Saturday, May 5, 2018

Are the Psalms connected?
Any teaching in the scripture including the narratives are Theological and Systematic. Even tho the Psalms are written in the different circumstances of the Psalmist yet the teaching of Doctrines of grace are consistently used in their application to the circumstances. The scripture should never be separated from the daily practical experiences in ones life. The question is , Did God simply react to the occupation of the king or did He decree from eternity past that the doctrines of God would come in the mode of conquest? Is Gods covenant limited to the activity of the church or is it unlimited in its application to the all of creation?
The first term of the doctrine that defines the condition of man and the creation after the fall is sin. Is the context of sin put in the mode of conquest? You will see that the teaching of sin is along side of the violence that permeates society. Sin is an offense toward God that is always applied horizontally. Ps 7 3 O LORD my God, if I have done this
and there is guilt on my hands-
4 if I have done evil to him who is at peace with me
or without cause have robbed my foe-
5 then let my enemy pursue and overtake me;
let him trample my life to the ground
and make me sleep in the dust." compare ..9 O righteous God,
who searches minds and hearts,
bring to an end the violence of the wicked
and make the righteous secure.
David is teaching about a specific sin and guilt not the daily sins of Gods elect. In this context the "sin" is speaking and acting as an enemy of the kingdom. Essentially it is a traitor to the covenant. When we are saved we enter into a bond with God. This bond is a swearing upon our own hurt. But we are not perfect. But God also swears to uphold His covenant on our behalf. So you have a guilty party swearing to their own hurt and the perfect party demanding perfect obedience. This creates desperation in the guilty party. The only answer to the condition of our hopelessness is the application of death or the curse.
Adam enjoyed this unopposed bond with God in the garden. The power of man in exercising his control over the creation was unlimited. Thought was followed by desire that resulted in action that was unopposed. But when man sinned , he was plagued with the inability to overcome sin and corruption. But mans desire to control the creation brought about the self destruction of living in contradiction. Man was completely divided. The Psalms teach that man in the garden was filled with the desire for the glory of God but in the fall man received the hopelessness of the curse. But the curse of God was actually a gift to man. You see the law of God demands absolute obedience upon the threat of death. We could compare this curse of death to a plague of inability in which every gift that was given to man only reminded him of the inability to fulfill his purpose. God had to give man power to overcome sin and corruption. We find that violence in this context is the result of the inability to overcome the curse of corruption. God had to provide man with a curse that gave him the ability to curse the desire to curse God. The traitor to the kingdom is the person who is unable to unite the two parts of the ten commandments.
Sin brought the curse of the law. This means that the laws condemnation was directed toward man. As the law is present in all reality so the curse speaks against the sinner. So God decreed from eternity past to bring to us a representative who would endure the curse in place of His elect who deserved to be under the power of the law and its curses. Christ not only ended the power of the curses but He brought us wholeness by turning the voice of the curses law away from us. If the curses are too powerful for Gods people then they would do violence. But now we have the weapon to kill the desire to curse God. We now direct the curse of the law toward the universal evil that is present in this world. There are two kinds of curses taught in the bible!

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