Thursday
Evening Bible Study
June
1, 2017
Introduction
Do people see Jesus? Is the gospel
preached? Does it address the person who is: Empty, lonely, guilty, or afraid
to die? Does it speak to the broken hearted? Does it build up the church? Milk
– Meat – Manna Preach for a decision Is the church loved? Target 3300 words Video
= 75 wpm
The English word psalm comes
from a Greek word that means “a poem sung to musical accompaniment”, or in
particular, “stringed instruments”.
The Hebrew name is tehillim,
which means “praises.”
The book of Psalms is the hymnbook
of God’s people.
It’s also the “Him” book as well.
It’s all about Jesus.
The writer of Hebrews quotes from
Psalm 40:8 when he writes,
(Hebrews 10:7 NKJV) Then I
said, ‘Behold, I have come— In the
volume of the book it is written of Me— To do Your will, O God.’ ”
The author was talking about Jesus.
We’re going to see a lot of Jesus
in the Psalms.
Soul Music
Music touches the soul. It’s
“soulish” in nature. It touches the emotions.
We’re going to find every kind of
emotion possible expressed in the Psalms.
For every sigh there is a Psalm.
For most of us, this is what makes
the Psalms so wonderful. We can identify. We can relate.
If we were honest, even darkest
most depressing Psalms describe the very things we go through day by day.
It is my prayer that as we continue
on this journey through the Psalms, we won’t just look at these songs
academically, with our mind, but that we may also grow as worshippers.
Psalm 140 – Bad Mouths
: To the Chief Musician. A Psalm of David.
:1 Deliver me, O Lord, from
evil men; Preserve me from violent men,
:2 Who plan evil things in their hearts; They continually gather
together for war.
:3 They sharpen their tongues like a serpent; The poison of asps is
under their lips. Selah
:3 They sharpen their tongues like a serpent
Lesson
Words
These wicked people were causing grief to David by the things they were
saying.
They had tongues like a “serpent”.
Just what does a serpent sound like?
Here’s another serpent that actually spoke words:
(Genesis 3:1–6
NKJV) —1 Now the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field which
the Lord God had made. And he
said to the woman, “Has God indeed said, ‘You shall not eat of every tree of
the garden’?” 2 And the
woman said to the serpent, “We may eat the fruit of the trees of the garden; 3 but of the
fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God has said,
‘You shall not eat it, nor shall you touch it, lest you die.’ ” 4 Then the
serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. 5 For God
knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be
like God, knowing good and evil.” 6 So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that
it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one
wise, she took of its fruit and ate. She also gave to her husband with her, and
he ate.
We might think that the words of a serpent will always be
cutting, critical, and harsh.
The serpent in the garden spoke sweet things to Eve. The enemy doesn’t just speak disgusting
things. Sometimes it’s quite sweet.
He questioned the authority and words of God, but he made
Eve feel good about herself, making her think she could be something more than
she was.
Jesus faced challenges throughout His ministry.
He faced some folks that he considered to be offspring of the devil.
(John 8:41–44 NKJV)
—41 You do the deeds of your father.” Then they said to Him, “We were not
born of fornication; we have one Father—God.” 42 Jesus said to them, “If God were
your Father, you would love Me, for I proceeded forth and came from God; nor
have I come of Myself, but He sent Me. 43 Why do you not understand My speech? Because you are not able to
listen to My word. 44 You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your
father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not
stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he
speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it.
The serpent’s words were lies.
Lies lead to death.
James warns us about the things that come out of our own mouths.
(James 3:1–6 NKJV)
—1 My brethren, let not many of you become teachers, knowing that we
shall receive a stricter judgment. 2 For we all stumble in many things. If anyone does not stumble in
word, he is a perfect man, able also to bridle the whole body. 3 Indeed, we
put bits in horses’ mouths that they may obey us, and we turn their whole body.
