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Hey, Bible nerds. This is Dr. Manny Arango and I'm your host for the Bible department podcast. Powered by Arma. This podcast follows a Bible reading plan we created to help you read the entire Bible in a year. You can head to the show notes or thebibledepartment.com to download our reading plan and join the journey. Let's be honest, a lot of us are still treating digital ministry like it's a backup plan from 2020. But discipleship isn't just happening on Sundays anymore. People need gospel centered connection every day of the week. And if you're stuck juggling five different platforms, one for giving, another for sermons, something else for events, it's no wonder engagement feels off. That's not ministry. That's a mess. Subsplash changes that one platform. Everything you need. Media, giving, events, messaging, your app, your website built specifically for churches. No hacks, no workarounds, just clarity and simplicity. Because every day you wait, families scroll past your sermons, new guests click away from clunky sites, and real people miss real moments with Jesus. Don't waste another summer stuck in digital survival mode. Use it to get ahead, simplify, upgrade, get back to what matters. Head to subsplash.combible-dept and schedule a free no pressure demo. And let this be the summer your church gets focused and fully equipped family. Welcome to day 254 here on the Bible department. Today we are walking through Psalms 6, 7 and 8. Got a good mixture of Psalms, got two Psalms of lament, and then we've got kind of like a praise psalm, a really, really popular 1 in Psalm 8. So we got a lot to dive into. If you haven't done the reading for today, I don't know what's wrong with you. You got to get the reading done. Hey, stop the audio. Stop the video. Go read Psalm 6, Psalm 7 and Psalm 8. It won't take you a lot of time, but it will give you tons of context for what I'm about to talk about. So let's dive into day254. And just like every day, I'm gonna give you context clues, I'm gonna give you some nerdy nuggets, and we're always gonna leave the episode with a timeless truth. So. So let's dive into today's episode. Okay, I wanna start with some context clues. I'll just give you a handful of context clues. I'll give you three. I'll kind of give you. I'll try to give you at least one for each of the psalms that we're dealing with today. So kind of in the same vein as we were talking about yesterday, Psalm 6 and Psalm 7, the first two Psalms for today's reading are personal laments. So we ended Yesterday with Psalm 5, which is a psalm of lament. This is another psalm of lament, okay? So we are going to get two psalms of lament today, and one is going to have no context. One is actually going to have some context. Let me tell you the context of Psalm 7, okay? So if you go to Psalm 7 and remember yesterday we kind of learned how to read these titles, okay? It says this in the title for Psalm 7. First, it says a shigayon. First of all, what is a shigeon? We don't know what a shigeion is, okay? A shigeion is a tune or a melody. It'd kind of be like if I said, hey, sing this song, but sing it to the tune of Back that Thing up by juvenile, right? Like, if somebody, if archeologist 500 years from now dug up something that said back that thing up by juvenile, they wouldn't know what it sounds like even if they had the lyrics. Okay? So we are in the same scenario as, let's say an archeologist would be 500 years from now. They don't know what it sounds like, but all they got is the lyrics. And I wonder if I'm the only one when I say back that thing up. You can hear. You can hear. You can hear the beat in your head. I know you can. I know you can. Anyway, all right, so a shigeon. We don't know what a shigeon is. It's like singing. It's kind of like when. I don't know if this happens with anybody. You know, it's time to wish somebody a happy birthday. And you gotta. You gotta ask the question. You know, you gotta ask the question. Are we gonna sing like the classic one or the Stevie Wonder version? Which one we gonna sing? Okay, so the title right here at the top of the psalm is saying that, like, are we gonna sing Happy Birthday to you? You know what I mean? Are we gonna sing that or are we gonna sing Happy Birthday to you? Like, what are we doing? And this is letting us know we gonna do a shigeon. That's what we gonna do. We're gonna do a shigeon. And obviously we don't know what a shigion sounds like, but the psalmist knows exactly what that sounds like. And clearly it is culturally relevant enough and popular enough that this would have answered all the questions for the director of music at the time. Okay, so Psalm 7. You can see the same thing in Psalm 6. Actually, Psalm 6 is a sheminist. Okay, so Psalm 6 is for the director of music with stringed instruments. Okay, play this with a stringed instrument in according to the Sheminoth. Okay, so that's a different tune. That's a different melody. Okay, so Psalm 6 is going to be for the Sheminith, and then Psalm 7 is for the shigeon. And we can leave it up to your imagination what the melody is, what the tune is. What's that song? Obviously, it's lost to history, but, you know, it's fun to make some conjectures. Anyway, all right. Of David, which he's saying to the Lord concerning Cush, a Benjamin. Now, a lot of scholars are going to take those words concerning Cush, a Benjamite, and kind of make some guesses that the situational context of this psalm has to do with him being chased by Absalom. And the reason is because this person, Cush, is