Summary 

Psalm 78 is both a history lesson and a personal challenge. It opens with a clear call to remember what God has done and to pass that memory on to the next generation, not just as information, but as a living faith. The psalm honestly recounts two things running side by side throughout Israel's story: the wondrous acts of God and the consistent rebellion of His people. That same honesty is part of what makes Christianity credible, because it does not flinch from either the beauty or the brokenness of the world. Psalm 78 ultimately points forward to Jesus, the Good Shepherd, who holds both sides of the story together. He restores what is broken and goes to the cross to deal finally with human rebellion, resolving the story at great cost to Himself. The challenge for every reader is to ask what history they are telling and whether it is pointing the people around them toward hope in God.

Transcript

Pray again. Lord, thank you for the Psalms, these songs, these prayers that the community together would offer up to you. Lord, I pray that this community, Second City Church, would hear these words, that we would hide them in our hearts, that we would live them out in faithfulness to you, that you teach us what you need to teach us today. I pray that our hearts would be open to you and that you would speak, Lord, that we'd hear your voice. Would the words of my mouth and these meditations of all of our hearts be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer.
Amen. All right. I don't know if you have heard this, but I've heard this a few times recently that dinner parties and family meals are getting less and less interesting. People just aren't sure what to talk about. Some of it is that we live our lives in isolation.
There's a few other interesting reasons that I have read about. I'm not going to get into all those right now. Instead, what I want to do is give you your question for your next dinner. Okay. It's probably one you've been asked.
I've been asked this before, but it's a great question. It helps you get to know somebody else. Here's what it is. Who is a teacher in your life that had a big impact on you? Great question.
Of course, the subsequent question is, why? What did they teach you that influenced you? Not just who it is, why and what. Okay, who? Why?
What teacher? Maybe ask that around your dinner table tonight. Maybe ask that with some friends. I have often thought that, you know, when that question comes up, the people that come to my mind often are my high school teachers. I can actually remember all of their names.
My high school teachers, I can remember. Very few of my college teachers. My high school teachers, I can remember. And then also I think of my young life leader, actually in high school, Matt Shorak. He had a huge impact in my life.
But I kind of was thinking about this because a couple weeks ago I was telling Lily that the first time I got to go sailing was with one of my high school teachers. Took me out on a sailboat with a couple other friends. It was so fun. And I remember that very clearly, just the love and that was shown to me. But I want to tell you actually a little bit about one of my other teachers who was not just my teacher, he was my history teacher my junior and senior year, but also my high school principal.
His name is Dick Hanula, Richard Hanula. And as the high school principal, he of course had to also be a disciplinarian. This is not something that I fault him for at all. In fact, it was a wise and good thing and he was very kind in it. But I remember being called into his office with four of my other classmates.
And. And we weren't just reprimanded with gentleness and kindness, but we were also fined because that was the policy of the school. Because after the school, after the school play, which we were in as seniors, we were over at one of the other seniors house and we were all smoking cigars, which was not according to school policy. So anyway. But he did that and gentleness.
I remember where I was sitting, sitting in his office. But beyond somebody that like, took sort of these rules with grace, but also with proper sort of severity and love in that. He also just loved where we lived. He actually wrote our history book on the Pacific Northwest in Washington State. And I knew this guy loved the Northwest.
He loved the people of the Northwest. He loved the place, and he just exuded it. He. He also loved, loved history. He actually wrote a book called 50 Remarkable Women in Church History.
But he primarily liked to teach 20th century history. And he was funny, and he's still living. I'm just saying was because it was in my past.
So he was kind of dry, he was funny and he was kind of warm, but also really serious. And he gave us the option one year to get extra credit for us who both wanted to take it on and who maybe needed to take it on. And the extra credit was that we memorize Billy Joel's famous We didn't start the fire because we were learning about the Cold War. And so if we memorized the whole thing and sang it in front of the whole class, we could get extra credit. You know, we didn't start the fire.
It was always burning. I mean, a sea. Such a good song. By the way, he also wrote a book on Samuel Rutherford, the Scottish preacher. A great guy.
