Small Group Guide

Small Group Guide MARKS OF THE CHURCH The Church at Brook Hills Matt Mason April 19, 2015 Psalm 48

MAIN TRUTH

Message Outline

To download the outline for this week’s sermon, visit brookhills.org/media.

Message Summary

Under the Old Covenant, the presence of God resided in the Temple in Jerusalem. Biblical writers often referred to Jerusalem as Zion, and God’s presence among His people there made the city a place of beauty and peace. Because it was God’s dwelling place, Jerusalem was the “joy of all the earth,” for from it, the God of all the universe dwelled with His people—those who were to reflect His glory to the surrounding nations (Ps. 48:2). As Jesus’ coming and redemption through His death and resurrection ushered in the New Covenant, God’s presence came to live in the hearts of His people. As they were spread among the earth, so was His presence. The Temple, then, no longer reflected the dwelling place of God—God’s holy city—but the church did—God’s bride. Therefore, we can see the connection between God’s people who literally dwelled in the city with God’s presence and the local gathering of God’s people in whom His presence dwells today.

Psalm 48 constructs a picture of the church as those who see God’s glory revealed in a unique way. Those who follow Christ and enter in community together witness the mercy and glory of God in a way that drives us to worship Him. As God rescued His people in the Old Testament, He rescues His church today. God has saved us from sin and death, and His presence never leaves us, no matter how difficult the circumstances. The worship of God’s people together, driven by His overwhelming glory and grace, drive them to constantly point the next generation and the nations to God’s amazing glory and redemption so that all people can come to worship Him.

WHY IT MATTERS

Digging Deeper

Oftentimes, we can be too quick to make leaps from Old Testament passages to current application. However, using Scripture to interpret Scripture is a valued Bible study tool. Hebrews 12 gives us clear indication that discussions regarding Zion and God’s people in the Old Testament is applicable to today’s understanding of the church. Lead your group to discuss the change in how local churches are viewed by believers today, particularly among younger generations. In the sermon, Matt Mason mentioned that a myriad of books have been recently published that decry problems among churches. Note that, although many complaints may be warranted, the church is still Christ’s plan to complete His mission and His tool to build up believers that they may fulfill their calling in His kingdom. Invite members to share how churches have impacted their lives in a nurturing way. Throughout the New Testament, the church is called the Bride of Christ. What does this term reveal about God’s affection toward His gathered people? What does negativity, animosity, or mockery of Christ’s church reveal about our attitude toward God’s plan and His intention for our lives to be connected with others for His mission?

Encourage your group to discuss why our culture is often so individualized that we prefer to avoid working with others for the sake of the gospel? Furthermore, why are we often so scared of membership with churches? Why do we think we can accomplish God’s calling on our lives without being in covenant with other believers? What are the biblical benefits of partnering with and covenanting with other like-minded believers for the sake of personal holiness and Gospel mission? Many people today claim that church membership is

“Marks of a Church,” April 19, 2015 | Page 1 Small Group Guide MARKS OF THE CHURCH The Church at Brook Hills Matt Mason April 19, 2015 Psalm 48 not a biblical mandate. However, it is an assumed action of believers. Based on New Testament practice and admonition, joining with others is something that is assumed and encouraged. In an age of podcasts and YouTube, why should someone join a local church? How can we become a local body in whom the marks of being God-honoring, Bible-teaching, and gospel-driven are evident? When we see issues that are problematic in our local church, how can we become part of the solution?

NOW WHAT DO WE DO?

Group Discussion & Application Use the following questions to examine what the sermon and its text mean, to apply the Word to your life, and to guide how you pray.

