Late last month the city of Halifax
announced the membership of a new committee. Its assigned task is to advise
City Council on “proposed changes to the commemoration of Edward Cornwallis”
and on “recognizing and commemorating the indigenous history in the lands now
known as Halifax”[1]. It was not long ago that Cornwallis was
hailed as a great military leader, the first Governor of Nova Scotia and
founder of the city of Halifax. In my year 2000 copy of the Canadian Encyclopedia no mention is made
of Cornwallis’s infamous “Scalping Proclamation” or of his later being brought
twice before courts martial in 1756 and 57. (To do him justice, he was
exonerated in both cases).
It has been said that
history is written by the winners.[2] And in many cases that may be so, which means
that its authors often try very hard to present a sanitized—and in some cases
glorified—version of the past. So we need to be careful to examine what goes
under the title of “history” with a critical eye.
On the other hand, one
of the refreshing features that I find about the Bible is that it can be disarmingly
candid about the past. Moses’ violent temper; Samson’s uncontrollable lust; King
David’s adulterous affair and his murderous attempt to cover it up; Jonah’s
unwillingness to preach to the people of Nineveh; the disciples’ arguments over
who should sit at Jesus’ right hand; Peter’s thrice-over denial of Jesus… No
doubt if we had the time you could give me numerous other examples as well.
This morning I want us
to look together at the first eight verses of Psalm 78. It is one of a dozen
psalms composed by a songwriter named Asaph. Asaph was a member of the priestly
tribe of Levi. He played the cymbals and he and his brothers were also singers.
After King David established Jerusalem as the centre of the government and
worship of Israel, he appointed Asaph in charge of the men who led the music of
the tabernacle. Their task was to minister before the
Ark of the Covenant by giving constant praise and thanks to God and asking for
his blessings upon his people (1 Chronicles 16:4). King David’s
charge to Asaph and his fellow musicians was as follows:
Give praise to the Lord, proclaim his name;
make known among the nations what he has done…
tell of all his wonderful acts.
Glory in his holy name…
Remember the wonders he has done,
his miracles, and the judgments he pronounced…
(1 Chronicles 16:8-12)
make known among the nations what he has done…
tell of all his wonderful acts.
Glory in his holy name…
Remember the wonders he has done,
his miracles, and the judgments he pronounced…
(1 Chronicles 16:8-12)
And that is exactly
what Asaph does in the psalm before us this morning.
If you turn to it in
your Bible, you will notice that Psalm 78 is seventy-two verses long. But we’re
just going to look at the first eight. Those verses form a prologue to the
following sixty-four, but in many ways they also follow from them.
Overall the psalm is a
long lament over the people of Israel’s sorry inability again and again over
the course of four and a half centuries to take in the lessons that God was
seeking to teach them—from the time of Moses to the time of King David. They
had hardly crossed over the Red Sea before they were yearning to go back to
Egypt. God gave them water from a rock and nourished them with manna but it was
not good enough for them. He drove out nations before them but they turned away
from him to worship idols.
Now at the time of
writing King David is on the throne and prosperity has returned to the land. It
is a time for new opportunities, new beginnings. But the question remains: Will
the people take the opportunity that God is giving them?
God’s Deeds (1-4)
So it is that the psalmist begins what he
has to say with a plea: “My
people, hear my teaching; open your ears wide to what I have to say.” He is bringing them a message of urgency, a
warning of the utmost importance. It reminds me of what I found myself doing on
September 11th, 2001. I was rector of St Paul’s Church on the Grand
Parade at the time. I had just heard about the passenger jet striking the first
of the twin towers of the World Trade Center. It was still tourist season and I
knew that there would be many American visitors passing through the building. I
also suspected that most of them would not have heard the news. So I stood at
the door and when I encountered someone from the U.S. I would ask them to sit
down before I told them what was happening in their country.
Unlike my experience, Asaph was not going
to inform the congregation of anything new. Quite the contrary: what he was
about to tell them was long known and familiar to all. “I will utter … things from of old,” he
sings, “things we have heard and known, things our ancestors have told us.” All
of it was a story that everyone in Israel had been familiar with since
childhood. Every year at the annual celebration of the Passover, God’s rescue
of the nation from their slavery in Egypt was recited in both word and action. Centuries
before, Moses had warned the people, “Be careful, and watch yourselves closely so that
you do not forget the things your eyes have seen or let them fade from your
heart as long as you live. Teach them to your children and to their children
after them” (Deuteronomy 4:9).
So once again Asaph recites God’s deeds on
behalf of his people: dividing the Red Sea so that they could cross over into
safety while their enemies were engulfed; guiding them step by step along their
journey with a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night; providing them with
fresh water to drink from a rock; feeding them with manna and quail, more than
they could eat; driving out the nations before them so that they could settle
in the land he had promised…
These were all stupendous acts. Yet in verse
32 Asaph is forced to lament, “In
spite of all this, they kept on sinning; in spite of his wonders, they
did not believe.” (32)
God’s Decrees (5-6)
From reminding them of God’s amazing deeds
among his people in verses 3 and 4, Asaph shifts his focus in verses 5 and 6 to
God’s decrees. Aside from his miraculous interventions in the life of his
people, the Lord also gave them a second gift: what the Bible calls God’s
law—his torah. The word torah in Hebrew means something much
broader than is suggested by our word “law”. While it includes individual rules
and regulations, for the most part it has much more to do with teaching or
instruction. “Listen my son, to your father’s instructions,” says the father in
Proverbs, “do not forsake your mother’s torah”
(1:8).
