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How Shall We Sing the Psalms? · Reformed Thinking

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Welcome to reformed thinking. It is good to have you with us
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to be here today we are not skimming the surface of the
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latest bestseller or looking at pop theology.
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We are doing what we love to do here, taking a serious,
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thoughtful and, well, maybe a slightly challenging look at how
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we approach the Scriptures. Specifically, we are looking at
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the hymn book of the Bible, the Psalms.
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That is right, and we are doing that by looking at a fascinating
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piece of scholarship. It is a review article called
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How Shall We Sing the Psalms, written by Jimmy Grant.
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And that title alone is provocative, isn't it?
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It is. It implies that maybe, just
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maybe, we have been doing it wrong.
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Or, you know, at least we haven't been thinking very hard
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about how we do it. And before get into the weeds,
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and we are definitely getting into the weeds today, I think it
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is right to just sort of set the table for where we are coming
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from. You and I are both Protestants.
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We hold to the Westminster Confession of Faith.
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And for us, the belief is that how you read the Bible, your
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hermeneutics, your presuppositions, it all matters.
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It changes everything. Oh, absolutely.
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It is not just academic gymnastics.
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We often say that theology drives practice.
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What you believe about the text determines how you sing the
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text, how you preach it, and at the end of the day, how you live
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it. And this review by Jamie Grant
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is a perfect illustration of that.
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He takes three books on the Psalms, three very, very
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different books from three very different traditions, and just
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compares them side by side. It is a comparative study of
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methods. That's it.
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It's like a laboratory experiment.
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Yeah, that's a good way to put it.
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You have the same control subject, the book of Psalms.
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You know 150 ancient Hebrew poems, but you apply 3
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completely different methods to it.
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And Grant is reviewing a book by Hassel Bullock, one by Erhard
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Gerstenberger and one by Stanley Jeke.
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And. The difference here is, is
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really the key. If Grant had just reviewed 3
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evangelical commentaries, we'd be, you know, splitting hairs
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over minor doctrinal points. But here the chasm is wide.
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It is Hassel Bullock is an evangelical, a professor at
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Wheaton College. Erhard Gerstenberger is from
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Marburg University in Germany, representing that heavy critical
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academic tradition. OK And Stanley Drewski is a
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Roman Catholic professor from Seton Hall, and he's actually a
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scientist by trade. A.
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Scientist. A physicist and historian of
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science, but he wrote a devotional on the Psalms.
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So we have an evangelical educator, a critical liberal
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scholar, and a Roman Catholic scientist.
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It it sounds like the setup to a joke.
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It does, doesn't it? An evangelical, a liberal and a
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Catholic walk into a library, right?
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But the punchline is actually quite serious.
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Grant's review isn't just saying buy this book, don't buy that
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one. He is using these three authors
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to ask a much bigger question. And it's one that every listener
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needs to answer for themselves. Yeah.
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Is it better to analyze the text critically, to experience it
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subjectively, or to organize it thematically?
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And that is the mission for this deep dive.
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We want to understand how those theological presuppositions
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shape the reading. And to do that, we're not just
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going to talk in abstracts. We are going to follow Jamie
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Grant's lead and look at a specific test case, Psalm 110.
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Psalm 110. It is the perfect battleground
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for this. It really is.
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It's one of the most debated texts in the Old Testament, and
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it is the most quoted Psalm in the New Testament.
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Is that right? Oh, by far.
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Jesus quotes it. Peter quotes it.
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The author of Hebrews builds an entire theology around it.
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Wow. So how these three men handle
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Psalm 1:10? Well, it tells you everything
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you need to know about their theology.
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OK, so let's unpack the contenders first.
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Let's get a better sense of who we are dealing with before we
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throw them into the ring with Psalm 110.
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Good idea. First up, hassle Bullock.
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Right, so Bullock wrote Encountering the Book of Psalms.
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This is part of the Baker Books Encountering series.
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Oh, I've seen those. Yeah, if you've ever taken an
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undergrad Bible class or maybe a seminary survey course, you
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might have seen them. They're designed for students.
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So glossy pages, sidebars, glossary is that kind of thing.