unknown. But the fact that the psalm seems to be about enemies pursuing David has led some scholars to think that this is connected to Absalom's rebellion. This was because during Absalom's rebellion, there was an uprising by the Benjaminite tribe. Okay, so we get tons of context. Okay, so the first thing that I want to let everybody know is, you know, a shigeon. And then this Cush Benjaminite thing has led a lot of people to think that maybe this is David's response or a lament psalm in response to his son rebelling against him and trying to usurp control of the kingdom. Okay. All right, last little context clue that I want to give you is for Psalm 8. Okay. In Psalm 8, I love to kind of teach through, like, Hebrew poetry and stylistic techniques. And we've talked about parallelism in previous episodes, but today we're going to talk about a refrain or an inclusio. Okay? A refrain is going to act like in, let's say, a chorus. Whereas a verse is different than a chorus. A chorus gets repeated over and over and over again. So a refrain is when a particular line is repeated throughout the psalm. But this refrain is also an inclusio, which means it bookends the psalm, everything before it and everything after it is included in the psalm, which is what an inclusio does. So it's at the top and it's at the bottom. So for Psalm 8, the inclusio here is Lord, our Lord. This is Psalm 81. Lord our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth. And then how does it end in verse nine. Lord our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth. So that is our refrain. That is also our inclusio. Everything before verse nine and everything after verse one are included in this psalm. That's why it is an inclusio. All right, so that's the context. That's kind of some literary context. And we're going to get another melody or tune that we don't know in Psalm 8. OK, so remember, in Psalm 6, we were supposed to sing this according to what a shemineth. We don't know what a shemineth is. Psalm 7, we're supposed to sing this. It's a shigion. We don't know what a shigeon is. I like saying that word. I really don't know why I like saying shigeon. It's a fun word. And then Psalm 8 for the director of music, according to GTH. So we're supposed to sing this one according to GTH. We don't know what GTH is, but obviously the director of music knew exactly what that was, and that would have made total sense. Alrighty. One of the funnest things that I did actually in college was the biblical studies team teamed up with all the music majors and we put the psalms to music. It was fun. Anyway, does anybody out there who's super musical have at that? You do that. You recreate the gittith. All right, let's keep moving. Okay, next, I want to give you some nerdy nuggets. My goal is to try to give you at least maybe a nerdy nugget for each one of these. I may not. I may not be able to do that. But anyway, actually, I stole my own thunder because my nerdy nugget for chapter six was a shimenith, and then my nerdy nugget for chapter seven was Ashigion. So we talked about Ashimonith and Ashigion, but actually it leaves me more time to talk about the nerdiest of the nuggets, which is gonna lead into our timeless truth for the day. And also. Well, let me give you a pretty nerdy nugget. We're gonna really dive into Psalm 8, and this is a descriptive praise psalm. Okay, so let's actually just read chapter eight. Let's read Psalm eight. Lord, oh, Lord, Lord our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth you have set your glory in the heavens through the praise of children and infants. And you have established a stronghold against your enemies. I have always loved that verse, that a stronghold would be like a fort, right? Like Fort Sumter or like, you know, there's different military bases all throughout America that are strongholds against foreign powers or foreign enemies. And the psalmist is saying, actually, the praise of children and infants is the stronghold that God has established against his enemies to silence the foe and the avenger. When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars which you have set in place, what is mankind that you are mindful of them, Human beings, that you care about them. So right here, David is essentially saying, man, when I look at all the stuff, when I look at your handiwork, when I look at your creation, there's so much glory in your creation. We're nowhere near as physically appealing as the sun or the moon or the stars. But somehow we humans are the ones that have God's image on us. We bear God's image. Therefore, Jesus could not have incarnated into a moon, into the moon or a star or anything in the heavens. Jesus couldn't have become a tree. Okay, so for all the people who are kind of pantheists, who kind of worship the creation, this psalm is saying, no, the creation actually reflects the brilliance of a creator. And that creator, when it came time to incarnate, could not become anything in the creation except that which was made in his image, which was humans, you and I. And so we may not seem as glorious as some of this majestic stuff in the creation, but actually we are the most majestic because we're made in the image of God, and we're uniquely made in the image of God. And God can only become what he's made in the image of or what's made in the image of him. Sorry, I said it the wrong way the first time. So. So Jesus could only become a human. And that is very, very special. We need to remember that. Okay? You have made them. You have made humans. This is what most translations are