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The Wisdom of the Psalms | Bob Deffinbaugh · Reformed Thinking

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Welcome to Reformed Thinking, where we take a deep dive into
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the theological and practical truths of Scripture.
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We are really thrilled you decided to join us today.
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If you have spent any time studying Reformed theology or
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reading through the historical confessions of the Christian
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faith, you've probably hit that wall where the sheer volume of
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information feels completely overwhelming.
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You are looking for clear, significant knowledge about the
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Word of God. You know you.
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You want the meat of the biblical text.
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You want the historical context. You want the practical
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application, all handled with absolute reverence for the
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Scriptures. Today we are cutting through the
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noise. Let us consider a highly
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relatable scenario. Think about the last time you
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needed to express a severe, intense emotion to someone you
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love. Maybe it was a time of intense
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grieving, a celebration of a milestone anniversary, or an
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offer of genuine consolation. What did you do?
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If you're like most people, you eventually found yourself
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standing in the greeting card aisle of a local store, scanning
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rows of glossy paper. You did this because while your
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own vocabulary failed you, I mean you realize someone else
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managed to put the words together better than you ever
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could on your own. You relied on those printed
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cards to articulate the groanings of your own heart.
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Today we are turning our attention to the primary source
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material of Bob Deffenbull's teaching wisdom literature, the
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Psalms Part 1. The objective of this deep dive
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is to examine the distinct characteristics of the Psalms
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and how they function as the supreme greeting cards of the
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human soul. They articulate our most intense
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raw emotions to God in a way we could never formulate
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independently. Before we begin, we should
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explicitly establish our theological framework for this
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discussion. Both of us approach the text
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strictly through the lens of Reformed theology.
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We maintain strict adherence to the Westminster Confession of
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Faith. We focus heavily on God's
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absolute sovereignty over all human affairs and the truth that
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the chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy him
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forever. This theological bedrock will
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shape everything we examine today.
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Also, regarding the format of our discussion, throughout this
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deep dive, we will be taking deliberate, thoughtful turns
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speaking. We want to ensure a thorough
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examination of the text without any crosstalk or talking over
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one another. We want to allow the weighty
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trees of Scripture full room to breathe.
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OK, let's unpack this greeting card analogy Deffenbaugh uses.
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It brilliantly illustrates our modern emotional poverty
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compared to the depth of the Psalms.
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He points out that nowadays, people are incredibly inclined
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to send a humorous card rather than a serious one.
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We pick out cards with a quick punchline for birthdays or
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anniversaries. We do this specifically because
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we actively avoid true intimacy. Modern relationships often stay
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entirely on the surface, avoiding the vulnerability
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required for genuine connection. But the book of Psalms is the
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complete opposite of a superficial joke card.
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The Psalms capture the entire unfiltered spectrum of human
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emotion. In this one book you will find
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shouts of joyful praise for God's acts of physical and
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spiritual deliverance. You will find agonizing cries of
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repentance and confession of sin.
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You will even find utterly terrifying feelings of divine
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abandonment where the writer cries out because God appears
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totally oblivious to their suffering.
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This is not surface level religion.
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This is the staggering reality of life in a fallen world.
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Furthermore, the New Testament provides overwhelming validation
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for the primary status of the Psalms.
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If you look at the sheer volume of usage, the Psalms are second
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only to the prophet Isaiah in terms of how frequently they are
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quoted in the New Testament. The Lord Jesus Christ Himself
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validated their prophetic and theological weight.
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He declared a Luke 24.44 that everything written about Him in
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the Law of Moses, the prophets, and the Psalms must be
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fulfilled. Jesus even used the Psalms to
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express His own agony. He cried out the specific words
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of Psalm 22.1. My God, my God, why have you
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forsaken me? While hanging on the cross of
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Calvary? The apostles utilized the Psalms
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to prove Jesus was the Messiah in the book of Acts, and the
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early church utilized them extensively for corporate
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worship. We see this in First Corinthians
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14.26, Ephesians 5.18 to 19, and Colossians 3.16.
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In those passages, believers are instructed to speak to one
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another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs.
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The Psalms were the indisputable lifeblood of early Christian
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devotion. What's fascinating here is how
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that lifeblood of devotion carried straight through into
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the era of the Reformation and beyond.