But Mr. Haniel, I want to say, is a great teacher because he was so very principled and he desired. He loved the content and he wanted it to be known, to be loved. He wanted to teach us well. He wanted us to love the Pacific Northwest, where I grew up, its history, its people, its places. He wanted us to know that the historical figures, that we might actually be shaped well as people.
Right? So Psalm 78. We're in this psalm today because we're making our way through the Psalms in the summers. You know, this is the 12th summer we've been doing this. And it's A long psalm, isn't it?
That's a long psalm. How many of you drifted off? You do not need to raise your hand. How many of you began to dream about canoeing on the yellow breaches? Yeah, quite a few of you.
Probably nobody raised their hand, but that's fine. If you're interested for your next Bible trivia, Psalm 78 is the second longest psalm in the Psalter, the longest one being Psalm 119. Of course, that one's much, much longer. But this is a history psalm, and that's actually not normally one of the categories that people break the psalms down into. I mentioned, of course, last week, that Lament is by far the most the largest category.
There's Psalms of Praise and Royal Psalms and things like that. And then there's a small category that some make called history psalms, where they recount much of the history or key aspects of the history of God working with his people. If you're Interested, it's Psalm 105, 106, 135, 136, and 78. Those are the history psalms. It's a history lesson.
But before it gives the history lesson, it says, remember the past and teach it to those who go ahead.
So I want us to sort of consider two big lessons. And it sort of begins like this, I think, instruct the present and the future with the past. Okay, that's kind of big, big lesson one. And then the obvious next lesson is learn the history of the past. Learn it, know it.
If you're going to be told to teach it, you got to know it. So first, instruct the present and the future with the past. So if you hopefully have your Bibles Open to Psalm 78 found on page 578. Oh, that's pretty handy.
What you will notice maybe is that there's this first kind of section. It's really verses one to eight that sort of are a preface or a preamble to the whole rest of it, right? In that section, there's not so much of the history happening yet. It's sort of here, here's what you need to do. And there's two things that it tells us.
First, I want to say that place the past alongside the present, right? So if this first main point is instruct the present and the future with the past, the first thing is place the past alongside the present. Verse 1. Give ear, O my people, to my teaching. Incline your ears to the words of my mouth.
So he's speaking in the present here. Listen to me. Listen to me. I'll open my mouth in a parable, I'll utter dark things from things. Dark things, things that may have been forgotten or pushed aside, things that we have heard and known, that our fathers have told us maybe aren't before our eyes like they need to be.
We will not hide them from their children, but tell them to the coming generation. We're going to get to that in a second. An interesting thing here is that the past is called a parable. It's called a parable there in verse two, right? I'll open my mouth in a parable.
And if you think of a parable, probably what you think of is. Well, you probably think of the parables of Jesus. That's probably one thing you think of. Think of like the Good Samaritan, all these different parables, right? And maybe when you think of the.
The parable, you think fictitious, right? Maybe not grounded in what really happened, that kind of thing. But I want to just. Just kind of dispel that, okay. Christianity is based on what happened.
In fact, Paul says if the resurrection didn't happen, we're all to be most pitied. And all the scriptures are always saying, God did this in real time and space, these things happened. Okay, so what does the parable mean here? Well, para means alongside of that prefix. And the parable part comes from balein, which means to throw.
So you put these two things together, and what it means is to take alongside, to throw it alongside, to put it alongside. So you're supposed. The idea is that you're supposed to have one story and another, and you're supposed to compare the two. What are you supposed to learn from this story? How does this Good Samaritan, you know, the person that comes up to Jesus says, who's my neighbor?
And he tells the story, and you're supposed to put that story along with your story. How do you understand who your neighbor is?
So we're supposed to put history alongside our story and to learn in the present from the past. Of course, there's tons of great quotes about history. Think of James Baldwin saying, history is not the past, it is the present. We carry our history with us. There's a parable dynamic, of course.
There's a famous quote also from George Santayana saying, those who cannot remember the past are what? Yeah, going to repeat it. So put it alongside the present. Take the past, learn it, instruct the present with it. Of course, there's tons we can learn from history.
