Ezekiel Part 46

Okay, we are gonna pray, and then we're gonna get into our study. Lord Jesus, again, as we open your word, we ask the Holy Spirit, help us to rightly understand what is revealed there so that we may properly believe and confess and do according to your holy word.

We ask in Jesus' name, amen. All right, now, real quick, just a quick aside. Those of you concerned with my inability to write and preach sermons, the good news is is that David Ferguland has come to the rescue, and he's given me a book called The Making of a Sermon.

So I expect things to get better in the days ahead. Thank you, David. What's the publish, is that publish date? Publish date, this one's a little bit older. He actually found this in the library of one of his relatives.

Hang on a second here.

Does it take more than ten minutes to read it?

It's a big book here. It's a junkie book. Okay, it's big. It's originally written, published by Simpson and Company in London. And I'm looking for a date on the copyright, and I don't see one. It might be that old.

So it was dedicated to somebody in 1940, so the dedication is written here. But I don't see a publication date, so we'll have to do a little research on that.

The history on that other side was he used to do some standing on his stump type of preaching. And they would host camp meetings and things like we don't really pay too much attention to.

Right, so if you detect any campfire, hellfire, brimstone stuff, it's all David Ferguland's fault.

There you go. I just thought, well, it's an interesting reading, and I thought to myself,.

Yeah, maybe you'll get the hint, but I'm just kidding.

Yeah, hint taken. All right, very good. Okay, now let me explain something. As we finish up, wind up our study of the Book of Ezekiel, the next portion of Ezekiel is not easy to understand. And unfortunately, as you read it, this has a tendency to be one of the sections of scripture that I have described in the past as dry and gravely.

And the reason why is because the detail that has gone into here, like legitimately, if you're an architect, this kind of stuff would turn your crank. But if you're like me, who thinks that math is evil, and spreadsheets should be banned for the sake of mercy, this type of detail is a little hard for somebody of my mental type.

I would note certain mental types proclivitate to this. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to resort to a skill that I learned when I worked at Disneyland when I was a first-year college student. And you're going, what did you do at Disneyland?

I was a Jungle Cruise captain, okay? My job was to point at things and kind of like make things obvious and draw people's attention to things as we were going through quickly. And of course, occasionally tell a joke.

What's funny is that Faith, at her birthday a few years ago, what she wanted to have as like our family thing that we were going to do is that everyone needed to give a presentation, a PowerPoint presentation or something.

And she even gave one which is still kind of in our family history epic. If you ever want to have something to really laugh at, ask Faith to show you her video about meat shapes, okay? It's fantastic.

But what I did for her is I went back and I relearned my spiel when I was a Jungle Cruise captain and using other people's vacation photos from Disneyland, put a PowerPoint presentation and reprised my skills as a Jungle Cruise captain.

And I asked, what did you think? She goes, it was really politically incorrect and would be offensive to people today. So, which means it was awesome. That's right. I did this in the early 90s or late 80s.

So, I remember telling somebody this week that, yeah, I did the 70s and 80s in Southern California. So, Barb, so did you. And here's a scary thought. When we were growing up, when we were growing up in the 80s, the 50s was the thing that everyone like the younger, the older generation was pointing to is kind of like a high watermark.

And when we were in the 80s, we were closer to the 50s than we are now to the 80s today. So, we're farther away from the 80s than we were to the 50s when we were growing up. Anyway, that's a scary, terrifying thought.

The New Temple as a Vision of the Heavenly Jerusalem

Okay. All that being said, we're going to do some highlights of the vision of the new temple. We'll point some things out. We're going to start in chapter 40. And I'm going to read a portion of this out.

In the 25th year of our exile. So, we're fast forwarding at this point. If you remember in the book of Ezekiel, the beginning of it, they'd only been in exile for a short amount of time. So, there has been some great amount of time that has passed between the last vision that we read in 39 and what he now sees here in 25.

And here's, I'm sorry, in 40, which is now 25 years into their exile. And here's where the big misunderstanding comes. If you're familiar with dispensational theology, dispensationalists, they are of the belief that this vision of a new temple is a temple that is remaining to be built in Jerusalem right today.

And so, you'll note that dispensationalists and a lot of evangelicals, their emphasis on eschatology and their misunderstanding of what it is that they're reading, they're expecting a third temple to be built in Jerusalem.

And so, with the Jews in Israel right now making preparations for rebuilding a temple there on the Temple Mount, which should be politically insane if you think about what would be necessary for them to be able to rebuild that.

