Psalms 120 - 122

Psalms — Steve Gregg

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Psalms 123 - 127

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Psalms 120 - 122

PsalmsSteve Gregg

In this talk, Steve Gregg discusses the possible meanings and origins of the Songs of Degrees, a collection of 15 psalms in the Book of Psalms. He explores various theories, such as the idea that the psalms were written by pilgrims or collected by King Hezekiah. Gregg offers his own interpretation that the psalms may represent different degrees of spiritual growth, leading to the ultimate glory of God. He also touches upon the themes of deliverance, fellowship, and peace within the church community.

Transcript

I think we should have no difficulty in today's classes covering all 15 of the Songs of Degrees, as they're called. They are 15 successive psalms from Psalm 120 through Psalm 134. They're very, very short for the most part.

For example, in my Bible there are eight of them. I mean, when I open to one page, looking at the two pages, I can see almost nine of them in one glance. So, they're very short.

That doesn't mean that they are not full of content, because some of them have very much depth of content. Others of them don't appear to have quite as much. And we won't make any attempt to spend equal time on each of the Psalms.

We will instead try to dwell on those things that will be profitable to us today. The question has been raised already earlier in our studies of the Psalms, when we've mentioned the Songs of Degrees, what does the Song of Degrees, the expression Song of Degrees, refer to? And that is a question I have not sought to answer previously when they've been mentioned, but I will seek to explore that a little bit right now. Each of these Psalms, the next 15, have as their title a Song of Degrees.

10 of them are anonymous, and five of them are attributed to some writer. Four to David and one to Solomon. So, we have five of the Songs of Degrees that we have an author mentioned in.

Four of them David wrote. One of them Solomon wrote. And the other 10, we don't know who wrote them, though there are some theories we could suggest.

But the more intriguing than who wrote them is the question of why are they called Songs of Degrees? What does that refer to? What is a degree? There are some translators that prefer to translate Songs of Ascents, that is A-S-C-E-N-T, like ascending, ascents. Different levels of ascent, or of moving upward. Now that's possibly the way it should be understood.

Although degrees is quite a good translation, the question is what does it refer to? There's obviously a common link between these Psalms, though as you read them, the material is varying in content, and you might wonder why these few Psalms happen to be linked together by this common name, the Song of Degrees. And there are a number of theories, of which I don't know that we'll be able to really single out one as the absolute, certain, final word on the subject, because scholars have just disputed over this matter. And there are different ideas.

Each concept may bring out a certain positive experience, or understanding of the Psalms, if it were true. It's theory, we don't know whether it's true or not. But there are those, for example, it's an old Jewish tradition, in fact, the Jews believed that the Songs of Degrees were written to be sung on the 15 steps of the temple, as the people would go up to the temple, that they would pause at each step, of which they believed there were 15 steps, and they would pause and sing one of these short Psalms as they approached the temple.

Now there are things in the Psalms that make reference to coming to the temple, or at least coming to Jerusalem. And therefore, that might be seen as support for this, but then there are other theories that would explain that content in the Psalms that do not require this understanding. The only thing this theory has in its favor is that it's an old Jewish tradition.

But as far as the number 15 being the number of steps of the temple, there is no confirmation from history whether there were even 15 steps to the temple. The only reason that is suggested is because there are 15 Psalms, and because of the tradition that they were sung on steps of the temple, that assume there were also 15 steps. But since we don't have any independent confirmation of that point, you see that this particular theory is very weakly supported.

It may be that that is what these Psalms were written for, but there's hardly any evidence for it, except that the Jews had this as a tradition. Probably a more popular view among scholars is that these were pilgrim songs. That is, songs that were sung by Jewish pilgrims going to Jerusalem.

Among those who hold this theory, there are different branches of it. Some believe that these were sung as a group of songs by pilgrims who came every year to the feasts in Jerusalem. And they were just a set of songs that they'd sing at different points on the way of their journey.

Others have felt, who also see these as pilgrim songs, others have felt that it was perhaps the songs of the exiles coming back from Babylon, going back to rebuild Jerusalem. There certainly is evidence within the content of the Psalm that this could be the case. There's a real longing to be in Jerusalem.

In Psalm 120, the first of them, there's a real discontent with being in the Gentile territory and desire to be back in the homeland again. In Psalm 122, it says, I was glad when they said unto me, let us go into the house of the Lord, rejoicing to go back to Jerusalem. It says in verse two of that Psalm, our feet shall stand within thy gates, O Jerusalem.

The problem there, if it were exiles coming back from Babylon is that Jerusalem didn't have gates or a house built in it at that time. They were returning to build them. But that wouldn't exclude the possibility that they would sing this in anticipation of having rebuilt the gates and the temple.

There are other places within the Psalm that speak of Zion and the house of God and so forth in these different Psalms. And so, there's a possibility that they are pilgrim Psalms. There have been at least one or two books I'm aware of written about these songs of degrees, which argue that these represent 15 degrees of return or different stages of return of the exiles.

One book written by one of my favorite teachers was called 15 Steps Out. And he sought to show spiritual lessons in these Psalms showing how exiles from Babylon coming to Jerusalem went by 15 specific stages and showing the spiritual lessons that accompany each one and sort of applying that to us coming out of spiritual Babylon into the new Jerusalem, going through this growth process through these stages. While I admit that this man who wrote the book is a favorite teacher of mine, and I don't necessarily agree with his conclusion about the Psalms of degrees, though he could be correct.

The idea of them being pilgrim Psalms seems very believable that they could have been sung by pilgrims every year going to Jerusalem for the feasts. As I said, the content of the Psalms as you'll see could easily lend themselves to that kind of context. But whether they were written originally for that purpose, we don't know.

Since four of them were written by David and one by Solomon, and neither David nor Solomon were pilgrims traveling to Jerusalem, but lived in Jerusalem, it would seem like at least those five were not written for the purpose of pilgrim Psalms, though they could easily have been added to a group of pilgrim Psalms later because of their applicability. There is a rather interesting theory that I've only read from one author about these, and it's elaborate, but fairly convincing. I don't say that I'm willing to throw my whole support into it, but it's a rather convincing theory, and it's J. Sidlow Baxter.

You might not know him, but he's written quite a few books. He's a rather interesting character and commentary. He's pretty scholarly.

