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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 260 here at the Bible department today. We've got a handful of psalms. We've got Psalm 24, 25 and 26. And I'm just gonna call this another bundle of psalms by king David. Psalm 24, probably a Psalm that most of us are familiar with. So we'll tackle all three of these psalms today. We'll get context, we'll get nerdy nuggets, and we'll always leave the episode off with a timeless truth so that you can apply God's wor word to your life. It is better to apply one word from the Lord than to understand every word from God. So we always want to get a timeless truth so you can apply the word of the Lord to your life. All right, if you haven't done the reading for today, stop the video, Pause the audio. Get. Get the reading done. Shouldn't take you long. It should take you probably maybe 10 minutes. I mean, I did the reading pretty, pretty quickly, so let's dive into the episode. Take Psalm 24. Starts out, the earth is the Lord's and all that is in it. I memorized this verse as a kid as the earth is the Lord's and the fullness Thereof, the world and all who live in it. That's actually my number one verse for tithing. Okay, now you may think to yourself, this verse doesn't say anything about tithing. Well, the Bible says that the earth is the Lord's. That means my house, my car, my job, everything belongs to the Lord. It's all His. And so I am only attaining wealth in his world with his resources, with the breath that he's given me. So the earth is the Lord's. Okay. The generosity starts when I realize he owns everything. The Lord owns everything. I actually don't own anything. I'm an owner of nothing. I'm a steward of everything. And that mindset really starts with Psalm 24. The earth is the Lord's in all that is in it, the world and all who live in it. It's funny. I was at a restaurant this past Sunday and invited the waitress at the restaurant to church. Why? Because I believe that the earth is the Lord's and everyone who lives in it. God wants to have relationship with every single person that's a part of his creation. She. She ended up coming to church, and I'm super excited. Why? Why am I allowed about the invitation? Because the earth is the Lord's. The world and all who live in it, everybody, whether they're a heathen or whether they're Christian or whether they hate God or whether they love God, they actually belong to God. They are the Lord's. So. And we as believers want to help them to realize you belong to God. Okay. I know you've leased yourself to sin, but God owns you. Okay? And he bought you with a price. And that price is the precious blood of His Son. Okay. The earth is the Lord. Such a good verse. The earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof, the world and all who live in it. For he founded it upon the seas and established it on the rivers. Okay, if you've been rocking with us since Genesis, Right. God takes that which is chaotic, the Spirit of the Lord's hovering over the waters, over the surface of the deep. And what does God do? Move the creation from chaos to order. So we can see here in the Psalms this exact same worldview that God founded on the seas, he established it on the rivers. What do seas and rivers represent? Chaos. All right. Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord? Here's where we're going to get into some context. Okay. Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord? Who shall stand in his holy place? Those who have clean hands and a pure heart. That's actually what these three psalms are all about. That question, who shall ascend the hill of the Lord? Now, the context here is that Jerusalem is on an incline, okay? So it doesn't matter what direction you're coming from, the north, south, east, or the west. In order to get to Jerusalem, you have to ascend. You have to ascend through. Through the hills in order to get to Jerusalem. Okay, so there's a whole section of psalms that we'll look at later called the Psalms of Ascent. And they were supposed to be read while you were on your trek to Passover, ascending up to Jerusalem. Okay? So Jerusalem is at high altitude, high elevation. You've got to ascend to get there. Okay, so who shall ascend the hill of the Lord? Who shall stand in his holy place? So this is asking. The hill of the Lord is Jerusalem. The holy place is his temple. Temple tabernacle. Those who have clean hands and a pure heart, who don't lift up their souls to what is false, who don't swear deceitfully, they will receive blessing from the Lord and vindication with the God of their salvation, such as the company of those who seek him. Seek him, O God of Jacob. Now this next part, the context that a lot of people believe, a lot of scholars believe is surrounding Psalm 24 is 1st Chronicles 13:8. Okay, so 1 Chronicles 13:8, David