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LESSON .XCVI.

THE BEGINNING OF PSALMODY.

B.C. 1047.-I CHRON. xvi. 4—9, 29—43.

And David appointed certain of the Levites to minister before the ark of the LORD, and to record,* and to thank and praise the LORD God of Israel:

Asaph the chief, and next to him Zechariah, Jeiel, and Shemiramoth, and Jehiel, and Mattithiah, and Eliab, and Benaiah, and Obed-edom and Jeiel with psalteries and with harps; but Asaph made a sound with cymbals ;

Benaiah also and Jahaziel the priests with trumpets continually before the ark of the covenant of God.

Then on that day David delivered first this psalm to thank the LORD into the hand of Asaph and his brethren.

Give thanks unto the LORD, call upon his name,

Make known his deeds among the people.

Sing unto him, sing psalms unto him,

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Give unto the LORD the glory due unto his name;
Bring an offering, and come before him:

Worship the LORD in the beauty of holiness.

Fear before him, all the earth:

The world also shall be stable, that it be not moved.

Let the heavens be glad, and let the earth rejoice :

And let men say among the nations, The LORD reigneth.

Let the sea roar, and the fulness thereof:

Let the fields rejoice, and all that is therein.

Then shall the trees of the wood sing out at the presence of the LORD,

Because he cometh to judge the earth.

O give thanks unto the LORD; for he is good;

For his mercy endureth for ever.

And say ye, Save us, O God of our salvation,

And gather us together,

And deliver us from the heathen,

That we may give thanks to thy holy name, and glory in thy praise.
Blessed be the LORD God of Israel for ever and ever.

And all the people said, Amen, and praised the LORD.

So he left there before the ark of the covenant of the LORD Asaph and his brethren, to minister before the ark continually, as every day's work required:

*To keep God's great works in mind.

And Obed-edom with their brethren, threescore and eight; Obed-edom also the son of Jeduthun and Hosah to be porters:

And Zadok the priest, and his brethren the priests, before the tabernacle of the LORD in the high place that was at Gibeon,

To offer burnt offerings unto the LORD upon the altar of the burnt offering continually morning and evening, and to do according to all that is written in the law of the LORD, which he commanded Israel;

And with them Heman and Jeduthun, and the rest that were chosen, who were expressed by name, to give thanks to the LORD, because his mercy endureth for ever;

And with them Heman and Jeduthun with trumpets and cymbals for those that should make a sound, and with musical instruments of God. And the sons of Jeduthun were porters.

And all the people departed every man to his house: and David returned to bless his house.

COMMENT.-When David had placed the Ark at Mount Zion, he arranged, evidently by his inspiration as a prophet as well as his authority as a king, a ministry such as had probably had its beginning in the colleges of the prophets formed by Samuel, and which has never had an end, nor ever will, for praise shall endure for evermore. The old Tabernacle, which had been at Nob, had since been transferred to Gibeon-at what time we do not know; and David left it there with a branch of the priesthood to continue the daily sacrifice. At the head was Zadok, the representative of the line of Phinehas, son of Eleazar, which was coming into note again after having in some manner lost the high priesthood to the younger line of Ithamar, to which Eli belonged.

But at the tent on Mount Zion, before the Ark, David placed bands of the Levites-chiefly the Kohathites, to whom Samuel had belonged, and whose gifts of poetry and music had been cultivated in his coliege at Ramah,—and appointed them to sing morning and evening to the praise of the Lord, such sacred hymns as already existed, and to the number of which the holy king was continually adding, as God the Holy Ghost, "who spake by the prophets," breathed into him yearnings for the coming Messiah-utterances that would be those of that Christ Himself—and voices of praise and prayer that would render the Psalms that he thus first commenced the "prayer-book of the Church" for ever-not suiting the Israelite king alone, but the whole body of Christians and each Christian separately.

This Psalm which he first delivered to them, as given in the Book

of Chronicles, consists of portions of several as they stand in the Book of Psalms, and he probably added to and divided it afterwards. Among the Levites here mentioned are Asaph, who was the writer of several Psalms; Heman, who wrote one; and Jeduthun, to whom several are inscribed, meaning probably that they were to be set to music by him, and sung by his division of Levites. Many of the Psalms have titles which are believed to be the names of their tunes, or of the instruments to which they were adapted, the chief being a small hand harp, the like of which it is said was preserved and used in the cities where the Babylonish captivity had taken place.

LESSON XCVII.

THE PROMISE TO DAVID.

B,C. 1047.-2 SAM. vii. 1-17.

And it came to pass, when the king sat in his house, and the LORD had given him rest round about from all his enemies;

That the king said unto Nathan the prophet, See now, I dwell in an house of cedar, but the ark of God dwelleth within curtains.

And Nathan said to the king, Go, do all that is in thine heart; for the LORD is with thee.

