You can turn with me this morning to Psalm 24. We're going to be continuing our series of Summer Psalms. So turn with me to Psalm 24. It's right after probably the most famous Psalm, one of the most famous chapters in the whole Bible, Psalm 23. A lot of people actually think it's part of a series of Psalms, including Psalm 22, Psalm 23, and Psalm 24. We're going to look particularly at the final one today, though.
This was actually a favorite of my grandfather's, and when I was a child, my parents had myself and all of my other cousins— and if you knew my family, that's a lot of cousins— they had all of us memorize this psalm for my grandpa and grandma. So we memorized it, and then we got together for a reunion and we recited this psalm for them. So this is a psalm that's always been sort of a favorite. It's had sort of a special spot in my heart just because of that past and that history I've had with it.
But as usually happens when I start doing sermon prep, you start digging into a certain passage in more detail than you've ever done before, and you start to see just the real richness of the text. You start to see all the stuff that's there that you've never seen before and things that are jumping off the page at you. I saw that with Psalm 24. This is a really rich chapter of the Bible.
One of the things that's really interesting is when you look at the Psalm, and when you actually look at the Septuagint— now, the Septuagint is sort of the Bible in Jesus' day. It was sort of like the ESV of that day. You can kind of think of it like that. It was the version of the Bible that was written in the common tongue. And if you read Psalm 24 in the Septuagint, there's actually a line that's added to the beginning of it. So right where it says, 'A Psalm of David,' right after that, there's a line in the Greek that indicates this Psalm is meant to be read on the first day of the week. So on Sunday.
Now, the reason for that is because I think it represents a tradition within the Jewish nation to reflect and push back against the practice of their neighbors. So here's sort of the background that's going on. You have Israel, right? The United Kingdom. They live in Judea and they're surrounded by all these foreign people that worship foreign gods. And these foreign people didn't just worship one god, they worshiped multiple gods. And so they had a practice where they would worship these gods in all sorts of different ways. And one of the ways they would do that is every day of the week, they would pray to a different deity. So you see how they're trying to make sure they've got all their i's dotted and t's crossed with all the different gods. Well, Israel saw that and said, 'We're not just going to reject the practice, we're going to thwart it by going one up.' We're going to pray every day to the one true God. And so they designated a different psalm for each day of the week. And this psalm, Psalm 24, is the psalm that we see in the Septuagint that was designated for Sunday. So it was read by the Jewish people every Sunday as a prayer recognizing the Lord reigns. And that's the reason it has that prominent place.
We see in this psalm, what we're going to see this morning, here's sort of the theme we'll see over top of it. That knowing the King of glory, a phrase we'll see here, shapes the missional lifestyle of God's people. Knowing the King of glory, knowing God who reigns, shapes the way we live as His people. So you can see why they placed that at the beginning of the week and recited it every day. In the midst of a place where all sorts of different peoples are praying to different gods and living according to their gods, they want to be reminded: we have the true King. He's the King of glory. And how we know Him and think of Him shapes how we live our lives.
6 · Reads the entire text of Psalm 24 aloud
So that's what's going on here. So now, without further ado, let's turn to the text. We have Psalm 24, a psalm of David. The earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof, the world and those who dwell therein. For He has founded it upon the seas and established it upon the rivers. Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord? Who shall stand in his holy place? He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not lift up his soul to what is false and does not swear deceitfully. He will receive blessing from the Lord and righteousness from the God of his salvation. Such is the generation of those who seek him, who seek the face of the God of Jacob. Lift up your heads, O gates, and be lifted up, O ancient doors! That the King of glory may come in. Who is the King of glory? Yahweh the Lord, strong and mighty. Yahweh the Lord, mighty in battle. Lift up your heads, O gates, and lift them up, O ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in. Who is the King of glory? Yahweh the Lord of hosts. He is the King of glory.
7 · The pastor prays, asking God to write the truth of Psalm 24 on the congregation's hearts, to help them consider God's reign, holiness, victory, and salvation, and to send the Holy Spirit to open the Word
The word of the Lord. May He write its truth upon our hearts. Would you bow your heads with me? Well, Lord, we too, like Israel, want to be shaped by the truth of this psalm. We want to consider the King of glory this morning. We want to consider His reign. We want to consider the extent of Your dominion. We want to consider the holiness of Your rule. We want to consider the way You go out in victory for Your people, and we want to consider the way You provide salvation. We want to do all of those things so that we can live rightly before You, so that we can worship You with truth. Lord, we love that You are the King of glory. It brings joy to testify with our lips that You, Lord, are the Lord of hosts. I pray now that you would send your Spirit, fill us, be with us, incline our hearts to your testimonies, to the testimonies of this Psalm this morning, and open your Word to us through the power of your Spirit. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.
