Psalm 15 - 10 Traits For Those That Want To Live With God

Podcast Transcript (Auto-Transcribed by Apple Podcasts)

Hello, and welcome back to Tabernacle Talk. We are at the end of our third week in the Book of Psalms. And it seems crazy to me that it's already been three weeks.

Kind of seems like it's flown by a little bit. And today, we are in Psalm 15. And this is another one of the Psalms of David.

And it starts off with just a great question. It's a question that many of us, if we've never thought about it before, we should think about this question. It's that important.

And Psalm 15 and verse 1 says this, Yahweh, who may reside in your tent, who may settle on your holy hill?

One thing that I don't believe I've mentioned on Tabernacle Talk before is with Hebrew poetry, which is what this book, the Book of Proverbs, the Book of Lamentations, Song of Songs, a few others throughout the Old Testament, these are Hebrew poetry.

Now, Hebrew poetry isn't necessarily this line rhymes with this line, though there are words that rhyme in Hebrew, and sometimes those are used in Scripture.

But how the Psalms and Proverbs especially are built is there will be two or three lines together, and they will either elaborate or rephrase, the second line will elaborate or rephrase the first line, or it could be put in contrast to the first

line. So, you know, when you think about how blessed is the one who does not walk in the council of the ungodly or stand in the way of sinners or sit in the seat of the scornful, it's all building lines.

He says, but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in his law, he meditates. So there's kind of that parallel that these things are opposite from each other. Sometimes it's building on each other.

So this is verse one of Psalm 15. Who may reside in your tent? Who gets to live with you, God?

It says, who may settle on your holy hill? That would be, obviously, we would know Jerusalem.

It's where the temple would be built, not built in David's day, but by the time that these Psalms were being compiled and put together by the Jews after the exile from Babylon and after they had returned, they would have known about the temple,

obviously, where David had initially put kind of the kingdom and his seat there in Jerusalem. And that was the place where God's temple was going to be. So he says, Who may reside in your tent, who may settle on your holy hill?

Who gets to be where God is? For many of the people in the ancient world, there was always a thought that the gods, the spiritual beings, they all lived on mountains. It was, they were places that were unattainable to the everyday person.

You know, they didn't have oxygen masks and all the sorts of things that now we use when we climb incredibly high mountains. And once you get up there, there's not really much in the way of food that you would be able to eat.

So not as much mountain climbing was taking place during this period of time. And so people always associated hills and mountains with where the gods were.

And for Israel, they often use some of those same phrases as their neighbors around them would use of, you know, God's holy hill, God's mountain. The mountain of God is what even the Garden of Eden is called, and it's either Isaiah or Ezekiel.

So here David writes, who gets to be in the presence of God? And he gives ten items.

It's ten thoughts, and they're kind of broken up into some smaller sections, but there's ten traits that David views as essential for those that would want to be with God, for those that want to be in his presence.

He says, here are ten things that we need to have in mind. He says, one who walks with integrity, practices righteousness, and speaks truth in his heart. To walk with integrity, that who you purport yourself to be is genuine.

That if you say you're going to do something, you will follow through on it. That if you purport yourself to be a righteous person, or a good person, or a Christian person, that is genuinely who you are. You're not putting on airs.

You're not just trying to make yourself look good. You are genuine. You have integrity that oftentimes the word integrity is used today.

If your house structure lacks integrity, then it might be that if you lean a little too hard against one wall, you might fall through. Don't step on that area of the floor, or else your foot will go right on through.

Having integrity that when the tough times come, when temptations come, you still stand and endure through it. So one who walks with integrity, one who practices righteousness, this is right relationship with both God and man.

If you view righteousness as just something between you and God, then you might think of yourself as very righteous when you are living in such a way with other people that is just completely foreign. God would never declare you righteous.

You might say, but I've got all of these theological opinions that I believe are correct. Wonderful. That by itself is not righteousness.

It is living in right relationship with God and with man. That you are not attempting to belittle anyone else. You're not trying to take advantage of anyone else.

You are not at odds with someone. You're not bearing hatred in your heart for another person. A number of other things that could go into a right relationship with God and with man.

But he says he practices righteousness. Righteousness isn't just some label that gets slapped on you if you have done enough good work. So great, you're a righteous person now.

No, you do righteousness. You do things that result in a right relationship with people. In eschewing sin and calling on God for needing his righteousness for a right relationship with him, we pursue that right relationship with him.

We don't disobey his commands, we don't ignore his commands, but we're seeking to live right with both God and man. It says, one who speaks truth in his heart.

And sometimes it can be easier to speak the truth out to other people, but how we need to speak truth in our heart, that we like to think and have certain opinions about ourselves, we like to think and have certain opinions about God or about his

justice or about the way he views the world, and we need to be ones that speak truth in our heart, that we don't allow ourselves to be captivated by lies and untruths and things that are not true of God, not true of ourselves, not true of other

people, but that we would have in our heart, in our mind a meditation on what is factual, what is real, what is genuine, what is true, and not spend all of our time thinking untruths. So who can settle on the Lord's property? Who is invited to his

dinner party? One who walks with integrity, practices righteousness, speaks truth in his heart. He does not slander with his tongue, nor do evil to his neighbor, nor bring shame on his friend. So here there are some successive things that you see.

He does not slander with his tongue. You do not speak evil of someone else. You do not demean their intelligence.

You do not demean their works. It doesn't mean that you can't speak truth, but it does mean that the way in which you do it gives honor to them as image bearers of God.

That because they, in one way or another, image part of who God is, that they are created in his image, that we would give honor to them. We wouldn't slander them.