And it came to pass that night, that the word of the LORD came unto Nathan, saying,

Go and tell my servant David, Thus saith the LORD, Shalt thou build me an house for me to dwell in.?

Whereas I have not dwelt in any house since the time that I brought up the children of Israel out of Egypt, even to this day, but have walked in a tent and in a tabernacle.

In all the places wherein I have walked with all the children of Israel spake I a word with any of the tribes of Israel, whom I commanded to feed my people Israel, saying, Why build ye not me an house of cedar?

Now therefore so shalt thou say unto my servant David, Thus saith the LORD of hosts, I took thee from the sheepcote, from following the sheep, to be ruler over my people, over Israel :

And I was with thee whithersoever thou wentest, and have cut off all thine enemies out of thy sight, and have made thee a great name, like unto the name of the great men that are in the earth.

Moreover I will appoint a place for my people Israel, and will plant them, that they may dwell in a place of their own, and move no more; neither shall the children of wickedness afflict them any more, as beforetime,

And as since the time that I commanded judges to be over my people Israel, and have caused thee to rest from all thine enemies. Also the LORD telleth thee that he will make thee an house.

And when thy days be fulfilled, and thou shalt sleep with thy fathers, I will set up thy seed after thee, and I will establish his kingdom.

He shall build an house for my name, and I will stablish the throne of his kingdom for ever.

I will be his father, and he shall be my son. If he commit iniquity, I will chasten him with the rod of men,* and with the stripes of the children of men:

But my mercy shall not depart away from him, as I took it from Saul, whom I put away before thee.

And thine house and thy kingdom shall be established for ever before thee thy throne shall be established for ever.

According to all these words, and according to all this vision, so did Nathan speak unto David.

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COMMENT. At this time David, in his 37th year, had triumphed over all the trials of his youth. Saul was dead, the Philistines were conquered, the Ark was on Mount Zion, and Israel had become a united kingdom, with a beautiful and strong capital. David was at rest; and the workmen and materials sent to him by Hiram, king of Tyre, had enabled him to build for himself a palace worthy of a settled kingdom. Then he felt—what it would be well for all of us to feel that the honour of God should come before his own. He could not bear to find himself in the most costly dwelling Israel had yet seen, while the Ark of God was only within a curtained tent. He therefore designed to build a costly temple for the glory of God, and he told his scheme to Nathan the prophet, who had probably been his companion in Samuel's School of the Prophets. Nathan heartily approved when first he heard of it; but that night the Lord spake unto him, with a message for David, a message of disappointment as regarded himself. In the first place He reminds David that up to this time a tent had sufficed, and He had never commanded any of the previous great men of Israel to build Him a solid and lasting temple, and He now forbade David to do so. We find afterwards, from what David said to Solomon, that this was because he, like them, had been a warrior, a man of blood (1 Kings viii. 8), and God required that His Temple should be built by a man of peace; with hands unstained by violence; even as

*Punish him like other men.

it is the Prince of Peace who hath built up the Church of God. But David's pure and loving intention, wholly to the glory of God, met with God's approval. He took the will as the deed; and it is a great comfort to know that it will always be so, if the will be a real will. And at the same time He softened the disappointment by the assurance that what David himself might not do, his peaceful son should accomplish after his death; nay, the promise went much further. The kingdom of David should not come to an end like that of Saul, but the crown should always continue in his family. If they fell into sin, they should be punished like other men, but not cast away like the house of Saul, nor cut off wholly like the royal families of the later kingdom of Samaria. Nay, in this promise came the declaration of the eternal kingdom that could belong to God alone; therefore it assured David that the Messiah should spring from him. No one since Judah had received that promise: now it came to David, in that assurance of the everlasting kingdom of his seed-the very word used to Abraham, and likewise in the saying quoted in the Epistle to the Hebrews (i. 5), “I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a son." Or as the 89th Psalm, written in much later times, when the sin had come and the chastening too, thus repeats the promise and enhances the prophecy :

Then thou spakest in vision to thy holy one, and saidst,

I have laid help upon one that is mighty;

I have exalted one chosen out of the people.

I have found David my servant ;

With my holy oil have I anointed him :

With whom my hand shall be established:
Mine arm also shall strengthen him.

The enemy shall not exact upon him;

Nor the son of wickedness afflict him.

And I will beat down his foes before his face,

And plague them that hate him.

But my faithfulness and my mercy shall be with him :

And in my name shall his horn be exalted.

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I will set his hand also in the sea, and his right hand in the rivers.

He shall cry unto me, Thou art my father, my God, and the rock

of my salvation.

Also I will make him my first born,

Higher than the kings of the earth.

My mercy will I keep for him for evermore,
And my covenant shall stand fast with him.
His seed also will I make to endure for ever,

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