The Psalms of the Sons of Korah

Transcript

Okay, good evening everyone. We're going to start looking at the Psalms of the Sons of Korah together. Tonight we're going to consider who the Sons of Korah were, what time period they might have been writing in, and then a high level overview of their Psalms, what they were maybe writing and thinking about, why they wrote what they wrote, and then later on in the year we'll pick this back up again and we'll dive more deeply into the first two Psalms of theirs, Psalms 42 and 43, because there's just too much great stuff in those Psalms that they really need their own time. So for now we're going to just get stuck into the overview of an introduction to the Sons of Korah. Who were they? Who were the Sons of Korah? Well, it is what it says on the tin. They were Sons of Korah. They were the descendants of someone who was called Korah. There's a Korah mentioned in verse 5 of Genesis 36. This was a son of Esau. I think the most well-known Korah in Scripture, and the Korah with a well-recorded family tree, is that famous rebel who we read about back in Numbers, and just to make sure that we're all on the same page and up to speed with that record of Korah and where he came from, we're just going to do a quick recap just now, and we'll start that by looking at 1 Chronicles 6, where we are given a family tree of Levi. So we're told in 1 Chronicles 6, jumping in at verse 1, these are the sons of Levi, Gershon, Kohath, and Merari, the sons of Kohath, Amram, Ishar, Hebron, and Aziel, and so on. Then we get to the sons of Kohath. They were Aminadab, his son, Korah, his son, and so on. So we're told here that Korah is a grandson of somebody called Kohath, and this explains why we see elsewhere in Scripture that the descendants of these men are sometimes called Kohathites as well as Korahites. They can be used interchangeably, it seems. We also see in this chapter that Korah is one of Levi's sons, and in Numbers 4 and Numbers 7, we're given some information about what the Kohathites were responsible for as part of their priestly family duties. So in Numbers 4, we're told, jumping in at verse 15, when Aaron and his sons have finished covering the sanctuary and all the furnishings of the sanctuary, this is a passage that's talking about the transportation of the tabernacle. As the camp sets out, after that the sons of Kohath shall come to carry these, but they must not touch the holy things lest they die. These are the things of the tent of meeting that the sons of Kohath are to carry. So we're told here in Numbers 4 about these things that they have to carry. Numbers 7 kind of clarifies how they have to carry it. We were told that to the sons of Kohath he gave none, this is talking about wagons and oxen, because they were charged with the service of the holy things that had to be carried on the shoulder. So we see here that the special task of the Kohathites, one part of their share of the priestly duties, was to carry the holy things on their shoulders. Kohath's brothers Gershon and Merari are given wagons and oxen to transport the So I can imagine that this didn't go down too well from a selfish human perspective. My brothers are getting oxen and wagons to lug these items around the desert, but me and my family, the special stuff that we got allocated, means that we have to carry it around on our backs or on our shoulders whilst we kind of wander around this desert. And of course there is a reason for it, that's how God works, but perhaps this might be the spark or one of the big contributors to the start of that rebellion that we're about to look at next. So if we look at Numbers 16 now, this is where we see things kicking off, this is the famous scene of a rebellion that takes place. We'll jump in at verse one, and I'm going to kind of pick out some verses to summarise what's going on in this chapter, there's a lot going on. So we read in verse one of Numbers 16 that Korah, the son of Izhar, son of Kohath, son of Levi, and Dathan and Abiram, the sons of Eliab, and On, the son of Pelleth, sons of Reuben, took men, and they rose up before Moses, with a number of the people of Israel, 250 chiefs of the congregation, chosen from the assembly, well-known men. And then we go on to read in verse 18, And then towards the end of the chapter, as soon as he'd finished speaking all these words, the ground under them split apart, and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed them up with their households, and all the people who belonged to Korah and all their goods. So high-level summary here is, you know, there's this group led by Korah, Dathan, Abiram, and On, they rise up in this kind of rebellion against Moses and Aaron. Then around verse 18, there's this scene of the rebels and Moses and Aaron presenting their censors of incense before the as a test to show who God is truly with. And then we go on to read in verses 31 and 32, that as a result of Korah and his group's attitude and their rebellion, they're swallowed up by the ground beneath their feet, and they're all killed. So from this chapter, we get the impression that Korah is not a great guy, doesn't seem like a great guy, doesn't sound like a good dad, or a good spiritual role model, certainly not the kind of dad that you would expect to produce this offspring who would go on to write some of the most passionate, beautiful, powerful, God-fearing Psalms that we have recorded for us. But he did. His sons, his offspring, they did turn out to be those writers. And whilst we're still in Numbers, we'll just have a quick look at how that happened. So also in Numbers 16, jumping in at verse 23, we read that the Lord spoke to Moses saying, say to the congregation, get away from the dwelling of Korah, Dathan and Abiram. Then