8 · Uses the story of Henry VIII and the War of the Roses to illustrate the weakness of human kingship claims—Henry's father won the throne by military conquest despite a weak hereditary claim—setting up a contrast with Yahweh's claim to kingship by right of creation
Well, as I said, we see this Psalm playing that prominent place in the history and the lives of ancient Israel. And there are several things we see as we unpack this idea of the King of Glory. And that's sort of the theme behind the song, that to know Him is to live a certain way. Well, David, as he writes this, unpacks ways in which we should think about rightly the King of Glory. And the first is the King reigns, and He reigns as Creator. The first thing we see in the psalm in the first two verses is that the King reigns as Creator. Now, if you were to get asked, and I'm gonna ask you right now, who's the most famous king in the history of England? If you were to think in your head, who comes to mind? I'm guessing if you think who are the most famous monarchs in English history, Henry VIII is probably on the list, right? Henry VIII is probably the one that comes to mind. One of them, he at least probably makes the final cut. He's probably in the top 5. Henry VIII is famous for all of his wives, right? There's even a little song that sings about him. He's famous for breaking from the Roman Catholic Church so that he could divorce his first wife. The Pope wouldn't grant him an annulment, so he broke from the church and started the Church of England. God used his strange idea of faithfulness to spur the Reformation in England. And he's famous for all the drama that followed his death because he had all these wives and he had daughters and a son by all these wives, and so when he died, there was chaos in who would have the throne. That's Henry VIII. Well, here's a question for you: why did Henry VIII get to be the King of England? Why did Henry VIII reign over the British Isles? Well, the answer is because of the War of the Roses. The War of the Roses. Henry's father, Henry VII, won the throne on the field of battle. He went to battle with all of his constituents and his allies, and he defeated the reigning monarch. Richard III was the king, and Henry VII gathered an army, beat him on the field of battle, killed Richard III on the field of battle, and was able to take the crown. So that's how he became king. And the reason he could do that is because he had this really weak-sauce relationship to a previous monarch. His great-great-grandfather was the fourth son of the third wife of a previous English king. So he was really high on the succession list, right? But there was a duel between two houses in England at that time, the House of Lancaster and the House of York. And the House of Lancaster was represented by a red rose, that was sort of their symbol. The House of York was represented by a white rose, and so you had the War of the Roses. And the House of Lancaster had come to the point where the only person they could actually put forward for the throne, everyone else had died off, was Henry VII. And so they got behind him, they fought for him, they defeated Richard III on the field of battle, and the rest is history. Henry VII became king, and his heir, Henry VIII, became king. And from that you have Mary, you have Edward, you have Queen Elizabeth, all flowing from that. Well, it's actually a pretty weak reason to be king, right? He just had a better army?
9 · Expounds Psalm 24:1-2, arguing that Yahweh is King by right of creation—He owns the earth because He made it—and that His covenant name (Yahweh, 'I AM') anchors the psalm's opening and declares His self-existence
The same question lies behind the opening verses of Psalm 24. Why? Why is the Lord, why is Yahweh, the God of this little tribal people in the hill country of Judea, why is He worthy of the title King of Glory? Well, you see it in the first two verses. The earth is the Lord's, and the fullness thereof, the world and those who dwell therein. For He has founded it upon the seas and established it upon the rivers. Yahweh is King because Yahweh, unlike any other god, is actually Creator. His name actually says it all. The earth owes its very existence to the One Who Is. That's what His name means. When Moses asked God at the burning bush, remember that interchange? 'Who do I tell these people is sending me? Who do I tell Pharaoh is sending me?' We have the famous answer. God says, 'You tell him, "I AM WHO I AM." You tell him, "I AM has sent you."' You can't see it in the English, but in this passage, the first word of the Psalm is actually God's covenant name. Yahweh. It's there at the very beginning to highlight the significance of His name, that His name sets the tone for the entire Psalm.
