Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

We have been on quite a journey through the psalms in search of Christ.

I think we found plenty of evidence that the Messiah, the King of Heaven is present in the psalms

We started by looking at Psalm 1 and looked at the human condition.

We saw that we have a choice to follow God’s righteousness—a way that provides blessings in our relationship with God—or we could choose to rebel against God, as the wicked do, and walk in a way that is cursed and leads towards God’s judgement.

We followed that by looking at Jesus as the Good Shepherd, in Psalm 23.

We saw how Jesus provides for our needs, as a shepherd provides for and protects his sheep.

In Psalm 2, we saw how the nations rage against God and his chosen king.

We saw that God had prepared his son to become the King of Heaven and eventually claim his inheritance as the King of all the world and King of Kings.

Psalm 110 showed us how the Messiah would be, not only the King over all kings, but would be the High Priest, a priest of the order of Melchizedek.

That is a new priest for a new covenant, one that would provide a new form of atonement and bring his people into a state of forgiveness and right standing with Father God.

We looked at the cornerstone in Psalm 118, and saw how Jesus would serve as the foundation, upon which his church would be built.

And, last week we studied Psalm 22 as we understood the need for the King of Heaven to suffer and die as the atonement for our sins, so that we might find forgiveness.

We also saw that he was resurrected and waits at the right hand of the father for the day when he will claim his inheritance.

Today, we’ll be studying Psalm 24 and looking for a connection between the return of the ark of the covenant to Jerusalem and the fulfillment of the glorification of Jesus Christ.

Let’s read Psalm 24 (E544 / S342)...

[pray]

Psalm 24 was written by David to memorialize the successful return of the ark of the covenant to Jerusalem.

Background

Let me provide a bit of background history on this psalm so that we might understand it better.

I’ll summarize this since this history is spread throughout the early part of the books of Samuel and the books of Chronicles.

Before Israel was established as a nation and a human king was anointed as their leader, God was the king of the Hebrews and he had judges to rescue his people in difficult times, to lead them and to communicate his wishes to them.

During the time of the Judge Samuel, there was great conflict with the Philistine people.

The Hebrew-Philistine conflict was primarily about land access, because the Hebrews occupied a strategic crossroads at a natural bottleneck between Europe to the northwest, Asia to the northeast, and Africa to the southwest.

The Philistines worshipped false gods, such as Dagon, a grain god; Ashteroth, a goddess of war and fertility; and Beelzebul, a god who had some connection with lightning or fire.

The Philistines rejected the God of Israel and created problems for them throughout much of the Old Testament history.

During this conflict, the Hebrews held the ark of God, which was representative of God’s presence on the earth.

There were very specific rules and procedures in place for the handling of the ark.

However, the Hebrews—wanting to win the battle—took the ark of God into battle without consulting God and they lost the ark, lost the battle, and lost God’s blessing.

While the Philistines held the ark of God, they experienced many curses, including bizarre “accidents” and a plague of tumors.

As they tried to figure out what to do, they decided to make some golden effigies in the shape of the tumors and some mice—don’t ask me why, I guess it seemed like a good idea at the time—and they put these golden figures in a box and sent them, along with the ark of God, away on a cart, hoping that they might get some relief from the plague.

When the Levitical priests of Beth-shemesh saw the cart coming, they made sacrificial offerings to the Lord and stored the ark of God away in a home for the next 20 years—don’t ask me why, I guess it seemed like a good idea at the time.

So the ark of God remained protected in a private home throughout the transition from judges of Israel to the anointing of King Saul and into the reign of King David.

However, the rightful place of the ark of God was in the tabernacle.

King David united Israel and Judah and became king over the United Kingdom of Israel and made Jerusalem his capital.

David brought the ark to Jerusalem, which the Israelites understood to be symbolic of the blessing of the Lord upon the reign of King David.

And since the presence of God was believed to travel with the ark, David was, in many ways, bringing God back to his proper place in Jerusalem.

