Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - A Bigger Story | The Writings | Psalm 79

Episode Date: July 3, 2024

Do you ever find it hard to trust that God will fix our broken world? Do you ever lose hope in a better future? How can we trust that God is just in a world full of injustice?In today's episode, Jensen shares how Psalm 79 reminds us of the bigger story our lives are in; a story where God will right every wrong. Read the Bible with us in 2024! This year, we’re tackling a group of Old Testament books traditionally known as “The Writings”— Psalms, Chronicles, Proverbs, Daniel, Ruth and more! Download your reading plan now. Your support makes TMBT possible. Ten Minute Bible Talks is a crowd-funded project. Join the TMBTeam to reach more people with the Bible. Give now. Like this content? Make sure to leave us a rating and share it so that others can find it, too. Use #asktmbt to connect with us, ask questions, and suggest topics. We'd love to hear from you! To learn more, visit our website and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter @TenMinuteBibleTalks. Don't forget to subscribe to the TMBT Newsletter here. Passages: Psalm 79

Welcome to 10-minute Bible Talks, where we connect the Bible to your life and the time it takes to get to work. I'm Jensen Holt McNair. We just had our church's VBS, and during the week I helped out with teaching some Bible lessons. And the big idea that we taught all week is that God is faithful to the promises he makes to his people, and that ultimately they all come true in Jesus. We saw how promises found in the Old Testament were just a preview of the bigger story that God was writing all throughout scripture, his big story to save the whole world through Jesus. Now, it was a big concept, but I was so excited that the second and third graders that I was with were learning about how the Bible fits together,

both the Old Testament and the New Testament. It's something that I didn't really understand until I moved to Columbia 10 years ago and started attending the church that I'm at now. But it's a truth that has radically transformed the way that I read, understand, and study scripture. And so as I read, Psalm 79 today, I couldn't help but notice the way that this one Psalm is sort of like a preview to the whole bigger story. Now, it's not super long, but if you stick with me, we're going to trace where different parts of Psalm 79 connect to other parts of the bigger story. And ultimately, we'll see how it's a little preview of the bigger story of redemption that God is writing for the whole world. We're going to start with context. So the superscript on this Psalm tells us that it was

written by Asaph. There's some debate surrounding when this psalm was written. If we look back in 2 Chronicles 29 verse 30, we learned that some of the Psalms used for worshiping God were written by David and by Asaph, the seer, which is another way to say that he's a prophet, someone who God allowed to see and understand parts of what was to come for the Israelites. Some believe that this is Asaf, who lived in the time of David, writing about an event that would take place in the future. Others hold that it was one of Asaph's descendants living in the time of exile writing about what they saw all around them.

Either way, we have a psalmist writing about the destruction of Jerusalem when the Babylonians conquered them and took the Israelites into exile. The psalmist is mourning and reacting to these circumstances with real deep emotion, whether he's currently experiencing the trouble

or seeing the devastation to come. And he begins by laying out the gruesome and devastating remains of Jerusalem. Oh God, the nations have invaded your inheritance. They have defiled your holy temple. They've reduced Jerusalem to rubble. They have left the dead bodies of your servants as food for the birds of the sky, the flesh of your own people for the animals of the wild.

They have poured out blood like water all around Jerusalem, and there is no one to bury the dead. We are objects of contempt to our neighbors, of scorn and derision to those around us. So things are grim. One commentator noted that the temple, the place where God dwelt with his people, the giver of life, is now filled with corpses, a place of death. There's no one left to bury the dead. All are dead or in exile. Rightfully, the psalmist cries out to God. How long, Lord, will you be angry forever? How long will your jealousy burn like fire? Pour out your wrath on the nations that do not acknowledge you on the kingdoms that do not call in your name, for they have devoured Jacob and devastated his So the psalmist is asking God for justice, justice for the cruelty and the crimes committed against God's people. But he also signals that he knows the punishment they're undergoing is a sign

of God's wrath, a punishment that the people didn't uphold their covenant. Verse 8, do not hold against us the sins of past generations. May your mercy come quickly to meet us, for we are in desperate need. Help us, God, our Savior, for the glory of your name. Deliver us and forgive our sins. for your name's sake? Why should the nation say, where is their God? Before our eyes make known among the nations that you avenge the outpoured blood of your servants. The psalmist recognizes the sins of the people, and he also recognizes that without God's mercy, they can't be rescued. They are in desperate need of his help. So they cry out to him. It's interesting here, the psalmist appeals to their need for help, their need for God's power, but he also appeals to God's honor.