4 Look also at
ships: although they are so large and are driven by fierce winds, they are
turned by a very small rudder wherever the pilot desires. 5 Even so the
tongue is a little member and boasts great things. See how
great a forest a little fire kindles! 6 And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue is
so set among our members that it defiles the whole body, and sets on fire the
course of nature; and it is set on fire by hell.
Our words have impact on people around us.
We can either bless or curse by the words of our mouths.
(Proverbs
12:18 NKJV) There is one who speaks like the piercings of a sword, But the
tongue of the wise promotes health.
We might not have control over whether or not others use
cutting words on us, but we do have control over what kinds of words we use.
(Proverbs
15:1 NKJV) A soft answer turns away wrath, But a harsh word stirs up anger.
:3 The poison of asps
When a poisonous snake strikes you, it gets its poison under your skin.
When wicked people say wicked things, it too can get under our skin.
What will you do with the poison once it hits you?
Will you let it linger and kill you?
Will you seek to remove the poison and seek an “anti-venom”?
:4 Keep me, O Lord, from the
hands of the wicked; Preserve me from violent men, Who have purposed to make my
steps stumble.
:5 The proud have hidden a snare for me, and cords; They have spread a net
by the wayside; They have set traps for me. Selah
:6 I said to the Lord: “You are
my God; Hear the voice of my supplications, O Lord.
:7 O God the Lord, the
strength of my salvation, You have covered my head in the day of battle.
:7 You have covered my head in the day of battle
How did David keep from letting the snake venom kill him?
He brought it to the Lord.
:8 Do not grant, O Lord, the
desires of the wicked; Do not further his wicked scheme, Lest
they be exalted. Selah
:9 “As for the head of those who surround me, Let the evil of their
lips cover them;
:10 Let burning coals fall upon them; Let them be cast into the fire, Into
deep pits, that they rise not up again.
:11 Let not a slanderer be established in the earth; Let evil hunt the
violent man to overthrow him.”
:12 I know that the Lord will
maintain The cause of the afflicted, And justice for the poor.
:13 Surely the righteous shall give thanks to Your name; The upright shall
dwell in Your presence.
:10 Let burning coals fall upon them
burning coals – gechel
– coal, burning coal, coals of fire, hot coals
Some have suggested that the “burning coals” paints a picture like Sodom
and Gomorrah, with fire and brimstone raining down from heaven.
(Psalm 140:10 The
Message) Let God pile hellfire on them, let him bury them alive in crevasses!
Lesson
Vengeance
We think of the harsh language as not being very nice, but David is doing
what we are supposed to do – he’s letting God handle the vengeance.
David’s son, Solomon, wrote,
(Proverbs 25:21–22
NKJV) —21 If your enemy is hungry, give him bread to eat; And if he is
thirsty, give him water to drink; 22 For so you will heap coals of fire on his head, And the Lord will reward you.
Paul quotes Solomon:
(Romans 12:17–21
NKJV) —17 Repay no one evil for evil. Have regard for good things in the
sight of all men. 18 If it is possible, as much as depends on you, live peaceably with
all men. 19 Beloved, do
not avenge yourselves, but rather give place to wrath; for it is
written, “Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,” says the Lord. 20 Therefore “If your
enemy is hungry, feed him; If he is thirsty, give him a drink; For in so
doing you will heap coals of fire on his head.” 21 Do not be
overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.
Paul says we can heap “coals of fire” on a person by doing
good to them instead of evil.
I think that in a way our returning good for evil makes a
greater contrast to everyone around us who we are and who our enemies are.
I don’t think Paul is counseling us to hold on to our
grudges and just pretend to be nice – he’s telling us to let it go, be kind to
the other person, and let God handle it.