The latter half of Psalm 19 is an eloquent
hymn to the glories of God’s torah:
The torah
of the Lord is perfect,
refreshing the soul.
The statutes of the Lord are trustworthy,
making wise the simple.
The precepts of the Lord are right,
giving joy to the heart.
The commands of the Lord are radiant,
giving light to the eyes…
The decrees of the Lord are firm,
and all of them are righteous.
They are more precious than gold,
than much pure gold;
they are sweeter than honey,
than honey from the honeycomb.
By them your servant is warned;
in keeping them there is great reward.
refreshing the soul.
The statutes of the Lord are trustworthy,
making wise the simple.
The precepts of the Lord are right,
giving joy to the heart.
The commands of the Lord are radiant,
giving light to the eyes…
The decrees of the Lord are firm,
and all of them are righteous.
They are more precious than gold,
than much pure gold;
they are sweeter than honey,
than honey from the honeycomb.
By them your servant is warned;
in keeping them there is great reward.
It’s more than likely
that Asaph had even sung that psalm himself, as it was composed by King David
for his director of music (presumably Asaph).
But the torah
was not only to be praised. Its teachings were to be passed down from
generation to generation. “Impress
them on your children,” we read in Deuteronomy (6:7). “Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along
the road, when you lie down and when you get up.” More significantly still, in
fact all-importantly, the torah was
to be lived on a daily basis.
Right in the middle of downtown Boston
there is an old historic church called King’s Chapel. If you look beyond the
pulpit, there on the far wall you will see four large tablets displaying the
Ten Commandments, the Lord’s Prayer and the Apostles’ Creed. The irony is that
King’s Chapel is a Unitarian church and they rejected the tenets of the
Apostles’ Creed more than two hundred years ago. But there it stands today,
nothing more than a monument to the past.
Sadly, that was the same kind of thing that
happened to Israel. The torah, God’s
gracious teachings were ignored, pushed aside, relegated to the past and left
to gather dust. “But they did not keep his statutes.” Asaph laments,
Like their ancestors they were disloyal and
faithless,
as unreliable as a faulty bow. (56-57)
as unreliable as a faulty bow. (56-57)
Jesus warned about this in his parable of
the soils. Do you remember the seed that fell among the thorns? It stood for
those for whom their daily preoccupations and their longing for greater
prosperity took the place of God’s word in their lives.
God’s Desire (7-8)
The picture Asaph paints is a tragic one of
a lost and wayward people, as he mourns over how they have failed again and
again to respond either to God’s miraculous deeds or to his wise decrees. Yet
none of this leaves him without hope. He looks forward to a day when God’s
people would not just know about him, but actually know him. And that is what makes all the difference.
Generations later the prophet Jeremiah expressed
that same hope in these words:
“The days are coming,” declares the Lord,
“when I will make a new covenant
with the people of Israel
and with the people of Judah.
It will not be like the covenant
I made with their ancestors
when I took them by the hand
to lead them out of Egypt,
because they broke my covenant,
though I was a husband to them,”
declares the Lord.
“This is the covenant I will make
with the people of Israel
after that time,” declares the Lord.
“I will put my law in their minds
and write it on their hearts.
I will be their God,
and they will be my people.
No longer will they teach their neighbour,
or say to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’
because they will all know me,
from the least of them to the greatest,”
declares the Lord. (Jeremiah 31:31-34a)
“when I will make a new covenant
with the people of Israel
and with the people of Judah.
It will not be like the covenant
I made with their ancestors
when I took them by the hand
to lead them out of Egypt,
because they broke my covenant,
though I was a husband to them,”
declares the Lord.
“This is the covenant I will make
with the people of Israel
after that time,” declares the Lord.
“I will put my law in their minds
and write it on their hearts.
I will be their God,
and they will be my people.
No longer will they teach their neighbour,
or say to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’
because they will all know me,
from the least of them to the greatest,”
declares the Lord. (Jeremiah 31:31-34a)
This was the hope that ignited a fire in
the heart of Asaph. It was the hope that the day would come when God’s people
would not just know about the Lord
either through his deeds or through his decrees, but that each one would know
God and his daily, living presence.
Asaph’s dream was also the prayer of our
Lord Jesus. On the night before he went to the cross John’s gospel tells us
that he looked toward heaven and prayed for his followers, “that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent” (John 17:3).
Recently we’ve been
looking at the letter to the Philippians. There, in chapter 3, Paul tells of
his own experience of moving from knowing about God to actually knowing him. He
had done everything right—here’s how he put it:
Circumcised on the eighth day, of the
people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to
the law, a Pharisee; as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for righteousness
based on the law, faultless. (Philippians
3:5-6)
But then he goes on:
Whatever were gains to me I now consider
loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss because
of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord… I want to know Christ—yes,
to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming
like him… (Philippians 3:7-8,10)
Someone has said that the church is always
one generation away from extinction. And that will surely be the case if we see
our task as simply carrying on as we’ve done in the past. But we are not here
to maintain an institution. We are not here to preserve a tradition. We are
here to carry forward a mission—to help women and men and children come to know
the Lord our God and their lives become a day-by-day walk with him. And we have
his promise, “I will be with you always, to the end of the age.”