Moses rose and went to Dathan and Abiram and the elders of Israel followed him. And he spoke to the congregation saying, depart, please, from the tents of these wicked men and touch nothing of theirs, lest you be swept away with all their sins. So they got away from the dwelling of Korah, Dathan and Abiram. So still in Numbers 16, we see that God tells Moses to tell the people to get away from the tents of Korah and those other troublemakers. And in verse 26, the people are told if they even touch anything that belonged to those guys, they would be consumed in their sin. So from these two verses and the fact that we know Korah had surviving offspring, we know that some of his family must have fled from his area of the camp, faithfully following the instructions of Moses. They had to completely separate themselves from Korah and they had to do it very quickly. And these verses, I think, point to what must have been a very difficult family situation and to the fact that the faithful descendants of Korah had to completely disown their father and then they had to watch him and the rest of their family get swallowed up inside the earth. What that scenario would have been like to witness in any case is hard to imagine, but for it to be your own family as well is something else. And maybe this is a significant contributing factor in producing what turns out to be a very faithful line of God's servants. If you witness an event like that and then you think you can just carry on doing your own thing and not follow God's instructions, you'd have to be pretty crazy. And I think with that image burned in their minds and then passed on to their children, it's no wonder that they seem to do a pretty good job of sticking to the straight and narrow after this. And we see in Numbers 26 that that confirms that there were indeed surviving offspring. We're told here, going in at verse 9, this is kind of a reminder of what happened. These are the Dathan and Abiram chosen from the congregation who contended against Moses and Aaron in the company of Korah when they contended against the Lord. And the earth opened its mouth, swallowed them up together with Korah. When that company died, when the fire devoured 250 men and they became a warning. But the sons of Korah did not die. So, yes, their father Korah was a bit of a rotten egg, to say the least, but the sons of Korah, all the way back there in Numbers, the first few generations of them, they give us a taste of their amazing faith and their obedience that we'll see continues in later generations. They did something that can be very hard to do from a human perspective. They didn't stick with their father, their family. They instead chose to trust and stick with God. And we see, because they crop up again throughout scripture, they keep their name. Despite their negative start as a family, a very famous bad start in Israel's history, and despite the potentially awkward years that maybe followed this event, maybe facing some unpopularity, some disrespect, perhaps. They keep their name and they put that event behind them. They heed the warning that Numbers 26 reminds us about here, that warning that this event was. They heed that warning and they show that they aren't going to behave in the same way. They aren't going to follow in the that they not only don't follow in the footsteps of their father, which would be good enough, they actually walk in the opposite direction and show us what a very special, very faithful, a very dedicated family they were. And I think that just from these first passages, there's maybe two quick lessons that we can take. The first one is that, you know, as the children of Korah showed us, we can't let anything come between us and God and his ways, even family. If they've chosen to go on a different path and they're influencing us in a bad way, then tough decisions need to be made and our trust needs to be put in God. And this ties in with what Jesus teaches in at least a couple of different places and in a couple of different ways in the Gospels. But maybe most appropriately for this, he says in Matthew 19 verse 29, everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my name's sake, will receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life. And he says in other places like Luke 14, for example, in verse 26, he says something even more challenging about needing to hate brothers and sisters and mothers and fathers to be followers of him. That's what's required, if needs be. So it's really hard hitting stuff, but it's very important to remember that nothing can come between us and God. And I think the sons of Korah set that example for us way back in Numbers. The second thing is, I think, a nice reminder of God's forgiveness and his willingness to work with broken humans. And although you could say, the sons of Korah obviously weren't their father, they don't need to be forgiven for his mistakes. And scripture makes that principle pretty clear. I still kind of see this as a powerful example of redemption, a redemption story. The sons of Korah keep the bad name and they turn it into a good one. God worked with them despite what their ancestors did. And given the fact that they could call themselves sons of Kohath, maybe, rather than sons of Korah, I think that it's a nice thought that maybe they chose sons of Korah to make this point for us to read that name in amongst those beautiful Psalms that they wrote and think, what, those guys? And yes, God works with everyone. He works with everyone who trusts in him and who loves him, even if your ancestors were so bad that God had to kill them by sucking them into the ground. So those were the main bits of information that I kind of wanted to highlight for now in terms of what we get told about Korah and his family from earlier on in scripture. If we move a bit further forward in time, we see how Korah's descendants become famous in Israel for positive reasons this time. Maybe the most well-known faithful descendant of Korah was the great man Samuel. Samuel, who gets a mention in Hebrews 11, he's well known for the things that he said and did, but maybe he's not so well known as being a son of Korah. But we're told in 1 Chronicles 6 that this is the case. He was a Korahite. 