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It solidified the Psalms as a central pillar of Christian
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worship. When we look at church history,
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the voices of our theological forebears echo this precise
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sentiment with striking clarity. John Calvin, a Titan of Reformed
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thought, offered a description of the Psalms that remains
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unmatched in its accuracy. In his introduction to his
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commentary on the Psalms, Calvin styled the book as an anatomy of
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all parts of the soul. He argued that there is not a
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single human feeling or emotion where the image is not perfectly
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reflected in the mirror of the Psalter.
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All griefs, all sorrows, all fears, doubts, hopes, cares, and
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anxieties. What Calvin called the
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tumultuous agitations that toss the minds of men, the Holy Ghost
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has represented them to the life within these pages.
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Calvin was not writing this from an ivory tower.
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He was a pastor in Geneva, ministering to religious
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refugees who had fled intense persecution.
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He knew first hand the terror of displacement.
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He knew the grief of losing loved ones to martyrdom and the
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overwhelming anxiety of leading a fragile church.
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So when he looked at the Psalms, he saw the specific vocabulary
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his congregation needed to survive.
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Martin Luther, another colossal figure of the Reformation, held
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a similarly high view. Luther declared the Psalter to
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be the favorite book of all the Saints.
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He noted that no matter what a person's circumstances might be,
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they will find in the Psalms words so perfectly appropriate
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to their specific situation that it feels as though those words
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were composed exclusively for their sake.
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Luther believed a person could never improve upon the words of
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the Psalms. He believed you could not find
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any better words to express your needs to God.
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And this reliance on the Psalms is not restricted to theologians
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in their studies. It holds true in the darkest
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moments of human history. Consider the striking historical
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anecdote of Dietrich Bonheffer, the German pastor and theologian
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who stood against the Nazi regime.
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In April of 1943, Bonheffer was arrested by the Gestapo and
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placed in Tegel military prison. He was stripped of his freedom,
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cut off from his congregation, and facing the terrifying
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reality of what would eventually be his execution.
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In that situation. Bonhefford did not turn to
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modern self help philosophies. In May of 1943, like he wrote
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from his cell that he was reading the Psalms daily, he
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stated plainly that he knew them and loved them more than any
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other book in the entire Bible. His last publication before his
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death was entirely focused on the Psalms as the prayer book of
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the Bible. If we connect to Calvin and
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Luther's reliance on the Psalms to our Reformed understanding of
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human frailty, the picture becomes incredibly clear.
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A core tenet of Reformed theology is total depravity.
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This is the truth that sin has corrupted every part of our
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being, including our emotions, our intellect, and our ability
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to formulate pure thoughts toward God.
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Because of our frailty and corruption, we are utterly
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incapable of producing perfect worship on our own.
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Left to ourselves, our prayers would be entirely selfish, short
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sighted, and tainted by our own localized perspectives.
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We have an absolute necessity to rely entirely on the words God
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Himself has provided. God and His sovereign grace did
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not leave us to fumble in the dark trying to invent a
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vocabulary for our grief, for our joy.
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He gave us the Psalms. He provided the specific script
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we need to approach His throne. This ensures that even in our
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weakest, most prayed state, we have a divinely inspired
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language to commune with a holy God.
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This divine provision extends even to the specific literary
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structure God chose for these words.
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We need to do a detailed breakdown of why the Psalms are
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written as poetry, and specifically the genius of
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Hebrew poetry. For centuries, Western readers
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looked at the Psalms and often missed the structural
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brilliance. They missed it because it did
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not look like the poetry they were accustomed to reading.
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It was not until just over 100 years after the King James
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Version was published that a man named Bishop Robert Louth
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rediscovered the actual structure and genius of Hebrew
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poetry. This happened in the middle of
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the 18th century. You see, Western poetry,
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particularly the poetry we are familiar with in the English
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speaking world, relies heavily on strict meter and the matching
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of sounds of the end of lines. Think of the classic hymns of
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the faith like John Newton's Amazing Grace or the works of
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Charles Wesley Amazing Grace. How sweet the sound that saved a
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Wretch like me. The rhythm of the syllables and
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the rhyming of the final words are the core features that make
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it memorable. But Hebrew poetry does not rely
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heavily on rhyme at all. The ancient Israelites were not
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concerned with making the ends of their sentences sound
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phonetically similar. Instead, they utilized a concept
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called parallelism. Parallelism is the repetition
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and development of thought from one line to the next.