Because Jews don't even control the Temple Mount, Muslims do. You have the Dome of the Rock and the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount. And what's interesting is that archaeologists have figured out that the temple, Herod's Temple and Solomon's before it, that where it occupied, where it was on the Temple Mount was actually between those two things, between the Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock.

So, there's technically no reason why you couldn't build a temple there, but here's the issue, is that the temple itself, we learn from the book of Hebrews, is a type and shadow. It is a type and shadow of Christ.

Christ has fulfilled all the types and shadows. Christ is our high priest. Christ is our sacrifice. Christ is everything. And so, the temple was always pointing to Him. And now that He has come and Christ, once for all sacrifice for sins, has been accomplished, you have to ask the question, would it be a good thing or a bad thing if they rebuilt the temple in Jerusalem?

I would note it would be a horrifically terrible thing. And on top of it, the theological confusion that would ensue would be bizarre is the best way I can put it because I remember back the year that I was installed here at Kongsvinger, right before I came up here, I debated Jim Staley of the Hebrew Roots Movement on whether or not Christians are required to keep the Sabbath.

And I asked him straight up in that debate, he's a Judaizer is the best way I can describe it. He's into the Hebrew Roots Movement. Part of the Circumcision Party. Yeah, part of the Circumcision Party, a party you don't wanna go to.

I asked him straight up, I said, if they rebuild a temple in Jerusalem, would you be going and offering sacrifices every year as commanded by the Mosaic Covenant? And he said, absolutely. And I'm sitting there going, first of all, that's the dumbest thing I've ever heard.

And do you think they're going to let you, a Gentile, sacrifice in the temple in Jerusalem? It's like, you're out of your mind. There'll be Gentile Day. Right, they'll have Gentile Sacrifice Day at the new temple in Jerusalem.

A mock-up temple down the street.

I mean, it's just so, so terrible. So the question then is, if this isn't prophesying a third temple being built in Jerusalem, and even if there is a third temple built in Jerusalem in our lifetime, this prophecy isn't about that.

And the architectural details, and one very notable detail that we'll take a look at as we, toward the end of this section, really rule that out, is that we're looking at something completely different than an actual temple being built in Jerusalem today.

Hint, hint, think Book of Revelation. Hint, hint, think New Jerusalem. You're starting to get the idea. So let's take a look at the intro to this section. So in the 25th year of our exile, at the beginning of the year, on the 10th day of the month, and note, so note the specificity.

He knows the exact day, the exact year when this took place. In the 14th year after the city was struck down, so Jerusalem has been gone for 14 years. On that very day, the hand of Yahweh was upon me, and he brought me to the city.

Now, if this sounds like kind of revelation, that's kind of the point. John, he sees things, and he's brought places, and how he gets around. Well, God is the one doing this, and he says, in visions of God, he brought me to the land of Israel, set me down on a very high mountain, on which was a structure like a city to the south.

When he brought me there, behold, there was a man whose appearance was like bronze, with a linen cord and a measuring reed in his hand, and he was standing in the gateway, and the man said to me, son of man, look with your eyes, and hear with your ears, and set your heart upon all that I show you, for you were brought here in order that I might show it to you, declare all that you see to the house of Israel.

So you'll note, we have an angelic being, who's going to be showing him around and giving him the details, and God has ordered that the children of Israel pay attention to this, right? So behold, there was a wall, and all around the outside of the temple area, and the length of the measuring reed in the man's hand was six long cubits, each being a cubit and a hand breadth in length.

So a cubit, by the way, is basically from your elbow to your wrist, that's a cubit, and then if you add a hand length to it, that's adding, so it's a long cubit, it's the longer form. This is the short form, that's the long form, and you get the idea here.

So slightly using a different measurement than we use for the ark. Okay, if you remember, when God commanded Noah to build the ark, he made it clear that the cubit was the measurement by which he was to measure it, and it was built according to the inventions using a cubit.

This temple is being used by the long cubit, which kind of basically hints at the idea, this is new earth kind of stuff, different measurement altogether. And of course, I can never forget Bill Cosby's famous line, what's a cubit?

But that's a whole other story, if you're familiar with that particular sketch, but that's a long time ago. So then he went into the gateway facing east, going up its step, and measured the threshold of the gate, one reed deep, and two side rooms, one reed long, and one reed abroad, and the space between the side rooms, five cubits, and the threshold of the gate by the vestibule of the gate at the inner end, and one reed, and at this point, your eyes are rolling back and going, I am lost, okay?