gonna say. A little lower than the angels. That's also how a lot of people have memorized this verse, But I'm gonna challenge that. That's actually my whole nerdy nugget is around challenging that idea and crown them with glory and honor. You made them rulers over the works of your hands and put everything under their feet, under humanity's feet, Everything. Okay, so how could we be lower than angels? But everything's under our feet. That doesn't actually make sense. That doesn't line up. Okay, all flocks and Herds and the animals of the wild, the birds in the sky. This actually correlates perfectly with Genesis, chapter 1, verse 26, that when God made Adam and Eve, he gave them dominion. That part of what it means to be a human is that we would subdue and rule and exercise dominion over the creation. Lord our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth. What a good psalm. What a great psalm family. The wait is over. My brand new book, Crushing Chaos is out now and available everywhere. Books are sold. Literally. Today I walked into a Barnes and Noble and I signed a bunch of copies at a physical location. So you can grab this book at a physical Barnes and Noble or you can go to a Books a Million or Amazon or anywhere books are sold and grab a copy. If you enjoy reading the Bible from an ancient perspective, if you understand that the beauty of scripture is actually knowing it in copyright context, then you'll love this book. And if there's any chaos in your personal life, I think that reading the Bible from an ancient perspective can actually help to crush the chaos in your life. I think this book is going to be a New York Times bestseller. I really do. I think we wrote a good one. I think you should get a copy today. All right, back to the episode. Hey, are you looking for a really cool gift or just solid tools to support your f faith and daily Life? Check out Mr. Pen. They've got no bleed Bible pens and highlighters that actually work on thin Bible pages. Journaling Bibles, Bible tabs and faith based journals. Even school supplies for parents, teachers and students. Mr. Penn was started by Christian teachers in Louisiana on a mission to serve the schools in their local community. And now They've got over 100,000 five star reviews on Amazon. I'm a huge fan of their Bible highlighters and pens. Super smooth and gentle enough to write notes in the margin of your Bible. Whether you're digging into scripture or stocking up for back to school. Mr. Pen has you covered. Shop the best Bible journaling supplies on the market and fantastic gifts for the ladies in your life@ Mr. Pen.com that's mrpn.com and guess what? Our audience here at the Bible department gets a special discount. Use code DEPARTMENT10 at checkout to get 10% off your entire order. All right, let's deal with the interpretive issue in this psalm, okay? It says this in verse 5, you have made humans a little lower than the angels. Now here's the conflict. In every Hebrew text, that word for angels is God. Okay? In the original Hebrew text verse 5 reads, you have made humans or you have made them a little lower than God. So if you're reading in an English translation and you just click the little subtext that's right there at the end of the word angel, it would probably say, or then God. Okay? Instead of then the angels, then God. Now it is the Septuagint. That is the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible that has a little lower than the angels, okay? So most translations, for a myriad of reasons, have decided to translate this based on our Septuagint data instead of our Hebrew text data. Okay? So with this verse, the Hebrew text that we have, and the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Hebrew text don't match, okay? There's a discrepancy in the source material. And most modern translations have opted to go with lower than the angels as opposed to lower than God. The only problem with that is the incarnation of Jesus because Jesus is not lower than angels, okay? And this psalm is actually a massive brick in the foundation of understanding how the incarnation works. Jesus can become a human because humans are made a little lower than God, not lower than angels. And there's a clue in the text that said, you've put everything under their feet. So Jesus is essentially ruling in the place of Adam and Eve because God has given Adam and Eve all authority over everything in creation. And then a spiritual being who's in the form of a dragon or a snake, clearly in the garden, he's some kind of created being, is actually lower than them. But that being that we know as Satan usurps them their authority and now has authority above them. But that's not how it's designed to be. So Jesus is incarnated as a human to regain that authority over a fallen angelic being or an angelic being or a spiritual being. So I would not contend that this verse says a little lower than angels. I would actually say what the Hebrew text says I feel more comfortable with, which is God. You have made humans a little lower than God. That human beings are actually in the pecking order or the hierarchy of the cosmos, are not below angels, but are above angels. And I actually would say that that probably lines up more with a holistic with the entire Bible, right? Also, we believers are in Christ, and Christ is at the right hand of the Father, and he's a human forever. I actually had to fix this idea with someone recently because they were like, yeah, Jesus had a body for 33 years. And I was like, no, he has a body right now. Jesus, the incarnation is an eternal