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They rhymed ideas rather than rhyming sounds.
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Bob Deffenbaugh breaks down three specific types of
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parallelism from the text to help us grasp this concept.
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First, there is synonymous parallelism, where the first
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line is simply echoed in the second line with only a slight
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change of terms. A perfect example is Psalm 2.1,
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which asks why do the nation's cause a commotion?
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Why are the countries devising plots that will fail?
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The second line reinforces the distinct thought of the first
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line. The nation's parallel the
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countries, and the commotion parallels the devising of plots.
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Next, there's antithetical parallelism.
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In this form, the words of the first line are affirmed in the
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second line, not by repetition, but by a sharp contrast.
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Psalm 1.6 demonstrates this perfectly.
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It says certainly the Lord rewards the behavior of the
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godly, but the behavior of the wicked is self-destructive.
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The truth of the first line is established by showing the
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opposing reality in the second line.
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Finally, there is climactic parallelism.
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This is where the second line refines, develops, and brings
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the thought of the first line to a complete climax.
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Look at Psalm 96.7. Ascribe to the Lord, O families
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of the nations, Ascribe to the Lord's splendor and strength.
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The thought builds an intensity, adding new information that
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elevates the praise. Now here's where we see the
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absolute practical blessing and sovereign wisdom of God in using
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this specific structure. Because Hebrew poetry is based
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on the repetition of ideas rather than the rhyming of
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specific sounds, it makes Hebrew poetry the most easily
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translated poetry in the entire world.
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Can you imagine the absolute nightmare of trying to translate
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the rhyming scheme of an English hymn into Mandarin or Swahili or
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Arabic, and still trying to force the translated words to
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rhyme perfectly while keeping the original theological
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meaning? It'll be impossible.
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You would have to sacrifice the meaning to keep the rhyme, or
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sacrifice the rhyme to keep the meaning.
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By grounding the Psalms and the parallelism of thought, God
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ensured that the emotional weight and theological truth of
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his poetry could be accurately translated into every single
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language on earth without losing its artistic integrity.
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The ideas translate perfectly across linguistic barriers.
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This proves that God intended these songs for a global
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congregation. That artistic integrity is
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permanently linked to the musical nature of these texts.
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The Hebrew title for the Book of Psalms is Tehillim, which
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literally translates to Songs of praise.
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These were not abstract theological essays meant to be
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read in silence in the library. They were vibrant, loud musical
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compositions meant to be sung by the gathered covenant community.
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We see evidence of this constantly in the musical
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headings attached to many of the Psalms.
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You will frequently see instructions directed to the
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choir director. You will see specific mentions
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of musical instruments to be used, such as flutes in Psalm 5
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or string instruments in Psalms 4654 and 55.
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We also know as a historical reality that the ancient
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Israelites knew very specific tunes for these songs.
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For instance, the preface to Psalm 45 gives the instruction
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that it is to be sung according to the tune of lilies.
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Another Psalm might be sung to the tune of the door of the
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dawn. Music was an absolutely vital
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central component of worship in ancient Israel, just as it has
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been throughout the history of the Christian Church.
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Martin Luther, who we mentioned earlier, held an incredibly high
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view of music. He openly stated that a person
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who despises music does not please him.
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Luther viewed music as a direct gift from God, not an invention
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of men. In fact, he accorded music the
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highest place and the greatest honor, placing it second only to
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theology itself. We see throughout Scripture that
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music has a massive effect on the human condition.
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David's music calmed the troubled spirit of King Saul,
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and prophetic revelations were sometimes closely linked with
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music. But if we connect this to the
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bigger picture, we encounter one of Bob Deffenbaugh's most
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brilliant and staggering observations regarding the
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musical history of the Psalms. Somewhere along the timeline of
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history, the original musical scores for the Psalms were
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entirely lost. We know the words, but we do not
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have the original sheet music. We do not know the actual melody
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for the tune of lilies. Deffenbaugh argues that this
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loss was no accident. Rather, it is a magnificent
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divine provision. Think about the mechanics of
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translating lyrics. When you translate Hebrew into
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English or German or Arabic, the translation drastically alters
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the syllable counts. Some Hebrew words require an
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entire phrase to translate accurately into another
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language. If we still had the rigid
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original musical scores, it would be mathematically
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impossible to match the translated syllables to the
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original notes. You would have twice as many
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words as notes, or vice versa. It would create a chaotic and
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unsingable mess. By sovereignly allowing the
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original scores to be lost, God granted a massive blessing to
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the global church. The lost scores give every
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single language group and every distinct culture the total
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freedom to adapt these inspired, infallible words to their own
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cultural grid and their own musical styles.