1 Chronicles 26 tells us, if we jump in at verse 31, these are the men whom David put in charge of the service of Song in the house of the Lord after the ark rested there. They ministered with Song before the tabernacle of the tent of meeting until Solomon built the house of the Lord in Jerusalem, and they performed their service according to their order. These are the men who served and their sons, of the sons of the Kohathites, Heman, the singer, the son of Joel, son of Samuel, son of Elkanah, son of, son of, son of Korah, son of Kohath, son of Levi, son of Israel. And we read elsewhere that the Korahites were keepers of the temple gates, and they were singers. These passages here in 1 Chronicles 9 were told, Shalom, the son of Korah, the son of Abiasaph, son of Korah, and his kinsmen of his house, the Korahites, were in charge of the work of the service, keepers of the thresholds of the tent, as their fathers had been in charge of the camp of the Lord, keepers of the entrance. 1 Chronicles 26 tells us, these divisions of the gatekeepers, corresponding to their chief men, had duties just as their brothers did, ministering in the house of the Lord. These were the divisions of the gatekeepers among the Korahites and the sons of Morari. And in 2 Chronicles 20, the Levites of the Kohathites and the Korahites stood up to praise the Lord, the God of Israel, with a very loud voice. So these passages give us a taste of the kind of jobs that these sons of Korah are doing. They're singing and serving in God's house. And if we jump back to that passage in 1 Chronicles 6 that we just read a moment ago, we see that someone called Heman is mentioned specifically among the names of the Korahites. We're told there that Heman, the singer, the son of Joel, the son of Samuel, he's one of these people who served. And we're told that he was a singer. And if we look out for his name later on in Chronicles, we see that in 1 Chronicles 25, he comes up again and we see that he was clearly a very musical guy. 1 Chronicles 25, starting at verse 1, tells us, David and the chiefs of the service also set apart for the service the sons of Asaph and of Heman and of Jejutham, who prophesied with liars, with harps, and with The list of those who did the work and of their duties was the sons of Asaph, a list of names of Jejutham, the sons of Jejutham, a list of names of Heman, the sons of Heman, and then Heman's children. Verse 5, all these were the sons of Heman, the king's seer, according to the promise of God, to exalt him. For God had given Heman 14 sons and three daughters. They were all under the in the music in the house of the Lord, with cymbals, harps, liars for the service of the house of God. Asaph, Jejutham, and Heman were under the order of the king. So we see that Heman had quite a few children and him and his 17 children were among those appointed by David to sing and make music in the house of God. So a very talented musical family and recognized as such by King David himself, a man who also had a great talent for making music and for writing songs. We also read in 2 Chronicles 29 that two of the sons of Heman were prominent in helping Hezekiah, King Hezekiah, house of the Lord. So 2 Chronicles 29 tells us about the start of Hezekiah's reign. We're told in verse 1, he began to reign when he was 25 years old. In the first year of his reign, in the first month, he opened the doors of the house of the Lord and repaired them. He brought in the priests and the Levites and assembled them in the square on the east and said to them, hear me Levites, now consecrate yourselves and consecrate the house of the Lord. Then the Levites arose and we're told who these Levites were and we're told in verse 14, of the sons of Heman, Jehuel and Shimei were among these people, these Levites. They gathered their brothers and consecrated themselves and went in as the king had commanded by the words of the Lord to cleanse the house of the Lord. So we see these children of Heman were involved in this really important event in Israel's history and it seems pretty clear from these passages we've just looked at that Korah's descendants clearly included many faithful servants who were dedicated to the upkeep and the daily operations of the temple, the house of God, and they had a talent for music and for singing in service to God. That was recognized in the times of David and then it was passed on through the generations to Korah's descendants in the time of Hezekiah. It's actually in the time of Hezekiah that a lot of people seem to think and agree that the Psalms of the sons of Korah were written, that time when the estranged inhabitants of the northern kingdom were encouraged to renew their loyalty to the temple in Jerusalem. We aren't told anywhere kind of explicitly that this is the relevant time period and if you look at the Psalms on their own you could say that they're applicable to lots of different historical events but if we take them as a whole I think we do seem to see pretty unmistakable links to the life and times of Hezekiah. They're kind of breadcrumbed throughout the the different Psalms and I'm happy for now personally to go along with the idea that whenever we read a Psalm with these titles it's probably from that period of time in Israel's and