And his view is that we should understand these Psalms as songs of the degrees. Actually, in the Hebrew, he says, it doesn't say song of degrees, but song of the degrees. And you might say, well, what's the difference? Well, if it is the song of the degrees, then it would imply that there was some particular set of degrees that these songs related to, not just songs of degrees, but songs of the degrees.

And so there was a set of degrees that were related to these Psalms, or to which these Psalms related. And he asked the question when he discusses this issue, what degrees could those be? What are the degrees? And he suggests that the only other place in the Bible that makes reference to the degrees is in the historic writings of the Old Testament, where there's reference to the degrees on the Ahab's sundial in Jerusalem. Now, Ahab, the king, at one time built a sundial.

It wasn't a sundial, really. We think of the sundial as a round thing. But his sundial was actually a set of steps, like a staircase going up.

And at different points in the day, the sun would hit different steps, or different degrees, and that's how they'd tell the time. They didn't have watches and clocks in those days to do it. They would just be able to tell when the sun hit a certain step on the staircase.

That was his sundial. That's how they would know what time it was. And those are the degrees.

Now, what would those have to do with these Psalms? The theory goes that these Psalms were collected by Hezekiah, a later king of Judah, and that they have to do with the degrees on the sundial because there was a significant thing that happened in Hezekiah's life about the degrees on the sundial. I don't know if you remember when you studied 2 Kings, but just to refresh our memories, I think it'd be good for us to look at 2 Kings chapter 20, and we may get a little bit of insight as to what these Psalms degrees might be referring to. 2 Kings chapter 20, Hezekiah was sick, nearly dead, and Isaiah the prophet told him that he was gonna die.

Hezekiah then prayed and asked God to deliver him. And so, God told Isaiah, go back and tell him you get 15 more years. I'm gonna give you 15 more years before you die.

And Hezekiah wanted some sign from God to know whether this was true, that he was gonna have 15 more years. And in verse eight of 2 Kings 20, it says, And Hezekiah said unto Isaiah, what shall be the sign that the Lord will heal me and that I shall go up into the house of the Lord the third day? That is, in three days he'd be healed. And Isaiah said, this sign shalt thou have of the Lord, that the Lord will do the thing that he hath spoken.

Shall the shadow go forward 10 degrees or back 10 degrees? And Hezekiah answered, it is a light thing for the shadow to go down 10 degrees, nay, but let the shadow return backward 10 degrees. And Isaiah the prophet cried unto the Lord and he brought the shadow 10 degrees backward by which it had gone down on the dial of Ahaz. So the sundial of Ahaz was of course measuring the time by the movement of the sun.

And the sign that Hezekiah asked for that he was really gonna be healed and God granted him the sign was that the shadow went backward as though the sun moved backward in the sky. Though it does not specifically say that the sun went backward, by the way. Some suggest that it would be impossible for that to happen even just because the earth would have to start turning the other direction and it would throw all the mountains into the ocean and everything would go wild.

Of course, those people don't take into account God's omnipotence and His ability to hold mountains in place if He wants to turn the earth the other direction for a few seconds. But at any rate, it doesn't specifically say that the sun moved, it only talks about the shadow moving on the sundial. And it went backward 10 degrees which would be like the clock running backward a certain distance.

Like it would appear that time was going backward. Though of course there's no suggestion that time went backward, only that the shadow moved. In the direction that Hezekiah suggested which was a miracle in itself.

And Hezekiah then received that as a sign that he would be healed. Now notice, the shadow went backwards 10 degrees on the sundial. The result of it was that Hezekiah's life was prolonged 15 years.

He said that the sign would show him that he would again go up into the house of the Lord. It says in verse eight, the sign that he wanted to see that he would be healed and that he would again be able to go up into the temple, into the house of the Lord. Now, according to J. Sidlow Baxter, and I only mentioned him because I'm not willing to stand totally by his theory, but it's interesting.

He believes that Hezekiah collected and wrote some of these songs, the songs of degrees to celebrate the phenomenon of the sundial going back, the shadow going back 10 degrees. The degrees on the sundial, songs of the degrees. And the only significant thing worth singing about that ever had to do with the degrees was that time when the shadow went backward 10 degrees and prolonged this man's life by 15 years.

Now it's suggested that there are 10 anonymous psalms of the songs of degrees. We know for a fact that Hezekiah wrote some psalms. We don't know how many and we don't know whether he wrote these ones.

But Baxter's view is that he wrote these 10 anonymous songs. And the fact that he did write some psalms is evident because the Bible records at least one of them and alludes to others. In Isaiah 38, for instance, Isaiah chapter 38, verses nine through 20, we have one of the songs that was sung by Hezekiah.

We won't read it, but it's a song that he wrote about his deliverance out of sickness when he was healed. He wrote this song to celebrate the Lord. And at the end of this song, he says in verse 20, the Lord was ready to save me.

Therefore, I will sing my songs to the stringed instruments all the days of our life in the house of the Lord. Now notice when he got healed, he wrote at least this one song. In this song, he says, because the Lord delivered me, I will sing my songs, plural, in the house of the Lord.

So his healing resulted in him writing certain songs and singing certain songs to celebrate that healing and doing it in the house of the Lord. So again, his concern is being able to go back into the temple. What will be the sign that I shall go again into the house of the Lord? Now he's been healed.

He says, now I will be able to sing my songs in the house of the Lord. Notice in the songs with degrees, how many of them celebrate, I was glad when they said it to me, let's go into the house of the Lord. An interest in being in the house of the Lord is expressed in these songs, in many of them.

So the suggestion is this, that Hezekiah collected these 15 songs to be sung as a matter of remembering the degrees, the degrees, the 10 degrees that the sun went backwards. That he himself wrote 10 of them, which are anonymous here, one for each of the degrees on the sun dial. But he collected five other songs that seemed closely related to him by other authors, David and Solomon, to make the total number 15 to celebrate the fact that there were 15 years added to his life.

Now again, I'm not saying that this proves anything about the authorship of these, but there are some interesting points of parallel. There's reference to the degrees and the only other reference in the Bible to such degrees as in the story of the degrees of the sun dial and the going back of 10. There are 10 anonymous songs.

