Psalm Nine "YHWH the Stronghold for the opressed"

Scripture Reading: 2 Samuel 18:1-8

2 Samuel 18:1–8 (ESV)

Introduction

Good morning Redemption Church. It is good to be with the saints of the Lord this morning. First, I want to start by thanking the saints from CVC for giving up their time to come and serve us this past weekend. Your church has been a huge blessing to us, in more ways then you will ever know. CVC and Redemption churches stories are forever inter-twinned. In fact if it was not for Rick Eimers, we probably would not have came to WV when we did. Your church has been supportive of us, every step of the way. When we went though our NAMB assessment we came to CVC, when we got the green light, we came to CVC. When we needed financial support and team support we relied on CVC. So thanks for being faithful in your partnerships. Secondly, if you are new to Redemption Church, my name is Noah Toney and I am the pastor of Redemption Church. Here at Redemption Church We exist to proclaim the gospel and make disciples for the glory of God. This is our vision statement and that is what we are all about.

This summer Redemption Church has been going through a sermon series called "Summer in the Psalms." My personal goal is to return to the psalter every year and preach ten psalms a summer. This week we are jumping into Psalm eight. If you are new to studying the psalms, allow me to quickly tell you how the psalter works. Do not think about the psalms as a random collection of 150 poems; no, think about the psalter as a unified and strategically organized book of poems that tell a unified story of God's mighty deeds for his people. Just as the Iliad, or the odyssey, is an ancient epic poem that chronicles the works of mighty kings and their people. The psalms is an epic poem that follows the story of God's mighty deeds through the history of his people.

Psalm One teaches us about the blessed man who is the perfect citizen of God's kingdom, who walks in the way of the righteous and turns from the way of the wicked.

Psalm Two teaches us about God's Messiah-King, who will reign forever despite the raging nations.

Psalm Three teaches us about God's chosen king, David, who, when the nations are raging against him, responds in faith and trust in God.

Psalm Four teaches us that when God's people are in distress, we should reflect on God's past faithfulness to find future hope.

Psalm Five teaches us that God's people can find comfort in the character of God.

Psalm Six teaches us that God's people will experience anguish and despair, yet we find our hope in God's steadfast love.

Psalm seven teaches us that God is the righteous avenger and the Righteous defender.

Psalm eight teaches us that God chooses to use the weak things of the world to defeat his enemies and establish his glory.

This week: Psalm Nine teaches us that God’s people can praise the Lord amongst great tribulation.

Psalm 9:title-20

To the choirmaster: according to Muth-labben. A Psalm of David. I will give thanks to the Lord with my whole heart; I will recount all of your wonderful deeds. I will be glad and exult in you; I will sing praise to your name, O Most High. When my enemies turn back, they stumble and perish before your presence. For you have maintained my just cause; you have sat on the throne, giving righteous judgment. You have rebuked the nations; you have made the wicked perish; you have blotted out their name forever and ever. The enemy came to an end in everlasting ruins; their cities you rooted out; the very memory of them has perished. But the Lord sits enthroned forever; he has established his throne for justice, and he judges the world with righteousness; he judges the peoples with uprightness. The Lord is a stronghold for the oppressed, a stronghold in times of trouble. And those who know your name put their trust in you, for you, O Lord, have not forsaken those who seek you. Sing praises to the Lord, who sits enthroned in Zion! Tell among the peoples his deeds! For he who avenges blood is mindful of them; he does not forget the cry of the afflicted. Be gracious to me, O Lord! See my affliction from those who hate me, O you who lift me up from the gates of death, that I may recount all your praises, that in the gates of the daughter of Zion I may rejoice in your salvation. The nations have sunk in the pit that they made; in the net that they hid, their own foot has been caught. The Lord has made himself known; he has executed judgment; the wicked are snared in the work of their own hands. Higgaion. Selah The wicked shall return to Sheol, all the nations that forget God. For the needy shall not always be forgotten, and the hope of the poor shall not perish forever. Arise, O Lord! Let not man prevail; let the nations be judged before you! Put them in fear, O Lord! Let the nations know that they are but men! Selah

Pastoral Prayer

Context

“To the choirmaster: according to Muth-labben. A Psalm of David.”