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That is it. Visual aids, breakdown of
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concepts. But you know, don't let the
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formatting fool you. Grant points out that while it
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is accessible, it's still a scholarly work Olek is trying to
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educate. His aim is to give you a broad,
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orthodox overview of what the Psalms are, how they work and
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what they mean. He is writing for the Church in
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the Academy, but you know, specifically from an evangelical
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framework. He assumes the text is coherent
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and authoritative. Got it.
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So that is contender #1 the educator.
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Then we have Erhard Gerstenberger, Psalms Part 2,
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and Lamentations. This is part of the Forms of Old
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Testament Literature series. That sounds dense.
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Dense is a polite word for it. This is rigorous German form
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criticism. OK, you should probably clarify
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what form criticism actually is. For anyone who hasn't, you know,
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spent time in a German university, sure.
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Form criticism or form, Geshita is interested in the forms, so
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the structure of the genre and most of all the setting in life
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or sits and leaving. The setting in life, yeah.
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So Gerstenberger isn't reading the Psalm to hear God speak to
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his soul. He's reading it like an
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archaeologist looking at a pottery shark.
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He wants to know, was this used in a temple ritual?
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Was it a clan festival? Who wrote it, really, and when?
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And, well, usually for scholars like Durstenberger, the answer
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to who wrote it is not David. Right.
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And when? Much later than you think.
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So if Bullock is the educator trying to help you understand
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the message, Gerstenberger is the anatomist.
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He's cutting it open to see how the organs work, but he might
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kill the patient in the process. That is a fair analogy.
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He is dissecting the text. And then we have the wild card,
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Stanley Jackie praying the Psalms, right?
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Grant mentions that Jackie is Hungarian born and mainly known
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for his work in science and religion.
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He said Physicist, he's a Templeton Prize winner, a
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heavyweight intellectual he is. So what is he doing writing a
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book on the Psalms? Well.
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According to the review, this is a one off.
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It is not his field of expertise.
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It's based on his own personal devotional use of the Psalms for
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over 60 years 60. Years.
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Wow. Yeah.
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So he is not trying to be an exegete.
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He is not trying to parse Hebrew verbs or debate the dates of the
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Babylonian exile. He aims to encourage the
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practice of prayer. So we have the educator, the
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anatomist and the Mystic. Precisely.
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And this is where the aims of a book dictate the content.
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If you pick up Jackie expecting to understand the historical
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context of David's kingship, you're going to be disappointed.
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And. If you pick up Gersenberger
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looking for something to comfort you in the hospital, you are.
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Going to be horrified and. If you pick up Bullock, you.
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Will get a bit of both but structured for learning but
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let's not just talk about their BIOS.
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Let's see them in action. Let's move to the test case.
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Let's. Do it Psalm 110 and maybe we
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should read the relevant part so everyone has it fresh in their
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minds. Good idea.
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Verse one the Lord says to my Lord, sit at my right hand until
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I make your enemies your footstool.
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And then verse 4 the Lord has sworn and will not change his
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mind. You are a priest forever after
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the order of Melchizedek. A massively significant text.
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Luther called it the crown of all the Psalms.
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From a reformed perspective, we see this as David prophesying
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about the Messiah, someone who is both king and priest.
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It is the cornerstone of our Christology and the Psalms.
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OK. Let's start with the anatomist.
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How does Erhard Gerstenberger handle Psalm 110?
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Well, true to his method, he starts with a structure.
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He breaks it down into two stanzas based on those two
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oracles. You just read the promise of
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kingship in verse one, and the promise of priesthood in verse 4
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makes sense, but almost immediately you run into his
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skepticism. Grant mentions that
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Gerstenberger called the text particularly obscure.
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Yes. He claims it's obscure because
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of textual corruptions and unintelligible allusions to
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mythical ritual and theological details.
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OK. Let's pause there.
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Textual corruption. That is a heavy charge.
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What is he actually saying? Is he saying the manuscript is
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smudged? That describes spilled his
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coffee. No, not really.
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He is saying the ideas are messy and this is a common move in
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critical scholarship. If a text is difficult, or if it
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doesn't fit the scholars preconceived model of what
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Hebrew poetry should look like, then the.
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Text must be broken, right? The assumption is often that the
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text is broken, the scribe made a mistake, it is corrupted, it
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is a garbled transmission rather.