10 · Asserts that Yahweh's kingship is unbounded and eternal because He is Creator: He has no beginning, no rival, no borders to His kingdom
Yahweh the Lord has no father who He owes His throne to. He has no beginning. His reign reaches further back than even the foundations of time itself. There's one biblical scholar who argues if you had to pick one single, like, organizing metaphor for the entire the Psalter, so all 150 Psalms, you had to say, 'What's sort of the one theological theme that kind of runs through the heart of the book of Psalms?' He argues it would be this: that the Lord reigns. That's the theme, the theological coherence of the book of Psalms. The sum total of its witness is that Yahweh, the Lord, in Psalm after Psalm is actively reigning, is actively sovereign. He's no absentee landowner. He reigns by right of creation. He made it all. He founded it all. And he founded everything that lives and breathes and creeps and crawls and swims and flies upon its surface. It is his. And because he made it all and rules it all, His kingdom doesn't have boundaries. His kingdom doesn't have borders. The whole world is His kingdom. It's all His sanctuary. That's what the fullness thereof means. Every corner of this globe, even a place like Antarctica that nobody in their right mind has ever claimed or ever will claim, is His. That's who He is. That's the nature of his reign.
11 · Applies the Pledge of Allegiance analogy: just as the pledge is not to cloth but to the Republic, Israel's recitation of Psalm 24 is not about tribal loyalty but about the King behind the kingdom—Yahweh
Now, here's why that's significant. We're all familiar with the Pledge of Allegiance, right? As kids, we grew up reciting, 'I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands.' Do you get the significance of that line? It's not that the flag is the point of all the significance of the pledge. We're pledging allegiance to the flag because the flag is a symbol. The flag stands in front of something that's more significant. The flag is grounded in something that's more significant. It represents the Republic. So when you pledge to the flag, the idea is, I'm not pledging to this chunk of cloth, I'm pledging to the idea behind it, the Republic behind it, this idea of democracy and the Constitution. That's part of the idea of Psalm 24. First day of every week, pledging allegiance. To the King of glory. That's what's going on in this psalm. It represents David describing the King that's behind Israel's kingdom. The King that's behind these 12 tribes, that supports them. It's not enough, David is saying, for the Israelites to be nationalistic. It's not enough to have this deep abiding sense of being Jewish. That's not enough. It's not enough to have total loyalty to David as the king, the human king on the throne. It's not enough to be passionate about the 12 tribes and especially passionate about your tribe. They needed a sense of the God behind, over, and under their kingdom.
12 · Applies the principle to Christians: passion for church, mission, or Christian identity is insufficient; we need a vision of the King behind the Kingdom—God Himself
It's the same way for us as Christians. It's not enough to be passionate about church. It's not enough to be passionate about being known and described as a believer. It's not enough to be passionate about the mission of the church. Those things fall short. They're important, but what we really need is a vision of the grandeur and the awesomeness of the King behind the Kingdom. In the same way that the flag really isn't the point of the Pledge, the Republic is. So the church or mission or Christianity isn't the main point. It's about the Lord, the King of glory. He's the main point. He's the prominent character. He's the one that should have our hearts. The Pledge of Allegiance is supposed to stir up patriotic living, right? That's why they kind of instituted it in schools across the country. Recite it. Remember when we lived at the Gimidees, they would do the Pledge of Allegiance. In their living room, in their little homeschool room each morning. They would pledge allegiance. It's meant to stir up a sense of patriotism and commitment to the country, a patriotic lifestyle. The psalm is meant to do the same thing, to stir up a spiritual patriotism, a particular lifestyle and ethic and mentality that reflects the King who has our allegiance. Knowing that the King of Glory is our God shapes the missional lifestyle of His people. That's the first thing we see. The King reigns as Creator.
13 · Introduces the second movement of the psalm (verses 3-6): the King reigns in holiness, and the central question is, Who gets access to the King of Glory?
The second thing we see is that the King reigns in holiness. The King reigns in holiness. Look at verse 3 to verse 6. Who shall ascend the hill of Yahweh the Lord? And who shall stand in His holy place? He who has clean hands and a pure heart and does not lift up his soul to what is false and does not swear deceitfully, he will receive blessing from Yahweh the Lord and righteousness from the God of his salvation. Such is the generation of those who seek him, who seek the face of the God of Jacob. This second section of the psalm hinges on a very important and very personal question. Who gets access to the King of Glory?