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A congregation in rural Africa can sing a Psalm to a completely
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different rhythm and melody than a congregation in urban
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Scotland, yet both are singing the true inspired Word of God.
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This proves the universal scope of God's Word.
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He designed the Psalms so that all nations could sing His truth
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in their own voice. They're untethered from the
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specific musical constraints of ancient Middle Eastern
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instrumentation while remaining entirely faithful to the
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inspired text. That universal scope brings us
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directly to how the Psalms function within the cycle of our
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worship. Ron Allen, a prominent Old
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Testament scholar, categorizes the Scriptures into three major
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divisions. He labels them Revelation,
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Reflection, and Response. Revelation includes the
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historical narratives, the accounts of God acting in space
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and time. This is God speaking directly to
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his people, revealing his character through his actions,
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such as the Exodus or the giving of the law.
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Reflection covers the Wisdom books like Proverbs or
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Ecclesiastes, where believers meditate on the truths of God's
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character and how to live skillfully in a fallen world.
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But the Psalms fall exclusively into the category of response.
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The Psalms are the formalized, inspired reaction of the human
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heart to the revelation of God. Defen bondos a fascinating
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pattern here. The Psalms are very frequently
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public responses to highly private encounters with God.
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The writers of the Psalms often express their worship in the
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great assembly of the people, specifically as the fulfillment
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of vows they made to God in secret.
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Look at Psalm 116, where the writer declares, I will fulfill
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my vows to the Lord before all his people.
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Or consider Psalm 22, where David says, You are the reason
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Ioffer praise. In the great assembly.
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I will fulfill my promises before the Lord's loyal
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followers. A private deliverance inevitably
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leads to public praise. This public sharing of highly
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personal encounters facilitates intense spiritual empathy among
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the people of God. In Romans 12.15, the apostle
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Paul commands us to rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with
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those who weep. The Psalms provide the actual
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mechanism to obey this command. When a congregation sings or
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recites the Psalms together, they were unable to enter into
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the very real, raw experiences of the original writers, and by
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extension, they enter into the experiences of the people
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standing right next to them in the pews.
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We were drawn into the intense longing for God described in
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Psalm 42, where the writer cries out as a deer longs for streams
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of water. So I long for you, O God.
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I thirst for God, for the living God.
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The writer of Psalm 42 is depressed.
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He is weeping day and night, feeling trapped and overwhelmed
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by the billows and ways of life. When we read those words out
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loud together in a corporate setting, we're giving a voice to
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the silent suffering of the person sitting next to us.
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We are allowing the entire body of Christ to participate in
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their sorrow and to collectively point their gaze back to the God
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who decrees his loyal love by day and gives a song by night.
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We are bearing one another's burdens through the shared
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vocabulary of the text. That provision of giving a voice
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to our silent suffering leads us to a crucial theological
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argument regarding the nature of prayer.
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Specifically, looking at Romans 8.2627, the apostle Paul writes
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that the Spirit helps us in our weakness, for we do not know how
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we should pray, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with
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inexpressible groanings. Now a great deal of theological
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debate has surrounded this text. Some groups argue that these
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inexpressible groanings refer exclusively to the spiritual
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gift of speaking in tongues. Deffenbaugh takes an extended
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amount of time to dissect and reject that specific idea.
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The logic is clear and rooted in the broader teaching of
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Scripture. The apostle Paul plainly states
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in First Corinthians 12 that not all believers possess the gift
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of tongues. Spiritual gifts are distributed
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sovereignly in different ways to different members of the body.
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If Romans 8 is referring exclusively to the gift of
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tongues as the way the Spirit helps us pray when we lack
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words, then we are forced to conclude something highly
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problematic. We would have to conclude that
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this vital intercessory help is entirely unavailable to a
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massive portion of the Christian Church.
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That simply cannot be true. The provision spoken of in
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Romans 8.26 to 27 must be a universal provision available to
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All Saints at all times, regardless of their specific
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spiritual giftings. Deffenbaugh concludes that the
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Psalms are a primary, tangible means the Holy Spirit uses to
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help All Saints articulate the intense distress of their hearts
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when they simply lack the vocabulary to pray.
