Post by Josh on Oct 3, 2011 20:15:56 GMT -8
“The most valuable thing the Psalms do for me is to express that same delight in God which made David dance… I am comparing [this] with the merely dutiful “church-going” and laborious “saying our prayers” to which most of us are, thank God not always, but often, reduced. Against that it stands out as something astonishingly robust, virile, and spontaneous; something we may regard with an innocent envy and may hope to be infected by as we read.” -C.S. Lewis
David and the psalmists and ancient Israelites showed amazing delight in two things: Temple and Law, two things which at first glance might seem very foreign and sterile to us.
Let’s describe the Temple and Temple worship for a minute:
Pageantry, visible symbols of God’s presence in the ark, the holy of holies, music, blood, roast meat, crowds, mystery, priests, etc..
In our culture, we tend to separate the physical from the spiritual. So we differentiate often between the church building and the worship of God in spirit. But the Jews didn’t make such hard and fast distinctions at first. To them, going up to the Temple mount was often almost synonymous with going to see and be with God.
We can learn from their longing to "go and see God", especially when they speak of their longing in terms like "hunger" and "thirst". Sometimes the passion of the Psalmists is a good catalyst for our own craving for the presence of God.
David and the psalmists and ancient Israelites showed amazing delight in two things: Temple and Law, two things which at first glance might seem very foreign and sterile to us.
Let’s describe the Temple and Temple worship for a minute:
Pageantry, visible symbols of God’s presence in the ark, the holy of holies, music, blood, roast meat, crowds, mystery, priests, etc..
In our culture, we tend to separate the physical from the spiritual. So we differentiate often between the church building and the worship of God in spirit. But the Jews didn’t make such hard and fast distinctions at first. To them, going up to the Temple mount was often almost synonymous with going to see and be with God.
We can learn from their longing to "go and see God", especially when they speak of their longing in terms like "hunger" and "thirst". Sometimes the passion of the Psalmists is a good catalyst for our own craving for the presence of God.