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Than assuming hey maybe this is hard and I just need to work
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harder to understand it. Or maybe the ancient Hebrews
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thought differently than a 20th century German professor Spot.
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On it places the critic above the text.
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Yeah. So Gerstenberger looks at the
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Lord in verse one. The Lord said to my Lord and he
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identifies that second Lord Adonai, not as God and certainly
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not as a pre Incarnate Messiah in the Christian sense, but as a
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generic Israelite royal figure. OK.
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Well, to be fair, historically, if David wrote about Solomon or
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if a court poet wrote it about David, it is a royal figure.
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True. But Gersenberger says this
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figure is being offered vice deity status.
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Vice deity He is. Sitting on the divine throne,
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that is a huge problem for monotheism if you are not
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careful. But then he runs into an even
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bigger problem, the conflict between verse one and verse 4.
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You have a king, but then you have a priest.
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Yeah, you're a priest forever. And.
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In the Old Testament, those roles were strictly separated.
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Saul got in big trouble for trying to offer sacrifices.
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Uzziah got leprosy. For it right you.
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Keep the Crown and the censor separate.
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That's the law. Correct.
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And Gerstenberger looks at this Psalm and sees incongruities.
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He thinks this mixture creates a theological mess within the Old
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Testament. It does not fit the pattern so.
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It's a contradiction. To him, it's a.
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Contradiction. And because he sees it as a
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mess, he tries to fix it by moving the date.
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This. Is the dating controversy And I
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know for a listener, sometimes arguments about dating ancient
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texts can feel a bit dry. Was it 1000 BC or 400 BC?
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But this really, really matters, doesn't it it?
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Matters immensely. It changes the nature of the
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Bible. Traditionally and certainly in
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the view of Jesus in the Gospels, Matthew 22
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specifically. This is a Psalm of David.
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It is pre exilic written while the monarchy is standing,
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roughly 1000 BC. But Gerstenberger disagrees.
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He. Completely rejects the pre
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exilic date even though he admits it looks like it comes
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from the Judean monarchy. It has all the royal language.
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He says no and his. Reasoning.
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Well, his reasoning is circular. He argues that the ideas in the
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Psalm, things like a universal outlook, world government from
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Zion, and a final battle against the nation's are incompatible
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with pre exilic theology. Wait.
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Wait, so he is saying they did not believe in that stuff back
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then? So this could not have been
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written back then that. Is correct.
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He operates on an evolutionary model of religion.
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He believes that Israelite theology started primitive, you
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know, tribal, local, and evolved into something universal and
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monotheistic only later after the exile.
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OK, so if he finds a universal priest king in Psalm 110, he
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concludes it must be late. He has to move Psalm 110 to the
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exilic or post exilic period. He concludes he was written
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later to kindle hope for betterment hold.
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On if you move it to the post exilic period after the
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Babylonians destroyed Jerusalem, after the line of David was cut
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off from the throne, then who is the king?
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There is no king that. Is the irony.
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He makes it a messianic expectation rooted in the Second
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Temple period rather than a prophecy to David.
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It becomes a community creating a fantasy to comfort themselves.
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It's. Just wishful thinking, yes?
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And from a Reformed perspective, and honestly just from a logical
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perspective on the text claims this undermines the prophetic
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nature of Scripture. It assumes God could not reveal
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the future glory of the Messiah to David.
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It assumes the text must be a reaction to history, not a
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revelation of history. It.
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Turns thus saith the Lord, into Thus hopeth the community that.
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Is a brilliant way to put it. He strips the divine author out
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of the equation and leaves us with a community struggling to
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make sense of their loss. So his analysis of the text is
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it? Is useful for data, Kryfter
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Grant admits. Girstenberger's scholarship is
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careful and thorough, but for doctrine it is hazardous.
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It turns the Bible into a book about God by men rather than a
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book by God for men and. This skepticism also touches on
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how he views the priest aspect right?
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If there is no king, then this priest forever align becomes
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what? Just a metaphor in.
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Gerstenberger's view it is an attempt to legitimize the
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Hasmonian rulers or some later priestly leadership by borrowing
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old royal language. He sees the mixing of offices
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not as a divine pointing to Christ, but as a.
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Political power grab. Or a confused theological
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development. He cannot accept that the
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incongruity is intentional, and that is.