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When your heart is overwhelmed by tragedy, betrayal, or intense
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spiritual dryness, and you physically cannot string a
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sentence together to offer to God, the Holy Spirit directs you
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to the Psalms. You open the text and find a
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passage that precisely describes your internal agony.
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The Spirit uses those inspired words to intercede for you,
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giving shape to your inexpressible groanings.
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This is why Athanasius, the great 4th century church leader,
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made his Fogus observation. In his letter to Marcellinus,
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Athanasius stated that most of the Scripture speaks to us,
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delivering God's commands and promises.
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All the songs speak for us. They give us the very words we
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need to respond to the God who spoke the rest of the Bible into
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existence. When we are crushed by the
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weight of living in a fallen world, the Holy Spirit hands us
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the Psalter and says, pray this. The Spirit takes our localized,
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fragile groanings and attaches them to the inspired, infallible
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cries of David, Asac, and the sons of Korra, lifting them to
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the throne of grace. When we grasp that the Psalm
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speak for us, it creates a massive contrast with many
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modern trends regarding prayer within the broader Christian
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culture. Consider the incredible
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popularity of the prayer of Jabez a couple of decades ago,
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based on a single verse in First Chronicles 4, Jabez prayed.
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If only you would greatly bless me and expand my territory.
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May your hand be with me. Keep me from harm so I might not
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endure pain. Millions of books were sold
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urging Christians to model their daily prayers after this
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specific request. Now, while we acknowledge
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Jabez's prayer is in Scripture and God answered it, we must
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honestly contrast the extremely narrow scope of Jabez's request
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with the vast, comprehensive reality of the Psalms.
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The prayer of Jabez is overwhelmingly focused on
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personal prosperity, the expansion of personal territory,
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and the direct avoidance of all physical or emotional pain.
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It is a prayer for absolute ease.
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The Psalms, on the other hand, are what Deffenbaugh calls
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broadband prayers. The Psalms focus primarily and
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relentlessly on the character of God, not the prosperity of the
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individual. Furthermore, the prayers
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contained in the Psalms almost always arise from highly
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difficult circumstances. They are born out of intense
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danger, betrayal, sickness, and the very real presence of
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enemies. The Psalms do not shy away from
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pain. They run straight into the
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center of human suffering and demand that God be recognized as
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sovereign in the midst of the chaos.
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The Psalms teach us how to pray when the territory is shrinking
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and the pain is severe. Let's look at a specific case
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study to demonstrate this specific dynamic, focusing on
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the problem of evil as presented in Psalm 73.
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So what does this all mean? When the theology of God's
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goodness collides with the reality of suffering, we meet a
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man named Asaph. Asaph was not a casual observer.
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He was a chief worship leader, a Levite who ministered directly
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before the ark of the Lord. He was a man steeped in the
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religious life of Israel, a man who led the congregation in
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songs of praise. Yet Asaph faced A monumental
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crisis of faith, and he documents the entire collapse
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and reconstruction of his theology in this Psalm.
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The basic premise of the Israelite faith was stated
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plainly in verse one. Certainly God is good to Israel
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and to those whose motives are pure.
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The covenant theology was clear. God blesses the righteous and
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punishes the wicked. Yet as Asaph looked around at
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the reality of his society, his observations violently
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contradicted his theology. Asaph observed the wicked
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prospering. He saw men who actively defied
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God, living lives of total ease. They were well fed, their bodies
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were strong, and they seemed completely free from the pain
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and trouble common to regular men.
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They wore arrogance like a necklace and clothed themselves
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in violence. Furthermore, they openly mocked
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God, looking at the heavens and asking, how does God know what
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we do? Is the sovereign One aware of
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what goes on? They lived as practical atheists
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and got richer and richer doing it.
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Asaph confesses that this observation nearly destroyed his
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faith. He admits his feet almost
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slipped and he nearly slid into total apostasy.
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He became intensely envious of the proud.
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He looked at his own life, strict religious obedience, and
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concluded, surely in vain. I have kept my motives pure and
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maintained a pure lifestyle. I suffer all day long and am
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punished every morning. He felt that his obedience was a
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complete waste of time, a terrible bargain that left him
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suffering while the wicked thrived.