We wouldn't speak lies and untruths about another person, and we wouldn't say things in such a way that would be insulting. Verse 3, he does not slander with his tongue, nor do evil to his neighbor.

And this kind of correlates with the practicing righteousness, the slander with his tongue.

You could see kind of pairing a little bit with integrity, that there would be a wholeness in his speech, that integrity of a person then means that they are not doing evil to others.

They're not trying to one up someone, they're not trying to take advantage of them, not trying to rob them, get their funds, get their money, a number of things. It says, nor bring shame on his friend.

I've known people in my life, and I'm sure you know people in yours, that the very fact that you know them is now a source of shame.

That because of their wicked actions, because of how they've treated people, because of the wrong that they've done, it's a shame that you know them. And you'd go, oh yeah, that person was my friend. That person was my relative.

That person was my youth pastor. And we would never want to be the person that through our living brings shame on our friends. So we want to avoid that.

Verse number four. A despicable person is despised in his eyes. And the person that wants to be with God, it says a despicable person is despised in his eyes.

That we do not value and esteem and hold as something to be modeled or admired or mimicked. Those that are against God. We can see some clarity in that in the very next line.

A despicable person is despised in his eyes, but he honors those who fear Yahweh. A despicable person is not just someone that, oh, they smell bad and so you hate the people that are weird. You hate the people that are gross.

You hate the people that whatever. No, no, no. It's those that do not fear the Lord.

Those are who are despised in the eyes of a person that values God.

Now, that doesn't mean, okay, I thought you said we shouldn't slander, we shouldn't harbor hatred in our heart for people, but now you're saying we have to despise those that don't fear the Lord.

It is that we don't view them as someone to be mimicked, admired or followed. It doesn't mean that we don't respect them as imagers of God.

You can think of 1 Peter chapter 2, and I'm turning over there where he says something along the lines of honor all men. Here we are. He says this, honor all people, love the brotherhood, fear God, honor the king.

We're called to honor everyone, not just the people that are saved, not just Christians. We are also called to honor those that are without Christ. But it doesn't mean that we view their lives as something that we follow.

It doesn't mean that we really, it doesn't mean that we speak only well of them to other people. So there are some people that maybe are very successful in the world.

And if all we ever say is good things about maybe their business acumen to other people, it might appear as though we are condoning their life, their godless, wicked life. And we would want to be careful not to do that.

Well, at the same time, not slandering people, but we would realize that who we hold up, who we, I can think even in the political realm, who we mention as being especially valuable to vote for ought to be god-fearing people.

It doesn't mean that if there's an instance in which, you know, there are multiple non-Christians that are there to vote for, it doesn't mean you can't vote for them, but in who we give authority, in who we give awe, in who we give whatever the

opposite of despising would be, in whoever we commend to others in our word, we have to be careful from this verse that we aren't holding up as something to be adopted and loved, someone that does not fear the Lord. They're in the next line.

But he honors those who fear the Lord, our greatest honor and accolades and compliments and sharing and whatever should be for those that fear the Lord, those that love him.

And that we would honor those that fear the Lord, that we don't save all of our honor and respect for just those that make it big in the world.

Let's compliment and make big those that make a spiritual difference in our lives, that we would love those that are joint heirs with us, with Christ as fellow Christians. Let's honor those people.

It says he takes an oath to his own detriment and does not change.

So here, the person that resides in God's tent, who settles on God's holy hill, he doesn't worry about if he is in a financial deal that is going south, that he kind of sees it through. He is honest with his money.

He doesn't bail at the first kind of sign of trouble. I read another couple of translations that made that even a little bit clearer here than the New American Standard has it. Who keeps his word, whatever the cost.

And thought that was a very great way to phrase this particular thought, that even if it costs him, he is going to keep his oath. He is going to keep his word. Verse number five, he does not lend his money at interest.

That would be something that was prohibited in Israel to fellow Israelites. They couldn't charge one another interest. It was, okay, if I give you a loan, I'm only getting that back.

There was some interest permitted for foreigners, but they were not to take advantage of one another.

Someone that needed a loan, that needed money, was already not in a good situation, and so God prohibited his people from then charging interest on those loans from fellow Israelites.

So he says he does not lend his money at interest, nor does he take a bribe against the innocent.

This would be in kind of a judge format, that they would not be the ones that would take advantage of the poor just because they got a little something on the side. And so I wanted to mention that.

That if you are in a situation where you do have authority or power over other people, never use it in order to extort from people. Never use it that if you've got a choice between two people and one person gives you a bribe, don't go with the bribe.

And I think the word bribe is even helpful in seeing how we phrase that or what that might look like. It says, one who does these things will never be shaken.

So what are the ten things that occur for someone that wants to be where God is, that wants to live with God? What typifies this person? They walk with integrity.

They practice righteousness. They speak truth in their heart. They do not slander with their tongue nor do evil to their neighbor.

They do not bring shame on their friend. A despicable person is despised in their eyes, but they honor those who fear the Lord. They take an oath to their own detriment.

They do right no matter the cost. They do not lend their money at interest, nor do they take a bribe against the innocent. The one who does these things will never be shaken.

So kind of ten somewhat random thoughts from across the spectrum of finances and testimony and words and number of other things that we can see for today. How do we live our life?

We live it realizing if we want to be with God, then we should act like God, that we would seek His face, seek His righteousness, and we should be those that do pray hunger and thirst after righteousness and ask God to help us to live out these

traits in our everyday life. Hope that be an encouragement to you today. Can't wait for next week. Psalm 16, Psalm 18, Psalm 19 are all some of my favorites in all of scripture.

So looking forward to reading through those with you. Thank you.