7Lift up your heads, O ye gates; and be ye lift up, ye everlasting doors; and the King of glory shall come in.
8Who is this King of glory? The LORD strong and mighty, the LORD mighty in battle.
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3 comments:
Lift up your heads, O gates,
And be lifted up, O ancient doors,
That the King of glory may come in!
Who is the King of glory?
The LORD strong and mighty,
The LORD mighty in battle. (Psalms 24:7-8 - NASB Version)
Lift up your heads, O you gates;
be lifted up, you ancient doors,
that the King of glory may come in.
Who is this King of glory? The LORD strong and mighty, the LORD mighty in battle. The LORD mighty in battle. (Psalms 24:7-8 - NIV Version)
These verses tell me that we have to acknowledge God as the king and Lord in every aspect of our lives. Unfortunately, it is true that Satan is "prince of this world/of the Demons" (according to John 12:31 /Luke 11:15)who tries to lure us to sin, and we are helpless sinners who need the grace and love of Christ every day. In addition to endless sinful temptations in our lives, and though there are never-ending wars and conflicts around the whole world, I still believe that God is in control over all mankind and the universe -> "the LORD strong and mighty, the LORD mighty in battle." We should always remember that God does not rest, but always waits for people to turn to Him....
Building upon my comments for verses 5-6, I believe these verses are foretelling the aftermath of Jesus' life and death on earth. His death literally tore open the curtain of the inner sanctuary. Therefore the gates that barred human beings from God are now forever lifted up. The King of Glory (Jesus Christ) enters and blazes the way.
Verse 8 is the messah that the Jews were expecting. They expected a new Joshua, a great Jewish warrior, who would free his people from persecution by the Romans. Instead, Jesus Christ came, a Lord strong and might in the great spiritual battle. Jesus didn't come to save people from earthly enslavement but from a spiritual enslavement. He came to fight and win a much bigger battle - one that the Jews at the time could not even hope to imagine. To imagine that a mere man could accomplish such things is blasphemy. And how could any human being even conceive of the idea of God debasing himself by becoming human - just to save us? How could any human being be so vain as to think that God would sacrifice His only living son, a part of Himself, to redeem a sinful and unfaithful human race? It makes complete sense to me why the Jews at the time were expecting a certain type of messiah and had such difficulty in believing in the real messiah. We take Jesus Christ and His sacrifice so for granted now. We forget how truly mind blowing Jesus really is.
When I really take in His majesty and grace, I want to shout out these verses with joy.
At first I thought the gates and doors referred to here are to the entrance to Heaven. But I'm not sure why the text says "may come in." God's home is Heaven so I'm not sure how we would ever find God outside of it. Even if we ignore this issue, wouldn't God be coming and going at His own pleasure? The other curious word here is "ancient" which is different from "eternal." There's a suggestion of something that's been around a long time but not necessarily forever (past and future). So alternatively, the doors/gates may be referring to the ones guarding the hearts and minds of mankind from the very beginning starting with Adam and Eve. Either way, I also think that "the King" here may not only be a direct reference to God of the Old Testament but it may also be alluding to Jesus Christ (as SJ mentions about earlier verses).
I did not appreciate this when I was at an earlier stage of my faith but I definitely now understand why Paul refers to spreading the gospel as "the good fight" and why there are numerous "warfare" references in the Bible and elsewhere. But it's concerning whenever I notice some over-zealous folks interpreting and implementing this idea too literally.
I just read the earlier comments posted by WM and SJ. Very enlightening -- especially regarding how the Jewish people at Christ's time would have answered the question in verse 8.
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