SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 3/3/2012 8:02:50 AM
My
Worship Time Focus:
Introduction and
Background to Psalm 52
Bible
Reading & Meditation Reference: Psalm 52
Message of the verses: In
Today’s SD we will begin to look at Psalm 52 and at first we will look at
several introductions from different Bible Commentators.
“Title. To the Chief Musician. Even short Psalms, if they record but one
instance of the goodness of the Lord, and rebuke but briefly the pride of man,
are worthy of our best minstrelsy. When
we see that each Psalm is dedicated to "the chief musician," it
should make us value our psalmody, and forbid us to praise the Lord
carelessly. Maschil. An Instructive. Even the malice of a Doeg may furnish
instruction to a David. A Psalm of
David. He was the prime object of Doeg’s
doggish hatred, and therefore the most fitting person to draw from the incident
the lesson concealed within it. When Doeg the Edomite came and told Saul, and
saith unto him, David is come to the house of Ahimelech. By this deceitful tale bearing, he procured
the death of all the priests at Nob: though it had been a crime to have helped
David as a rebel, they were not in their intent and knowledge guilty of the
fault. David felt much the villany
(wicked or criminal behavior) of this arch enemy, and here he denounces him in
vigorous terms; it may be also that he has Saul in his eye.” (Charles H. Spurgeon)
“This psalm is a poetic lesson about
the futility of evil, the final triumph of righteousness, and the sovereign
control of God over the moral events of history. The event in David’s life which motivated him
to write this psalm is recorded in 1Samuel 21-22.” (The MacArthur Study Bible)
“When David wrote this psalm, he was
angry and rightly so. (For the reason,
see 1Samuel 21:1-9 and 22:6-23.) Doeg
was one of many men around Saul who catered to his whims and inflated his ego
in order to gain power and wealth. He
typifies all who promote themselves at the expense of truth and justice. Doeg was an Edomite, which means he was
descended from Esau, the enemy of Jacob (Genesis 27-28; Heb. 12:16-17). The
battle between the flesh and the Spirit goes on. However, it’s possible that David was writing
about Saul, who certainly fits the description given of the proud powerful
tyrant. There has always been a certain
amount of evil in high places, and God’s people must learn to handle it in a
godly manner. David paints for us three
contrasting scenes.” (Warren Wiersbe)
We will begin to look at these three
scenes in a moment, but first I want to go back and look at the Spiritual
Diaries on the verses from 1Samuel that are mentioned in Dr. Wiersbe
introduction in order to set the background for this psalm.
“This section begins a new part of
David’s life, a life on the run, a life of exile. This part of his life lasted for about ten
years and it is thought that many of the Psalms that he wrote were written at
this time of his life. The Psalms that
he wrote have given comfort to many people who have been in similar situations
in their lives where comfort is needed.
David may have looked back on this time of his life as a very profitable
time where he grew closer to the Lord.
“Dr. Wiersbe thinks that perhaps in
this section that David was referring to the Lord whenever David said that he
was on the “king’s” business, but I think that this is a stretch even though he
was on the Lord’s business overall.
“This section goes back to one of
the questions that I had earlier while studying the book of 1Samuel concerning
the high priest Eli, and wondering why he was there in the first place because
he was not from the line of Ithamar when it should have been from the line of
Eleazar. The Lord said that He would remove
Eli’s line from being priests and when Saul kills these priests at Nob this was
part of the process of removing that line.
Dr. Wiersbe says that the Bible is silent on the moving of the priestly
line between these two men listed above.
“The question in this section, at
least one of these is why was David able to eat this bread that was supposed to
be only for the priests who served at the tabernacle. Jesus spoke of this while on the earth
speaking to some of the Pharisees who were accusing Him of breaking the Sabbath
day by eating grain from a field. Jesus
answered these Pharisees in Matthew 12:7-8 this way, “7 “But if you had known
what this means, ’I DESIRE COMPASSION, AND NOT A SACRIFICE,’ you would not have
condemned the innocent. 8 ‘For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.’”
“The tabernacle was at Nob but the
Ark was still at the house of Abinadad in Kiriath Jearim, (1Samuel 7:1).
“One more point and that is about
Doeg who was from Edom, and was the shepherd for Saul. What was he doing at this place in the first
place for he was from Edom? He may have
been a Jewish proselyte and because of killing sheep he may have touched their
dead bodies and had to then bring a sacrifice there.” (My Spiritual Diary from June 29, 2010 on
1Samuel 21:1-9)
The next SD is from July 4, 2010 and
it will cover 1Samuel 22:1-10: “This SD
begins the fourth point in Warren Wiersbe’s commentary 1Samuel in this chapter
of his book. He entitles this forth
point “Doeg: a deceitful servant and it
covers 22:6-23 of 1Samuel. Doeg is the
fourth person whom is seen in this chapter of his commentary, and all four
characters involve drama.
“The scene begins with Saul ranting
and raving about how his officers and his son Jonathan are plotting against him
and as he begins to shout at these men and one of them, Doeg, begins to tell
Saul exactly what he saw while David was at the priests home where the ephod
was. Doeg seems to be telling the truth
to Saul with the possible exception of saying that the priest had found out
from the Lord what David was suppose to do and where he was to go. I suppose that this made Saul happy for a
while, but what Doeg did was wrong for God had anointed David to be king in
Israel and so Doeg was actually going against the rightful king of Israel. David writes the 52nd Psalm about
this incident.”