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The keyword intentional as reformed believers, we look at
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the Westminster Confession, we look at our theology, and we say
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the Holy Spirit intends the text to be what it is yes,
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Gerstenberger seems to think the text is an accident of history
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for him, the. Text is a distinct human
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artifact. Yeah, it is layered, edited,
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redacted and corrupted. There is no singular voice of
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God weaving it all together. There is just a collection of
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voices shouting over each other across centuries.
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OK, so. That is the critical approach.
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Skeptical of the text? Skeptical of the history?
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Skeptical of prophecy, it dissects the frog until it is
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dead. Let's swing the pendulum all the
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way to the other side. Stanley Jakey.
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Subjective approach the. Contrast here is jarring.
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It really is. Grant quotes Jakey's opening to
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his chapter on Psalm 110. And just just listen to this
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tone shift. Jakey says if 30 years count for
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one generation, then 60. Some generations of Christians
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have already prayed this Psalm as a praise to Jesus.
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That is a beautiful. Thought actually it connects us
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to the great cloud of witnesses. It reminds us we are not the
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first ones to read this. It is beautiful.
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But then, he continues. He says whether all the words
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they prayed were clear to them all the time is doubtful.
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But pray they did, praise they did, and had their soul filled
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with the sense of certainty and peace.
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I see where this is going. You see it?
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He is. Validating the experience of the
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prayer even if the understanding of the prayer is missing, right?
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Grant notes that Jackie is not concerned with exegesis.
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He does not care about the genre.
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He does not care about tax criticism.
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He ignores the difficult hermeneutical questions of how
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the Old Testament relates to the New.
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He just assumes A Christological reading.
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But is that? Not what we do.
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We read it Christologically. We see Jesus in Psalm 110.
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We do. Of course we do.
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But we do it because the text warrants it.
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We do it because we believe the Holy Spirit inspired David to
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write about Christ, and we can trace that line through the
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covenants. Jackie seems to do it simply
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because that is what the church does.
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It is tradition over text. It is.
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We sing it this way because we have always sung it this way.
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So for. Him.
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The authority is not in what the words actually mean
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grammatically or historically. The authority is in the sense of
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certainty the believer feels, and that is.
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The Trap of subjectivity Grant critiques this heavily.
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He says the problem is that the prayers one believer draws from
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the text might contradict another because they're not
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anchored in the text's actual meaning.
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It's all just. Floating it is.
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If the meaning is just what it makes me feel or what brings me
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peace, then the Bible becomes a mirror.
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You were just looking at your own emotions.
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It reminds me. Of the classic small group
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error. You know what does this verse
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mean to you instead of what does this verse mean?
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Spot on. And Jackie, despite being a
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brilliant scientist who deals with hard facts and physics,
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falls into this trap. In his theology, he creates A
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hermeneutical gap. He jumps from the Hebrew text to
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Roman Catholic piety without showing his work.
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He ignores the bridge of exegesis it is.
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Fascinating that a man who spent his life measuring the physical
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universe with such precision would be so imprecise with the
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text of scripture, right? You would think a scientist
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would want to know the mechanics of the Psalm, the grammar, the
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syntax, one would think. But Grant suggests that Jackie
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treats the Psalms almost like a sacrament in the Roman Catholic
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Sensex opera operato, meaning the.
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ACT itself does the work, the act of saying.
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Them does the work. Regardless of whether your mind
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comprehends the historical reality, it is the chanting that
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matters, the repetition, the feeling of being part of the 60
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generations that sounds. Very spiritual, but from a
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Reformed perspective it is dangerous.
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We believe faith requires knowledge.
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You cannot trust what you do not know, correct?
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The Westminster Shorter Catechism asks What is faith in
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Jesus Christ and the answer involves a receiving and resting
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upon Him as He is offered to us in the Gospel as He is.
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Offered, which implies. We need to know how he is
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offered. Yeah, if we just feel good while
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chanting Psalm 110, but we do not understand that it is about
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the king, priest establishing justice, are we really
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worshipping in spirit and in truth so?
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Gerstenberger dissects the frog until it is dead.
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Jackie pets the frog and imagines it is a Prince, but
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does not actually check to see if it is a frog.
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We are really. Scratching the frog metaphors
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today, but yes, that's about right. 1 kills the meaning with
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skepticism, the other obscures the meaning with sentimentality.
