Page 62 - The Poetic Books - Student Text

to give general comfort and soothing – follow the argument; let them reason it out with
you.
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We are pressed by the opening psalm. We admit to our sinfulness. We admit to our lack of interest often
in the word of God, his revelation of himself. We hear rumors of others who take more effort than we
do. They put us to shame. In comparison are we righteous?

One day I heard about a clandestine “Bible factory” set up in the back room of a
Christian’s home just outside Sofia [Bulgaria], and made my way there… Inside I found a
long table and seven people sitting around it hard at work. They didn’t even look up as I
was led into the room. It was an incredible sight.
They had somehow secured a Bible and cut it apart. Each “work station” at the table
was assigned to copy that one book over and over, by slow painstaking, hand-lettering.
At other “work stations” others were busy with other books. When one group was tired,
they were relieved by others in relay so the work wouldn’t stop. The hand copying
continued 12 hours a day. When a book of the Bible was finished, it was put together
with other books, and stitched into a complete Bible. This “Bible factory” produced 25
hand-written Bibles a year.”
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The intensity of the Psalms is daunting. The outcome for good or evil in our lives is great. Our first
instinct is to give up. How could we ever match the requirements? Could I ever come to the point of
delighting in God’s law? Is that the only way to achieve fruit in season and avoid withered leaves? I
would really, really like for the LORD to watch over my way and not follow the way that leads to
destruction, but the standards seem so high. I need that second Psalm or I will give up.

As Psalm 1 and 2 imply, worship of the Son has eternal consequences. We are called to begin our
worship of him in this life and thus be removed from his wrath and no longer experiencing it. “Be wise
now therefore, O ye kings” (v. 10, KJV) expresses the immediacy of the call. “Now” is the time to begin.
Our worship of Christ in this life prepares us for the next.

It is impossible that he who never meditates with delight on the glory of Christ
here in this world, who labors not to behold it by faith as it is revealed in the Scripture,
should ever have any real gracious desire to behold it in heaven… It is, therefore, to be
lamented that men can find time for, and have inclinations to think and meditate on,
other things, it may be earthly and vain; but have neither heart, nor inclination, nor
leisure, to meditate on this glorious object. What is the faith and love which such men
profess? How will they find themselves deceived in the issue!
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May we take our cue from the book of Psalms, even at this beginning of the book, and daily kiss the Son.
We are much relieved at not having to follow the impossible dictates of the law. May we, by taking
refuge in him, honor him with our lives.

100 Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Spiriitual Depression (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1994), 253.
101 Harlan Popov, Tortured for His Faith (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1971) 130.
102 John Owen, The Glory of Christ (Cornwall: Diggory Press, 2007), 40.
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