Psalm 24:3-10: Who Shall Ascend? Who is this King of Glory?

Vs. 3-4 Who may ascend to the hill of the Lord? Who may stand in his holy place? He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not lift up his soul to an idol or swear by what is false.

In this verse we have moved from the universal rule of Yahweh over the entire world and its inhabitants to His local presence in Jerusalem. We move from the depths of the sea to the hill of the Lord, from a place of chaos and brokenness, to a place of holiness and life.

Who among the inhabitants of the earth is able to stand in the holy place of Yahweh? The requirements are four fold:

1. The one who has clean hands
2. The one who has a pure heart
3. The one who does not lift his soul to an idol
4. The one who does not swear by what is false

Clean Hands and Pure Hearts:

John Calvin said, “Clean hands and pure hearts comprehend all religion and denote a well ordered life.” The two ideas are largely about holy actions and holy intentions.

Interestingly, the lectionary associates this passage with the bringing of the ark into Jerusalem. The counterpart passage is the narrative where the Ox cart stumbles and Uzzah reaches out to stabilize the ark with his hand and when he touches it Yahweh strikes him dead.

You see, the action of Uzzah was not morally neutral or even good. No one is to touch the ark – that’s why the priests carry it on poles. Presbyterian theologian RC Sproul’s got it right when he comments that Uzzah’s assumption in touching the ark was that his hands were clean. His assumption was that his hands were clean while the dirt was not. But since clean is a moral category, this is a major problem for him – the earth has never morally rebelled against Yahweh. The earth has never disobeyed. The earth has never dwelt in sin. But Uzzah has done all of these – his hands are not clean.

Or consider the idea of a pure heart – the idea Jesus plays on in the sermon on the mount when he says those one with a pure heart will “see God.”  The idea here is that one must have a heart which has unmixed devotions or allegiances. It is a heart that lives under the reality of Yahweh as Creator and Redeemer and therefore does not bow to any other king.

This then make sense of the next two criterion for approaching Yahweh – one who does not lift up (that is, take a posture of worship) his soul or being to an idol, nor swear by what is false – that is, something which is contrary to the reality which God has set in place.

Vs. 5 He will receive blessing from the Lord and vindication from God his savior.

The Christian tradition has always held that there is only one who has ever qualified to mount the holy hill and stand in the presence of Yahweh. There is only one who has ever been blessed and has been vindicated – that is, pronounced as righteous, before Yahweh.

As we try move to the final section of this psalm, we note that the Christian church has always used this text in its Ascension liturgy. Christ, the only one to live with clean hands and a pure heart, the only one to orient the entirety of his being to Yahweh’s moral standards ordered in the very creation, the only one able to ascend the hill of the Lord and stand in his holy place, he and he only is the one who has ever been worthy to be called the King of Glory.

The Christian connection, then, is that the psalm not only indicates that the perfect Son of God is worthy, but that He is the same King who is entering the Temple gates.

For thousands of years those ancient gates stood still. Lifeless. Unmoving. No one was able to enter. No one worthy to mount the hill of Yahweh. No one worthy to stand in the Holy place – or see God.

The ancient gates grew rusty in their stillness – a continual reminder of human brokenness and a world gone awry.

But when the worthy one comes – fully devoted, fully clean, fully pure, without competing allegiances – even the allegiance of saving his own life – the heavens cry out to those ancient doors  – Lift up your heads in hope and anticipation of redemption, of expectation of creation (Eden) restored! Be lifted up you ancient doors that the King of Glory may come it.

AS the proclamation went  out for the first time in history, those old, telling doors slowly creaked open. Never has a human ever entered them. Never has flesh and blood ever been worthy. But now things will never be the same. There is hope.

This Christ, the chosen one of God who took on flesh, who through the power of the Spirit refused to bow down and worship the devil or give his allegiances to Rome, enters the gates as a representative of all humanity and all creation – THE EARTH IS THE LORD’S AND EVERYTHING IN IT! For the Son, through death, has mightily battled the devil, the principalities and powers, and has won! His victorious resurrection was God’s vindication of him – his pronouncement that this single man, of all people, is the one who is worthy. Who is this King of Glory? The Lord, mighty in battle, having already defeated the devil and works in us rights to become children of God – princes and princesses, priests and kings.

