Our home based Bible study group has started going through the 5th book of the Psalms. Most people don’t realize that there are 150 psalms, divided into five separate books that roughy correlate with the Pentateuch. These are the first five books of the Bible, written by Moses, and each of them has a theme that goes with it. The fifth book of the psalms includes Psalm 107-150 inclusive and the theme of these psalms is worshipping God.
Yes, there are several imprecatory psalms (calling for God to reign down judgment on the enemies of Israel) but for the most part, we are reading numerous psalms whose priority is the worship of our Father in heaven. As is the case with almost the entire Bible, there are “nuggets” everywhere you look and tonight we are looking at one of the most intriguing verses in all of Scripture.
The psalm we are looking at is a remarkable one written by David, the author of many of the psalms that we all study. David starts by speaking of the LORD – in all capitals it stands for God the Father, Jehovah, Adonai, otherwise known as Yahweh. In other words, we are speaking of the supreme God of the universe – the first among equals in the Trinity – the Godhead.
Occasionally, people will ask me for proof of the Trinity. For the most part, these inquiries come from people who believe in God the Father but do not believe in the deity of Jesus. This is not a new issue. In fact, at the Council of Nicaea back in 325 A.D., the purpose of the gathering was to affirm the deity of Jesus. There were votes taken to determine if Jesus was divine. How odd that a group of men thought they could decide whether or not Jesus was God.
The first vote tally fell on the side of disavowing the deity of Jesus. However, after further discussion and input from Emperor Constantine, a recent convert to Christianity and host of the Council, a second vote was taken and the result was different – Jesus was declared to be divine. Arius, a member of the opposition, with several of his supporters, was sent into exile. He also suffered anathema – worse than excommunication from the church, it in effect meant that he never existed!
So you can see that there is a huge divide when it comes to the deity of Jesus. In the psalm we are studying tonight, David actually tells us that God the Father refers to Jesus as Lord. And David even professes that Jesus is his Lord. How can this be? Jesus came after David in His earthly life, but as God, he preceded David. So Jesus came before and after David. That could only happen if David was, indeed, God!
So our verse for tonight is from Psalm 110:1. As you already know, the psalm was written by David and references God the Father and the Lord, His Son Jesus. David tells us, “The LORD says to my Lord: “Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.” So there you have it – David referencing the LORD speaking to His Lord, Jesus. And God invites Jesus to sit at His right hand and will eventually make Jesus head over all, including His enemies.
How exciting to hear David profess his “knowledge” of the relationship between Yahweh and Jesus. My encouragement this evening is that God, in an effort to reveal more about the Godhead to us, introduced us to Jesus, fully human and yet fully God, when Jesus made His appearance being born in a stable at the beginning of His time on earth. Of course, we eventually also had the Holy Spirit revealed to us at Pentecost after Jesus ascended back to the Father, seated at His right hand.
My prayer is that we will accept the truth of the Trinity and when our faith wavers, we will trust in God. After all, we are to spend eternity with Yahweh and His Son! Have a great day in the Lord, grace and peace…