We know that Hezekiah wrote songs. We don't know how many. We don't know which ones, but it's possible that these were there.

We do know from other places of the scripture that Hezekiah was active in the collection of songs. In fact, this ladder, this fifth book of songs that we're now in is believed to have been largely collected by Hezekiah. Almost all scholars in agreement on that point, the men of Hezekiah tended to collect both songs and Proverbs that David and Solomon had written.

In Proverbs 25, for example, in verse one, Proverbs 25, one says, "'These also are the Proverbs of Solomon, which the men of Hezekiah, king of Judah copied out.'" In other words, from Proverbs 25 on, it apparently is a list of Proverbs that Solomon wrote, but which Hezekiah's men collected. Hezekiah actively collected Psalms and Proverbs and he may be the one who's responsible for our present collection of the Psalms and Proverbs entirely. We know from other sources, 2 Chronicles primarily, 2 Chronicles 29 tells us that when Hezekiah was king, he reinstated the Davidic kind of worship that had pretty much fallen into disuse.

You remember that David had sort of spearheaded a certain style of worship with musical instruments and dancing and tambourines and singing around the ark and all that stuff. That was all associated with David's innovations in worship. Well, after David's time, many of the kings totally neglected that and worship fell back into a more of a dead kind of routine.

But in the days of Hezekiah, according to 2 Chronicles 29, Hezekiah reinstated the Davidic types of worship, the musical instruments, the Psalms that David wrote, the singers and so forth, all these things that David and Hezekiah reinstated. So we see that David's worship was admired by Hezekiah. His Psalms were collected by Hezekiah.

Hezekiah loved Psalms. He wrote some songs and therefore, it's quite realistic to suggest at least he could possibly have written these 10 anonymous songs of degrees and collected the other ones to be a celebration that he would sing to commemorate the fact that he was allowed to be restored again to the temple of God, that his life was prolonged 15 years, reflected in the 15 Psalms, and that the shadow went back 10 degrees on the sundial, reflected in the fact that there are 10 Psalms that he could have written himself. Now, that is one of the many theories about the songs of degrees.

And I feel it has some merit, though it's far from conclusive. Like the other theories about them, the evidence is somewhat circumstantial, though there's far more details that seem to correspond to suggest this view than some of the other views that I mentioned. Another possibility, though again, I don't know if I've ever read any author saying this, this is my impression as I read it, it might present a fourth theory, but I'm sure it's not originalist me, I'm sure others have considered it.

Since they are called songs of ascents or of ascending, there is a possibility that they may have been written before Hezekiah's time for the purpose of being sung while the ark was ascending to Mount Zion when David took it up, that they represent the ascending of the ark in the procession that David led, taking the ark into Jerusalem. There is not a whole lot of evidence for that, only the reference to the ascents and also the fact that there is reference to coming into Jerusalem. But there's also one other possible link with that theory, and I don't promote it as an end-all theory, I mean, all the theories perhaps have some merit, but Psalm 132 in particular, the second to the last of them, or the third from the last of them, Psalm 132 is about that very thing, about the ark being taken into Jerusalem.

It's a song of degrees and it celebrates how God brought His ark into Jerusalem, and it describes it and so forth. So it seems to me like there's at least the possibility that these were songs to be sung on the occasion of the taking of the ark up when David took it out of the house of Israel. He took it out of the house of Obed-Edom and took it up to Jerusalem.

So there you've got four theories. Any of them could be true. It could be that these were sung on the 15 steps of the temple by worshipers going into the temple.

It is possible that they were sung by pilgrims, either pilgrims coming from Babylon after the captivity back to Jerusalem or else pilgrims coming on a yearly basis to the feasts. It is possible as a third option that they were written and collected by Hezekiah to commemorate his healing from sickness and the 10 degrees of the sundial that the shadow went backward on. That's definitely a possibility.

It's also a possibility, certainly couldn't be ruled out that there should be understood as songs of ascent or ascending and referring to the ark ascending into Jerusalem. We know that certain songs were sung on that occasion. We have already read a few of the songs that were written specifically for that occasion as we're told.

So these could have been among them. You can take your pick of those theories or you might make up your own but that just gives you some ideas. And each of those theories, if you would adopt any of those theories and say this is the one I really believe is it, it would give special meaning to these songs.

It wouldn't matter which of those theories you took, it would give a certain special meaning. Depending on which theory you took, it might give a slightly different meaning but you'll find that it does give meaning. Baxter again, the one who believes that these were written by Hezekiah and collected on the occasion of his healing points out, and I don't fully agree but I feel he's a better scholar than I am so I need to at least give his view a hearing.

He believes that we can see in these 15 psalms five groups of three. That is, every three of them make up a separate group by itself. And did you find that theory also in your Bible somewhere? Okay.

But he believes that we should divide these into five groups of three and that each group has certain characteristics similar to the other four groups. Namely, that in each group of three there is one written by either Solomon or David and two anonymous. If you just look at it that way, it's true.

The first three, the second three, the third three, the fourth three, and the fifth three. In each group of three there is one psalm that has an author ascribed to it and two that are anonymous. And Baxter goes further to say that in each group of three they follow the same pattern.

The first of the three talk about trouble. The second of each group of three talks about trust. And the third of each group of three talks about triumph.

Now, he believes that this would support the contention that Hezekiah wrote them on this occasion because his circumstances started with trouble. Then he learned to trust God. Then he had triumph with being healed.

And that he believes that there are five successions of three. Each three begin with a psalm about trouble so that every third psalm would be about trouble. Every third psalm following that would be about trust.

And every third one after that would be about triumph. Now, I have not found that to be an obvious pattern within them. It is true, of course, that in every three there are two anonymous and one who have an author ascribed to them.

But I haven't found it necessarily to be true. In fact, this suggests that there is that obvious content to them. So, I don't know whether that's arbitrary or whether he sees something deeper there than I'm able to see.

I would like to make one suggestion as we go through them. And as I said, I think we'll have no trouble going through the whole batch in today's classes. Possibly even in our first two classes because they are short.

But it's certainly at least in our whole day's classes. There is something that I feel like I've observed and I won't try to read anything much into it. But I feel like there is a possible progression seen here as degrees of spiritual growth starting with conversion and ending up in the ultimate glory that God has called us to.