Psalm 24:2 – Creation is Not Morally Neutral

Vs. 2 For he founded it upon the seas and established it upon the waters.

This kind of language makes no sense to modern people – that is, substantiating Yahweh’s claim to ownership by appealing to His founding of the earth upon the waters. But to ancient Jews it would have made complete sense. Not only did their concept of creation involve the notion of the earth resting upon huge deposits of water, but that notion had interesting theological significance.

You see, ancient Jews associated water with chaos – even demons.

Consider all your Sunday School stories that involved major bodies of water and you will see that the water is hardly ever a good character:

1. Noah’s ark where the waters of chaos systematically undo the creation account of Genesis 1.

2. Think of the Nile River turned to blood. The Nile, and Egyptian deity, conquered, killed, slaughtered like an animal by Yahweh.

3. Consider the Red Sea where the sea stands between the Israelites and their salvation, where Yahweh proves powerful enough to move an entire body of water.

4. Or think of Jonah who goes out to the sea precisely because the sea is where He thinks Yahweh is not!

5. Or Jesus, who is out on the sea multiple times when he calms storms and, indeed, walks on the water.

6. Or finally, Revelation, where the sea is calmed and brought to glassy subjugation under Yahweh’s sovereignty.

For the ancient Jew, to say that God established the earth upon the waters was not merely a geological claim. No far from it – it was a theological claim. Yahweh was sovereign over all the forces of chaos in the world that threaten to unhinge creation and put an end to his redemptive purposes.

But consider this…

If Yahweh is claiming ownership, indeed Kingship, over a creation where he has set a certain order, a certain reality, a certain way of being, then it follows logically from there that this creation is not morally neutral.

To claim allegiance to any other deity, nation, or story is to fight against the very creation itself; indeed, it is to fight against Yahweh. But when  people and nations center themselves within His story, there is an order to life, a shalom (a peace which is more than merely the absence of violence, but the presence of Justice!).

The larger biblical narrative is clear that Yahweh’s defeat of the agents of chaos is not only a creative act, but a redemptive act. Particularly in the cross Jesus is said to have defeated all principalities and powers, thrones, rulers, dominions, and authorities. In the cross, according to Hebrews 2, Jesus defeats death (anti-creation) and the devil.

From first to last creation is connected to redemption and redemption involves the defeat of evil, chaos, and disorder.

So it remains clear, that if this creation is not morally neutral, then any who wish to approach King Yahweh must not assume moral neutrality is an option. But we’ll explore this a bit more in the next post.

Hovering Over the Face of the Deep: The Spirit in Creation

For all our debates about the nature and genre of the Creation stories in Genesis 1 and 2, I’m amazed by the lack of discussion surrounding the meaning of the Spirit’s activities in 1:2 where the text reads, “And the Spirit of God hovered over the face of the deep.”

We’ve been so sidetracked by other questions, often questions the text isn’t even asking, that we’ve overlooked this odd and fascinating feature of the Creation narrative – the presence and activity of God’s Spirit.

Neglecting the Spirit’s role in creation is easy for us, not only because we’re distracted by the Creationism vs. Evolution questions, but also because we’ve severely limited the Spirits role in the Christian life to conviction of sin and assurance of salvation. Or, more specifically, we’ve limited the Spirit’s role to our subjective devotional lives.

But prior to the need for conviction of sin and the need for assurance of salvation, the Spirit was involved in the work of creation. Contrary to our privatized Pneumatology, the fingerprints of the Spirit are clearly displayed in the cosmos.

But what do those finger prints look like? And why was the Spirit hovering over the deep?

