It took me around three decades after I was.....born again....and after I had at first spent at least a decade focusing on Christian apologetics....to discover the Psalms. Oh I read them....but I had no idea the majesty of what was contained in them. It took a pastor dying from ALS....no longer able to speak....only peck out messages on an eye-coordinated keyboard....to challenge my thinking on the importance of the Psalms....not with words directed to me....but devotions directed to God.
Two books helped immensely....one a somewhat spurious book on prophecy....and the other a scholarly and groundbreaking book on theory. The following post is from March of 2020....and after it I'll continue with this post....
Well....I turned seventy. I've never paid much attention to birthday numbers before....not fifty or sixty....but seventy years old is more a milestone...."As for the days of our life, they contain seventy years, or if due to strength, eighty years..." (Psalm 90:10)
That Psalm....the 90th.....begins book four of five books contained in the Psalms....I cannot recommend too highly a book on just this subject....The Flow Of The Psalms....Discovering Their Structure And Theology....by O. Palmer Robertson!
In this book he describes Book Four of Psalms as.... "a resurgence of hope in the kingdom of the Davidic Messiah" Psalm 90:12....two verses later is...."So teach us to number our days, that we may present to Thee a heart of wisdom." We are to realize that there is a limit to our days....so let us use them wisely.
How long our life will be is a fair question for anyone to ponder upon....but how long will it be until the Lord returns in power and glory....how long until every tear is dried....until wars end....how long until the lamb lay down with the lion.....(to choose that phrase)....how long until the blood of the martyred saints is avenged....how long until our bodies are raised imperishable....how long until the Jewish people see and rejoice in their Messiah....how long until every knee shall bow....and every tongue give praise to God? I don't know the exact answer to these questions....other than....soon....but I know this....as of today....these answers will be seventy years less than they were the day that I was born....and I thank God for these three score and ten years....and the many blessings He has given....and many mercies He has shown!
J. R. Church was a well-known....and typical....teacher and author on prophecy. In 1986 he wrote a book titled....Hidden Prophecy In The Psalms....based on Psalm 49:4...."I will open my dark saying upon the harp." He interpreted this as there being prophecies in the Psalms...."dark saying." He went further and theorized....that the number of the Psalm corresponded with twentieth century dates....For example....Psalm 1 would be 1901....Psalm 40 would be 1940 and down the line. This led him to believe that the Tribulation would begin in 1988. He was wrong in this....but in spite of being incorrect....he was on to something. He went to be with the Lord in 2011. There are definitely prophecies in the Psalms....on both the Lord's first advent and His second coming.
The second book is scholarly and reformed in theology. I mention it in the above post from 2020. I gave this book to the pastor that I also mentioned....and he seemed very appreciative after reading it. O. Palmer Robertson...(he has some wonderful sermons on the web by the way)....conjectured that the five distinct books within the Psalms were a chronology of sorts....as he labelled them....Book One....Psalms 1-41....Confrontation....Book Two....Psalms 41-72....Communication....Book Three....Psalms 73-89....Devastation....Book Four....Psalms 90-106....Maturation....and Book Five....Psalms 107-150....Consummation.
All I'm attempting to do here is encourage you to....first....read the Psalms regularly....and with patient meditation....taking joy in what you will read....but also keeping in mind the day that we live in....particularly alongside of books four and five. The Psalms do seem to build to a crescendo as they progress....and the intensity of the Lord's return....in Messianic verse....is increasingly present.