What's a cubit? Indeed, right? So thankfully, one of our members, Lily, who joins us from London, she, when I taught in the Aletheia service about this, she gave me a wonderful video that I think should be a little bit helpful.

I'm not gonna have any sound on this, but what I want you to do is at least kind of see what this does. So basically, all of these details will culminate in describing this structure that you are about to look at, and we'll take a look at some of the things along the way.

Again, no sound is necessary. We'll just kind of roll through this. So all of these details will create this building. Now, one of the interesting things that you'll notice is that there is a spring of water that legitimately flows from the altar of this building, and we'll see as we get towards the end of Ezekiel that this water then flows into the Jordan, into the Dead Sea, and a living spring coming from the altar of God, if it hits the Dead Sea, is it the Dead Sea anymore?

No, okay? So this little water tributary, which then hints at something way different than another temple in Jerusalem, hints at the theology behind all of this, and there's something else going on here, and let me show you this.

I have to kind of scroll down. I have the Lutheran Study Bible open over here. Now, unfortunately, this would be upside down, but I want you to take a look. This is just a straight down look at this temple being described here.

So it's got an inner courtyard. It has these different gates, all of these little inner chambers for different reasons and stuff like that, and then you can kind of see that over here, but I would note, does anyone notice something interesting in the middle of this thing?

Doesn't that look like a cross to you? Huh. So it's the cross conspiracy theory, yeah. I would note that that cross is noticeable, especially when you take a look from this look. There's no mistaking it, and you're gonna note that the altar is in the dead center of this cross.

Wink, wink, nudge, nudge, know what I mean, know what I mean? This is what this is pointing to. Is that the water of life? Right, exactly. So this is pointing to something that is related to Christ, okay?

And the thing is, is that when you consider the details, number one, building a temple in Jerusalem to these specifications is not possible under the current political circumstances. The second aspect of this is that even if they could build it, good luck getting a water tributary just to spontaneously come up from the earth, right?

It's just not gonna happen. That's not the point. All of this is pointing to the heavenly Jerusalem and the real temple, okay? When we read in the book of Hebrews that Christ entered into the holy of holies, not the one made by man, which was a replica.

So remember, the tabernacle that God had Moses build and then later became the permanent facility that Solomon built and then was rebuilt by Herod and adorned by Herod, which took 46 years plus to do, that all of that was a replica of the real thing.

So when Jesus enters into the holy of holies, where did he do it? This is the description of that real thing. And here's the thing. When Christ returns in glory to judge the living and the dead, and I will reiterate what I said today in the sermon, we have nothing to have anxiety over when Christ returns.

Not a thing, all right? Christ has bled and died for all of our sins. He has made peace with God for us. So it legitimately describes in the book of Revelation the heavenly Jerusalem coming out of heaven and there is this big announcement.

God has made his dwelling place with man and he will dwell with him for how long? Forever, right? So I mean, don't you think it's odd that we have a God whose face is hidden from us? Why? It's because of our sin.

The scriptures make it very clear that God hides his face from us because of our sin. So we trust in his promises by faith, not by sight, but there's a day coming when we'll see things by sight. So this is a detail.

This is a building. This is something related to that heavenly Jerusalem that comes down to earth. That's kind of the point. So if I were, wait, hang on a second. Let's take a look at some more of these details here.

And by the way, Lily in the chat, she put the link to this video. And so you kind of watch how this all works out. It kind of focuses in on the different gates, the different portions, wall outside, house all around and about.

So you'll see that if you were to watch this in its entirety, the people there that put this together were meticulous in their details. So this is a two-scale 3D model of what is described there. So this is the end result of all the architectural detail that if you were to read it and your eyes glaze over, just give me a summary of what this is.

This is it, okay? And even the details of the different palm trees on the inside, these little, you know, as you're coming in the gate, that's all part of the architectural detail that's also described in Ezekiel's prophecy.

And the angel wanted everybody to pay attention to. So you'll note, since we're all grafted into Israel, this is for us as well. This is very much specifically for us because we're the only ones who are circumcised in the heart, right?

By faith in Christ. So it describes all of these details. Let me see if I can speed things up a little bit here. But there's no rocking chair. Well, just go to the Richmond airport. Yeah, they do. It's the same with the airport in North Carolina and in Atlanta.

They have rocking chairs and sweet tea there too as well. Yes, Marilyn. Okay, yeah. So this is technically the third temple. And when we talk about first and second temple, first temple is Solomon's, second one is, my immediate question would be a clarifying question.