By placing the Spirit within Genesis 1:2, where we have the beginning of a movement from darkness and void to order and light, the author suggests the Spirit is the agent by which creation is given form and order. The Spirit is not removed from the creation; the Spirit is intimately with the creation, guiding its development and progress along with the spoken word of God.[1]

The Spirit’s hovering over the face of the deep is significant. For the ancient Hebrews, the sea was a force of chaos and unruliness. Often mythologized in Babylonian religions, the chaotic character of the sea is confirmed by numerous biblical accounts: Noah’s Flood and the destruction of the entire world, the crossing of the Red Sea, Jonah and the whale, Jesus and the calming of the Storm.[2] Even more telling is in Revelation when the sea is the place from which the great Beast comes (13:1) and, ultimately, a place to be destroyed in the new creation: “and there was no longer any sea.”(21:1)

Furthermore, within our narrative, it is important to note that the deep is possibly a subtle reference to a Babylonian deity, Tehoim, “a belligerent and monstrous ocean goddess.”[3] If so, Genesis 1:2 would have been an especially comforting verse for ancient Hebrews wrestling with the constant pressures of Babylonian culture and religion. Not only are the chaotic waters of the deep under the Spirit’s dominion, but implicitly and subversively, Babylonian religion is stripped of its power and demonstrated to be inferior to the religion of Yahweh. For in our narrative, the Spirit is holding at bay the chaotic forces of the world – Babylonian religious and cultural influence, to be more specific. The Spirit drifts over the deep and demonstrates the dominion of God over the disorder soiling the life of an exiled people attempting to be faithful to Yahweh’s covenant “in a foreign land.” (Ps. 137:1-4)[4]

I know the objections will be that there are no forces of evil yet b/c Genesis 3 has not yet occurred. But, again, like the Creationism debates, I don’t think that’s the question the narrative asks.[5]

Rather, it assumes some sort of rebellion has already occurred. You see, the pre-Fall narrative is replete with numerous subtle references to Babylonian deities, and even words which indicated violent subjugation (1:28).[6] Furthermore, such an answer also accounts for the mysterious serpent in Genesis 3 – another possible allusion to a Babylonian deity, and one which would, again, make a lot of sense to an ancient Hebrew person struggling with the constant influences of Babylonian religion and culture.[7]

Thus, what we’re learning from Genesis 1:2 is that those forces of chaos, those things in the world that are disorderly and unruly, are still held in check by the Spirit. The Spirit is already at work to bring the creation back to its original intention – the order of God.

The implication of this is, yes, that there were forces of death operative within creation prior to Genesis 3, but those forces of death were not yet operative within humanity or the earth in which humanity resided. But these forces of death are being checked by the Spirit. Indeed, even though the narrative makes subtle references to pagan deities, these subtle references are subtle precisely because the narrator wants the reader to see that the sea was created by God and that God is in control. The sea is not a deity, it is part of Yahweh’s creation and He is sovereign over it as the Spirit hovers over the deep and keeps it in its place (Ps. 140:9). “The author here plainly understands God’s act of creation to have involved some type of conflict with cosmic chaos, but also clearly portrays Yahweh as being more than up to the task.”[8]

So what is the Spirit doing hovering over the face of the deep? Displaying and maintaining God’s sovereignty over creation. Demonstrating God’s intimate concern for the details of His creation. And ensuring the ancient reader that God maintains control over the chaotic influences and forces of false religion. The gigs up: the Sea is demythologized and shown to be part of creation. It is not an independent agent, and insofar as chaotic forces do control the sea, Genesis 1 will not allow us to despair, as if Yahweh has lost his sovereignty.

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[1] For a great discussion on the closeness of the Word and the Spirit, see Walther Eichrodt, Theology of the Old Testament. Vol. II (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1967), 49-50. Eichrodt argues that there are times in Israel’s history where the “word” and the “Spirit” are nearly identical in nature and indistinguishable from one another.

[2] Also see Job 7:12 when Job asks God is he is a cosmic opponent that needs to be guarded and watched – like the Sea and the Dragon.

[3] Victor P. Hamilton, The Book of Genesis: Chapter 1-17. NICOT. (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 1990), 110.

[4] Obviously this assumes a later date for the final composition of Genesis. I have no problem saying the sources go back much further, but the final redactors included these stories with these details to communicate certain and specific theological truths to their contemporaries in exile.

[5] Notice how the narrative never says the “deep” was “good.”

[6] In 1:28, the word the first of the 2 words for “dominion/rule” is an extremely violent one. It is used elsewhere in Hebrew literature to refer to pillaging after war. The question, then, becomes, why is there a need for violent subjugation if the creation as a whole is still under God’s rule?

[7] The serpent, like the sea, is de-mythologized and is demonstrated to be merely a creature made by the Lord God, not a deity to be worshipped (3:1).

[8] Greg Body, God at War.