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1 is hyper. Rational.
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The other is hyper emotional. Which brings us to our third
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contender, Hessel Bullock, the evangelical.
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How does he handle Psalm 110? Does he find the middle ground
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1st we have? To find it, Bullock organizes
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his book by theme, not by chapter number.
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Oh interesting. So you do not just turn to page
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110. You have to look in the index.
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You find Psalm 110 under Psalms of the Earthly King, which is.
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Interesting because as we mentioned, the word king is not
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actually in Psalm 110. It implies kingship, but it does
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not use the title. Melik, right and Bullock.
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Acknowledges that this is where he does good form critical work,
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but without the skepticism. He explains that it is a royal
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Psalm because it describes the power and paraphernalia of the
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king, the scepter. The footstool.
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The address. My Lord form follows function,
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so he. Is grounding it in history.
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He is saying this is about the Judean monarchy.
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He agrees with the ground level reading, yes.
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He calls this the ground level of hermeneutics.
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You have to start with what it meant to the original audience.
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It was about the Davidic King. But, and this is the key
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difference from Gerstenberger, Bullock sees the overtones.
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The overtones. What does he mean by that?
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The. Implications that go beyond the
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immediate history. Bullock argues that these royal
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psalms have strong eschatological implications.
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They were always meant to point forward.
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They readily lend themselves to the NT messianic view.
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So. He's not saying the New
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Testament writers hijacked the Psalm and forced new meaning on
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it, which is what critical scholars often imply.
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No, not at. All he is saying.
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The meaning was there in seed form, waiting to bloom.
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Precisely. This aligns very closely with a
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reformed covenantal view. God operates through history.
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He uses the line of David as a type A shadow and the
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disconnect. The Gerstenberger saw that
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incongruity of a king priest. Bullock would likely argue
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that's the point. No earthly king could fully
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satisfy this text. David could not be a priest.
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Uziah could not be a priest. The text demands a future
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fulfillment. The text creates A tension that
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only the Messiah can resolve. So the problem.
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In the text is actually the signpost pointing to Jesus, yes.
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Where Gerstenberger sees a mistake, faith grounded in
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careful reading sees a promise. Bullock balances the history and
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the theology. He does not ignore the grammar,
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like Jakey, and he does not ignore the divine intent, like
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Gerstenberger. He reads it as a unified
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document. And this.
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Thematic approach Bullock uses grouping psalms by genre, like
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royal psalms or lament psalms. Does that help or hurt the
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average reader? Grant.
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Argues it is very helpful for the student.
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It helps you see patterns. When you read Psalm 110
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alongside Psalm 2 and Psalm 72, you start to get a composite
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picture of this ideal king. You see the expectations
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building up, right you? Might miss that.
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If you're just reading them in order, you might.
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If you just read them sequentially.
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Psalm 1. Psalm 2.
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Psalm 3. You might miss that thematic
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connection. So bullocks organization is
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actually a teaching tool it seems like.
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Grant is steering us toward a verdict here.
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He has reviewed the three methods.
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Who wins in his? Assessment.
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He is fair to all three, but the critique is clear he values them
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differently. OK.
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Let's breakdown that verdict, starting with Gerstenberger.
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Grant praises the scholarship, right?
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He does. He calls it careful, well argued
20:28
and thorough. He says if you want to do
20:30
serious research, Gerstenberger is an ideal starting point.
20:34
You need the data. You need to know what the
20:36
arguments are. You can't just.
20:37
Ignore critical scholarship. No, you have to.
20:39
Answer it but there. Is a but a big but.
20:42
He warns the readers of The Melios, which is the journal
20:45
this review appeared in, that they will not agree with the
20:48
theological conclusions. The dating of the royal Psalms
20:52
is a prime example. If you accept Gerstenberger's
20:55
conclusions, you dismantle the prophetic structure of the Old
20:58
Testament you end up with. A human book, so useful for
21:02
data, dangerous for doctrine. Handle with care, correct?
21:06
Use a chart. Ignore the conclusion.
21:09
It is like using a map drawn by someone who believes the Earth
21:12
is flat. The local roads might be right,
21:15
but the big picture is distorted now.
21:18
Looking at Jackie, Grant is less impressed.