Because when you read in Ezra and Nehemiah about when they had come back from exile in Babylon, they were instructed by God, kind of commanded by God, hey, listen, you rebuilt the walls, you also have to like get the temple back in shape.

But what they put together, the only way I can describe it is that Solomon's temple was a palace. The second temple technically in its first iteration was Home Depot. Okay, it was kind of stucco and sheet rock and it was really made, they didn't have the means for anything approaching that.

And so it was Herod then who took that second temple and then there was a refurbishing project that he initiated to kind of bring it back to something similar to its glory from the days of Solomon. But you'll note shortly after that was finished is then when God had it destroyed.

So if you're gonna talk about the second temple, my immediate question is, are we talking about the second temple at the time of Ezra and Nehemiah or are we talking about Herod's temple? If we're talking about Herod's temple, that's gonna be closer to Solomon's, but still not quite as spectacular.

But I would note, Herod's temple did have a lot of gold in it, a truckload of gold, so much so that when we read in Josephus' Jewish Wars, the reason why the Roman soldiers raised the temple and tossed all of the stones of the temple off the temple mount is because in their initial coming into the city, they set fire to Herod's temple and it melted all the gold and there was a river of gold that came out of the temple and then it got stuck in the cracks of the stones.

And so the Roman soldiers, they wanted all that gold and that's why they took every stone and just tossed it off to one side of the temple. By the way, that rubble heap is still there to this day. That's one of the features if you were to travel to Jerusalem.

So anyway, you get the idea here and I'm not gonna play this out. I just want you to see kind of the end result of all of this. And so now we're gonna focus in on kind of the theology rather than the architecture.

Although you can clearly see, man, there's a cross there and there's an altar right there in the middle of that cross. I wonder why. Okay, so it describes then chambers for the priests, the best people of the temple, the inner temple.

He brought me to the nave. All right, so he's being shown around by this angel, the temple's chambers, all that's being described. And again, this is minutiae detail. But here's chapter 43, a notable portion.

If you remember as we've been working our way through the book of Ezekiel, one of the things that Ezekiel was caused to see by God in a vision was the glory of God leaving the temple in Jerusalem because of their idolatry and their abominations in the things that they were doing.

And so what is recorded for us in the book of Ezekiel is the glory of God, God's presence being lifted and taken off of the temple in Jerusalem, basically saying, hasta la vista, right? But here's the bookend on that, chapter 43.

So then he, this angel, led me to the gate, the gate facing east. Behold, the glory of God, the God of Israel, was coming from the east. And the sound of his coming was like the sound of many waters, and the earth shone with his glory.

Now, a little bit of a note here, all right? That's interesting, coming from the east, okay? Now, which is weird, I'll tell you why it's weird, is because, well, he's in Jerusalem and the glory of God's coming from the east.

Quick question. If I were to ask Victor Sweeney, okay, which direction do the people in our graveyard face when they're buried? Does anyone know? East. They're facing east, why? Because when Christ returns, he's going to land in Jerusalem, and where's Jerusalem compared to where we are right now?

East. East. So the idea here is, is that we've kind of worked this all out, okay? I feel bad for the pagans, you know, or somebody who gets buried by pagans and don't understand how this works, okay? On the day of the resurrection, if you're buried out here, okay, you're gonna pop out of your grave facing the exact direction that Jesus will be returning from.

That's pretty cool, okay? So we actually, that's a detailed, I don't know if you guys knew that. Oddly enough, I didn't know it until I became a pastor, and we won't talk about any particular faux paces that I may have committed in my first funeral, but that's a whole other story.

We won't discuss that, okay? Because I plead the fifth, okay? But I quickly learned through the help of men like Victor Sweeney, certain things that I'm supposed to be doing, but I wasn't even aware of that detail.

Was not aware at all. But just a little bit of a note there. So the vision I saw was just like the vision I had seen when he came to destroy the city, and just like the vision that I had seen by the Chabar Canal, and I fell on my face.

So the glory of the Lord is coming from the east, and he's falling on his face. As the glory of Yahweh entered the temple by the gate facing east, the spirit lifted me up, brought me into the inner court, and behold, the glory of Yahweh filled the temple.

So God's glory, his presence fills this temple. While the man was standing beside me, I heard one speaking to me out of the temple, and he said to me, son of man, this is the place of my throne, and the place of the soles of my feet where I will dwell in the midst of the people of Israel forever.

