Families, Church & Discipleship (iii) Ps.78:1-8
I will give thanks to you, Lord, with all my heart; I will tell of all your wonderful deeds. I will be glad and rejoice in you; I will sing the praises of your name, O Most High.”
(Ps.9:1-2)
I will tell of the kindnesses of the Lord, the deeds for which he is to be praised, according to all the Lord has done for us— yes, the many good things he has done for Israel, according to his compassion and many kindnesses. He said, “Surely they are my people, children who will be true to me”; and so he became their Saviour.
(Is.63:7-8)
“Great and marvellous are your deeds, Lord God Almighty. Just and true are your ways, King of the nations. Who will not fear you, Lord, and bring glory to your name? For you alone are holy. All nations will come and worship before you, for your righteous acts have been revealed.”.
(Rev.15:3-4, The Song of Moses)
Asaph was a musician, likely what we would call today a ‘worship leader’ in that he is responsible for leading the musical elements of the ancient Church’s worship (I Chron.15:19, see also 16:6-37). He was appointed by David to ‘to minister before the ark of the Lord, to extol, thank, and praise the Lord, the God of Israel’. He was trusted by the King to regularly minister before the Ark, and seemingly wrote this Psalm in the course of his duties there. In doing so, he fulfilled the role of prophet, which is key to being able to make sense of the opening verses of the ‘maskil’. Matthew gives us the key to interpreting the passage before us. In Matthew 13, in the midst of Jesus has teaching the Parables of the Sower, the Weeds, the Mustard Seed, the Yeast, the Hidden treasure, the Pearl and the Net, we are told that, ‘Jesus spoke all these things to the crowd in parables; he did not say anything to them without using a parable. So was fulfilled what was spoken through the prophet:
“I will open my mouth in parables,
I will utter things hidden since the creation of the world.”
Psalm 78 suddenly takes on an added significance. It is liturgy designed to find its place on the lips of Jesus Himself. This ‘strategy’ that we have been reflecting on over recent weeks is so close to the heart of Christ that He becomes part of ensuring the process of passing on the knowledge of God to the next generations... to those not yet born. Although parents bear a unique privilege in this, it is the command of God to the whole Church, and is so critical that Christ commits Himself to being involved – not just in His own experience of being a child and then a teacher during his earthly ministry, but also in the ensuing generations to come.
Realising this might be what helped Asaph to follow his own ‘advice’... although of course, it is more in the category of ‘command (Ps.78:5). The Sons of Asaph are a regular feature, and pop up repeatedly at critical moments in the history of the Church. They are ‘brought along’ by their father into serving the Church musically as part of their worship (I Chron.25:1f), gaining experience in how to respond to ‘the praiseworthy deeds of the LORD, His power and the wonders He has done’ (Ps.78:4). And they were present at the dedication of the Temple, when it was filled with the glory of the LORD (II Chron.5:11-13). their knowledge of God was no dry intellectualism, but a living encounter with His glory and holy majesty. The descendants of Asaph turn up again during the revivals lead by King Jehoshaphat (II Chron.20:14, where one of Asaph’s descendants is also a prophet); King Hezekaih (II Chron.29:13, see also 29:30, where Asaph is again referred to as a ‘seer, i.e. a prophet, I Sam.9:9); and King Josiah (II Chron.35:15).
And generations later they are again at the dedication of the foundation of the Temple when the people of God return from exile under Ezra and Nehemiah (Ezra 3:10-11). For all the long centuries of the Kings, in the midst of the slow degenerating of the life of the Church, even in the midst of the exile, Asaph’s family fulfilled the commands of Ps.78, teaching each generation of their family the praiseworthy deeds of the Lord, the statutes and Law of Israel so that they could in turn teach the next generation what it means to put their trust in God and to keep His commands.
Questions
How can you make sure that your children are equipped to understand any part of the Bible they read?
How can you nurture a child’s / young person’s sense of ‘encounter’ with the Lord? ...their practise of worship? ...their fear of the Lord? ... their experience of pursuing holiness and resisting temptation?
How do you / did you encourage them to put their trust in God (Ps.78:7)? As you reflect on these things, what went / is going well? ...where were things less positive?
Read Ps.78:1-8
How does it change your understanding of the Psalm when you realise it is prophetically speaking of, and being spoken by, Jesus (see Matt.13:34-35)?
In v.3, Asaph / Jesus tells us that the ‘hidden things, things from of old’ that He teaches, are things we have known? How do we hear and know these things? Who are ‘the ancestors’ who have told us? Or do you think these verses don’t apply to us, but only to the original writer, or readers?
In what ways can a generation of the Church be guilty of ‘hiding’ what they have heard or known (v.4)? How might that be done consciously? ...and how unconsciously? What would the effects of that be?
As you read through the rest of Psalm 78, you are reading the ‘syllabus’ of what Asaph would have us ‘tell the next generation’. How would you plan a considered, intentional approach to ensure that these histories and their meanings are taught in ways that develop with a child as they grow?
Is there anything here you’d be uncomfortable teaching children / y.p.? What do you think are the main ideas Ps.78 wants us to teach about God and His dealings with His people?
What about when v.7 doesn’t ‘work’?
Memory Passage:
You who are young, be happy while you are young, and let your heart give you joy in the days of your youth. Follow the ways of your heart and whatever your eyes see, but know that for all these things God will bring you into judgment. So then, banish anxiety from your heart and cast off the troubles of your body, for youth and vigour are meaningless. Remember your Creator in the days of your youth, before the days of trouble come and the years approach when you will say, “I find no pleasure in them”...
Eccl.11:9-12:1
Going Deeper:
I’m always intrigued by the idea that it is somehow harder to be a Christian in today’s generation than in previous ones. There is nothing new under the sun. We may think the struggles and the pressures on us as parents, or temptations that we face that are unheard of in the history of the Church. They may put on a new face... technology isn’t something previous generations had to wrestle with. But there was something. As far back as Plato we find people complaining about how hopeless the ‘youth of today’ are. Do not say, “Why were the old days better than these?” For it is not wise to ask such questions (Eccl.7:10). In fact, there has always been deep spiritual stress around this question of bringing our children up by prayerful reliance on the Holy Spirit to hope in God. In fact, in times past it might have been more problematic that it is even for us today. Martin Luther found himself preaching this over 450 years ago
We are plagued by the miserable fact that no one perceives or heeds this truth. All live on as though God gave us children for our pleasure or amusement, as though He gave us servants to use, like a cow or an ass, for work only, or as though we were to live with our subordinates only to gratify our whims, ignoring them, as though what they learn or how they live were no concern of ours. No one wants to see that education or training is the command of the Supreme Majesty, who will strictly call us to account and punish us for its neglect, or that the need to be seriously concerned about young people is so great
(What Luther Says, vol. 1, p. 140)