14 · Expounds the language of 'ascend' and 'stand' in Psalm 24:3-4, drawing on Exodus 19:3 (Moses ascending the mountain) and Solomon's court to show that the psalm asks who may enter God's presence, worship Him, and plead their case—access requires holiness
If He's King by way of being the Creator, if He has a better claim to kingship than any human king ever could, it's a pretty big deal to get to come before Him. So who can do it? Well, His reign might be unfettered. It might have no bounds, right? But the access to Him isn't. There's an identity issue. Only people with a certain lifestyle, David says, can properly be considered subjects in good standing of this King. Our identity question is actually based on the greater identity questions regarding God in the psalm. To think about, okay, who do I have to be to enter into the presence of this King? You first have to ask, what's the character of the King I want to enter into the presence of? Who is He? What does He look like? What's His nature? That's the point of this second section. He's holy. And those who hope to come before Him must also be holy. There's words that give this vivid image of what's going on here. The word 'ascend' implies a person going up to where the Lord is. We see it in Exodus 19:3 where Moses ascends the mountain to go up to God's presence and receive the Ten Commandments. And there's this idea of standing, of standing in the king's place, of standing in the holy place, and that's just loaded with meaning. It envisions people standing and rising to worship, right? Standing to worship and pay homage to the king. It also envisions people who are able to stand and plead a cause in the face of the king? Kings sit on their throne and they hear people come with pleas and seeking counsel. Remember the famous stories of Solomon and his wisdom, right? The two women with the one child. One child's dead, the other child's living, and they're pleading their case. Who has the right to come stand before the king and plead their case?
15 · Argues that Psalm 24:3-6 is not just about temple access but about who may enter the kingdom at all—who will live rightly under God's reign
At first glance, it seems like Psalm 24 is asking Who gets to come into the king's city? Who gets to come into his palace or his temple? But it's more profound than that. It's a deeper question of identity. It's asking, who will live rightly under God's reign? It's asking, who will enter the kingdom at all? That's the big question when we think of the boundaries of the kingdom, right? If the boundaries of the kingdom are as big as we just said they were in the first point, everything is a part of this kingdom, then it's a pretty big deal if you get to enter it, if you get to be a part of it. That question is sitting here at the heart of it. The answer to verses 3 to 6 reveals that God's kingship Demands a certain way of living. The king has the right to make laws, right? The king's law is the law of the land. So the king's laws define what the ethics of the kingdom are. And the ethics of Yahweh's kingdom begin with a life— hear that again— with a life that professes the great theme of the Psalter. Remember what we said the theme was? The Lord reigns. What David's showing us here is it's not enough just to say the Lord reigns. In verses 3-6, you have to live out that the Lord reigns. The Lord reigns. Your life has to give profession. Your life has to confess to the reality that you believe the Lord reigns.
16 · Expounds Psalm 24:4 ('who does not lift up his soul to what is false'), explaining that 'false' means idolatry, 'soul' means 'throat' (desire/appetite), and the idiom evokes nursing an appetite for a false king
And the nature of this God sets the ethics of what is right in this Kingdom. And to be a good subject into this Kingdom is to live in a way that reflects His nature. We're reminded in v. 4 that like any true king, Yahweh the Lord hates when His people turn to false rulers. No good king allows his people to commit treason. You see this phrase, 'who does not lift up his soul to what is false.' That's a really packed phrase. The word 'false,' it actually has this idea behind it of something being empty or vain. There's no substance to it. Figuratively, it's used in Scripture to talk about idolatry. So when I memorized this in the King James Version as a kid, it was, 'Who does not lift up his soul to an idol?' That's how it's rendered in the King James Version. And then in that phrase, the word for 'soul,' it literally means 'throat.' That's sort of a weird image, right? Doesn't lift up his throat to what's false? Well, it's talking about Your desire for something, your desire to consume something. It's usually used in reference to God. Actually, in the very next Psalm, you look at Psalm 25, you get your Bibles open, the very first verse, what does it say? To you, Yahweh, O Lord, I lift up my soul. O my God, in you I trust. To lift up your soul to something is implicitly to say, I lift up my soul, I trust this. The image of the throat is saying, I don't just lift up my soul to it, I have an appetite for it. I'm hungry for it. I desire it. The idiom means you're nursing an appetite for something. But in this instance, you're nursing an appetite for something that isn't God. You're hungering for a false king. When we trust in false things, Jeremiah calls them 'no gods.' Same word. He says, 'These no gods.' When we feed our desires for things outside of God, we flaunt His reign. And David's point is that we have no right to enter His kingdom or to enter His presence.
17 · Asserts that entering God's presence requires both outward righteousness (clean hands) and inward devotion (pure heart), reflecting James's teaching that faith produces works
The right to enter the King's presence is a matter of outward activity, having clean hands, doing the right things, and inward trust, having a clean heart. Your hands have to be pure, your heart has to be clean. So the way you come into this King's presence is with a sanctified life that flows out of a heart wholly devoted to God. You hear James in that? James reflecting that? Remember, James is just steeped in Jewishness. We talked about it this spring. The wedding of— yes, your justification, your faith, your right posture of heart before God is foundational. But if your heart posture is right, what happens? Works follow. Not because those works justify you, but because those works naturally come from the one whose heart is set, the one whose heart desires, the one who lifts up his soul to the Lord. He lives a certain way. That's the idea that we're seeing in this psalm. It's a singleness of commitment, a single-mindedness to God against all competition.