1. Jerusalem was known as Zion or the City of God. God’s presence dwelled there in the Temple among His people. Thinking about this historical perspective, how does Zion reflect the nature of God’s presence and His revealed glory and character through His dwelling place? 2. In Genesis 12, God promised that all the people of the earth would be blessed through Abraham. This blessing came through Jesus, who was from the physical lineage of Abraham. Similarly, the psalmist states that Zion/Jerusalem was the “joy of all the earth” (v. 2). How could the author of this psalm be confident in Jerusalem’s effect upon the world? 3. Under the New Covenant that Jesus ushered in, God’s dwelling place became the hearts of His people instead of a physical location at the Temple. Spiritually, Zion was often used to refer to heaven, but it also became synonymous with the church. How then, are God’s people to be a reflection of God’s glory and a source of joy to the whole earth? What can we do to remind ourselves of this eternal calling daily, particularly when we find ourselves in the mundane tasks of daily life? 4. God revealed Himself uniquely to His people in Zion, and His Spirit within His people today reveals Himself in a unique way to those who trust in and follow Him. How does the revelation of God drive His people to worship today in our local churches as it did in the Temple? 5. God’s revelation to His people was intended to gather people for worship and to scatter them for mission. How does our theology (seeing/knowing God) drive the church’s action (doing)? When our motivation for corporate worship and mission seem hindered, what does that reflect about our theology? What in our everyday culture tends to weaken our view of God and our drive to bring Him glory—in practicality even if not in our expressed beliefs? 6. Our theology of God may, at times, seemingly encounter an experience that brings doubts about God. Why is a biblical theology of God more authoritative than our experiences? What are the dangers of holding our personal ideas and experiences equal to or greater than biblical truths? 7. How can we develop a deeper theology of God that is founded on biblical truths? Why is it important that we preach, teach, and encourage one another in true biblical theology? 8. Looking at both of the ideas of Zion—as the location for God’s dwelling place and the gathering of His people—how does that influence our beliefs about the biblical intention of gathering with other believers for worship and mission? Why is our culture so apt to neglect or de-value meeting with others corporately (Heb. 10:25)? What does this pattern reveal about our understanding of our calling to display the glory of God? How can we practically make meeting together with our faith family a priority? How have we neglected meeting with our small group? 9. The author of Psalm 48 recounts God’s miraculous military intervention on behalf of His people. He physically rescued them and, thus, demonstrated His love for His people and His glory to the nations. This passage is not an indication that God miraculously intervenes for His people at all times, but what does it tell us about God’s protection, intervention, and presence in our lives? What was the greatest rescue that we needed? How did He provide that rescue through Christ? 10. In the New Testament, God promised His presence to be with His people at all times (Heb 13:5-6). Even as Jesus ascended to heaven, He left His followers with the promise that He would always be with them (Mt. 28:19-20). His presence is assured as we live in obedience to Him but a trouble-free life is not. How does this truth impact the way that we pray during times of struggle? How does this

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affect the way that we can view challenging circumstances in our lives? How can we encourage and pray for others who are experiencing brokenness and feel their rescue has been forgotten? 11. Thinking back to the previous discussion about biblical theology and our own experiences— considering specific struggles in our lives that we are currently experiencing or have recently experienced, how does good theology impact the way that we view God through those experiences? How does our belief in God determine our attitude toward situations that bring us to a crisis of belief? 12. How can we be sensitive to the human struggles of one another without abandoning good theology? 13. In the opening verses of Isaiah 6, we see the prophet respond to a vision of God and His glory with a completely unrestricted commitment to go anywhere and do anything God instructed. Psalm 48:9-10 reveal that the same should be true of God’s people as they encounter the truth of His glorious salvation. How does our corporate gathering with our faith family excite our desire to proclaim the gospel? How can we surround ourselves with others who encourage our command to take the gospel with us wherever we go? 14. As people who take the presence of God with us everywhere we go, why is our daily relationship with Christ imperative to our responsibility as a child of God to reflect His glory and gospel? 15. In Psalm 48:12-14, the author instructs God’s people to continually remind themselves of God’s work in their lives. In this instance, there are concrete examples that His people can use to prompt discussions with future generations about God’s goodness. What physical reminders can we use in our homes to remind us, others around us, and the next generations of God’s unending glory, salvation, and unchanging character?

Resources for Small Group Leaders

Weekly Prayer Focus

 Pray for Our Lives: o Praise God for His beauty, greatness, and glory. Respond to Him with worship. o Thank God for revealing Himself to us and calling us to know Him. o Pray we will turn to God for His forgiveness and rescue when we have sinned. o Ask God for strength against temptation and perseverance to endure hardships. o Ask God to reveal our role in making Him known. o Ask God to develop us into people known for His love.

 Pray for Our City: o Pray for Route1520, a Christ-centered ministry to help men and women recover from sex and pornography addiction. o Pray for Mountaintop Community Church and Douglas Ferguson, Pastor.

 Pray for Our World: o Pray for Brook Hills Field Partner Compassion International who seeks to release children from poverty in Jesus’ name. o Pray for the children in nine Child Survival Projects—in Northern India, Ethiopia, and the Dominican Republic—with whom we sponsor.

Weekly Readings for April 20-26

Ecclesiastes 7-12, Song of Solomon 1, 2 Timothy 3-4, Titus 1-3, Philemon, and Hebrews 1

Commentary on Sermon Passage for Sunday, April 19

Psalm 48

Background & Structure of Psalms: God used many different writers to write Psalms: David, Moses, the sons of Korah, Asaph, etc. The book is arranged in five parts, and this arrangement occurred after the people of Israel returned to the land after the Babylonian exile. A doxology concludes each book or arrangement of psalms (Psalm 41:13 for Book 1, Psalm 72:18-19 for Book 2, Psalm 89:52 for Book 3, Psalm 106:48 for Book 4, and Psalm 150:6 for Book 5), and the entire book of Psalms climactically ends with a grand doxology of several psalms (Ps. 146-150).

