Sermon Tone Analysis

Psalm 127

King James Version

127 Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it: except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain.

2 It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows: for so he giveth his beloved sleep.

3 Lo, children are an heritage of the Lord: and the fruit of the womb is his reward.

4 As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man; so are children of the youth.

5 Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them: they shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate.

House can be used to describe kinship relations, such as a family, tribe, or royal dynasty.

Ending - Father’s House Archaeologists believe that the four-room house served as the dwelling for ancient Israel’s primary kinship group—the “father’s house” (בֵּית־אָב, beith-av).

Since Israelite society was patrilocal in nature, the father’s house included not only the nuclear family (husband, wife, and children), but also the extended family—the married sons with their wives and children.

The father’s house often was composed of up to three generations and could number as many as 30 people, who lived together in one compound that might have consisted of multiple four-room houses with adjoining walls (Stager, “The Archaeology of the Family,” 20–22).

This living arrangement is reflected in Jesus’ saying, “In my Father’s house are many rooms” (John 14:1–2; Richter, The Epic of Eden).

By extension, the term “house” might have included a man’s household—all of a family’s possessions, including slaves.

For example:

G. Vincent Medina and Stacy Knuth, “House, Ancient Near Eastern,” ed.

John D. Barry et al., The Lexham Bible Dictionary (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2016).