reality. For the rest of time, eternally into the future, Jesus will have a body he didn't incarnate and then unincarnate. No, he's incarnate. He's in the flesh. And then he got a glorified body, a resurrected body, and ascended. And we are seated with Christ in heavenly places. That's what Paul teaches. So if I'm seated with Christ in heavenly places, I'm not lower than the angels. I'm higher than the angels. So this verse right here, I've heard this verse quoted a lot. People just will memorize the English translation of this verse. And I would actually contend that the Hebrew text has it right here and not the Septuagint. Why the Septuagint made a change to the word when translating from Hebrew to Greek, I don't know. But I would opt to go with the original as opposed to the translation for this one, which leads easily into our timeless truth, which is that you and I, every human being watching this, is made in the image of God. We're in the middle of planting a church right now called the Garden. And one of our cultural values is honoring people is how we honor God. And the reason that honoring people is the way that we honor God is because people are made in the image of God. When I interact with another human being, I'm not just interacting with an enneagram number or an employee or a brother or a sister or sibling. I'm interacting with someone who bears the image of God. And because they bear God's image, the way that I treat them is actually a reflection of what I think about God. And that's a timeless truth. Like, biblically, when God begins to tell Noah, if someone murders someone, then I have to take their life because murder is destroying an image bearer like this. This goes against, like, murder is an offense to God because you are ripping. You are ending someone's life. And so God says, for their lifeblood, I'll give an account like murdering. I know. I know all the, you know, animal lovers and, you know, but deer are not made in the image of God. Dogs aren't made in the image of God. And killing a dog is not the same as killing a human. Now, I know there's, you know, there's all these people who would hate that I said that. But the reality is that there's something special about humans. There's something that's divinely special about human beings. And one of the best things that I think the church can help people to do is to restore the dignity of their humanity. So the reason that I hate poverty is because poverty begins to diminish the dignity of the human. The reason I hate racism is because racism diminishes the humanity of humans, the dignity that humans have suffering. I actually think that part of the mission that God has Christians on is on this mission to reconcile or to restore the dignity of what it means to be human. And so I'm all about the restoration of all things, that we should be restoring people to their rightful place as co heirs with Christ, seated with Christ in heavenly places. And if there's royalty in your DNA, then that should affect how you act and think. And I remember one time a pastor of mine who was just holding me accountable was like, at some point you are going to realize that you're going to stop indulging in sin when you realize I'm better than this. Okay, we don't get you to stop indulging in sin by making you guilty about it. We get you to stop indulging in sin when you realize this is beneath me. Actually, I should be disgusted by this. Why am I acting this way? I'm a human. And what it means to be human doesn't mean that I indulge in sinful behaviors, but it means that I keep my dignity. I'm elevated above. This is beneath me. And whenever we dip back into our primal, carnal, animalistic ways, we have to remember we're made a little lower than God. And that's a timeless truth. And when we honor people, we honor God. And knowing that we're image bearers has tons of implications for the incarnation of Jesus. But also how we honor each other and how we love each other. Because the greatest commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your mind, all your soul, all your strength, and to love your neighbor as you love yourself. Why does God connect loving him with loving your neighbor? Because your neighbor is made in his image. And you can't say that you love a God who you don't see, but you don't love your neighbor who you do see. Your sibling, your co worker, your boss, whoever that person is in your life as an opportunity for you to prove that you actually do honor God, that you actually do love God. They're made in God's image so that they can be the recipient of your love for God. And when you think about it that way, it actually gives you a whole bunch of grace to deal with complicated people because they're made in the image of God. And that's not just true for the psalmist in Psalm 8. That's true for you and I today. And with that I'm going to tell you I'm proud of you, especially if you're on a streak. And I want you to meet me back here for day 255 as we walk through Psalm 9, 10 and 11. I love you so much. I'm so proud of you. I'm so proud that you're on this journey with me. I honor you for reading the Bible this year and I'm so happy for you. Glad that we get to do this together. See you tomorrow. Peace. Thanks so much for joining us on the Bible Department podcast. You can find us online and learn more about the show@thebibledepartment.com and on Instagram hebibledepartment. If you enjoyed this episode and want to dive deeper into the Bible, you can get free access to our library of courses@thebibledepartment.com we'll see you back here tomorrow.