Illustration
Dr. S. I. McMillen illustrates in a
chapter entitled “The High Cost of
Getting Even,” from his book, None of
These Diseases, how physical maladies including ulcers, high blood
pressure, and strokes are connected to harboring resentment and hatred toward
others. He says, “It might be written on many thousands of death certificates
that the victim died of ‘grudgitis.’” Dr. McMillen describes how hating a
person enslaves the one who hates:
The moment I start hating a man I become his slave. I
cannot enjoy my work anymore because he even controls my thoughts. My
resentments produce too many stress hormones in my body; I become fatigued
after only a few hours of work. The man I hate may be miles from my bedroom,
but more cruel than any slave driver he whips my thoughts into such a frenzy
that my inner-spring mattress becomes a rack of torture. I really must
acknowledge that I am a slave to every man on whom I pour out my wrath.
Illustration
An Indian brave found an eagle’s egg. Since he couldn’t find the nest to
put it back, he did the next-best thing. He put the eagle’s egg in a nest with
prairie chicken eggs. So the eagle was hatched and began to live with the
prairie chickens. All it saw were chickens, so it clucked and scratched and
pecked around and was a chicken for years. And then one day it saw a glorious
sight in the sky, a great bald eagle soaring up there. He said, “What is that?”
The chicken said, “That is the eagle, the king of birds. But forget it.
That’s not for you; you are a chicken.” And he lived the rest of his life
clucking, pecking, and scratching, and not flying.
- Bruce Larson,
“When Your Enemy Prospers,” Preaching Today, Tape No. 78.
We can live like a chicken and just hate our enemies, or
we can learn to love our enemies and soar like an eagle.
Psalm 141 – Teachable
: A Psalm of David.
:1 Lord, I cry out to You;
Make haste to me! Give ear to my voice when I cry out to You.
:2 Let my prayer be set before You as incense, The lifting up of my
hands as the evening sacrifice.
:2 Let my prayer be set before You as incense
Lesson
Sweet Prayer
Throughout the Bible, incense is a picture of prayer.
When Moses built the Tabernacle according to God’s directions, he built an
altar for burning incense made out of gold.
It was placed right in front of the curtain that led into the Holy of
holies.
Every evening a priest would come into the Holy Place and burn incense on
this altar, and as the smoke from the incense rose, it would waft into the Holy
of Holies, before God’s throne.
The incense the priest would burn was to be of a specific formula.
(Exodus
30:34–36 NKJV) —34 And the Lord said to
Moses: “Take sweet spices, stacte and onycha and galbanum, and pure
frankincense with these sweet spices; there shall be equal amounts of
each. 35 You shall
make of these an incense, a compound according to the art of the perfumer,
salted, pure, and holy. 36 And you shall beat some of it very fine, and put some of it
before the Testimony in the tabernacle of meeting where I will meet with you.
It shall be most holy to you.
I’ve got some frankincense if you’d like a whiff.
Jewish tradition tells us that the family entrusted with
the exact formula had a way of making the incense so the smoke would rise
straight up, as if ascending to God.
Just as incense required a specific formula, our prayers ought to generally
reflect the formula that Jesus gave us.
(Matthew
6:9–13 NKJV) —9 In this manner, therefore, pray: Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be
Your name.
Prayer acknowledges the God of heaven and gives Him honor
and praise.
10
Your
kingdom come. Your will be
done On earth as it
is in heaven.
Sweet smelling prayer yields itself to God’s will.
11
Give
us this day our daily bread.
Prayer acknowledges our real daily needs.
12
And
forgive us our debts, As we forgive our debtors.
Fragrant prayer comes from a heart of forgiveness, not
bitterness.
13
And
do not lead us into temptation, But deliver us from the evil one. For Yours is the kingdom and the
power and the glory forever. Amen.
Healthy prayer acknowledges the battle we’re in and clings
to God for help.
The time of day when the incense was burned was known as the hour of
prayer.
The priest didn’t just burn incense, he brought the prayers
of the people before God.
John the Baptist’s dad was a priest was burning incense
and praying when an angel told him he would have a son. (Luke 1:8-10)
(Luke 1:8–10 NKJV) —8 So
it was, that while he was serving as priest before God in the order of his
division, 9 according to the
custom of the priesthood, his lot fell to burn incense when he went into the
temple of the Lord. 10 And the
whole multitude of the people was praying outside at the hour of incense.