1Samuel 22:11-15 are the verses that
are covered in the next SD entry from July 5, 2010 and this was entitled “The illegal
Trial.”
“I suppose that this sub-title could
have been called “the paranoiac king,” as Saul was acting more and more
paranoid all of the time. Since Nob was
not far from Gibeah Saul sent for the high priest and his family, but refused
to call him by his given name and called him the son of Ahitub, which means
“good brother,” while his real name Ahimelech means “brother of a king,” and
perhaps that is why he did not use his real name. Another reason was certainly that of
disrespect for the high priest as he suspected him of treason against the
kingdom.
“Saul would go on to charge
Ahimelech of four different charges which none of them were true, and
eventually would have him killed because of Saul’s paranoiac behavior. The charges were giving David a sword, and
feeding him, and inquiring of the Lord for David, and thus being in a
conspiracy to kill the king. Now
Ahimelech did give David bread, and a sword, but as far as inquiring of the
Lord for him that may not be true even though the way it is worded here in the
text. The point Saul was trying to make
was that he did all of this because Ahimelech was working with David to kill
Saul, and none of that is true.
“Ahimelech defends himself in a
proper and true way by saying that after all David was the king’s son-on-law
and was one of the king’s most trusted officers and would not do something like
this.”
Now we will look at the SD from July
6, 2010 which covers 1Samuel 22:16-19 which was entitled “The Unjust
Sentence.” “Samuel had warned the people
what a king would do before a king was given to them and the things that Samuel
spoke of concerning a king were coming true in the Scriptures that are before
me today.
“The crime of Ahimelech was that he
did not tell the king that David was leaving and therefore he and eventually
all of the priests and their families and even their animals that were at Nob
were killed. The men around Saul refused
to do this awful deed, for they would not kill the priests of the Lord, but
Doeg had no trouble in doing this and it seems he even went beyond what Saul
had ordered him to do by killing all of the families at Nob. As mentioned in an earlier SD this was a
partial fulfillment of what was told to Eli back in 1Samuel 2:27-36; 4:10-18,
and if one fast forwards to 1Kings 2:26-27; & 4:2 the remainder of this
prophecy is fulfilled.
“Although this was a prophecy that had been fulfilled just
as the Lord had said that it would happen that certainly does not mean that
what Doeg did was without consequences to him for this ruthless killing of
innocent people.”
The last SD which goes along with
Psalm 52 is entitled “The Protected Priest,” and it covers verses 20-23 of
1Samuel 22.
“In yesterday’s SD it was revealed
that Doeg the Edomite had killed all of Ahimelech’s family, but it seems that
he was not ordered by Saul to kill everyone.
Now it is learned that there is one survivor, the grandson of Eli, who
is Abiathar. He escaped to the camp of David which was now
at Keilah, but unknown when he moved there.
David then took the responsibility for the killing of all this family
and then told him to stay with his men.
David now had the high priest with an ephod, and a prophet and he was
the king that the Lord had chosen to reign over Israel, and the Lord was with
him through all of this even though he was now officially an outlaw from King
Saul.
“Later on Abiathar would side in with Adonijah in his
quest for the throne and Solomon dismissed him, and this fulfilled the prophecy
of ousting the line of Eli as the office of high priests which was told to Eli
in the 2nd chapter of 1Samuel.”
Spiritual
meaning for my life today: When I
was a very young believer I was listening to a program on a Christian radio
station and it was by a Pastor that my mom used to listen to every morning when
I was growing up. The program was called
“Morning Sunshine,” and the Pastor was involved in starting a church that
eventually started a Christian school that both of our children went to and now
two of our grandchildren are going to.
In the Pastor’s message that day he spoke of how one portion of
Scripture can connect with other portions of Scripture and it was important to
learn how different Scriptures connect with others. As I began looking as Psalm 52 and how it
ties in with other portions of Scripture I remembered the importance of that
message that I listened to many years ago.
Saul was a king that the people
asked for and he was not the king that God would use to bring about the birth
of His Son on the earth. David was the
man after God’s own heart and Samuel told Saul that because of his disobedience
that God was going to look for a man after His own heart. As I was listening to 1Samuel last night I
heard that right after Samuel anointed David to be king over Israel that the
Spirit of God came into David’s life and the next verse tells that the Spirit
of God left Saul. The reason for this
was that Saul was no longer the rightful king of Israel. What I have learned from this is that the
Holy Spirit has to be involved in my life for me to have an effective
ministry. Ephesians 2:10 speaks of the
works that God has planned in eternity past for all of His children and I
desire to do all of those works that the Lord has planned for me in eternity past. Life is a battle, and we do not battle with
flesh and blood as Paul writes in Ephesians chapter six. One of my favorite verses that has just
become a favorite is Mark 14:38, “"Keep watching and praying that you may
not come into temptation; the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.’” Jesus spoke this to His sleepy disciples
right before He was to be taken to the cross and as I look at that verse it
tells me that there is a battle going on and yes my spirit is willing to do the
right things to overcome temptations and to do the will of God, but my flesh is
weak and does not want to do them. Like
the disciples I sometimes want to sleep, but like David I want to do the will
of God even after I fall flat on my face.
Dr. Wiersbe quotes a Scottish Pastor in many of his books who said, “The
secret to the successful Christian life is a series of new beginnings.”
My Steps of Faith for Today:
1. Mark 14:38.
2. Ephesians 6:10-18.
3. Philippians 4:11b.
4. Proverbs 3:5-6.
5. Romans 12:1-2.
3/3/2012 9:15:15 AM
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