One of the things that we can learn from history is that oftentimes our stories aren't terribly different than theirs. So we can actually use them as comparing our lives with what has happened in the past. Of course, it invites certain questions. Have we learned from it?
Have we learned enough that we are able to actually speak to it with those who come alongside us or after us? Will our children know that we've learned it in such a way because we speak of it? Right. Of course. This begs the question of what kind of legacy we leave.
Also, have we learned from the past? And what will people say of us when we become the past? Place the past.
But this, of course, quickly brings up the idea that the past doesn't just inform the present, but it informs also the future. Right? So the other thing that's in this little preamble here is talk to the future about the past. You know, don't just learn it in the present, but talk to the future about the past. Teach the past to the future.
And that's actually kind of the main thing that's happening in this preamble. And so I'll just walk through verse four, right? We will not hide them from their children, but tell the coming generations. Verse 5, which he, the second half, which he commanded, talking about the law appointed in Israel, which he commanded our fathers to teach their children, Verse six. That the next generation might know them, the children even yet unborn.
It doesn't say even but yet unborn. And arise and tell them to their children. You know, it's like that Russian doll just keeps going, verse seven. So that they should set their hope on God and not forget his works, you know, this memory that's being passed on. Verse 8.
And that they should not be like their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation whose heart was not steadfast. All this generational language. Teach the past to the future.
What's really clear here is teaching the past to the future. What that of course, assumes is that you know it, that you know it, you know, shirk it off, that you learn it yourself, that you place your own story alongside it as a parable to be thought of together, to be instructed for yourself and for the coming generations.
Now, okay, let me stop there for a moment before we kind of get into the next section, because I have a few questions that I want to ask you. And though these may seem like they're geared towards parents, which I think to some degree they are, keep in mind that this psalm was to be read by the whole community. It was to be sung by the whole community together. And so this is broadly for us, what are your children going to say that they learned from you?
You know, your children aren't going to be able to, I don't know, spend a hundred hours talking about what they learned from you. If they were quickly to say, what did they learn from you? What are they going to say?
What are the children of this church going to say they learned from us?
Kind of similarly, what do you want your children to say that they learned from you?
I think related to this is just a real simple question. If we go back to the dinner table, what are your children going to say that you were always talking about?
Like, just literally, like, think about your life. Think about the conversations. What are the things that are often on your lips? What are your children going to say they heard you talking about a lot.
Of course, let's keep in mind there's a lot of good answers, right? There are a lot of good answers to these questions. I can think back, right, of Mr. Hanula teaching me the history of the Pacific Northwest.
I want my children to know the history of their place and to love it, right?
I want to think through creatively. How do I learn some of the history of Harrisburg and our church and all this so that I can teach you. So those are good things.
I hope. Your children say that my parents taught me to seek the welfare of the city where God has placed them, like we're instructed to do in John at 29, as Jeremiah instructed the exiles in Babylon to do long ago. I want my children to learn to love the arts and, you know, music and painting and all of that. My kids love sports, and I love that there's lots of answers that you could give. But what will they say that you most talked about?
What were you eager to have on your lips more than anything else?
They say, you know, my parents wanted me to love this. Well, of course, there are a number of questions or passages that I could read to you from. Well, actually, quite a few. But let me read to you Deuteronomy 6, verses, 6 to 9. So this is Moses.
This is his fifth book. As they enter into the promised land, he's instructing them. Deuteronomy means the second giving of the law. This is the book that was written right before they entered in. He says, and these words that I command you today shall be on your heart.
Isn't that slip service? You shall teach them diligently to your children and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk, by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise, you shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates. He's saying the law of the Lord and the ways of God and how he has saved you are the thing that's it that you should have on your lips when you're walking around, when you're lying down, when you're eating your dinner. They're on your hands, they're right before you, they're right between your eyes.
It's what you see that is what our children should know that we want to instruct them in. So will your children say the main thing, the main thing that you wanted them to know and to pass on to their own children was God?