This was when an
angel appeared to Zacharias and told him he would have a son named John.
This was the hour when Peter and John went to the Temple
and a lame man was lying at the gate…
(Acts 3:1 NKJV) Now Peter
and John went up together to the temple at the hour of prayer, the ninth hour.
Things happen when people are praying.
The rituals in the Tabernacle and Temple were only a reflection of what
takes place in heaven.
(Revelation
8:3–4 NKJV) —3 Then another angel, having a golden censer, came and stood at the
altar. He was given much incense, that he should offer it with the
prayers of all the saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne. 4 And the
smoke of the incense, with the prayers of the saints, ascended before God from
the angel’s hand.
Earlier in Revelation we find that the incense is kept in
bowls before they are poured out to God.
(Revelation
5:8 NKJV) Now when He had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the
twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each having a harp, and golden
bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints.
I’ve had this personal theory (I certainly may be wrong
here) that each situation has a “bowl” assigned to it. Some bowls are small and don’t require much
prayer. Others are much larger and
require that we dedicate significant time over possibly years before those
bowls are filled.
When the bowl is filled, it’s poured out and God moves.
:2 The lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice
The hour of incense was also the same time as the evening offering.
It was around 3:00 in the afternoon.
Lesson
Acceptable offerings
Church folk often think of lifting the hands as an expression of praise to
God, and that’s okay.
But for the rest of the world, raising your hands means one thing: Surrender.
David is asking that his surrender to God might be counted as an acceptable
sacrifice to God.
David is surrendering everything to God.
Too often we would have to admit that we don’t surrender
to God at all, we only surrender some things.
Acceptable sacrifice to God didn’t always involve the sacrifice of an
animal.
(Hebrews 13:15–16
NKJV) —15 Therefore by Him let us continually offer the sacrifice of praise
to God, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to His name. 16 But do not
forget to do good and to share, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.
It’s not always an easy thing to give God praise, or to surrender to God.
Sometimes it takes a step of faith, to praise and
surrender to Him despite our circumstances.
:3 Set a guard, O Lord, over
my mouth; Keep watch over the door of my lips.
:3 Set a guard, O Lord,
over my mouth
In the previous Psalm, we talked about how evil and destructive our words
can be.
David asks God to shut him up.
Lesson
Keep quiet
A wise person once said, “It’s better to keep your mouth shut and let them
think you’re a fool, than to start speaking and dispel all doubt.”
Illustration
I remember as a young man sitting in on church staff meetings with the
older men.
I often was quick to speak up, because of course I knew
better than everyone else.
There was one fellow named Dave Burns who was about seven
years older than I, and he would rarely speak up.
Yet when he did, he often spoke carefully and wisely on a
subject. When he spoke, people listened.
I remember thinking more than once that I needed to learn
to be a little more quiet like Dave.
Solomon said,
(Proverbs 17:27–28
NKJV) —27 He who has knowledge spares his words, And a man of
understanding is of a calm spirit. 28 Even a fool is counted wise when he holds his peace; When he shuts
his lips, he is considered perceptive.
:4 Do not incline my heart to any evil thing, To practice wicked works With
men who work iniquity; And do not let me eat of their delicacies.
:4 do not let me eat of their delicacies
David asks God for help with his heart, his deeds, and what kinds of things
he enjoys.
We can get into trouble when we taste too much of the world and start to
like the things the world likes.
:5 Let the righteous strike me; It shall be a kindness. And let him
rebuke me; It shall be as excellent oil; Let my head not refuse it. For
still my prayer is against the deeds of the wicked.
:6 Their judges are overthrown by the sides of the cliff, And they hear my
words, for they are sweet.
:6 overthrown by the sides of the cliff
Sometimes at the end of a battle, the victor would throw some of the
vanquished off a cliff. Even the good guys did this.