 Book 1: Psalms 1-41  Book 2: Psalms 42-72  Book 3: Psalms 73-89  Book 4: Psalms 90-106  Book 5: Psalms 107-150

Commentary: Psalm 48 falls under the category of “Songs of Zion,” for it focuses on the city of Jerusalem, which was the home of the Temple, the dwelling place of the Lord. Zion and Jerusalem are often used synonymously, although Jerusalem is the city and Zion is the specific term for the mountain near Jerusalem. The original name of the city (at least in Abraham’s era) was Salem, and it was located on a hill known as Mount Ophel that served as a fortress for the Jebusites who inhabited it prior to King David’s conquest. It became known as Mount Zion or the City of David after King David made Jerusalem the political and religious center of the nation, and Mount Zion became the location of Solomon’s Temple (the site is currently where the Dome of the Rock is located). Worshippers often sung psalms about Zion as they traveled to Jerusalem for the three annual feasts (Purim in the spring, Feast of Weeks in the early summer, and Rosh Hashanah in the autumn) and anticipated worshipping the Lord together at the Temple, the place of His presence.

The first three verses of the psalm praise the God of Zion. The city’s claim to fame is God Almighty since it houses the Temple, the only place where God’s people could come to make sacrifices for their sin. Verse one notes the elevation of Zion, for the Temple sat on a summit that overlooked the surrounding region. Whether approaching from the east, west, north, or south, one had to travel “up” to reach the Temple. As J.J. Perowne states in his commentary on the Psalms,

…to the traveler, approaching Jerusalem from the west or east, it must have always represented the appearance, beyond any other capital of the then known world-we may add, beyond any important city that has ever existed on the earth-of a mountain city: breathing, as compared with the sultry plains of the Jordan or of the coast, a mountain air, enthroned as compared with Jericho or Damascus, Gaza or Tyre, on a mountain fortress.

While we do not know the original cause for the psalm, it could have been some sort of deliverance or military victory because of the reference to God making Himself known as a fortress within Jerusalem’s citadels (v. 3), and Psalm 48:4-8 could be describing the response of invaders to the holy city. Although they had came to attack, they panicked and fled when they saw the city because of what God had done, for the psalmist notes how “you shattered the ships of Tarshish” (v. 7). Whether an invasion and God’s deliverance were the cause for the psalm or whether the psalmist simply points back to a time when God protected His people, the psalmist demonstrates God’s power and God’s defense of His people and His dwelling place.

The psalmist overwhelmingly acknowledges Jerusalem as God’s possession, God’s city, and verse eight asserts that God will establish the city for eternity. As Dr. Allen Ross notes in the second volume of his Psalms commentary, “Every victory is a foretaste of the final victory which will secure the holy city forever under the LORD’s reign.” The Apostle John describes this day in Revelation 21 when he tells of the new heavens and the new earth with the New Jerusalem being a place with no temple, “for its temple is the Lord

God the Almighty and the Lamb” (Rev. 21:22). As God was present with Israel via the Holy of Holies in the Temple, present with humanity via the incarnation of His Son Jesus Christ, and present with the Church through the Holy Spirit in us, God will be present in the New Jerusalem – not encased in a building or in human flesh – but as He is in all His glory. At this time when all of God’s enemies have been permanently eliminated, God’s people will praise Him in the holy city, not the Zion of old but the New Jerusalem.

Psalm 48:9-14 continues in praise to God. In the psalm, the psalmist describes God as the Lord (Yahweh, the covenant name for God), the great King, the Lord of hosts, and God (Elohim, which is the “self-existent one”), and the psalmist praises Him for being great (v. 1), for His presence with His people (v. 2), for making Himself known (v. 3), for being the powerful protector of His people (v. 7), for His steadfast love (v. 9), for His righteousness (v. 10), for His judgment (v. 11), for being an eternal covenant God (vv. 13-14), and for guiding His people forever (v. 14). Because of His presence, His people are secure, for He is their defense. Because of His character, He deserves the praise of all people, particularly the praise of His covenant people. The psalmist even encourages the people to walk around Zion, noting its towers, ramparts, and citadels. After God’s protection of the city from her enemies, doing this was a way for them to evaluate the evidence of God’s deliverance, seeing it in person. For those born in generations after this deliverance, they would pass on such witness accounts to succeeding generations. Such rehearsal bolsters faith, for as we remember and recount what God has done in the past, we can look to the future with confidence that His character and His power remains unchanged by time.

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