory Word

Most believers are seem to have a particular love for the book of the Psalms. The Psalms, far more than just a random collection of Bible stories and doctrines, actually flow out of the deep feelings, expressions and experiences of godly men. And what flows out of these ones?  Though at times reflecting their human thought and concept, at other times expresses the deep and profound thought of God directly. God’s speaking through this book is full of the divine revelation and if we possess the keys to enter into this divine revelation, the Psalms will become even more precious more enlightening and will usher us all into God’s presence, His heart and especially His heart’s desire.

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Job (Program #15) – Two Trees, Two Sources, Two Lines, Two Principles, and Two Ends in the Divine Revelation of the Holy Scriptures

The Bible opens with man placed in a garden before two trees. These two trees represent two lines that run through the entire Bible. And these two lines become two ways that man can take. At the end of the Bible, the two ways issue in two ends, two results. One line or way represented by the tree of life leads to life, the eternal life, the eternal city of life – the New Jerusalem. While the other way, typified by the tree of knowledge of good and evil, leads ultimately to death and destruction.

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