Now, I'm not saying that these are always followed in the exact order that they are here. But just in reading these psalms a few times through myself just today and yesterday and trying to just let the Lord speak to me about what's in them and what they're trying to say to us, I have seen at least something I'd like to suggest to you as a possibility and you might see it there too. That each of the 15 speak of or could be seen as speaking of a particular stage of development in our own Christian life.

Degrees of growth. Remember it says in 2 Corinthians 3.18 that we are being transformed from glory to glory which seems in my mind to be saying that we're being changed from one level of glory to another. From one degree to another.

And to me, I don't know if it is necessarily totally valid for anyone else, but to me I cannot help but read these psalms and see these as degrees of spiritual growth. Starting with a man who's totally discontented with his life and sin and going through stages of development which all of us seem to go through I believe and ending up ultimately in the glory that God has called the church to. And maybe I could just quickly run through each of the 15 and tell you what I have seen as the main theme of each one and then you could sort of see a progression there perhaps.

The first one I believe, Psalm 120. I believe everyone can see clearly it speaks of discontent. The man is in distress.

The man has dwelt longer than he would like to remember in the tents of the oppressors. He's discontented with a certain state even as a person is before they get saved. They come to a place where they just want something more and where the Lord is actually moving on them to receive the gospel I believe.

It's actually making them discontented with their life of sin. When we get to Psalm 121, it's clearly a psalm of trust or putting one's faith in God which is the first step or we might say that a person makes out of that discontented state, out of his life of sin he has to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. And we find in Psalm 121, the psalmist is clearly putting his trust in God which is another step.

And then the third psalm, 122, I think no one can dispute it talks about fellowship. I was glad when they said to me, let us go into the house of the Lord and talks about the fellowship in the house of the Lord. And we'll talk about that psalm probably more in depth than most of the others because of the great riches that are in it when we get to it.

Then when you get to the fourth one, 123, we find the psalmist offering himself to the Lord as a servant. In verse two, especially behold as the eyes of servants look unto the hand of their masters and as the eyes of the maiden to the hand of her mistress so our eyes wait upon the Lord our God until he has mercy upon us. We find in Psalm 123, the psalmist is submitting himself to God as a servant and yet there's undertones of the presence of certain persecution he's experiencing or at least alienation from others.

So we find that if we follow the steps so far, the person starts out discontented with his life. He comes to a place of trust in God. The next thing that happens, he's added to the fellowship of the saints.

Then he's personally offering himself to God's service, experience a certain amount of persecution which develops more fully a little later. Yet in Psalm 124, he's experiencing God's deliverance from the hand of his enemies. He's experiencing victory in his life on a certain level.

In Psalm 125, he's experiencing security in God. They that trust in the Lord shall be as not Zion which cannot be removed but abides forever. This is a Psalm about security and safety in the Lord.

He's called unto the Lord. He submitted himself to the Lord as a servant in Psalm 123. In Psalm 124, he expresses the fact that though he were in distress, God has saved him out of it.

God has given him victory over his enemies. And now in Psalm 25, he's come to just settle into the rest of faith. I believe a feeling secure and safe in God.

In Psalm 126, I believe there's a certain amount of celebration and the joy of salvation really over having the parched life renewed like streams breaking forth in the deserts. And actually at the end of that Psalm, there's a reference to going out and sowing seeds and perhaps could speak to us of evangelism because it says they that sow in tears shall reap in joy. He that goeth forth weeping bearing precious seed shall doubtless come again rejoicing bringing his sheaves with him.

Certainly whether it's intended that way by the Psalmist or not, verses five and six of Psalm 126 have been used by many preachers with reference to evangelism. And I believe that it certainly has application there. Then when you get to Psalm 127, it's a Psalm about reproduction.

You know, he's into evangelism, planting seeds. Now he's reproducing his life. This Christian's experience is now discipling others.

And so we have reference to children being raised up and being discipled or being trained and directed by the believer. So he's come to a place of reproducing his own ministry in others or reproducing himself spiritually. And then in Psalm 128, I believe we find fruitfulness being the main theme, fruitfulness of his life.

In Psalm 129, the focus seems to be trials and afflictions and persecutions, which is definitely something that we go through in our Christian experience. In Psalm 130, where we're getting very near the end of the batch, we find that there's still deeply ingrained sin patterns that the man finds. It's like he's repentant of his sins initially as he's come to God, but as he grows in the Lord, he begins to see deeper and deeper areas where sin has found a foothold.

And out of the depths, he cries out to the Lord. And he starts talking about being aware of his iniquities in verses three through six and all. And the man's seen that he's got a lot more work that needs done in his life.

Even though he's come into a place of fruitfulness, he's discipling others, he's experienced victory over his enemies, he feels secure in God, yet he is painfully aware that he's still a corrupt being, undergoing transformation. He still is not perfect. I find myself that the more spiritual people that I've known have been the ones most aware of their own shortcomings.

If you find someone who's quite smug and self-righteous, it's evidence they're not very spiritually attuned at all because the more spiritually sensitive you become, the more sensitive you become to things in your life that you never thought of as sin before, but suddenly you realize they're un-Christlike and you grieve the more over sin. The result of that is Psalm 131, humility. Lord, my heart is not haughty, that means arrogant, nor are mine eyes lofty.

And then the man comes to a place of humility, which is worked in him through the realization of his continuing sinfulness. In Psalm 132, he's realizing certain promises of God. It's a reference to the promises made to David which are realized by, as I said, it talks about the ark being brought to Jerusalem, perhaps the glory arising upon God's people and the realization of his promises to us.

In Psalm 133, clearly it's about unity. One of the final stages of God's purpose for the church is that it become into complete unity and that's what Psalm 133 is about. Behold how good and how pleasant it is for the brethren to dwell together in unity and so forth.

So we can see the unity of the church as one of the final stages near the end of the road for us. Certainly the thing that God is working toward and waiting for, I believe, is in the final one, Psalm 134, we find the servants of the Lord standing before the presence of the Lord day and night. That is coming into full, unbroken fellowship with the Lord, no doubt, at his coming.