realizes that the Ark of the Covenant is actually in an area called Kiriath Jearim. You can read all about this in 1st Chronicles 13. And in 1 Chronicles 13:8, they actually put the Ark of God on a cart, which is going to be a bad idea. But that's a whole nother timeless truth. Nerdy nugget context flew for another day. They put it on a cart. And it says this in verse eight, David and all Israel were dancing before the Lord with all their might, with song and lyres and harps and tambourines and cymbals and trumpets. So they got instruments and they've got music, and they're dancing before the Ark of the Lord. Why? Because they're bringing it up to Jerusalem. So a lot of people would say this is actually a Psalm of Ascension, not the same as the. The Psalms that we'll study later, which are literally, you know, to be sung as you climbed through the hills, not those Songs of ascent that we'll study later, but that this is about the King of glory ascending. So this is gonna become a psalm that's then gonna get transposed onto the person of Jesus, that the ascension of the King is to be parallel with the enthronement of that king. So this is a worship psalm. So here we get getting to verse seven. Lift up your heads, O gates, and be lifted up, O ancient doors, that the King of Glo may come in. Come into where? Jerusalem. Who is this king of glory? The Lord God, strong and mighty. The Lord God, mighty in battle. What does the Lord do before he rests in his temple? He defeats all of Israel's enemies. That is salvation in context. Salvation in the context of the Psalms is not from sin. It's from Israel's enemies. And what does Jesus do? He defeats the enemy, Satan, so that you and I don't have to pay the penalty of sin. And so he defeats his enemies. And then what? Gets ascended to the right hand of the Father to sit on his throne. Okay, so defeat of the enemy is preceded is the thing that precedes the enthronement of God. Okay, so this is Psalms. Who is the king of glory? The Lord God, strong and mighty. Lord God, mighty in battle. Lift up your heads, O gates, and be lifted up, O ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in, that the ark of the covenant is going to come into Jerusalem. Who is this king of glory? The Lord of hosts. Who is this king of glory? Selah. So a lot of scholars actually believed that this moment in 1st Chronicles, chapter 13, verse 8, when they are singing and dancing with song and lyre and harp and tambourines and cymbals and trumpets, that what they're singing would have been Psalm 24. Okay, so that's the context of Psalm 24, Psalm 24. I know. I'm kind of skipping Psalm 25. I'll give you one nerdy nugget for Psalm 25. What you're not gonna ever realize when you study this in English is that Psalm 25 is actually an acrostic. Okay? An acrostic. An acrostic is. Let's take. Say you would take A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P. Okay? All the letters of the Alphabet. And you'd have A would stand for something and B would stand for something. So if I say, you know, oh, man, an acrostic, we would think of, like, an acronym, okay? Where every letter actually stands for something. So an acrostic, you would take the 22 letters of the Hebrew Alphabet, and that would give you 22 stanzas. That's exactly what you get for this psalm, okay? The Psalm is a full acrostic. An acrostic is a form of writing in which the first letter in each line or stanis spells out some specific kind of pat. The most usual pattern would be the Hebrew Alphabet. So here's what acrostics are designed to do. Here's a nerdy nugget for you. Acrostics were usually used to show some full range of emotion or theme. It's very similar today where we say from A to Z. Or let's take John the Revelator in the book of Revelation says that Jesus is referred to as the Alpha and the Omega. He's the beginning and the end. The point being is that God was there at the beginning and at the end and is therefore there at every step in between. Okay, so full range, full range from A to Z. That's what acrostic poems in Hebrew are there to communicate. So chapter 25 is showing a full range of this one. Theme of Yahweh defeating enemies, giving guidance that when God defeats enemies and he allows you to approach, there's a guilt over sin and a trust in him that proceeds when we. When we realize that Yahweh's defeated our enemies and that he's allowed us to approach him. So verse 20. So chapter 24, chapter 26 kind of mirror each other and that if chapter 24 is all about how the ark of the covenant ascends up the hill and approaches Jerusalem and then comes to rest In Jerusalem, Psalm 26 is actually a psalm of how the worshiper is to ascend, enter, and approach. Okay, I want you to remember that pattern. Ascend, enter, and approach. So the ark of the covenant has ascended, entered, ascended the hills, entered Jerusalem, and approached the resting place where the glory is going to dwell. The worshiper is now supposed to follow that same pattern. Ascend, enter, and then approach. And so Psalm 26 is going to give a layout of how the worshiper is supposed to do that. 