“Yet they tested and provoked the Most High God, and did not keep His testimonies, but turned back and acted unfaithfully like their fathers. They were turned aside like a deceitful bow. For they provoked Him to anger with their high places and moved Him to jealousy with their carved images.” Psalm 78:56-58
Did you ever test your parent’s patience? Do you have children who test your patience? The children of Israel tested God’s patience by giving the love that was due Him to other gods. God was providing for them and keeping them alive. They were like a deceitful bow because their “arrows” always flew where false gods wanted them to fly and not in God’s direction.
What about believers today? Have we stopped testifying for Christ in public places? Do we support the retelling of pagan tales of Easter bunnies and Santa Clauses more than proclaiming Christ? Do we invest more in bunnies that lay eggs (which is a lie) and in a fat men who slides down chimneys (which is a lie) than in retelling the testimony of what Jesus Christ did for the salvation of human souls? And what about Halloween? Why is there so much excitement about images that relate to demons? God is the One who causes the earth to yield its increase.
Is the generation coming behind us embracing the testimonies in the Bible of God’s greatness?
“When God heard this, He was furious, and greatly abhorred Israel, so that He forsook the tabernacle of Shiloh, the tent He had placed among men, and delivered His strength into captivity, and His glory into the enemy’s hand. He also gave His people over to the sword and was furious with His inheritance. The fire consumed their young men, and their maidens were not given in marriage. Their priests fell by the sword, and their widows made no lamentation.” Psalm 78:59-64
Psalm 78:59-64 refers to 1 Samuel 2:12-17. In this passage, the Lord informs us that Hophni and Phinehas committed adultery with women who brought offerings to the tabernacle in Shiloh. They forcefully took meat offerings that were intended to be offered to God and ate them. In 1 Samuel 4, Hophni and Phinehas carried the Ark of the Covenant into battle. This was their idea, not God’s. They died in battle and the Ark was captured. God’s glory departed from Israel.
Manifest sin in the holy place is a red flag that something is wrong and needs to be discerned and addressed with the help of God.
In 1 Samuel 2:29, God asked Eli, the father of Hophni and Phinehas, “Why do you kick at My sacrifice and My offering which I have commanded in My dwelling place, and honor your sons more than Me, to make yourselves fat with the best of all the offerings of Israel My people?”
In 1 Samuel 3:13, God told Samuel, “For I have told him [Eli] that I will judge his house forever for the iniquity which he knows, because his sons made themselves vile, and he did not restrain them.” Soon after Samuel received this prophecy, Eli and his two sons died on the same day.
Healthy food laced with poison is highly dangerous because no one suspects it to kill them. God’s Word blended with lies is highly dangerous because unless our children know God and His Word well, they will be poisoned. In Matthew 15:9, Jesus rebuked the Pharisees because they taught as doctrines the commandments of men. They mixed their own ideas in with God’s.
God was furious with the priests in Shiloh. He took His presence from them.
Do you sense God’s presence in your worship assemblies?
In Galatians 1:8-9, Paul wrote, “Even if we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other Gospel to you than what we have preached to you, let him be accursed. As we have said before, so now I say again, if anyone preaches any other Gospel to you than what you have received, let him be accursed.” The One True God... Father, Son and Holy Spirit must be the focus of our worship and of our teachings in the Church if we want God’s presence among us.
God gave the people of Shiloh over to captivity. He turned them over to the enemy.
In Romans 1:18, Paul wrote that God reveals His wrath against men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness. In Romans 1:28, Paul wrote, “Even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a debased mind, to do those things which are not fitting.” The full Gospel includes a call to repentance of sin, a call to believe in Christ for cleansing from sin and reception of the Holy Spirit for empowerment to live a new life.
“Then the Lord awoke as from sleep, like a mighty man who shouts because of wine. And He beat back His enemies. He put them to a perpetual reproach.” Psalm 78:65-66
God defended His glory amidst the Philistines. In 1 Samuel 5:1-6:16, the Lord caused the idol of the Philistines to fall flat on its face and break apart. He afflicted the Philistines with tumors to the degree that they were happy to return the Ark of the Covenant to Israel.
“Moreover He rejected the tent of Joseph, and did not choose the tribe of Ephraim, but chose the tribe of Judah, Mount Zion which He loved. And He built His sanctuary like the heights, like the earth which He has established forever.” Psalm 78:67-69
The Lord provided a new location for the Ark of the Covenant. He never sent it back to Shiloh where the tribe of Joseph and Ephraim dwelt. The people of Shiloh lost the privilege of hosting it. The Lord moved it to Mount Zion which He loved. Mount Zion is where Christ was crucified and resurrected from the dead. Jesus Christ is also called the Lion of the Tribe of Judah. [1]
“He also chose David His servant and took him from the sheepfolds; from following the ewes that had young He brought him, to shepherd Jacob His people, and Israel His inheritance. So he shepherded them according to the integrity of his heart and guided them by the skillfulness of his hands.” Psalm 78:70-72
Eventually, God set a good king over Israel. A king after His own heart! He chose David out of all the thousands of Israel, and put the scepter in his hand, out of whose loins Christ was to come, and who was to be a type of him. [2]
God delights to raise the poor out of the dust and to set them among princes. David’s time spent in solitude and contemplation with God proved to be the best of all educations. David was not taken from leading the rams, but from following the ewes... those great with young. He had a tender spot for those of his flock that most needed his care. [3]
At first, God humbled David, but later He exalted him. Thus, by God’s grace, David became skillful and faithful at his task. He fed, taught, guided and protected God’s sheep for God’s glory. In this way, he was a type of Christ. In Isaiah 11:3-4, God foretold that Messiah, would be filled with the spirit of wisdom and understanding and should judge and reprove with equity. [4]
In John 17:6-8, Jesus said to His Father, “I have manifested Your Name to the men whom You have given Me out of the world. They were Yours, You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your Word. Now they have known that all things which You have given Me are from You. For I have given to them the words which You have given Me, and they have received them, and have known surely that I came forth from You, and they have believed that You sent Me.”
As I prayed over Psalm 78 and John 17:6-8 above, the Lord gave to me a vision of circles in a sea of water. The first circle formed where a stone entered the water. This first circle symbolizes Christ and His Word entering the hearts of my wife and me. Before we can teach and model His truth to others, we must first know the Father and receive His Word directly from Him. Within this first circle are Christ, my wife, and me.
The second circle represents our descendants. God calls us to teach them the truths He has taught us, passing on His love, wisdom, and ways to future generations.
Beyond the third circle are the people of the world who do not yet know the Lord. We desire to share His teachings with them in the same spirit that loving parents nurture and guide their children.
[1] Matthew Henry’s Commentary (edited)
[2] Ibid
[3] Ibid
[4] Ibid
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