18 · Corrects a misunderstanding: God does not want legalistic rule-keeping or pre-church moral tidying
But the vastness of verses 1 and 2 shape how we understand this ascent, this ascending to the Lord. The thing is, God's not concerned that like one day of the week when the Jewish people said this prayer, they made sure their life was all tidy before they said it. He's not primarily concerned that before you come to church on Sunday, you kind of go through the list in your head of the sins and get them all prayed up in the car before you get out and come in. That's not the mentality at all. God rules everything. And so He desires His subjects to live every day and everywhere in a way that reflects the reality that they are always in His presence. The ethics of those who enter the presence of the holy King— get this— it's not rule keepers. It's not what He's looking for. It's not people that have this exhaustive list of dos and don'ts that dictates their life. That's not what the point is. The point is He's looking for people who are consumed by the desire— how does He say it?— to seek his face, to seek the face of the God of Jacob, where every action and choice is an expression of trust in the reign of the King. Why do I do what the King wants? Not because I'm always carrying around this list and checking it off and just walking and consumed with it. Because I see the King, and the King represents the list, and I want to see the face of the King. So I'm gonna live in a way that represents the King. There's a relational element. We do this because we trust His rule, and because we trust the King of glory, we desire His instruction.
19 · Applies the principle: how we live testifies to who we believe reigns
How we live bears witness. It gives testimony. To who we think reigns. What you do with your life, whether your hands are pure and your heart is clean, that gives testimony to who you think really reigns. The lingering questions are quite simple and eternally significant: Who do we believe is truly supreme? Who do we believe rules the earth? And do we live consistent with that reign? So think of it this way. How does a young person act when there's nobody else around, there's no other adults around? You get a sense in that context for who they think reigns. How does an unmarried couple act together behind closed doors? You see a sense of who they think reigns. Does their lifestyle reflect the ethic of the king? Those are a couple of them, and there's a litany of them. How you live, what you do, reflects who you think sits on the throne. And the King, the King of glory, reigns in holiness.
20 · Introduces the third movement of the psalm (verses 7-10): the King reigns in victory
Last section of the psalm, we see the next piece. What does it look like to know this King and to reflect it, to live in a way that's in line with Him? Well, it's to recognize that the King reigns in victory. The King reigns in victory. There's this really triumphant note at the end of the psalm, right? It ends on this just powerful refrain. Well, the thing that it reminded me of was Roman triumphs. Familiar with that phrase? In ancient Rome, great military successes were celebrated. The whole city would literally shut down for a day to celebrate a conquering general returning to the city. And this was talking like in the Republic days, in the days of the High Republic, all the way into the days of the Empire. The victorious general would come in and there would be this massive civil ceremony that took all sorts of religious overtones as well. The hero, the conquering general, the one who had vanquished an enemy, so had turned Hannibal back, right? Or the one who had conquered Gaul or whatever the victory might have been. That general who's returning is known, was given the title, vir triumphalis. Man of triumph. He's given that title for a day. And they give him purple robes and he's treated like he's king for a day. And he gets to come into the city And there was a strict rule in Rome that the armies of Rome couldn't enter the city. That's a sacred place. The armies of Rome can't come in because they don't want military coups. But when you're having your triumphal procession, the Roman triumph, you get to come in with all your soldiers, with all your armies. They had to leave their arms outside the city, but you got to go up and down the streets with all your armies and all your spoils of war. And you're showered with praise and you're treated as if you're almost this deified being. Sometimes they'd build monuments to the conquering hero. Trajan's Column is one of those monuments. It's this massive column in Rome, and around it there's chiseled out pictures of his armies depicting his victory. Victory over the people who now live in Romania.