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 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 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 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. Penn has you covered. Shop the best Bible journaling supplies on the market and fantastic gifts for the ladies in your life@mrpenn.com that's M r p e n.com and guess what? Our audience here at the Bible Department gets a special discount account. Use code department10 at checkout to get 10% off your entire order. Okay, I'll read it the way that I've got it in my notes. Psalm 26, then, is a psalm of approach. In Psalm 24, we saw Yahweh approach Zion to be enthroned upon it as king. But now in Psalm 26, we see one of Yahweh's subjects approaching the king's throne or palace to petition him for salvation and sanctuary. This, then, is another example of how these psalms tell us so much of how Israel was meant to interact with Yahweh, their king. Another nerdy nugget. Okay, I'll drop one more nerdy nugget. The reason that David is a man after God's own heart is because David, and you can hear it in all these psalms, David doesn't really consider himself to be the King of Israel. He considers Yahweh to be the King of Israel. He doesn't consider himself to be the shepherd of Israel. He considers Yahweh to be the shepherd of Israel. Like for David, he very much so sees himself as a lowercase k king, a lowercase s shepherd. At no point does David try to take any kind of glory or credit from Yahweh. David is incredibly careful to consistently place Yahweh in the king position, even though David is king. And so David becomes the archetype for what a king is supposed to be. Because the earthly king is supposed to enthrone the heavenly king as king. That is his job. And David is the one that establishes this pattern, that the earthly king is really just there to not even be a king, but to establish Yahweh as king. And that is incredibly counterintuitive. Most humans would think, oh, God anointed me to be king, Let me go ahead and be king. But no, David is saying, well, God anointed me to be king so that I could enthrone him as king. That's my job, to enthrone him as the king. And so Yahweh is going to vindicate David. Not because David is always insanely moral, but David never, and I mean never, practices idolatry and never robs glory from Yahweh. Yahweh is always king. He's always given the credit. He's always deferred to. And you can see that in these psalms. Okay, last little nerdy nugget that I'll give you about Psalm 26 is that Psalm 26, 27, and 28 are to be seen as a single unit. Okay? We try hard not to break up natural units of thought or flow as we create the Bible reading plan, but we couldn't avoid it here. Okay, so Psalm 26, which is our last psalm for today, is actually supposed to be a unit with the 2, 2 of the Psalms for tomorrow. So Psalm 26, 27, 28 are seen as a single unit. Three Psalms are connected with the house of Yahweh. The big theme there is the house of Yahweh. These three psalms together tell a story, a story of a petitioner and the house of Yahweh. Psalm 26. That petitioner approaches the house and is searched by Yahweh to see if he is sincere. That's the psalm that we have here that is closing out our time together. Psalm 27. He finds safety and sanctuary in Yahweh's house, And in Psalm 28, he brings his petition to Yahweh and is given an answer. Okay, so Psalm 26, Psalm 27, Psalm 28 is the relationship of a petitioner and how they are supposed to ascend, enter, and approach the throne or the palace, or the glory of yahweh. So Psalm 26 then is a psalm of approach which leads us perfectly into our timeless truth. My timeless truth today is that Yahweh and Jesus are both seen through the Scriptures as holy, worshiped, exalted, enthroned fully other than us, yet fully approachable. I love this word. For Psalm 26, a Psalm of approach. It's the petitioner approaching Yahweh. How do we approach the Lord? With thanksgiving, with praise, with honor. Okay, a psalm of approach. This holy, worshiped, exalted God is fully approachable, fully intimate and fully present. Okay? This God who's holy is not distant. This God who is holy is fully close and allows us to be to approach Him. That's not just a New Testament idea, that's an Old Testament idea. And that is a timeless truth. There are a couple of verses that I highlighted. It says this, this is Psalm 25. This is verse 14. The friendship of the Lord is for those who fear him, and he makes his covenant known to them. Friendship, Friendship with the Lord are for who? Those who act casual. No, friendship with