These superscriptions in our bibles do not have verse numbers; they almost function like titles. They are easy to overlook in the text, but I want you to know that these are extremely important. These superscriptions are in every manuscript of the Psalms that we have. Meaning these titles are the inspired word of God and deserve to be treated as such. I have been using an illustration of a photo album. Imagine you have a photo, and it is black and white. It is a picture of a young man and a beautiful young woman sitting in a green field with a picnic basket. This was before you were born, and you have no memory of this event. But you take the picture, turn it over, and it says "fourth of July 1956 our first date." That superscription on the back of this photo tells you the picture's context. It tells you information that you would not know without it. This is how these superscriptions work for the psalter, and if you do not understand this, you are very likely to misinterpret the psalms as you go and study them.

So we come to Psalm 9, and there there is something very spectacular about this superscription. As have been preaching though the Psalms this summer I have been arguing that Psalm 3-9 are one literally unit. These Psalms are all deeply connected and they all take place within the timeline of David’s exile from Jerusalem when Absalom revolted against him. Look at Psalm three, the superscription reads, “A Psalm of David, When he fled from Absalom his Son.” Now we come to Psalm nine and we come to this superscription, “To the choirmaster: according to Muth-labben. A Psalm of David.”

This word "choirmaster" could also mean "preeminent one", or exalted one. I think that if you go and read through the chronicles, you will see that David himself is the choirmaster of Israel. It is David, who commands the Levites to select men to go and sing before the Lord every day, it is David who writes songs that will be sung, and when the time comes for the tabernacle to come into Jerusalem, David dresses up like the band of priests, and he leads the procession into the city and he is dancing and singing to the Lord, and this ends with David's song in 1 Chronicle 16. David sings this song and 1st Chronicles ends with "and all the people praised the Lord." So I am arguing that David see’s the king of Israel as this exemplary person who is the leader of the band, this Choirmaster over God’s people. He is to be the example of what it looks like to worship God. However, when David writes “to the choirmaster” he is not writing a song for himself, no I believe that David is looking forward to the future king of Israel who will come and lead God’s people in praise forever.

Next we read, “according to Muth-labben. A Psalm of David.” In the ESV there is a foot note that reads, “probably a musical or liturgical term.” I do not know why they did that, because this one actually is very easy to translate. It literally means for the death of the Son. In fact many transaltions including the KJV and many more, render this death of the son. This is important because this lets us know the context in which Psalm 9 was written. This was written upon the death of David’s son Absalom. Our scripture reading covered the battle that defeated Absaloms armies, but we did not cover his death because it is a long narrative that goes on for two more chapters. To summarize, Absalom is caught by his hair in a tree and he is killed. When the men run and tell David that Absalom has been defeated, David starts weeping and wailing for the death of his Son. He is weeping and the people of Israel hear the cry of David. Joab then goes to David and really rebukes him. Go read 2 Samuel 19. It is an amazing passage of scripture. After David is rebuked by Joab, he turns his heart and no longer crys for his son, but instead understands that this was the Lord’s victory.

The reason i mention all of these details of the story, is because they teach us about the Biblical characters and the psalms. First, we learn that characters of the bible are complicated people. That should be encouraging because is this not how life is? do we not all wrestle with complex emotions and difficult situations, and life is extremely messy. Christ is not the ruler of a perfect church, Christ loves to take broken and messy things and make them whole. Second, The psalter teaches us how to deal with the highs and lows of life. It is amazing to watch how the psalms follow these cyclical patterns where the greatest joy comes from the lowest places in our hearts. David has lost his son, and he is about to give the very first psalm of praise in the psalter.

V.1-4

I will give thanks to the LORD with my whole heart; I will recount all of your wonderful deeds. I will be glad and exult in you; I will sing praise to your name, O Most High. When my enemies turn back, they stumble and perish before your presence. For you have maintained my just cause; you have sat on the throne, giving righteous judgment.

What is fascinating about Psalm nine, is that this is the first psalm of praise in the Psalter. We have been preaching for 10 weeks though the psalter and this is the first one that is a Psalm of Praise.