There’s a strange verse that
records David’s victory over the Moabites, and the King James translates it:
(2 Samuel 8:2 AV) And he
smote Moab, and measured them with a line, casting them down to the ground;
even with two lines measured he to put to death, and with one full line to keep
alive. And so the Moabites became David’s servants, and brought
gifts.
King Amaziah would fight against the Edomites:
(2 Chronicles 25:12
NKJV) Also the children of Judah took captive ten thousand alive, brought
them to the top of the rock, and cast them down from the top of the rock, so
that they all were dashed in pieces.
The NLT handles our passage like this:
(Psalm 141:6 NLT) When their
leaders are thrown down from a cliff, the wicked will listen to my words and
find them true.
When these evil people are one day defeated, they will look back and
realize that David was correct.
:7 Our bones are scattered at the mouth of the grave, As when one plows and
breaks up the earth.
A different sense is:
(Psalm 141:7 NLT) Like rocks
brought up by a plow, the bones of the wicked will lie scattered without
burial.
:8 But my eyes are upon You, O God
the Lord; In You I take refuge; Do not leave my soul destitute.
:9 Keep me from the snares they have laid for me, And from the traps of the
workers of iniquity.
:10 Let the wicked fall into their own nets, While I escape safely.
:5 Let the righteous strike me
Lesson
Hard words
The wicked sometimes don’t learn until they face a difficult defeat, like
being thrown off a cliff (v. 6).
David is praying that he will learn when a righteous person rebukes him
rather than having to be thrown off a cliff.
One of the keys to growing up in life is learning to listen when someone
has “hard” things to say to you.
As children, we wanted to stop up our ears, hum, and not listen to what
someone says.
But as we grow up, we find that we need to listen to hard things.
Paul wrote,
(Ephesians 4:14–15
NKJV) —14 that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried
about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning
craftiness of deceitful plotting, 15 but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him
who is the head—Christ—
Growing up requires that we listen to truthful things,
even if they’re difficult to listen to.
Solomon wrote,
(Proverbs 12:1
NKJV) Whoever loves instruction loves knowledge, But he who
hates correction is stupid.
A wise person is going to pay attention when someone offers
correction.
Solomon also wrote,
(Proverbs 27:6
NKJV) Faithful are the wounds of a friend, But the
kisses of an enemy are deceitful.
Sometimes we get to thinking that if we love someone, we
don’t want to say anything negative to them, especially if it’s going to upset
them.
The problem is, that’s not real love. It might be just the opposite.
There ought to be ways of saying difficult things, yet in
a loving way.
When someone criticizes you, be careful not to respond
with a knee-jerk criticism back.
Sometimes we fall into the habit of playing “tit-for-tat” when it comes to
criticism.
If your relationships look like this, things aren’t good.
In J. Oswald Sanders’ Book, Spiritual Leadership (pg.120), he writes:
Samuel Brengle, noted for his sense
of holiness, felt the heat of caustic criticism. Instead of rushing to defend himself, he
replied: “From my heart I thank you for
your rebuke. I think I deserved. Will you, my friend, remember me in
prayer?” When another critic attacked
his spiritual life, Brengle replied: “I
thank you for your criticism of my life.
It set me to self-examination and heart-searching and prayer, which
always leads me into a deeper sense of my utter dependence on Jesus for
holiness of heart, and into sweeter fellowship with Him.”
This was a wise man.
Song
Am C Dm
Am
Let our voices rise like incense
Am C E
Am
Let there be a sweet perfume
Am C Dm
Am
Let our praises fill the temple
Am C
E Am
Hallelujahs ringing ever new
Am C Dm Am
Holy, Holy
Am C E Am
Is the Lord Almighty
Am C Dm Am
Holy, Holy
Am C E Am
Is the Lord on high
Let Our Voices / Words & Music by Linda Whitmer Bell
/ © 1986 Clark Brothers
Communications / Incense.doc