In some ways it's a simple assessment. It's a great question. Is that going to be the thing that your children go, that's what my parents. That's what my church, that's what their friends wanted me to know. The glorious deeds of the Lord, as it says here, his might, his wonders that he's done.
Well, they say you wanted them to not forget the works of God, but to keep his commandments, as verse 7 says.
Well, they say that you did not want them to be stubborn and rebellious generation that were not steadfast and were not faithful to God, as verse 8 says.
What would they say that you taught them? What's the main thing? So my first point is this. Instruct the present. Learn it yourself.
The past as a parable. Instruct the present and the future with the past. Okay. Of course, what very easily comes out of that is the second main point, which is what happened. Right?
I mean, that's a good question. Well, if we're supposed to know this, what is this? What are these lessons from history? That's kind of the second main thing. What are the lessons from history?
And let's just broadly agree that learning the lessons from history is very wise thing to do. And you can agree with this if you're a Christian or not this morning, learn the good things from history and the not so good things from history, Right. There's lots that we can say are great about our city from past and that are not so great. There's a lot of good about our country from the past and a lot that's not so great. And you know, when you talk about American history, it seems as though you either have to be in one of those camps, right?
It's either. You have to look at it, go, oh man, blah, blah, blah, blah. Just, you know, Only the story is the story of slavery or it's only good.
We know that it's more complex than that. Of course. Think about some of the history that we must learn here in Harrisburg. Some of you all know the history of the 8th Ward here in Harrisburg that became our state capitol park, where Soldiers Grove and that area that was like that ward was the heartbeat of primarily the minority communities and immigrant communities in our city. Place where the churches and the synagogues were, where the music venues were, where their businesses thrived.
We decided we want Soldiers Grove instead. We displaced thousands of. Of minorities and immigrants. Primarily the black community, the Jewish community, Italian communities. We need to know these stories.
These are important stories for our city to tell. And we need to know the stories of God's great work and our rebellious hearts. And that's kind of the two big things that are in the rest of this psalm. The story of God's great work, his saving acts for his people. And our rebellion, our rebellious, sinful hearts.
So first, the work of God for his. For the work of God were wondrous for his people. His great saving acts were amazing for his people. So let's see, guys. Do we have verse 9 to 72?
You ready?
Here's what we're going to do. I'm just going to highlight some of these for you, okay? We're not going to walk through it. All right. I know we have canoeing and I need to be at Paxton, and you all want to eat eventually.
But if you look at verse 13 and 13 16, what you'll see is a little bit here of God, of it being recounted, of what God did in parting the Red Sea, and the story of the pillar of fire by night and the cloud by day. Right. Of how God brought them in safety. Even when things seem like we saw last week unimaginably against them, God was providing for them. I mean, there's some beautiful language here.
He made the waters stand like a heap. Waters don't stand like a heap unless God does it. His saving acts for his people. Amazing. If you look down at verse 20, this is kind of a funny verse because they spoke against God, saying, can God spread a table in the wilderness?
He struck the rocks with the waters gushed out and streamed overflowing. Can he also give bread and provide first people? That's kind of a rebellious thing. But the fact is that it does recount what God does. Right?
Even in the rebellious hearts, it's mentioning what God does. If we look at verses 23, down to verse 29, I'm not going to read all of this, but this part here is talking about how God provided them food in the wilderness in this desert place. And if you know the story, what they're really grumbling about is the fact that they had, ah, the food back in Egypt. Some of you know the Keith Green song Hamburgers, right? They're remembering the hamburgers, they're thinking back and they're grumbling.
And God provides for them miraculously, unbelievably, lavishly, in the midst of the desert. We can jump down to verse 45 to 51. This is a long recounting of the plague that God sent because Pharaoh was hardened and he was not going to let God's people go. And he sends these plague after plague after plague so that his people can be freed from their 400 years of slavery. God using his power, his saving act for the sake of his people.
Verses 54 and 55, they brought them to his holy land, to the mountains which his right hand had won. He drove out nations before them. He appointed them for possession, settled the tribes of Israel in their tents. Which is, he's saying, God is the one that brought us into this promised land. It's he that did it.
