Psalms of Ascents - Program 8
Psalm 132
Most of the Songs of Ascent we are studying are short psalms sung by travellers going up to Jerusalem to worship in the Temple there. But the one we are looking at now, Psalm 132 is quite a bit longer than the rest. So we shall study it in two parts. The first runs from verse one to verse ten and has to do with King David’s desire to have the place of God’s presence in the city of Jerusalem on Mt. Zion.
Look at verses one to five. David had a hard life. As king of Israel anointed by the judge Samuel in place of Saul who had departed from God in his heart, he was hounded by Saul and had often to live rough, even once living in a cave. But after Saul’s death, David came into his own and was determined to bring the Tent of God, which had been neglected in Saul’s day, to his capital city of Zion or Jerusalem. Up to now, the Tent had been taken from place to place with no sure resting Place. It had been constructed when Israel, years before, came out of the Desert of Sinai. As they travelled in tents they carried with them one special tent to house the presence of the Lord. Inside was a seven-branched candlestick representing the light of God, a table with twelve loaves on it to stand for the twelve tribes of Israel and an altar of incense to represent the prayers of the people of Israel. Outside the Tent was a large bowl for the priests to wash themselves in before they offered animal sacrifices to God to cover the people’s sins. But deep within the tent, in a small room, was a gold-covered box (called the ark of the covenant) containing the ten commandments given by God to Israel through Moses. The blood of a goat was sprinkled on top of this box and seven times in front of it on one special day of the year called the Day of Covering when, symbolically, the sins of Israel in not keeping the ten commandments, were covered from God’s sight.
You can see how important it was for David to have this tent in Jerusalem (Zion) for all that the Jews believed about God was expressed there symbolically. When he arrived in Zion 1 Chronicles 15.1 tells us “he prepared a place for the ark of God and pitched a tent for it.” But what has all that to do with us today? David made a vow that he would honour God by providing a place for God’s presence to dwell in the midst of his people and he wouldn’t rest until he had done this. David made a vow to God: “I will not enter my house or go to my bed, I will allow no sleep to my eyes, no slumber to my eyelids, till I find a place for the Lord, a dwelling for the Mighty One of Israel.
As we journey to God in our lives we do not have now a special place on earth that we can point to and say that is where God is, but, more wonderfully, we have all of us who have received Christ into our hearts, the living God living within us. We have become his temples. Paul writes: “Don’t you know that you yourselves are God’s temple and that God’s spirit lives in you” (1 Corinthians 3.16).
David’s Tent, which became Solomon’s Temple in Jerusalem, is no more. Twice it was destroyed by invaders. But our hearts remain in which to welcome God and worship him. Have you a desire as keen as David’s to see God’s presence honoured by making your life his dwelling place? There is no higher privilege on earth.
In the first part of the Psalm the writer reminds us that King David would not rest until he had established the temple of God in Zion, David’s capital city. Now, in the rest of the psalm, he thinks about Zion as the place where David and his descendants will rule for ever and also where God will reign on his throne for ever. God promised to keep David’s descendants on the throne of Israel, see v 11 “One of your own descendants I will place on your throne”, but there is a qualification: verse 12 “If your sons keep my covenant and the statutes I teach them, then their sons shall sit on your throne for ever and ever.” The word “covenant” as used here means an agreement to abide by God’s laws. Sadly this did not happen. Very few of David’s descendants were righteous and godly men. They dabbled in immoral practices and tolerated or even supported idolatry; they broke their covenant with God. And, as a result, they lost the blessings God promised-abundant provisions and a godly priesthood, see verses 15 and 16. Things got so bad that by the sixth Century before Christ the Prophet Jeremiah wrote: “The time is coming”, declares the Lord, “when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant I made with their forefathers, 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 house 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”.
Can you see now why, when Jesus was about to leave his disciples and go to the death of the Cross, he called a meal which he took with them the beginning of a “new covenant”? Luke records this in his gospel as he describes that meal of Jesus with his disciples: “And Jesus took bread, gave thanks and said: “This is my body given for you: do this in remembrance of me”. In the same way, after the supper he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you” (Luke chapter 22 verses 19 and 20).
King David is a sort of picture of Jesus. He was brave and fought God’s battles; he was just and faithful and righteous in his rule as king, but he was also a sinner who murdered and committed adultery. Jesus was without sin, the perfect man, the real King of Israel. Yet he was rejected by his people and crucified. God’s covenant with David failed because of David’s sin, but God’s covenant with his people today has been made by Jesus, the sinless One.
The old covenants had been broken many times, but Jesus himself is the new covenant between God and his people. So now it is not just the people of Israel who are called into covenant, with God, but people from every race and nation. There is no racial barrier, gender barrier or social barrier in this new covenant. No one is superior to anyone else. We come into covenant with God through Jesus as sinners who cannot claim anything except that Jesus died to forgive us our sins and bring us into the new covenant. Are you in covenant with God? Will you come in today?