we'll see some of those links when we get stuck into Psalms 42 and 43 later in the year but I'm interested as well to hear any of your ideas for who these sons of Korah in the Psalms might be and when they might have been writing so please do share afterwards if you have any other ideas but clearly for the most part what we have written in Scripture we see that they turn this bad name around there there's still some kind of dodgy behavior with the likes of Samuel's sons they don't have a great reputation but on the whole the the sons of Korah have many prominent faithful descendants they become heavily involved in the activities of temple worship and as I've said already and I'm sure you've seen this yourselves and Jim mentioned it in his prayer if not hopefully you'll see this as we look further into the subject together the sons of Korah go on to write some of the most beautiful passionate Psalms that we have recorded for us in our Bibles their serious involvement in in the running of the temple is reflected in in their writing which almost always demonstrates a real interest in and love for the affairs of God's temple and of formal worship they really show how dedicated they were to God and their words are a real inspiration for us in our lives today and in our worship and our service of God so that's who we're told they were in the rest of Scripture outside the Psalms where they came from what they did what sort of time period they were perhaps writing these Psalms in let's now turn to to their Psalms themselves and actually take a well we'll take a high level look at what they wrote so there are 11 Psalms that are directly attributed to the sons of Korah I think we can say that there are actually 12 Psalms written by the sons of Korah because although Psalm 43 has no title no author we can make a pretty good case for that one being one of theirs as well and we'll see why when we come to look at that that Psalm later in the year but on a basic level the main reason is that it's just very similar it's the exact same structure it's just a continuation of Psalm 42 it is possible that it was added later by by someone else who was inspired by Psalm 42 I think that kind of thing happens elsewhere in the Psalms but I don't think that's the case with this one and I'll explain more when we look at it in more detail the Psalms are split into roughly two blocks one block in in book two of Psalms that's Psalms 42 to 49 and then the other block is in book three of Psalms Psalms 84 85 87 and 88 and when you look at these Psalms together which we don't always do if we're following the reading plan but if we do read them through as one we see or you notice more easily that they have a really distinct character to them and a lot of similarities in terms of themes and patterns they're not all saying the exact same thing but they're clearly linked in several ways and we'll pick up on some of those themes and some of those patterns when when we look at all of this again in more detail later on but for now I'm just going to point out a few to give an idea one of the most clear themes I think that comes out is this longing for God desiring to be in his presence not just a belief in him but a sincere desire to be near to him we see this right at the start of of psalm 42 where we read as a deer pants for flowing streams so pants my soul for you oh god my soul thirsts for god for the living god when shall i come and appear before god and then we see in in the rest of psalm 42 and in 43 more of this kind of language it comes up and we'll see more of it when we look again in more detail but also comes up later on in in in the later block of their psalms in book 3 and psalm 84 we see more of this kind of language psalm 84 verse 2 says my soul longs yes faints for the courts of the lord so there's this repeated idea of a sort of spiritual thirst for god and and this ties in with what we've already considered about these people and who they were they weren't just turning up at the temple to tick a box to just observe they were right in the middle of it and and they wanted nothing more than to be involved and to be as close to god and his ways as they possibly could and when we see words like those in verse 2 of psalm 42 here and in other parts of these psalms that they seem to be longing for the ability to come and be with god at the temple it seems like their their access has been taken away for some reason or that they've they've been kept away for a for a long time we see that they're in serious anguish they cry out and and you can really feel it in the way that they write and these verses where we see kind of hints towards you know them not being able to access the temple or they're reminiscing about past visits to the temple this is one of the reasons why people make a link to the life and times of hezekiah because during the siege of jerusalem that took place during his reign there would have been no coming and going for those who outside of the city the temple would have been out of reach for you know a period of time and that would have been incredibly difficult for them given the passion that they clearly had for the for temple worship that would have been tough on them and i don't think we know for sure how long the siege was but there were other assyrian sieges in the land around the time of hezekiah samaria for example was under siege for three years so if it was anything close to that it would certainly have been difficult and even if it was short say it was just a few weeks that one that the fact that there was a three-year siege north of jerusalem by the mighty assyrian army that would have made things pretty difficult to say the least for northerners who were trying to commute into jerusalem a monster army engaging