Now, I don't mean to say that the psalm is in any way meant to imply this progression. I'm saying that this is a personal thing that was ministered to my heart just as I was reading these today and yesterday, particularly this morning as I was reading through them. I read through the whole batch of them a couple times this morning and just asking the Lord what it was and to my heart, all the theories about what the psalms and degrees are about seemed to fade into the background and there was something special or was kind of showing me.

Maybe it was for me, maybe it won't be for you. But as I read these, I can't help but see this progression, this degrees of progress that a Christian makes, starting with his very beginnings, from his being discontent in his life of sin, going all the way up to the final stages of realizing the promises of God in his life, coming into unity with all the brethren and standing night and day in the presence of God ultimately when the Lord returns and never having to be out of his presence. Well, I'll just leave it up to the Holy Spirit to minister to you whether or not that's a meaning of these psalms for you, but to me, it's given new life to these psalms just as I read them.

Now, we've spent this whole time in introduction and we really don't have a lot of time, but we will get started on these. And since they are short, we'll probably be able to cover quite a few of them before we have to break this class up. Psalm 120.

In my distress, I cried unto the Lord and he heard me. Deliver my soul, O Lord, from lying lips and from a deceitful tongue. What shall be given unto thee or what shall be done unto thee, thou false tongue? Sharp arrows of the mighty with coals of juniper.

Woe is me that I sojourn in Meshach, that I dwell in the tents of Keter. My soul hath long dwelt with him that hateth peace. I am for peace, but when I speak, they are for war.

Now, if this was seen as a pilgrim song, we could see how this could apply. The Jews living among the heathen just longing to be back in Jerusalem, they've dwelt too long among the heathen, among those who hate peace, among in the tents of Kedar and in the land of Meshach. One thing we can deduce about this psalm is that it's not necessarily literally talking about living in Meshach or Kedar because those two lands are so distant from each other, it's impossible or certainly unlikely that one person would have been in exile in both places.

Meshach is extreme parts of the north from Jerusalem, whereas Kedar is down south in the Arabian Peninsula, so that we're not really talking about a literal experience that a person has had being both in Meshach and in Kedar. It's likely that he's simply speaking as one who feels far from God, just as Kedar and Meshach are distant places from Jerusalem, he has felt like he's dwelt a long ways from God, like a foreigner, like an alien from God. He's been too long in that state and he now wants to change that matter and come closer to God.

I said that the theme of this psalm seems to be discontent with one's present life and that verse would seem to confirm that. In the earlier verses, in my distress I cried unto the Lord and he heard me. In his distress and discontent, he knew where to look.

He called on God and that's what started his Christian walk. That's what begins us through the various degrees of spiritual growth. We start out by calling to God when we find ourselves dissatisfied with our lives as they are.

Verses two and three, actually through four, are talking about being delivered from lying lips and a deceitful tongue. This could be taken two ways. One could be saying, I don't want to be a liar anymore.

I don't want my tongue to be deceitful anymore. I want to be delivered from those habits of dishonesty. Or perhaps more likely, it means that those people that he dwells among are liars and slanderers.

And because later on it says, I'm for peace, but when I speak, they are for war. They hate peace. It could be that he's speaking about the type of people that he's living among.

He doesn't like his present company. His present companions are liars and deceitful. He wants to be delivered from the company of such people.

What should be given to lying tongues, he says. Well, sharp arrows will be given to them and coals of juniper. Coals of juniper, the juniper tree or the broom tree as it's also called.

The roots of it were used for coals and fire because they're, I guess, very dense wood. And once you get them burning, they burn for a long time as coals. And so they're sort of noted, the roots of the juniper tree were noted for their use as coals.

And that's, he's saying essentially that this represents the coal, the burning fire of God's wrath, the arrows of God and the judgment of God. Coals often refer to the purging element of God's wrath. We think of Isaiah's call in Isaiah chapter six, how that he saw the Lord high and lifted up in his train for the temple.

And he said, oh, I'm, woe is me, I'm undone because I am a man of unclean lips and I dwell among a people of unclean lips. And then the Lord told one of the cherubims to take a hot coal out of the altar and touch his mouth with it, touch his lips with it. And he said, your sin is purged now.

And so perhaps we could even see that figure that's taken from Isaiah chapter six where the coal was placed on the man's mouth because he knew himself to be a man of unclean lips and it purified him by the touching of that coal. Well, if he's saying deliver me from my habits of unclean speech, my lying tongue and my deceitful tongue, what shall be done for it? Well, maybe God will purify me with one of these coals of his judgment. On the other hand, as I said, it could be equally taken either way.

It might be speaking about the deceitful men that he lives among and that he wants to be delivered from and that they have nothing to look forward to except judgment from God for their ways of life. But woe is me, in verse five, which we already covered, that I sojourn in Meshach and I dwell in the tents of Kedar. In other words, I'm away from home.

I'm not near God. I feel like a total alien. My experience is dry.

My companions are not edifying. The people that I've long have dwelt with are people who hate peace. I love peace, but they don't love peace.

And so this is where the discontent begins to grow. Usually a person will not come to the Lord if he's quite happy with the sinful patterns of his companions. Usually before a person actually responds to the gospel, they begin to be a little bit uneasy about their sinful ways.

They tend to have a certain amount of discontent about, I mean, I don't know that we could say it's true of every person. Sometimes people are just blasted in the kingdom without any preparation, but I believe most of you could testify that you were prepped for the gospel by a growing sense of disillusionment, perhaps, with the goals that you were pursuing in life previously and seeing emptiness in there and seeing that the habits of your friends were obnoxious rather than funny, that the sins they were involved with were not clever, but were just ugly. When people begin to come to that stage and seeing that their soul is abhorring their evil companions and their evil ways and feeling thirsty for God and feeling discontent with its present state, that is what usually draws people to cry unto God in their distress and to come to the Lord, as this psalmist said he did in the first verse.

And one of the things he particularly was bothered by about his companions that he was with is that he was always for peace, but whenever he spoke, they always turned it around to make it for war. I don't know whether you can relate with that, people that you've dealt with before, I think probably most people have been through this. I know I have on many occasions where I've wanted nothing but unity and peace in a certain relationship, but every time I reached out to someone, they took it wrong and tried to use it as something to take offense by.