21:22
I think he calls it. Subjective.
21:24
And in the world of scholarship, that is not a compliment.
21:27
And he points out that subjectivity is divisive.
21:30
If you show Jackie's specific brand of Roman Catholic
21:33
spirituality, you might love it. It resonates.
21:36
If you do not, it is alienating. He calls it a methodological
21:39
soup. Soup.
21:40
Yes, a soup, a mix of ingredients that do not always
21:43
go together. Jackie moves between the Old
21:45
Testament, the New Testament, Catholic doctrine, and even
21:48
scientific observation without explaining how we got from A to
21:50
B. It is stream of consciousness,
21:52
theology and grant. Gives a specific example of this
21:55
failure with Psalm 96. I want to touch on that because
21:57
I think it really highlights the problem of the subjective
21:59
approach. Oh, the Psalm. 96 example is
22:02
devastating, it really is tell us about.
22:04
It so Psalm. 96 is a missionary Psalm.
22:07
It is about the glory of God being declared among the
22:10
nations. Sing to the Lord all the earth,
22:12
declare his glory among the nations.
22:15
It is massive, global, triumphant.
22:18
It's the great. Commission in the Old Testament.
22:20
That's a great. Way to put it.
22:21
And what does Jackie do with it? I'm afraid.
22:24
To ask, he focuses. On the phrase new song in verse
22:27
one, and he goes off on a ramble about novelty and liturgy.
22:30
He talks about the human desire for new things versus old
22:33
things. He misses the main point
22:35
entirely. So he.
22:37
Zeroes in on 2 words and misses the whole song completely.
22:40
Grant calls that peripheral at best and irrelevant at worst,
22:45
and he says it hides the meaning rather than revealing it.
22:48
And that is the tragedy of the subjective approach.
22:51
You can get so caught up in a single word that triggers a
22:53
thought in your head. Oh, new song that reminds me of
22:56
how I like new cars that you miss what God is actually
22:59
shouting through the text. You miss the.
23:01
Mission of God because you are thinking about liturgical
23:04
novelty, you are hearing your. Own thoughts, not God's
23:06
thoughts, that is. A serious warning for us.
23:10
We often open our Bibles wanting a nugget or a feeling, and if we
23:13
ignore the context, we might be meditating on our own
23:16
imagination. Which is why.
23:17
We need the anatomist skills of Gerstenberger, even if we reject
23:22
his skepticism. We need to look at the text
23:24
closely so we do not drift off into daydreams like Jackie.
23:28
That brings us to Bullock. The verdict seems to be that he
23:32
is the Goldilocks option here. Not too hot, not too cold.
23:35
That's fair. Grant called it a helpful,
23:38
comprehensive introduction. It is well written, it handles
23:41
the major debates, and it provides a solid bibliography.
23:44
It is the ideal starting point for the learner we talked about
23:47
on this show. It respects.
23:48
The history so it. Satisfies the mind, but it also.
23:51
Respects the theology, so it feeds.
23:53
The soul so. Let's synthesize this.
23:56
We have looked at the three approaches.
23:57
We have seen them wrestle with Psalm 100 M.
24:00
Why does this matter for the person listening right now?
24:03
Maybe they are not writing a commentary.
24:04
Maybe they are just trying to read their Bible before work it.
24:07
Matters because we all have a default setting when we open the
24:11
Bible, and usually it leans toward one of these three.
24:15
We are all naturally little bullocks.
24:17
Gerstenberger's or Jakey's. OK, unpack.
24:19
That how do we spot this in ourselves?
24:22
Well. Some of us are naturally
24:23
intellectual. We might lean toward
24:24
Gerstenberger. We want to know the Hebrew root,
24:28
the historical setting, the archaeological evidence.
24:31
We love the footnotes and the danger.
24:34
There is pure academic study. You dissect the text until it
24:38
dies. You become a critic of the word
24:41
rather than a doer of the word. You miss the divine author, you
24:44
know. About God.
24:45
But you do not know God, right? And then some of us are
24:48
naturally emotional or mystical. We lean toward Jakey.
24:51
I want that. Liver shiver we want to feel.
24:53
Peace. We open the Bible and point a
24:54
finger and say, what does this say to me today?