This psalm commemorates the return of the Lord to Zion.

This is the primary event that made David famous.

So when David wrote this psalm, he was working under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and attempting to capture the huge accomplishment and the glory surrounding the return of God’s presence to his people, the Hebrews, who had become Israelites under King David’s leadership.

However, while this psalm is definitely about the return of the ark of God to Zion—a significant location that is connected with the Temple Mount, the location of the temple and where God’s presence was said to dwell within the Old City of Jerusalem—the psalm is also prophetic in speaking about the return of Christ to Zion at the time he comes again to earth to claim his inheritance and establish his kingdom.

This is not an uncommon occurence in the Old Testament writings.

We often find that texts were written with an original purpose and understanding, only to find that there are echoes of meaning that repeat and point forward in time, in some cases, to events that have not yet come to pass.

I. God Owns the World

We sing the praise song God of Wonders...

Lord of all creation

Lord of water, earth and sky

The heavens are your Tabernacle

Glory to the Lord on high

He’s the Lord of heaven and earth!

We hold this belief that God created all of heaven and earth.

His word tells us this in the very beginning...

We also believe that Jesus played a part in Creation.

The Apostle John wrote about Jesus in the beginning of his gospel account.

He called Jesus the “Word”—logos—because he was writing about Jesus

John is using poetic language to describe that Christ runs throughout human history, indeed throughout divine history and is linked inextricably to the very beginning of everything that we know.

The Apostle Paul agreed with John’s assessment and wrote about it in his letter to the Colossian church, saying that Jesus is the Creator of the universe...

This is what we are talking about today, the reconciling of everything to the person of Jesus Christ.

Everything under heaven and on earth will be reconciled to Christ.

This means those of us who count ourselves as slaves to Christ and those who have rebelled against him.

We will find that the new master will have arrived to take control over all that is under his authority and order will be returned to his kingdom.

II.

Who Can Enter God’s Presence?

We see the psalm ask about the credentials of this new Lord.

It asks “who has the right to take control?”

And the response gives us the answer...

The only one to ever have clean hands and a pure heart, who has never sworn deceitfully was Jesus Christ...

These are references to the prophesied Messiah...

The apostles of Christ believed that he was the one who would ascend the mountain of the Lord and stand in the holy place.

You’ll remember that God could not abide with sin, and the holy place is a place with God.

We are told the Jesus abides in God’s presence at his right hand, awaiting the proper time for his return to claim his inheritance.

III.

Christ is our Righteousness

Christ—being the only man to ever live up to God’s requirements—leveraged the righteousness that he had with God to extend his blessing onto those of us who believe in him and proclaim his name..

By Christ’s work completed on the cross, we too can be considered forgiven and enter into the presence of God as one of his own children.

IV.

The King of Glory Enters

Let’s look back at Psalm 24, we see the arrival of the King of Glory returning to Zion...

What a beautiful picture of the gates of Zion opening up for the arrival of the king.

Even though, as we have seen, the nations of the earth rebel against the newly crowned king, this does not stop God from granting him his inheritance and placing him on the throne as the king over all kings.

V.

The King Claims His Inheritance

The book of Revelation records the Apostle John’s prophetic vision of Christ’s return to the earth and the judgment that will follow...

This passage is filled with beautiful imagery of the authority and severity of the king placed upon the throne.

Conclusion

Isn’t it appropriate that the One who was there in the beginning and was integral to the very creation of our world and by which all things hold together will be the same One that comes to take up his inheritance and reconcile it all, fulfilling his purpose?

This is a picture of the bridegroom returned to take his bride and at this point those who died in Christ will rise up and be reunited with their king...

Will you be in that great crowd that joins with Christ on his return?

Will you be ready to answer his call?

When we look to scripture it is clear that those who know Jesus and call on his name, believing in the work that he accomplished on the cross, will be there with him on that day of his return.

Are you ready to join him as he leads us to victory in the battle to claim his inheritance?