21 · Reads Psalm 24:7-10 and connects it to 2 Samuel 5-6: David's conquest of Jerusalem and his decision to bring the Ark of the Covenant into the city
What we see in Psalm 24 It's sort of a Jewish triumph, except the victorious general isn't 'vir triumphalis,' it's 'dominus triumphalis.' It's the Lord triumphant. Listen to the final verses. 'Lift up your heads, O gates! Be lifted up, you ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in.' Who is the King of glory? Yahweh the Lord, strong and mighty. Yahweh the Lord, mighty in battle. 'Lift up your heads, O gates!' And lift them up, O ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in. Who is the King of glory? Yahweh the LORD of hosts, He is the King of glory. It's a pretty powerful phrase, right? It's actually thought that this Psalm might relate to 2 Samuel 5-6. Now the context, you probably can't remember just off the top of your head what that relates to, In 2 Samuel 5 and 6, you have David finally securing the throne. He's finally vanquished his enemies, he's secured the throne, and he goes up to this Jebusite city and decides, 'That's the city I want to be my capital.' It's a little city that we know of as Jerusalem. And he goes up to this Jebusite city with Joab, his general, and his army, and the Jebusites are sitting behind their walls, feeling all tucked in and secure, And they mock the Israelites. And they just sort of look at them as hillbillies, which they kind of are. They're this kind of ragtag army of agrarian people pulled together in times of war from the hill country of Judea. And so they mock them and they feel no fear. Well, David devises this plan and they sneak up this waterway from the Gihon Spring up into the city of Jerusalem. It's like this covert Navy SEAL type deal. They send in their best of their best, David's mighty men. So it's Eleazar and guys like that. Remember Eleazar? He's the guy that kills so many Philistines his hand gets frozen to the sword. My defensive coordinator in college loved that idea. He fought until his hand was frozen to the sword. You ever fought like that? He talked about one day he came in, he used an axe cutting wood. He's like, I was trying so hard to chop the wood till my hand was frozen to the axe. It didn't happen. That's Eleazar. Those are the kind of guys David and Joab send up the tunnel. And they conquer the city. Jerusalem is theirs. And so David sets it up. This is going to be his capital. It's in this fortified, good position on the top of the hill. It's going to be known as Mount Zion. It's going to be the place where God dwells. And so what does David do? He says, 'This is going to be my city. I'm the Lord's anointed. I'm the king. We need to bring the Lord's presence into my city.' So he calls out for the Ark of the Covenant.
22 · Expounds the Ark of the Covenant as the locus of God's holiness and glory, and interprets Psalm 24:7-10 as a liturgical dialogue: the worshipers call on the gates to open, the gates ask 'Who is this King?', and the answer is 'Yahweh, strong and mighty, the Lord of hosts
The Ark of the Covenant is this place where God's majesty and His holiness and His glory dwell. It's crafted by the Levites, crafted by these skilled artisans, and there's two golden cherubim that sit on the top of the Ark of the Covenant. And God's Shekinah glory, His glory comes and descends upon the wings. And it's this holy, this holy symbol. It's so holy they have to have like a special contraption with rods and poles for how they carry it because no one can touch it. It's so holy. And David has conquered and he says, 'Bring the Ark into Jerusalem.' It's thought that this psalm is written in preparation for that occasion. It's a big deal. It's a significant moment. You know what happens though? You see this breathtakingness of the psalm as it's laying out. There's this kind of interplay. David almost envisions the gates of Jerusalem talking, right? It's this ancient, proud city. And here comes this ark. And here comes this people. And so, first they call out, right? They call out and say, 'Lift up your heads, O gates! Be lifted up, O ancient doors!' that the King of Glory may come in. In verse 8, he's kind of envisioning the gates answering back, 'Who is this King of Glory?' And then they give the answer, 'The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle.' Jerusalem, this proud ancient city, won't let anyone enter its doors. But the vision of the statement is breathtaking in its scope. These ancient doors meet the ancient days. The Lord of Hosts, Yahweh, the mightiest warrior, the Lord Almighty, the all-powerful King. That's the one who demands entrance.
23 · Asserts that the title 'Lord of Hosts' affirms Yahweh's universal rule over every force—heavenly, cosmic, and earthly—making human military titles trivial by comparison
It's this stunning, exalted title that affirms that Yahweh's rule is universal and that his rule encompasses every force and every army, heavenly, cosmic, and earthly. Everything is under his command. And when He goes to the field of battle, He commands with His mighty right arm, and victory is His. It's a title that makes Supreme Allied Commander sound really puny. Oh, you got 4 stars? Wow. I made the stars, the real ones, not the ones that are sitting up here. That's what's behind this. Listen to how the prophets understood this title. Amos 4:13. You're going to hear reflections of the Psalm here. For behold, he who forms the mountains and creates the wind and declares to man what is his thought, who makes the morning darkness and treads on the heights of the earth— Yahweh the Lord, the God of hosts, is his name. Open your doors. Open your gates, ancient Jerusalem. The King of Glory has arrived.