And it's such a frustration to be always trying to cultivate relationships of peace and unity with people, but they question your motives or they assume that you've got something up your sleeve that you don't and they just take it in a war-like way because they're not for peace. And the psalmist says he doesn't like that situation. He doesn't like being with people like that.

He wants to change. He's cried out to God for deliverance from this situation. And so I believe he receives deliverance from this situation.

Of course, both these psalms, this one and the next one are anonymous. So it's possible that the same writer wrote them both, possibly Hezekiah or some other writer. And if it is the same writer, we see a progress then from his discontented state in Psalm 120 into a place of complete trust in the Lord.

He cries out to the Lord in Psalm 120, but in 121, he's already made the transition into the kingdom of God. He's now trusting God. He knows he can't trust men.

He knows he can't trust himself. He now looks to the Lord completely and he says, I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills. From whence cometh my help? My help cometh from the Lord, which made heaven and earth.

He will not suffer thy foot to be moved. He that keepeth thee will not slumber. Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep.

The Lord is thy keeper. The Lord is thy shade upon thy right hand. The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night.

The Lord shall preserve thee from all evil. He shall preserve thy soul. The Lord shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in from this time forth even forevermore.

Well, the psalmist says right from the beginning that he's going to seek help. He's going to trust in something. But what's he going to trust in? The way it's punctuated in our Bible is I think deceptive.

It looks like he's saying, I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills from whence cometh my help. In other words, my help is coming from the hills. And that I'm looking to the hills to protect me.

Now, it would be possible for people to be doing that because the hills in those days were often a means of security. Because hills, if a city had hills around it, it was considered more easily defended because armies had to go through the hardship of going over hills to get to them. And so to be surrounded by hills was considered to be a secure thing.

In fact, we have allusion to that in Psalm 125, one of these other songs of degrees in verse 2. Psalm 125, verse 2 says, As the mountains are around about Jerusalem, so the Lord is round about His people from henceforth even forever. Meaning that as the mountains around Jerusalem protect it from attack, so the Lord protects His people from attack. So it is not inconceivable that a psalmist could say, I'm looking to the hills for my help.

But I think in verse 2 it's very clear he's not looking to the hills for his help. He's not trusting in natural defenses. He's not trusting in horses and chariots.

He's trusting in the Lord. My help comes from the Lord, which made heaven and earth. So I believe we should repunctuate those two verses.

I think it should be, I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, period. Then the next line is a separate sentence to be ended with a question mark. From whence cometh my help? Where is my help coming from? The answer, my help comes from the Lord.

Now why he lifts his eyes up to the hills? Perhaps it's to see the enemy coming. Maybe he's looking up to see if the enemy is close by. But though he looks there to see what, to survey his situation, he nonetheless puts his trust not in the hills, but in the Lord.

And he explains, of course, throughout the rest of the psalm how the Lord is trustworthy and gives him cause for feeling secure because he's put his trust in the Lord. God will not allow him to be removed. Yet God will keep you and God will do so continually.

God doesn't sleep. It says the Lord is thy keeper. It says in verse four, behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep.

Meaning God doesn't become weary. We can sleep well at night knowing that he's staying awake, handling things while we're gone to sleep. And the reference in verse six, the sun shall not smite thee by day nor the moon by night, is probably figurative rather than literal.

No one really expects the sun to hit them or the moon to hit them. Though there could be an allusion to sunstroke, of course, and possibly moonstroke. What is moonstroke? Well, it was usually believed in old times that lunacy was caused by the effect of the moon upon people.

That's why the word lunacy describes insanity because lunacy is from the word lunar, which has to do with the moon. And sometimes if a person was insane, they were said to be moonstruck. Now, what they thought the relationship was, I don't know.

Perhaps it was argued that since the moon affects the tides of the oceans, it also affects other things, including men's mental states and so forth. And I suppose there are astrologers today who would say the same thing about the stars and so forth, that man's lives and characters and personalities are affected by those things. This is not confirming that fact.

This is merely saying that the things that men might commonly fear. So, this is mainly a psalm, I believe, of expressing trust in the Lord, even though there may be dangers around, yet God is my keeper. Therefore, I will not trust in the hills.

I will trust in God. And that is, of course, an early step that we must take to become Christians at all. We have to trust in God.

That's what faith is. Now, in Psalm 122, which is probably the last one we'll be able to take before our break, this is a fantastic psalm, in my opinion. I don't know if I can do it justice in the time we want to give to it, but it is a psalm about fellowship.

It's very clear that one of the first things God does or intends to do in our lives after we've come to trust him is to put us in company with others who trust him, to knit us into his body, to give us a place in his body. Paul said, by one spirit were we all baptized into one body. That means that when we experience baptism in the Holy Spirit, that the purpose of it is to bring us into the body of Christ, to give us a function, to give us a gift, something that we do, some contribution we make to the total effort of the whole body so that we become ministers to each other, that we're not an island off by ourselves doing our own thing for God, like some of the Old Testament prophets were, Elijah and so forth.

That was not wrong back then. That was often the only way that people could stay pure in a totally corrupt society. But God now has a company of people that he wants us to be joined to, to interact with, to relate to, and that is the people of God, also the city of God, the Christian community, and that's what this is about, I believe.

Now, clearly, David wrote this psalm. It says, A Song of Degrees of David, and in David's mind, when he spoke of the house of the Lord, he must have been thinking of the temple in Jerusalem. Well, there wasn't actually a temple in Jerusalem in David's day, but the tabernacle that he'd set up where the ark was, that would be the house of the Lord in his opinion, and correctly so in those days.

For us, though, the house of the Lord speaks of much more. It speaks of his whole household, his whole family, his people, his community on the earth, the church. And therefore, David rejoiced to be able to go into that house of the Lord, into the tabernacle.

We rejoice to be able to come into the body of Christ and to become part of the fellowship of the saints. And so, we see Psalm 122 as the next step. After coming to trust God, the very next thing is to be linked with other believers in fellowship in the body of Christ.

He says, I was glad when they said unto me, let us go into the house of the Lord. Our feet shall stand within thy gates, O Jerusalem. Jerusalem is builded as a city that is compact together.

Whither the tribes go up, the tribes of the Lord, unto the testimony of Israel, which is meaning the ark of the covenant, the ark of the testimony, to give thanks unto the Lord, or unto the name of the Lord. For there are set thrones of judgment, the thrones of the house of David. Pray for the peace of Jerusalem.