Now, would it make sense for God's presence to fill a temple that they build in Jerusalem today? No. Have the Jews repented of their pharisaical religion? No, not even close, okay? So this is pointing to something very different.

God has made his dwelling place with man. Let me go to the book of Revelation to bookend this so you can see what it is that I'm referring to. Oh, wait, I'm getting ahead of myself here. Here we go, 21.

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth. The first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride, adorned for her husband.

I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes.

Death shall be no more. Neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away. He who was seated on the throne said, behold, I am making all things new.

Also, he said, write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true. And he said to me, it is done. I am the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty, I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment.

The one who conquers will have this heritage. I will be his God, and he will be my son. But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for the murderers, the sexually immoral, the sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.

So you're starting to see the kind of connection. These two are related to each other. And then I would note that what we're seeing depict here in Ezekiel 43, with God saying that he's gonna dwell with man, with Israel forever, that's your cross-reference is Revelation 21.

It has to be. That's what this is talking about. And so, and my house shall no more be defiled. And so the idea of God's presence coming into the temple, that's kind of an Old Testament vision, if you would, of the second return of Christ, right?

So how do you discuss the second return of Christ in a time when people don't even quite get that there's gonna be a second return? That's kind of the point. And so there's the eschatological overtones regarding this particular temple, all right?

So, and the house of Israel shall no more defile my holy name, neither they nor their kings, by their whoring and by their dead bodies of their kings at their high places, by setting their threshold by my threshold and their doorpost besides my doorpost, with only a wall between me and them.

They have defiled my holy name by their abominations that they have committed. So I have consumed them in anger. Now let them put away their whoring and the dead bodies of their kings far from me. And I will dwell in their midst forever.

So no, this vision also serves a judgmental function. It is a condemning function because all of the exiles in Babylon at this time, with the exception of those who were born during the 25 years that they were in exile, everybody who has a memory of what Jerusalem was like before would know full well of the syncretism, of idolatry, the nonsense that was taking place in the temple complex itself.

And God says, no more. By the way, take a look at this temple. It's completely Asherah free, okay? Stop trying to hook me up with that woman. I don't wanna have anything to do with her, right? And as for Molech, as for Baal, they're not there either.

And God makes it clear, in this new temple, there will be none of that nonsense, none of it. As for you, son of man, describe to the house of Israel, the temple, that they may be ashamed of their iniquities.

So here's the idea. Take a look. This is what the temple's gonna be, and they should be ashamed because that isn't what it used to be, right? And if they are ashamed of all that they have done, make known to them the design of the temple, its arrangements, its exits, its entrances, that is, its whole design, and make known to them, as well as all of its statutes, its whole design, all its laws, write it down in their sight so that they may observe all of its laws and all of its statutes and carry them out.

This is the law of the temple. The whole territory on the top of the mountain, all around shall be most holy. Behold, this is the law of the temple. So you get the idea of what's going on here. This vision not only gives hope to those who believe, but condemns those who participated in the idolatry and the syncretism that brought that first temple to a screeching halt.

The Temple as a Call to Repentance and Covenant Renewal

So it goes on to describe the measurements of the altar. It goes on to talk about the gate for the prince. I wonder who that would be. Right? I would note that the gate for the prince, that prince just might be, you know, Jesus.

Yes, yes, that's a great question.

So if this is an eschatological temple, why are there descriptions of offerings and things like this? Because there won't be need of that in the new earth. The reason being, and I would recommend reading your Lutheran study Bible on this, as well as the Concordia Commentary on Ezekiel, which I think are super helpful, is because there's a proleptic aspect to this.

So you'll note, because God is wanting them to see what the dimensions of this new temple are gonna be and all of its architectural details as a sign against them, what God is basically talking about then here by convicting them of their sin is having them renew the Mosaic Covenant that they are already in upon their return to Jerusalem in the hopes of this temple.

So the idea here is that the purpose of the vision is for the impenitent to be brought to penitence and for them and for the Mosaic Covenant then to be renewed. And for them, that is exactly what you would expect.

So the idea here is that there is an aspect of this vision that does apply to them. And it's specifically calling them to remind them of their iniquities, call them to repentance. And those who hear the call through the details of this heavenly vision of this heavenly temple, then they are called then to renew their covenant with God, the Mosaic Covenant, and offer right sacrifices and have the right people be the priests and have the priests do the right things because the Mosaic Covenant is still in effect at the time that this vision is given.