Which by the way, let me take a quick aside here. This is a rabbit trail that has to do with the point when the first battle that takes place when God brings His people from the wilderness into the promised land is the battle of Jericho. Right? What are the people of God doing that they don't do basically anything. They walk around and they blow a horn and actually is God gracious?
He shows his grace. His grace is open to all the people there at Jericho. Why do we know that? Because Rahab, who is a prostitute, is the one that is saved. Because she says, I follow your God.
People don't do anything. God does it. Right. And that's part of what this is recounting. This is the mighty acts of God for these people that just don't do anything.
Anyway, this is the refrain in this psalm. It goes, here's what God did. Here's what God did. Here's what God did. Here's the story of how God acts.
Here's how he does miraculously beyond what you could imagine, beyond what makes sense of creation. Here's how he has done it. He's done it all.
But I asked you, partly because I know my own mind is going to wander when somebody's reading 72 verses. So I asked you, hey, would you try to be attentive when I'M reading this to the buts and the yets and the even sos and all that kind of stuff. Because as much as this psalm is recounting for us the wondrous acts of God for His people, it is recounting for us their rebellious hearts and their sinful lives. And so let's look at some of these. Okay.
And they're kind of sandwiched in between all those other ones. Right. Verse 10 and 11, right after this command. They did not keep God's covenant, but refused to walk according to his law. They forgot his works and the wonders he had shown them.
Verse 17 and 19 to 19. Yet they sinned still more against him. Rebelling against the Most High in the desert, they tested God in their hearts by demanding the food they craved. They spoke against God, saying, can God spread a table in the wilderness?
Verse 21 and 22. They didn't believe God or trust in his Saving power. Verse 31.
Yeah. Despite all that he had done, they still sinned. Despite his wonders, they don't believe. Verse 36, verse 37. They flattered him with their mouths, but lied to him with their tongues.
Their hearts were not satisfied toward Him. They were not faithful to his covenant. Verse 40.
How often they rebelled against him in the wilderness and grieved him in the desert. And then verse 56 to 66, which I'm not going to read all of again, but it begins, yet they tested and rebelled against the Most High God. And actually what that whole next section is talking about is that they. They rebelled in terms of idols. They went after other gods.
They said, something else is going to give me what I desire. Something else is going to protect me and provide for me and give me meaning. See, here's what's happening is that all along, this recounting of history that the preamble says you've got a place alongside your own, is recounting the great deeds of God and recounting a rebellious and sinful people constantly. Just as you go throughout, you're like, man, God is amazing and man, these people, which they were to say is us, because they're singing it, reject God again and again.
See, if we're. If we tell this history well, you have to tell both the wondrous part and the rebellious part. If you're going to live wisely in the present, if you're going to instruct the future, you got to tell both sides.
So again, what story are you telling?
Are you telling stories of God's faithfulness?
Are you willing to tell the stories of your own rebellion. Maybe you notice that actually in this psalm also, the rebellion is not just, hey, we did this, but actually, here's the effects of it, here's the judgment, or here's just how this destroyed us. Here's how my sin led to something that was really not good.
Are you telling a story with your word and with your actions that is honest?
Do you spend your time and your money? Because that's another way that we tell a story that recounts the wonders of God.
Are you telling history honestly?
To tell history well, to tell the history of God and of God's people, to tell our own stories faithfully, you have to tell both of these.
We have to tell the story of God's wondrous grace and our sin. We have to tell the stories of the disastrous effects of sin.
So how do you tell the story? What's the story you're telling? Are you being honest with it?
So I have often thought, and I've said this before, but probably not for a long time, one of the reasons why I'm a Christian, which is a good question to ask yourself if you're actually, Let me encourage you with this. I've given you so many questions to ask around the dinner table, but maybe ask this one.
Why are you Christian? If you're with a Christian? Okay. If you're, like, having lunch together today, maybe before going canoeing, maybe ask yourself, why are you a Christian? Here's one of the reasons why I'm a Christian.