They shall prosper that love thee. Peace be within thy walls and prosperity within thy palaces. For my brethren and companions' sakes, I will now say, peace be within thee.

Because of the house of the Lord our God, I will seek thy good. Now, there's some really beautiful thoughts expressed in these verses. The first one, I was raised in a church, a Baptist church, to be exact.

And we used to, as children in Sunday school, be taught to sing a song from this verse. I was glad when they said unto me, let us go into the house of the Lord. And of course, to us, we thought that meant going to the church building.

We thought that meant Sunday morning, going to Sunday school and going to the church service. That was going into the house of the Lord. In many cases, people think in terms of the building on the corner, the church is God's house.

Of course, the building on the corner is neither God's house nor is it really the church. The church is the people of God. Wherever they are, wherever they worship, when they are together and when they are separate from each other, they are always the house and habitation of the Lord and his church.

But there is special blessing and joy in coming to the assembled people of God, the assembled house of the Lord. When we come to worship with the brethren, when we come to relate to one another as living stones built together in a wall, as Peter presents the image in 1 Peter 2.5, when we come together in that way, there's a special joy in it because we're told elsewhere in scripture, Psalm 22 and verse 22, Jesus said in the midst of the congregation, will I praise thy name? That is Jesus praises God in the midst of his congregation. Now the congregation means the assembled people of God.

So when we come together in the assembly of other brothers, it's a glad thing because there Jesus is. Jesus said clearly, where two or more are gathered in my name, there am I in the midst. When there is a congregation singing praises to God, there is Jesus in the midst singing praises in the midst of the congregation.

So while it is true that Jesus is with us at all times, even when we're alone, there's a special sense in which his presence is manifest. His body, the components of his body come together to work together, to relate together, to function together in one place when the congregation is gathered. So there's a certain joy and excitement, at least I experience, I think you probably do or have at times.

For me, it's usually Friday, when the Friday night meeting is approaching, I just have an expectation of joy, knowing that there's brothers and sisters that I never see any other time during the week, but that they'll be there, I'll get to see them again, and we're gonna worship the Lord together. And it just, even though sometimes, you know, I don't have a real confidence in the contribution I'm gonna make to those meetings at all times, I really look forward to them because of the fellowship of the saints. I'm always glad when I think, oh boy, it's Friday night again.

I was glad when they said unto me, let's go and ask the Lord, our feet shall stand within thy gates, oh Jerusalem. Now, Jerusalem was a type of the church also, as we know. And even in the Old Testament, this fact is brought out that there would be a spiritual Jerusalem apart from the physical Jerusalem.

In Isaiah chapter 60, there's a really beautiful chapter about the glory of the Lord arising upon God's people. And from time to time, we've alluded or quoted from the opening verses of Isaiah 60, which say, arise, shine, for thy light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon thee, and so forth. Well, the whole chapter is about what God is going to do through his people, the church.

And it says at the end of verse 14 of that chapter, it says, they shall call thee the city of the Lord, the Zion of the Holy One of Israel. That is, I believe the believers in Christ, the church will be called the city of the Lord, the Zion of the Holy One of Israel. Concerning that, in verse 18, it says, violence shall no more be heard in thy land, wasting nor destruction within thy borders, but thou shall call thy walls salvation, and thy gates praise.

Now notice, it's not talking about a literal city made of stones, of real stones here, because its walls are salvation, its gates are praise. It's not actual literal walls of stone, or gates of stone, but it's actually spiritual walls, spiritual gates. We know from Psalm 100, we enter into his courts, into his gates of thanksgiving, into his courts with praise.

This is a spiritual experience, and this is a description of a spiritual city, with walls that are actually salvation, with gates that are praise. And these symbolize certain things, of course. Now, in Psalm 122, which is our psalm that we're studying at the moment, it says, our feet shall stand within thy gates, O Jerusalem.

If we take this further than David could, and actually make it apply to the spiritual Jerusalem, to the church, then we are confessing that we have a place within the citizenship of the holy city of God, within the gates. The walls around us are salvation. The gates through which we enter into his presence are praise.

And we stand, we have a firm standing and a position within that building, within that city. We are a part of it. As it says in one of those other psalms that we studied, this one and that one were born in her, and it shall be written, it's Psalm 87, where it said in verse five, and Zion, of Zion it shall be said, this and that man were born in her.

And the highest himself shall establish her. The Lord shall count when he writheth up his people that this man was born there. That is, this man is a citizen of this city because he's been born into it.

So we too, our feet stand firmly inside the walls of that new Jerusalem. We are part of that. We are surrounded by the walls of salvation and come into the gates of praise.

Now in verse three, it says, Jerusalem is builded as a city that is compact together. The word compact actually is the same word that's used in Exodus 2611. In Exodus 2611, there's a description of the building of the tabernacle.

And you know that the tabernacle tent was made of several individual curtains that were linked together by hooks. And they made one tent. It's like the individual curtains were linked together so that they became one wall or one tent.

And so that when they disassembled it, it broke down into small pieces. But when they put it up, they linked these together. They joined them together.

And in Exodus 2611, it speaks of this joining together of these curtains. It says, thou shalt make 50 tatches of brass and put the tatches on loops and couple the tent together that it may be one. That is, you take the different curtains and they couple with these hooks.

They couple the tent together that it may be one. That is that these individual curtains become one big curtain as they link together. The word coupled there is the same Hebrew word that we find here where it says, Jerusalem is a city built together that is compact or coupled together.

Seeing that the city of Jerusalem is a coupled entity. It is built of various smaller parts that are linked together into one. And of course, the parts are us.

We are the parts of that temple. We are the parts of that city. We are the living stones in that wall.

To change the metaphor a little bit from the previous one of the walls of salvation, we see ourselves as parts of the wall ourselves. And the city itself is joined together or that is the stones, the actual buildings of the city are joined in unity into one. And that is perhaps an idealistic description.

Certainly the literal city of Jerusalem never could that really be described totally accurately of the physical city of Jerusalem. There was always so much strife in Jerusalem and so much division that it's hardly likely that it would ever apply in a literal sense to that city. Though of course, it hasn't very often applied literally to the church either.

