Music Mondays

As I noted on Friday, in the New Testament, Psalm 110 is used to establish Jesus' authority and superiority. He is the promised Messiah-King and also our great High Priest who replaces the old system. 

He is our King-Priest - our spiritual and political leader. As Ps. 110 applies to us, we realize that through Christ, God provides for our practical needs, grants us access to the presence of God, and offers us protection from our enemies.

I think I've shared this song previously, but it uniquely captures the multi-faceted nature of our Savior. He is our Prophet, our Priest, and our King.

Sermon Snippets

We are continuing our series in the Psalms this week, studying Ps. 110. This is the most quoted Psalm in the New Testament. The mysterious author of Hebrews particularly loved using it, alluding to it in chapters 1, 5, 7, and 10. Jesus himself identified with it in Mark 12:35-37.

Because of it's popularity in the New Testament, it's easy for we as Christians to automatically read into our NT understandings. But if we are going to be proper interpreters of the text, we must first understand a passage in it's original context, then move on to it's NT usages, before building the bridge to our current world.

When collecting my resources for this series, I picked up one particular book edited by two of my seminary professors. It has proven to be invaluable in helping me work through all the interpretive issues that these poetic Psalms have.  If you want a devotional aid to help you properly read the Psalms or if you want some understandable excellent scholarly work on specific Psalms - I can't recommend this book highly enough.

So, I guess I'll conclude by admitting this isn't really a sermon preview as much as an encouragement to carefully respect the biblical context of any particular passage. Discern it's original meaning for it's original audience before jumping into "What does this say to me?" like so many church-goers are prone to do.

Christian Movies, Christians and the Movies, and Christians going to the Movies

Hollywood is finding religion.

Between God's Not Dead, The Son of God, Noah, and the future Ten Commandments remake, movie studios are turning to the Bible as source material almost as much as they have turned to comic books in recent years.

Personally,  I'm interested in seeing these 'Christian movies', but unfortunately not in a financial position to take my wife on dates to the theater to see each and every one. I'll wait for them to come out on DVD - Redbox is received much better by our bank account right now.

I will probably see them, but it's been the Church's responses to these films that have really grabbed my attention.

Nationally and locally, I've observed a variety of responses from Christians - everything from adamant rejection to wholesale endorsement. Skepticism and ambivalence can also be seen from church-going folk as well.

Hopefully enough of us evangelicals can take a look in the mirror and resist an uninformed knee-jerk response and interact with this cultural trend in a wiser way.

I found this particular discussion to strike the right notes. The bulk of the first half specifically discusses the Noah movie. It was fair and balanced. At around the 27:00 mark however, the focus turns to how we as Christ-followers ought to engage with 'biblical' movies and movies in general. It's this last part of the video I found the most beneficial.

Props to Dr. Darrell Bock, Naima Lett, and Dallas Theological Seminary for providing an excellent thought-provoking presentation.

Music Mondays

It's over 8 minutes long, but well worth it. A perfect song for Easter - no real comment needed other than that.

Music Mondays

Yesterday was Palm Sunday, where Christians world-wide celebrate the 'Triumphal Entry' of Jesus into Jerusalem the week before he died (see Matt. 21:1-11, Mark 11:1-11 etc). 

As he entered the city on a donkey and made his way towards the temple, the crowds responded with singing and laying palm branches and their cloaks on the ground. They held messianic hopes for Jesus and joyously sang Psalm 118 proclaiming their hopes of God's salvation. "Hosanna" literally means "Lord save us!" In it's original context, Ps. 118:26 is actually a call for deliverance, though used in these later days, it seems to have morphed into an expression of praise. 

Interestingly enough, before his death, Jesus would lament his rejection and predict his future coming that will be accompanied by the same proclamation that was made that first Palm Sunday (Matt.23:38-39). It's fascinating to me how Psalm 118 had specific relevance to ancient Hebrew worshipers, worshipers of Jesus' day, and it still holds relevance for the future. 

I didn't completely understand all of this until the very end of our service yesterday when I made the spur-of-the-moment decision to read Revelation 7:9-10:

⁹ After this I looked, and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands. ¹⁰ And they cried out in a loud voice:

“Salvation belongs to our God,
who sits on the throne,
and to the Lamb.”

While this vision doesn't directly allude to Psalm 118 or what Jesus described in Matthew 23, I hadn't noticed the palm branches reference the many times I'd read this before. No doubt this is an allusion to the celebrations that first Palm Sunday as the final victory of God is realized on that day.
Hosanna in the Highest!

Music Mondays

We dove into one of my favorite Psalms yesterday - Psalm 40. I never remember particularly paying much notice to this Psalm until I heard this song:

Which is a cover of this song:

"He put a new song in my mouth,
a hymn of praise to my God.
Many will see and fear
and put their trust in the Lord."