He seeks deliverance for God's people so that the nations cannot claim that God has been unfaithful to his people. In the next verse 11, he calls out for God to be faithful to the remnant in exile, to preserve them. He knows that God has promised to make the Israelites into a great nation, to establish their kingdom forever, so he appeals to God's honor, his faithfulness. Rescue your people like you've promised you would. In verse 12, he says, pay back into the laps of our neighbors seven times. the contempt they have hurled at you, Lord. So seven is the number of perfection in the Bible. In other translations, it says, to pay it back sevenfold. So here, he's asking that God would bring about his perfect justice, to restore his people, to be faithful, to leave no evil unpunished. And he finishes saying,

then we your people, the sheep of your pasture, will praise you forever. From generation to generation, we will proclaim your praise. So from the outset, this Psalm, looks pretty straightforward. The psalmist sees destruction. He asks God for forgiveness for his wrongdoing and ask God to deliver the people to protect them, to rescue them, and to enact justice on the evil brought against them so that they can praise his name forever. And God is faithful. We know that the Israelites do go into exile. But we also know that God was faithful to bring them out of exile, to preserve the remnant. We read in 2 Chronicles 36 that King Cyrus sent God's people back to Jerusalem, back to the promised land, to restore the temple, to inhabit the land they were given

once again so that they could be with their God. And we know that King Cyrus of Persia became king by overthrowing the Babylonians. God gave justice for the wrongdoing and delivered his people from their darkness. He heard their cry and he answered. But remember, this moment of grief, of hope, of justice and restoration, it's a preview of the even bigger story. It shows us that God is been faithful to his promises in the past, and so we can know that he will continue to be faithful to all of his promises in the future. In Psalm 79, we have a people who have broken their covenant with God. They haven't been faithful. They couldn't be. God sent Jesus, the one who could fulfill the law, who could live a perfect human life because he was the only divine human to ever live.

And while we, like those in Israel, cannot save ourselves from the wrath of God by our own power, through the death of Jesus. He was the sacrifice we needed to pay for our sin. He took on the wrath, the punishment for us. And just as the Israelites in exile cry out to God, how long, oh Lord, how long will we wait for justice? In Revelation 6, we read that those who have been slain will cry out to God, O sovereign Lord, holy and true, how long before you will judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth. See, the language is so similar to that of Solomon. Psalm 79. The people see evil in the world. They long for God's justice. They long for him to write what is wrong to restore humanity and creation. And in Revelation 16, we read of God doing just that. He pours

out his wrath on all those who have brought evil on the world. He is just. He punished fairly, perfectly, and preserves those who have hidden themselves in Jesus. So that those who are found in Jesus can live in a world free of sin, free of brokenness. John describes the same. John describes the coming kingdom in Revelation 21. Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth. For the first heaven and the first earth had passed away and there was no longer any sea. I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, look! And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, look, God's dwelling places now among the people and he will dwell with them. They will be his people,

and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain for the old order of things has passed away. Those who put their hope, their faith, their whole lives in Jesus, those who cry out to him for mercy, for help, who see their need for rescue and their inability to get there on their own. Those who long for the world to be made right,

for her to see true justice, for evil to be cast out, those who look to Jesus for the restoration of all things will one day see the new heaven and the new earth. They will dwell with God forever in a restored creation, full of love, justice, and peace. And they will worship their Savior, their Creator, and God forever. That's the bigger story. When we see the just merciful and rescuing God of the Old Testament, we're reminded to place our hope in the promises that we've been given in Scripture. We follow a God who always keeps his promises and who through Jesus has been faithful to provide,

protect, and rescue his people. Those who put their faith in Jesus do not have to fear the wrath of God, the justice of God on all the evil and sin we are guilty of because Jesus has taken our deserved wrath and paid for it with his life. We don't have to wonder when the injustices, the evil, the war, the murder will end because we know. We know that God will be faithful to bring about final, true justice, to put an end to evil, to punish the wrongs of the evil. We don't have to fear what comes after death. We know that God has promised to provide a forever home for us in his coming kingdom. And it will be a kingdom, a city without evil, without tears, and without sickness. God will be faithful to his promises.

We can put our hope in him in the big story he's telling throughout all. all of Scripture. Our hope is secure. We will see the restoration of all things and worship our Creator forever.