But we can be sure that since God has told us in his word that unity is his goal for the church, that this would apply much more to the church, at least ultimately someday, than it has ever applied to Jerusalem as a city. Speaks of the unity of the body, of the joining together of the members. This is certainly an experience that we come into early in our Christian walk or should come into early in our Christian walk where we find ourselves linked, hooked together with other believers to be one body and one house, one city in the midst of the world.

It talks about the tribes going up in verse four and in verse five it says, there are set thrones of judgment or justice and the thrones of the house of David. Now this doesn't mean thrones that actual kings necessarily sit on because David was alive writing this psalm. He wrote this psalm.

So he speaks of the thrones plural of the house of David. He's not talking about his own kingly throne. He's talking about thrones that he set up, no doubt for his judges and princes that rule under him.

He had his own throne, but these plural thrones of the house of David would be the thrones that David had set up for his household, his princes, his sons, or possibly for his judges. Actually, there was not much different between the judges and the princes anyway. It was usually the princes that sat in judgment on matters.

So it's making a reference to the fact that the authority of David is found in the city. He has set up there in the city, his thrones for his judges and for his co-regents. And there also in the church, God has set up his thrones for his co-regents.

Jesus said to his disciples in Matthew 19, when Peter said, Lord, we've forsaken all, what shall we have? He said, you 12 who have been with me from the beginning and been with me through my trials. He says, in the regeneration, he said, in the regeneration, you 12 should sit on 12 thrones judging the 12 tribes of Israel. That is to say in the regeneration, which means rebirth.

That is when Pentecost would come and the church was born. In that economy, the apostles would sit on 12 thrones judging the 12 tribes of Israel. Now we know they didn't literally sit on thrones and that wasn't to be understood as a literal thing where actually 12 seats were set up, which were called thrones where all the people would come forth and the apostles would pass down judgment.

What was being said is that spiritual authority would be delegated from Jesus to them to speak as his agents, to speak his laws and his words to the people, that they would be the ones who, as the judges in earthly society were the authorities under the king. So the apostles would sit in authority under Christ. And so also others, perhaps besides the 12, have had some level of authority.

We know there are authorities in the church. Paul said that God has delegated the authority of the apostles and prophets and makes reference to the evangelists and the pastors and the teachers. These are different offices of authority in the church and it's there in the church that the authority of God is manifested and invested.

It's not someone off doing his own thing away from the body of Christ, not related to others, calling himself some kind of an apostle or last day's prophet or Elijah come back, as so many times people arise with those kinds of claims about themselves. It's in the church that God has invested his authority. It's in the city that the thrones of the house of David are found.

And so that the kingdom is, what should I say, administered from the church. The church is the seat of God's government on earth. Now the last nine verses talk about praying for the peace of Jerusalem.

Based on these verses, there are Christians today who believe it is a Christian obligation to pray for the literal city of Jerusalem in Israel today for their peace and to work for their safety. There are many Christians today who believe that this is a Christian obligation that we need to be sponsoring Israel, praying for their prosperity, praying for all the Jews to come back and for them to be safe from their enemies and that this is what Christians are supposed to do. And they base it all pretty much on this verse and maybe one or two others that say, that speak less directly to the subject.

I believe we should pray for peace. Whether we're talking about the earthly city of Jerusalem or any other earthly city, I believe we should pray for peace on earth. That's the will of God.

We must pray that God's will be done on earth as it is in heaven. And we should certainly wish for the peace of the Jews in Jerusalem as well as wishing for the peace of the Palestinians and the Arabs and the Russians and everyone else. We should wish for peace on earth to cover the earth.

We should wish for all swords to be beaten into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks so that men will learn war no more. That kind of peace is certainly something we should pray for, but I don't believe that that is the application of this verse to us today. If we have understood Jerusalem to be a reference to the church, to the heavenly Jerusalem, then it refers to praying for peaceful conditions for the church.

And if we understand it that way, then we find ample confirmation in the words of Paul in 1 Timothy 2. In 1 Timothy 2, verses one and two. Paul says, I exhort therefore that first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men, for kings and for all that are in authority, that we, that is the church, may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty. Now Paul, notice Paul doesn't say, I exhort first of all that prayers and intercessions be made for the peace of the city of Jerusalem.

That would have been needed, of course, in those days. In Paul's days, Jerusalem was not at peace. They were under the Roman oppression.

Very shortly after the time that he wrote this, they came under the destruction of Rome. And also, I mean, Paul could have said, hey, listen, pray for Jerusalem. Pray for the city of Jerusalem.

It's really in danger today. But he said that wasn't even one of his concerns that we're praying for. He said we should pray for all who are in authority.

Why? Because they affect the church. We're actually praying for the peace of the church. And he says pray for all who are in authority so that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty.

That is, so we don't have to go underground so that we can promote the gospel without persecution. So Paul is exhorting us to pray for governments of the world to keep the peace of the church so the church can peaceably go about its business of evangelizing the world without having to secretly do things. They can do it all above ground in honesty and in peace and so forth and security.

So the exhortation in Psalm 122, verses six through nine, I don't take to be a reference for us to pray for Jerusalem. If that's what God wants us to do, he certainly hasn't mentioned it in the New Testament at all in any of the places where the New Testament tells us things to pray for. It's not one of the things listed.

But to pray for our own peace, for the peace of the church so that the mission of the church can be carried out in an environment of safety and quietness and peace. That is for the purpose of the kingdom of God and that is supposed to be a matter for our prayers. Therefore we read in verses six through nine, pray for the peace of Jerusalem.

They shall prosper that love thee. Peace be within thy walls and prosperity within thy palaces. For my brethren and companions sake, I will now say peace be within thee.

That is Paul said, pray so that we might live in quietness and peacefulness. Well that's for my companions sake, for my brethren's sake, for the church sake. In other words, I say peace be within thee.

I ask for peace for you. Because of the house of the Lord our God, I will seek thy good. That is because God is building a house, a temple, a spiritual temple.

And because he has a project that he's seeking to complete, I'm going to seek the good, the conditions of peace for the church so that this project can be completed. For the sake of the house of God, I will seek thy good. Well, we'll skip on now to take a break and then come back to Psalm 123 after the break.