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That confession from Asaf requires serious analysis,
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particularly when we apply a reformed view of human depravity
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to his statements. Asaf complaints that he has kept
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his motives pure entirely in vain.
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He assumes a posture of inherent righteousness, believing he has
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somehow earned a trouble free life from God through his
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religious performance. He is essentially accusing God
22:14
of breaking a contract. But this assumption of personal
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righteousness is fundamentally flawed.
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Deffenbaugh correctly directs our attention to Isaiah 64.6
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which declares that all of us are like one who is unclean and
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all our so-called righteous acts are like filthy rags in the
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sight of a holy God. Asaph's assessment of his own
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purity was completely blinded by his self righteousness.
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When we examine his internal state according to the doctrine
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of total depravity, we see that his motives were not actually
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pure at all, They were entirely polluted.
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His heart was driven by raw envy and deep seated bitterness
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against God for not distributing wealth according to Asaph's
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personal preferences. Asaph eventually recognizes this
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corruption within himself later in the song.
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He confesses in verse 21 and 22 that his spirit was bitter, his
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insides fell sharp pain, and that in his ignorance before
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God, he was acting as senseless as an animal.
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He was functioning purely on base, instinctual envy,
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completely devoid of spiritual understanding.
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He was evaluating God's goodness entirely based on material
23:15
outcomes, acting no differently than a beast of the field
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looking for its next meal. The precise moment of
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resolution, the turning point of the entire Psalm, does not occur
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because Asaph's bank account suddenly increases or because
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his enemies are struck by lightning in the street.
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The turning point happens in verse 17 when Asaph says, Then I
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entered the precincts of God's temple and understood the
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destiny of the wicked. The crisis is resolved by
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entering the sanctuary in the presence of God.
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The fog of envy lifts, and Asaph gains a divine, eternal
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perspective on reality. Deffenbaugh shares a highly
23:48
illustrative anecdote about salmon fishing with his brother
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off the coast of Oregon. They were having a terrible day
23:53
of fishing, sitting in their boat for hours without a single
23:55
strike. However, a fellow on the boat
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next to them was catching fish after fish, pulling them in
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effortlessly, all while casually reading a dirty magazine.
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Deffenbaugh complained about the glaring injustice of the
24:06
situation. He wondered why God wouldn't
24:08
direct just one fish to His line while a man openly indulging in
24:12
sin was experiencing massive success.
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His brother wisely responded. This is all the pleasure this
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fellow will ever get. We've got heaven to look forward
24:19
to. That statement perfectly
24:21
encapsulates Asaph's revelation in the sanctuary.
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When Asaph views the wicked from the vantage point of eternity,
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he realizes their terrifying reality.
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Their prosperity is strictly temporary.
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God places the wicked in slippery places.
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Their sudden, terrifying ruin is guaranteed.
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Their wealth and ease will vanish like a brief morning
24:40
dream. When the Sovereign Master
24:41
awakens to judge them, their current comfort is an illusion
24:44
masking our impending eternal destruction.
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Asaph's conclusion drastically redefines our understanding of
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the ultimate good. Having seen the eternal destiny
24:52
of the wicked, Asaph completely abandons his previous envy.
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He realizes that his earthly relationship with God, even if
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it is marked by physical poverty, suffering, or lack of
25:02
worldly success, is infinitely superior to the temporary,
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doomed wealth of the arrogant. He cries out in verse 25, Whom
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do I have in heaven but you? I desire no one but you on
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earth. And then in verse 28, he states
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the definitive thesis of the reconstructed believer.
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He says, But As for me, the nearness of God is my good.
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Notice that the definition of good has shifted entirely.
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It is no longer defined by physical safety, financial
25:26
security, or the absence of pain.
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Good is now defined exclusively by proximity to the Creator.
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This truth demands a massive correction to popular modern
25:34
misconceptions about the nature of heaven.
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When many Christians think of heaven, they focus primarily on
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the physical benefits. They think of literal streets of
25:41
gold, massive mansions, reunions with deceased relatives, and a
25:44
place where there are no more tears, sickness or death.