the Lord is reserved for those who fear him. So actually, the more I honor him, the more I worship him, the more God extends friendship to me. And that's counterintuitive. We think that the way that we get friendship with people is by treating them casually or by not, you know, being respectful or honoring. But actually honor creates a pathway towards friendship. And then there's one more verse that I saw. It says, it says this in Psalm 26, verse 8. Oh, Lord, I love the house in which you dwell and the place where your glory abides. I love the place where you dwell. There's something that I want, you know, to be contagious that I think David represents is zeal for God's house, a love for God's house. Okay, so approaching the throne of God, approaching the house of God, having reverence for the throne of God, the ark of the covenant, the place where God dwells, having reverence and passion and honor for that, but not having so much reverence for it that I don't form an intimate relationship with it. It's funny, A sister in Christ that's in my life. Her name is Amanda. And you know, Amanda's actually on a streak. So Amanda, hopefully you watch this and you hear the shout out, okay, I hope you're still on a 260 day streak. It's funny because when I told her, you know, you want to mark up your Bible, like you gotta get a pen, you gotta get some colored pencils, like you gotta mark it up. She's like, oh, no, the Bible's holy. I can't do that. And I was like, holy doesn't mean that you don't engage. Actually, if it's holy, Then you should be writing in it. If it's holy, then you want to get it on the tablet of your heart. And the only way to do that is to consume it, is to underline it. It's to. So God says, I'm not holy. I don't want to be holy in a way that you don't engage with me. If I'm holy, come to my house. If I'm holy, come to where I'm dwelling. If I'm holy, approach my throne. Okay, yes, I'm holy, which means that you value me, but you can't value me so much that you don't engage with me. And so I said to Amanda, so are you telling me that by not opening your Bible and not memorizing scripture, you think that by not engaging with the Bible, you're honoring it? You're not honoring it because you don't have a relationship with the word of God. But guess what? Amanda's on a 260 day streak, which means she decided to actually honor it, not just with lip service, but with life service. Like, I'm going to actually, you know, engage with it. And I think it was maybe, I think it was maybe like Charles Spurgeon who said these words, a Bible that's falling apart typically belongs to someone whose life is not. Okay. So I don't exalt the word of God by making sure that my Bible's pristine and that, you know, it's clean. It's like on a shelf somewhere. No, the way that I show that the Bible's holy is by ripping it apart. Man, I want to tear the Bible apart. I want to write in it, I want to color in it, I want to underline it. I want to take notes. Why? Because I want to engage with it because it's holy. That's actually the way that I prove that it's holy is by getting it ingrained into the fabric of my life. And that happens by wrestling with the text. That happens by marking it up. A Bible that's falling apart typically belongs to a person whose life is not. And my prayer is that as you've been walking with us for the last 260 days, or maybe you just started, maybe you've been on this podcast Journey with us for 10 days, maybe five days or two days, I hope that eventually your Bible starts falling apart, because guess what? It'll be proof of that your life's not. And the more people engage the Bible, the less and less their life is a mess. And I'll say it this way. The Bible will either keep you from sin or sin will keep you from your Bible. Guilt and shame will either keep you from engaging with God's word or the word of God in you. I've hidden your word in my heart so that I may not sin against you. The word of God in you will actually be the thing that keeps you from sin. Not your willpower, not you grinning and bearing it, not you white knuckle disciplining your way to salvation, but you saying no. Lord, the path to being more like you is by actually being near you. And the more I'm close to you, the more I'll be like you. All right, that's our timeless truth for the day. Tomorrow I'll see you right here, same time, same place. For day 261. We've got Psalms 27, 28, 29. Tomorrow it's gonna be a good one. I love you. I'm so proud of you. If you're on a 260 day streak, I'm proud of you. If you're on a two day streak, I'm proud of you. I can't wait to see you tomorrow. I love you guys. Peace. Thanks so much for joining us on the Bible Department Podcast. You can find us online and learn more about the show at thebibledepartment.com and on Instagram hebible department. 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.