So you'll note that when God gives visions, oftentimes there's not a single point, there's multiple points that might revolve around a central point. So does that make sense as to why that would be the case?

Because that's something I racked my brain on until I really kind of studied it out. Why would there be a description? Then it's like, oh, I get it.

Because there's an aspect of this that does apply to the people who would have heard it at first. Yes, yep, that makes no sense, right.

Yeah, by the way, I took a look and I hunted down that Michael Bates fellow and his idea about faith being allegiance. And I gotta admit, I'm unimpressed with his scholarship. Well, here's the thing, he teaches at Notre Dame.

My immediate question is, is he Roman Catholic? Because there's kind of a works righteousness in his theology that's very prevalent. But in one interview, I saw him talking about his idea that faith should be understood as allegiance.

He readily acknowledges, number one, he got the idea by reading Josephus. Number two, he readily recognizes that allegiance for pisteo is a rare definition. So my immediate question in watching him admit these things is like, so we're gonna let Josephus and an off definition define how we should understand pisteo and we're going to ignore how the church has understood pisteo going all the way to the apostolic era.

So the best way I can describe it is this, is that within academia, and I know that by saying this, I'm gonna sound like I'm judging the guy, and I am, is that in academia, there is a lot of pressure on people to find something new and to publish and for them to find an aspect of something that maybe other people have missed.

And there's pressure on people to publish when they're in academia and things like this. I think that's what is going on here. Because at the end of the day, even in his own interviews regarding his assertion that we should understand it as allegiance, he readily admits, I got it from Josephus and I know that even the lexicographers recognize that that is the smallest, least used definition of the word pisteo.

And so it's like, then why are we even interviewing you at this point? Because clearly you trying to put that into Ephesians, two, is wrong. That's not what the Holy Spirit meant when he had Paul pen those words.

That makes perfect sense on the Heiser crowd. So if you're not familiar with Michael Heiser, Michael Heiser, I have some very big concerns about Heiser. And Heiser, he's most known for his idea of there being a council of the gods.

And it's like, really? Okay, I think it's a form of polytheism, legitimately a form of polytheism. And the issue is that Heiser technically is supposed to be a conservative evangelical scholar, but he had some wackerdoodle ideas.

So like in Psalm 82, I'm off topic here, but I only have a few minutes anyway. Let's go with my bunny trail. I'm the one who started it. It's like, okay, so in Psalm 82, listen to the words, okay? And this is Heiser's big argument.

God has taken his place in the divine council, all right? And so in his translation, since the word El here is in the Hebrew, is that he argues that this is the council of the gods and that Yahweh has taken his place in the council of the gods, in the midst of the gods, he holds judgment.

And so Heiser just reads this and he legitimately goes at this just like, literally. Here's the issue. It's very clear what's going on here. Well, I'll explain it. Let me read it out. How long will you judge unjustly and show partiality to the wicked?

Give justice to the weak and to the fatherless. Maintain the right of the afflicted and the destitute. Rescue the weak and the needy. Deliver them from the hand of the wicked. They have neither knowledge nor understanding.

They walk about in darkness. All the fountains of the earth are shaken. I said, you are gods, son of the most high, all of you. Nevertheless, like men you shall die and fall like any prince. Arise, O God, judge the earth, for you shall inherit all the nations.

Now that's the psalm. So here's the issue. How are we to understand, oh, God has taken his place in the divine council? It's really simple, okay? Go back to sixth grade. In sixth grade, you learned about the Fertile Crescent, right?

You had to take World Civ. I remember World Civ. I still remember the ugly, and I mean ugly, used textbook that I had for World Civ. The cover was yellowed. The pages were yellowed. This thing, and there were people who signed, you know, who signed for that book going back to the late 60s.

So that being the case, when you learned about the Fertile Crescent, what do you remember learning about all the kings and the monarchs of the ancient Near East and Middle East during that era? They were worshipped.

They were worshipped as gods. A lot of inbreeding. And there was a lot of inbreeding. Yeah, you think of Tutankhamen. He didn't have any branches on his family tree. It was just a straight up stick. Okay, so in the ancient world, kings were considered gods on earth.

That practice continued even up to the time of Christ. What was the emperor of Rome considered? A god on earth. So this is a tongue in cheek, if you would. God has a snarky sense of humor. I'm convinced I'm more like Jesus the more snark I have, okay?

But that being the case, so it says, God has taken his place in the divine council. In the midst of the gods, he holds judgment. So God says, all right, you guys are all gods, right? Here, let me sit down with you guys.