25:47
While Scripture affirms the absence of suffering the age to
25:49
come, those physical benefits are not the primary glory of
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heaven. The highest supreme blessing of
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heaven is the unhindered, unveiled, eternal intimacy with
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God Almighty. Heaven is glorious entirely
26:01
because God is there. If you remove God from heaven
26:04
but kept the golden streets and the lack of physical pain, it
26:07
would cease to be paradise. If we understand that nearness
26:11
to God is our supreme good, it totally changes how we view
26:14
earthly suffering. The apostle Paul writes in 2nd
26:17
Corinthians 4.16 to 18 that our momentary light suffering is
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producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all
26:24
comparison. Our earthly afflictions, our
26:27
pains, and our deprivations function as instruments in the
26:29
hands of a sovereign guide to aggressively loosen our tight
26:32
grip on the material things of this world.
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Suffering starves our idolatry of comfort and creates a
26:38
desperate, starving hunger for the eternal realities of God's
26:40
presence. Asaph learned that a poverty
26:43
that drives a man to the feet of God is an infinitely greater
26:46
blessing than a prosperity that allows a man to mock the
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Almighty. When God removes earthly
26:51
comforts, He does so to give us more of Himself.
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This raises a critical question regarding the practical
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application of these truths, specifically concerning how we
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operate in corporate worship. If the Psalms represent this
27:02
high, weighty theology of God's sovereign goodness and our
27:05
absolute reliance on Him, how should this impact the way
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believers prepare for Sunday gatherings?
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Deffenbaugh brings his teaching to a highly practical conclusion
27:15
based on the practices of his own local church.
27:18
His church utilizes an open meeting format for worship and
27:21
the Lord's Supper. In an open meeting, various men
27:24
from the congregation publicly lead in prayers, hymns and
27:27
scripture readings as the Spirit directs, rather than following a
27:31
rigid pre printed liturgy. Deffenbaugh stresses that the
27:34
structural brilliance and theological depth of the Psalms
27:37
absolutely dictate that our corporate worship should never
27:39
be sloppy, spontaneous or haphazard.
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Worship requires serious, intentional preparation.
27:45
The songs were meticulously crafted.
27:47
Therefore, our contributions to corporate worship should be
27:49
carefully considered. Your personal encounters with
27:51
God during the week, your private wrestling with the text,
27:54
your confessions of sin, your recognition of God's daily
27:57
Providence. These provide the raw material
28:00
for your corporate praise on Sunday morning.
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You do not show up on Sunday hoping to suddenly invent a
28:05
theology of praise. You bring the finalized product
28:08
of a week spent in the sanctuary of God's presence.
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Furthermore, a crucial element we learned from the Psalms is
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the necessary trajectory of true worship.
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Even the Psalms that are born from highly humbling or even
28:20
morally questionable circumstances always move in a
28:23
specific direction. Take Psalm 34, for example.
28:27
The heading tells us David wrote this Psalm after feigning
28:29
madness before Abimelech to save his own life.
28:32
This was a humiliating and desperate act where David
28:34
literally let saliva run down his beard to convince a Pagan
28:37
king he was insane. Yet the Psalm itself does not
28:40
lender on David's cleverness or even his humiliation.
28:43
It rapidly shifts focus entirely away from the individual and
28:46
aims upward, fixed directly on the majesty, compassion, and
28:49
saving grace of God. True worship modeled by the
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Psalms might begin with our human experience of suffering or
28:55
failure, but it absolutely must conclude by declaring the
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unchanging character of the sovereign God.
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We do not gather to sing about our own feelings.
29:04
We gather to sing about the God who sustains us despite our
29:06
feelings. We sincerely thank you for
29:08
joining us for this extensive analysis today on Reformed
29:11
thinking. To close out our time, we want
29:14
to leave you with a final thought to ponder that builds on
29:16
the realities we have discussed today.
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We noted earlier that the loss of the original musical scores
29:21
for the Psalms was actually a divine provision, forcing every
29:25
distinct culture to seek God's voice in their own unique
29:28
rhythms and melodies. Consider this application.
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What if the specific tune of your current personal suffering
29:35
has also been left intentionally blank?
29:37
Perhaps God and his absolute sovereignty leaves certain
29:41
painful circumstances unscored in your life, so that instead of
29:44
relying on a predictable, comfortable melody to get
29:46
through the day, you are forced to rely entirely on the
29:49
unchanging character of the composer himself when the music
29:53
fades and the rhythm of your life breaks down completely.
29:56
The lyrics of God's faithful presence were made written in
29:58
stone. Keep suing truth, keep reading
30:01
the Word, and we will talk again soon.
30:03
Goodbye. Goodbye and peace be with you.