24 · Pivots from the triumphant close of the psalm to the sobering realization that the triumphal entry is not ours—only the sinless may enter, and we fall short
It's a pretty stirring moment, right? But if we're honest with ourselves, deep down inside we know the triumphal entry isn't meant to be ours. Who gets to enter with the King of Glory? As David says, 'Who may ascend the hill of the Lord? Answer: He who has clean hands and a pure heart, she who is innocent of wrong and has never lied or lusted after what is false.' Only the sinless will enter the King's sanctuary. It's like right at this moment of just, 'Yeah!' You realize you're not cheering for the winning team. We know, every person sitting here, we know we fall short. We know that we don't have the right to ascend, or the right to stand, the right to come into the presence of this King of Glory. And David knew it too.
25 · Recounts the story of Uzzah's death (2 Samuel 6:7) when he touched the Ark to steady it
Remember the rest of the story in 2 Samuel 6? What happens as the Ark is on its procession into Jerusalem? It's going in, it's on this cart, it's all set up in all of its particular ways to make sure that it's being respected and the oxen are going along and they sort of hit a pothole. Evidently the Jebusites didn't have a good city program to make sure their roads were good. Hits a pothole and the oxen stumble. What happens? Uzzah reaches out and reacts and he grabs the Ark to keep it from falling. And all the people cheer and you hear God's voice saying, 'Well done, Uzzah! You saved the Ark!' No. He dies. He's struck down. 2 Samuel 6:7 says, 'And the anger of Yahweh the Lord, the anger of Yahweh the Lord of hosts, was kindled against Uzzah, and God struck him down because of his error, and he died there beside the ark of God.' Why does he die? He's just trying to help, right? Because he presumed to touch the place where God's glory rested, to touch the place where the holiness of the King of Glory dwelt. The Ark is never touched by human hands. The Ark gets crafted and made, right? And then they set it, and then they consecrate it, and then the Lord's glory descends. And from that moment on, no human hand touches the Ark. There's at one point where a Philistine city captures the Ark, remember? And what happens? They get hammered with plagues, and they realize, we can't even handle having this Ark in our presence. And so they send it back out. They just send it out with a couple oxen, just say, just go wherever you're gonna go. They put it on the road. Uzzah's reaction assumed, assumed the Ark needed saving. You know what he's assuming there? It's assuming the King of Glory is nothing more than an idol. It's assuming that the King of Glory needs human help to keep from falling. The Lord of Hosts is not served by human hands.
26 · Recounts David's fear after Uzzah's death—he stops the procession and sends the Ark away, asking 'Who can live in the presence of this holy God?' The pastor imagines David standing on Jerusalem's walls, despairing, until he finds hope in Yahweh's covenant promise: the King is Savior
David's so shaken by what he sees that he stops the procession. They've planned a triumphal entry. They're going into the capital. This is like, this is supposed to be the biggest day in Israel's history. And he stops it. He cancels the whole celebration. Inauguration's off. Go back home. He's so scared of having God's holiness present in the city with him that he decides not to bring the Ark in. He sends it over to some Some guy that lives down the road. The guy's like, 'Whoa! Hang on! This is what gave the Philistines boils!' Well, they have the right heart. And so God blesses the person who has it. And David sees this and he realizes, 'Maybe I do want it.' But he sees and feels in that moment when he sees Uzzah die, he asks, 'Who can live in the presence of this holy God?' Let's just hold on a second. Do I really want this Ark in my city? Imagine David standing on the walls of Jerusalem. He's looking outside the gate, he's looking at the Ark. He longs to bring it in, but he's fearful to do so. Despairing because who can ascend the hill of the Lord? We had Uzzah stand by the Ark because We thought he was the right guy for the job and he got struck down. Who's clean enough and pure enough and devoted enough? Who's perfect? And that's when I imagine David, not even fully knowing what he writes but filled with the Spirit, finding hope in Yahweh's covenant. The King isn't just Creator, He isn't just the Holy One, He isn't just victorious. The King is Savior.