The world is immensely, sometimes overwhelmingly beautiful. I mean, creation itself. At times, how many of us have sat down along the riverside park and watched the sunset? I mean, it's like, literally, it'll take your breath away. But other people are like, each one of you are wonderfully beautiful.
And if you sit with someone, you're, like, amazed by, wow, look at how you're made. And how insightful different people. I mean, it's like so much beauty in the world, which is how the whole Bible begins, the great works of God. Good, good, good. You know, God looks back and says, very good.
So you have to give an account. You have to give an account for the wondrous beauty of the world, the overwhelming beauty of the world. But you must also give an account for why is. Why are things so messed up?
Why is it that the streets do not feel safe at certain times of the day? At night? Why does war persist as it does when so many do desire peace?
Why are marriages, even the best marriages, so often fraught with conflict?
So you must give an account Both for the beauty of the world and for the brokenness of the world. You have to, because it is so glaringly obvious. And one of the reasons I'm a Christian is because Christianity does that. It doesn't shirk off either. It doesn't say, oh, it's so messed up, right?
It's not just a Debbie downer about things, nor is it sort of, ah, everything's just fine, don't worry about gives a true account of the way the world is. So here's this story that's doing the same for the people of God and God's interaction with us. The mighty saving acts of God in a consistently rebellious people.
I wonder if you were able to make it with attention to the end. It's a long psalm. I don't blame you if you didn't. But if you get to the end, the last, last little paragraph there, the very last part of it says things like this. He rejected the tent of Joseph, you know, all this stuff, but he built a sanctuary like the heavens, like the earth, which he's founded forever.
He chose David, his servant and took him from the sheepfolds from following the nursing ewes. He brought him to shepherd Jacob, his people, Israel, his inheritance. With upright heart he shepherded them and guided them with his skillful hand.
There's this story of God working and just the consistent rebellious sinfulness of God's people. And it ends with saying there is a shepherd who once shepherded ewes as they were nursing their children. But now it's to shepherd my people. And the New Testament and actually the scriptures often look forward to a greater David. And that one is actually called the shepherd of his people, the true shepherd, right?
The good shepherd, as John says. And that is Jesus. And I think honestly this, I don't think this is forcing this at all. This passage is pointing us to the work of God in Christ Jesus. Because it is at is in Jesus that we see the true telling of the story, right?
The true account of the world is seen in the great shepherd. Because Jesus does not shirk off the wonder of the world so often. He's re establishing the wonder of the world. He's giving sight to the blind, making the lame to walk. He's estravicing social relationships that have been broken.
He's feeding people. He does right after the resurrection most time he's just eating with people as though he's like delighting in the wonder of the taste of grilled fish over a campfire, right? He's saying this world is lovely but what the cross does is it says, this world is in utter rebellion, and you and I are in utter rebellion. And it does us no good to shirk that off. That has got to be dealt with.
Because the effects of rebellion are destruction. The effects of rebellion are always disastrous. And so Jesus goes to the place where there is the most destruction, the most gruesome destruction, the cross, and says, I'm going to show you both the love of God and the heinous reality of rebellion and sin, and I'm going to take that upon myself. Your sin and your rebellion is so awful that it demands the very death of God. But God gladly does it for you because he holds together the beauty of the world and the brokenness.
He tells the story honestly.
So I want to invite you again.
First I'm going to ask you to ask the question, who is the teacher that influences you the most? Why? Right? Who? Why?
What? What did he influence? How did he influence you? And then I want you to ask this question. I've given you a lot, but these are the two main ones.
What history are you telling?
What history are your words telling, your actions telling? And if you're a Christian, are they telling the story of Jesus? That's what we are to pass on to one another. We're to pass on to the generations after us. That's what we're doing still in them in such a way that they want to instill it to their children and their children's children.
What story are you telling? Let's pray. Lord God, we're thankful for this psalm, long though it is packed full of different stories that we could dive into. But God, I thank you for this sober encouragement. And I pray, Lord, that in the sobriety of it we would look to the cross and cast our sins there, where we are washed clean by the pure and spotless Lamb, who is our Lord Jesus himself, in whose name we pray.
Amen.

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