24:57
And the danger there is that we stop listening to God and start
25:01
listening to ourselves. We might feel good, but we might
25:04
be missing the actual instruction like missing the.
25:06
Missionary call in Psalm 96 because we are focused on our
25:09
own feelings about new songs. You got it.
25:12
So the goal is the structured study, the Bullock approach.
25:15
The Reformed approach, really it is recognizing that God used
25:20
history, He used genres, He used grammar to communicate
25:24
intelligible truth. We need the mind and the heart.
25:27
We need to understand the history to grasp the theology.
25:30
We need to study the ground level so we can hear the
25:33
overtones. It is about.
25:34
Integration. We want the rigor of the Academy
25:37
and the warmth of the devotion held together by the truth of
25:40
the Gospel. That is it.
25:42
If you lose the rigor, you drift into fantasy.
25:44
If you lose the devotion, you drift into cold rationalism.
25:47
I want to go back. To Psalm 110 one last time, the
25:50
king priest conflict. We touched on it, but I want to
25:52
drive this home. Gursenberger saw it as a
25:54
contradiction. An error, yes.
25:57
A textual mess, but from where? We stand that contradiction is
26:01
the Gospel. It is the hinge.
26:02
Upon which our salvation turns. Yeah, it really is.
26:05
If you only have a king, you have judgement.
26:07
A king enforces the law. If you break the law, the king
26:09
punishes you. And if you only.
26:11
Have a priest you have. Sacrifice, but no authority.
26:14
The priest can plead for you, but he cannot rule the world.
26:17
We need a priest king. We need someone who can offer
26:20
the sacrifice and then sit on the throne to apply it.
26:22
The. Incongruity that the critic
26:24
sneers at is actually. The specific shape of the hole
26:27
in the human heart that only Christ can fill, that is well.
26:30
Said. And it shows that if you trust
26:32
the text, if you wrestle with it rather than dismissing it, you
26:35
find treasure, you find that the problems are actually the
26:38
points. Absolutely.
26:40
The stone the builders rejected or the text the critics rejected
26:43
has become the cornerstone so to.
26:45
Answer the title of Jamie Grant's review How shall we sing
26:48
the Psalms? We sing them with understanding,
26:51
Contra Jackie's ambiguity. We need to know what we are
26:54
saying. We should not just mumble along
26:56
and we sing. Them as ancient truth, Contra
26:58
Gersenberger's skepticism, We trust they are real words from
27:02
God, rooted in history and not just community wish fulfillment
27:05
or political propaganda. And we sing.
27:07
Them as pointing to Christ, agreeing with Bullock and grant,
27:12
we sing them, knowing that David's Lord is our Lord we sing
27:15
Psalm 110 not just as a history lesson about the Judean
27:19
monarchy, but as a hymn of praise to the ascended Christ,
27:22
who is putting all enemies under his feet.
27:24
This has been a. Really clarifying discussion.
27:26
It is easy to just pick up a commentary and assume smart
27:30
person wrote this. It must be right, but we need to
27:33
look at the presuppositions. Always check the.
27:35
Presuppositions. Are they looking for God in the
27:37
text or are they looking for cracks in the text?
27:39
Are they they're trying to hear the spirit or are they trying to
27:41
hear themselves before we go I. Want to leave our listeners with
27:44
a thought? We talked about Jackie's opening
27:46
gambit that 60 generations have prayed Psalm 110 and even if
27:51
they did not fully understand it, they found peace.
27:55
Here is my question for you to chew on.
27:56
If we only read the Bible for that emotional experience, like
27:59
Jackie suggests, are we actually listening to God, or are we just
28:03
listening to the echo of our own desires?
28:05
But conversely, if we only study the grammar like Gerstenberger,
28:09
do we miss the voice entirely? Is the.
28:11
Difference between knowing about someone and knowing someone you
28:15
need the facts to know them truly you cannot have a
28:18
relationship with a delusion, but you need the relationship to
28:21
know them intimately so we. Need we need intelligent.
28:25
Devotion. Intelligent.
28:26
Devotion, I like that. Thank you for joining us for
28:29
this deep dive into reformed thinking.
28:31
We hope this helps you sing the Psalms a little louder, a little
28:34
clearer, and with a a lot more understanding next Sunday.
28:37
See you next time.