27 · Declares that the King of Glory is Jesus, the promised Son of David
If not David, if no one from that generation, then surely His descendant, surely the Promised One, the Messiah, the Son of David, the One Yahweh promised would reign forever over God's people in God's place. The right of entry surely is given to the true King of glory. Who's the King of glory? It's Jesus, the church. For its history has interpreted this psalm and seen those last verses and said, 'That's talking about Jesus.' David hasn't even been promised the descendant yet. That comes in the next chapter. And under the inspiration of the Spirit, he's talking about something that hasn't even been prophesied to him yet. He just knows the King of glory is this amazing thing and doesn't even realize the hope that's going to be tied up in that King of glory. You know who Jesus is? You know what Jesus means? It's an Arabic transliteration of Yeshua. Yahweh saves. Remember the angel to Mary? You will call him Jesus. Yahweh saves. It's this amazing moment. Listen, I love how the opening verses of Hebrews describes Jesus. Think of that question. Who can ascend the hill of the Lord? Who can stand in his holy place? And here's the sweet answer to our question in Hebrews 1 when it talks about Jesus. 'He who is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of His nature, and He upholds the universe by the word of His power. After making purification for sin, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, having become as much superior to angels as the name He has inherited is more excellent than theirs.' as much more excellent to the angels as the name of Yahweh is superior to the name of Michael or Gabriel. For to which of the angels did God ever say, 'You are my Son, today I have begotten you'? Verse 8, but of the Son he says— listen to this— 'Your throne, O God.' Of the Son he says, 'Your throne, O God, is forever and ever. The scepter of uprightness is the scepter of your kingdom.' You have pure hands. You have a clean heart. You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness. Therefore, God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness beyond your companions. And you, Lord, laid the foundation of the earth in the beginning, and the heavens are the work of your hands. Whose hands? Jesus' hands. They will perish, but you remain. They will all wear out like a garment, like a robe. You will roll them up. Like a garment they will be changed, but you are the same, and your years will have no end.
28 · Applies the Gospel: Jesus can ascend the hill of the Lord, and all who receive righteousness from Him can enter God's presence
Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord? And who shall stand in His holy place? Jesus can ascend the hill of the Lord. Who can enter the King's presence? Look at verses 5 and 6. Anyone who receives blessing and vindication— it's the language of justification, that word vindication we translate righteousness in the ESV. They receive that vindication and righteousness from the God of His salvation. Those are the ones who can enter. Those are the ones who have the right to enter free from fear, that can come in the name of Jesus to stand in God's presence. You want to ask the identity question? What does it mean to think and live rightly knowing who the King of Glory is and live a lifestyle that's pleasing to Him? It's to look at verses 3-6 of this psalm and say, outside of Jesus, I have no hope. But in Jesus, I have every hope. It's to recognize that He is the One that goes before us, that Christ has access Perfect, eternal access. And He has access because He's clothed in the robe of His own righteousness, His own perfections, His own purity of heart, His own devotion to the Father. And this is the promise of the Gospel. The foreshadowing of the Gospel we see in Psalm 24. To every person who repents of their sin, every person who recognizes when they read the middle verses of this passage That surely isn't me. To every one of those people who repents and entrusts themselves to Jesus as their only hope, to each of these, Jesus, the King of glory, clothed in His righteousness, will clothe them in righteousness and welcome them to enter. Enter into the reign and kingdom of the Lord Almighty.
29 · Quotes the hymn 'The Solid Rock' to illustrate the Gospel promise: Christ's righteousness is our only hope, and in Him we can stand faultless before the throne
We sang it this morning on the Solid Rock. We wrote— sang this: His oath, His covenant, His blood, they support me in the whelming flood. When all around my soul gives way, He then is all my hope and stay. When I'm David watching one of my people die for touching the Ark, when I'm Joe Schmo and I know I've screwed up this week, I can think of 10 ways where I have lived out of step with the reign of the King of Glory. On Christ the solid rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand. Then he says this: when He shall come with trumpet sound. Oh, may I then in Him be found dressed in His righteousness alone, faultless to stand before the throne.
30 · Concludes with the Gospel climax: Jesus entered Jerusalem on Palm Sunday in triumph but was crucified outside the gates, dying in our place
You know why we get to do that? Jesus entered Jerusalem, remember? He enters Palm Sunday seated on a donkey. They're throwing down their cloaks. There's a triumphal procession. It's the Messiah! He's here! They're waving the palm branches. And then He receives the treatment we deserve. You know where the cross is located? The cross is located outside of the gates. Outside of the ancient doors. He gets, as the King of Glory, sent outside the city that is His. And He dies in our place. So that when He returns, everyone who trusts in Him, who believes that their hope is grounded in the cross, is grounded in the covenant that He perfected, the covenant that He purchased in His blood, that believes if they come with Jesus and in the name of Jesus, dressed in His righteousness, that they'll get to re-enter the city and be faultless to stand before the throne. That's the promise of Psalm 24. And to live mindful of the reign of the King of Glory is to live every day pinning all your hopes in that place and that place alone. Would you bow your heads?