in in siege warfare is not the easiest thing to get around and and we'll think more about all of this next time as well another theme that is closely linked to that longing for god is is the love that they for the temple and worship practices we see this coming out in in psalm 84 and again going back in at verse 2 that we've already looked at psalm 84 and we read all of verse 2 my soul longs yes faints for the courts of the lord my heart and flesh sing for joy to the living god and then in verse 10 of that psalm for a day in your courts is better than a thousand elsewhere i would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my god than dwell in the tents of wickedness so it's they make some pretty powerful statements it really show that really shows us that these people truly valued being in the house of god being part of that collective worship and again it makes sense the things they're describing based on the role that we know they were performing as singers and as gatekeepers when they write about the temple we know that they're writing from from their very intimate experience of it another theme that we get coming out of their psalms is one of trouble of opposition crisis some of these psalms clearly seem to be written against a kind of backdrop of serious difficulty there's lots of opposition enemies national trouble people mocking them abusing them things not being as they should isolation separation and this kind of stuff comes up in in several places but psalm 44 is a good example of this of language going in at verse 11 we read them saying you have made us like sheep for slaughter scattered as among the nations you've sold your people for a trifle demanding no high price for them you've made us the taunt of our neighbors derision and scorn of those around us made us a byword among the nations a laughing stock among the peoples all day long my disgrace is before me and shame has covered my face at the sound of the taunter and reviler at the sack at the sight of the enemy in the avenger and and then they also talk as it continues in this psalm about suffering at the hands of their enemies even though they've been faithful and that's clearly it they're hurting from that all this has come upon us though we have not forgotten you and we've not been false covenant our heart has not turned back nor have our steps departed from your way yet you have broken us in the place of jackal and covered us with the shadow of death and they're really crying out from a very difficult place and it's sad stuff to when you think about it carefully what situation they must have been in how they were feeling then then we get ones like psalm 46 that seem to be a response to being in this situation that we've just read in psalm 44 psalm 46 gives us words like god is our refuge and our strength a very present help and trouble therefore we will not fear though the earth give way and that's a good hint back to the the events in in further up their family tree where they're swallowed up in the earth though the mountains be moved into the heart of the sea it's waters roar and foam though the mountains tremble at its swelling the lord of host as withers the god of jacob is our fortress and they we see them crying out in their suffering like in psalm 44 but then psalms like this show us that they don't lose trust in god and that is the other of these psalms god is our refuge god is our hope trust in god over and over again god is described as a refuge a place of safety the one who is in control and these these are just some examples throughout all of their psalms from the the earlier ones to the later ones psalm 44 and early on in 44 we read for not in my bow do i trust nor can my sword save me but you have saved us from our foes and i've put to shame those who hate us in god we have boasted continually 46 we just read 42 hope in god for i shall again praise him my salvation and my god psalm 48 this is god our god forever and ever he will guide us forever psalm 84 oh lord of hosts blessed is the one who trusts in you so those are the main themes as i said some high level main themes that really come out and hopefully we we get a chance to dig a bit more into some of those later on in the year along with some of the repetition that they use and and yeah they really highlight these themes for us throughout their psalms and we see that they really do that in psalms 42 and 43 very powerfully and then we'll look at those psalms in particular these psalms are really very beautiful and passionately written and they cover a really wide range of emotions from psalm 84 being full of joy and longing to psalm 88 which is considered by some to be one of the darkest psalms out there it doesn't really have a positive ending or resolution it just ends in darkness so they have this huge variance in emotion and yeah they're emotional they're thoughtful they're very focused on worship and with that wide range of emotion and so many different scenarios that get described it makes them really relatable for us and most importantly they consistently remind us that whatever situation we might find ourselves in throughout this life like they faced many difficult situations as well god is the answer trust in god so that's all i'll say for now hopefully that's been a helpful overview of who the sons of korah were to set us up for some deeper digging into their writings later on in the year and hopefully just helpful anyway for when we're reading those psalms in our own time it's always good to be aware of who the author might be and what situation they were in but yet next time next time i'm on bible class we'll look at psalm 42 and 43 and we'll really see all of those themes that i mentioned coming out very powerfully so thank you for listening