This weekly feature is dedicated to Adventists who are looking for biblical insights into the topics discussed in the Sabbath School lesson quarterly. We post articles which address each lesson as presented in the Sabbath School Bible Study Guide, including biblical commentary on them. We hope you find this material helpful and that you will come to know Jesus and His revelation of Himself in His word in profound biblical ways.
Lesson 1: “How to Read the Psalms”
COLLEEN TINKER
Problems with this lesson:
- This lesson opens with a reminder of EGW’s model of “thought inspiration” even though affirming the Psalms as “Scripture”.
- Adventism’s view of inspiration supports seeing the Psalms as human expressions about life rather than as revelations of God’s sovereignty over all life and history.
- Adventism sees the Psalms “inside-out”, as primarily human expressions of needs and experiences instead of as revelations of God’s sovereign kingship, election, covenant faithfulness, and as testimonies to Christ.
This week we begin a new lesson quarterly entitled Psalms, and this first week focusses on “How to Read the Psalms”.
The lesson correctly identifies the Psalms as originally examples of Hebrew poetry written over a span of years. It explains that the book of Psalms is divided into fives sections and includes writers from as early as Moses to some who may have written after the exile to Babylon.
As with so many of the Sabbath School lessons, the actual facts this one presents are not necessarily wrong; the problem lies instead with what the author does NOT present and with the subtly phrased wording that confirms the Adventist worldview.
For example, the first paragraph sets the stage for the way the reader is expected to understand the Psalms:
The Psalms have been a prayer book and hymnbook for both Jews and Christians through the ages. And though the Psalms are predominantly the psalmists’ own words addressed to God, the Psalms did not originate with mortals but with God, who inspired their thoughts.
The author does continue by saying that both Jesus and His disciples referred to the Psalms as Scripture and affirms that “the Lord inspired them to write what they did,” and the lesson proceeds to explain some of the technical ways the Psalms are organized and written.
Nevertheless, the lesson reminds the readers of the Adventist conviction: the words of the Bible are not really the Word of God. Instead, they are the words of the human writers who interpreted the thoughts God supposedly gave them, and they were allowed to interpret those thought according to their own understandings of the world and of God.
This view of inspiration is from EGW who said that the words of the Bible were not inspired. Here is one of her statements, this one from Manuscript 24 written in 1886:
The Bible is written by inspired men, but it is not God’s mode of thought and expression. It is that of humanity. God, as a writer, is not represented. Men will often say such an expression is not like God. But God has not put Himself in words, in logic, in rhetoric, on trial in the Bible. The writers of the Bible were God’s penmen, not His pen. Look at the different writers.
It is not the words of the Bible that are inspired, but the men that were inspired. Inspiration acts not on the man’s words or his expressions, but on the man himself, who under the influence of the Holy Ghost is imbued with thoughts. But the words and thoughts receive the impress of the individual mind. The divine mind is diffused. The divine mind and will is combined with the human mind and will; thus the utterances of the man are the Word of God.
This view of revelation was developed to protect the claims that Ellen White herself was inspired; she, and the Adventist organization after her, claim that she was inspired exactly the same way the Bible writers are inspired. It is obvious that her words were not inspired because they often contradict not only the Bible but herself as well—so Adventists have developed the argument of “present truth” to explain that her counsels changed over the years.
It is clear, however, that Ellen’s view of inspiration is not biblical. Paul said this in 2 Timothy 3:16, 16,17:
All Scripture is God-breathed and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be equipped, having been thoroughly equipped for every good work (2Tim. 3:16-17).
Given this foundational Adventist principle, however—that Scripture is actually the interpretive record of the Bible writers’ thoughts, we can understand how Adventism teaches that the psalms are simply the prayers and praises and emotions of various writers and NOT primarily a revelation of almighty God.
Sovereign, Just God
Even though the Psalms is primarily a book of prayer and praise, the varied writers still all held a worldview and a belief in Yahweh that was consistent. It was this core understanding that I missed as an Adventist.
I’m using the introductory notes to the book of Psalms from the Study Notes published by Zondervan in the NASB 1995 Study Bible. They say:
At the core of the theology of the Psalter is the conviction that the gravitational center of life (of high human understanding, trust, hope, service, morality, adoration), but also of history and of the whole creation (heaven and earth), is God (Yahweh, the Lord).…
Under God creation is a cosmos—an orderly and systematic whole. What we distinguish as “nature” and history had for them one Lord, under whose rule all things worked together.…
As the Great King by right of creation and enduring absolute sovereignty, He ultimately will not tolerate any worldly power that opposes or denies or ignores Him. He will come to rule the nations so that all will be compelled to acknowledge Him.…Because the Lord is the Great King beyond all challenge, His righteous and peaceable kingdom will come, overwhelming all opposition and purging the creation of all rebellion against His rule—such will be the ultimate outcome of history.
Notice that this summary of the psalmists’ worldview is nothing like the “great controversy”. There is no challenge to Yahweh’s authority that must be answered and proven wrong. The writers of the psalms—like the writers of all of Scripture—never questioned God’s authority and sovereignty.
Satan has never made a compelling claim against God that God must answer. The entire Bible—including the Psalms—reveals a God whose righteousness and justice have always been known.
Significantly, the lesson does not stress that God is sovereign over men’s experiences and will ultimately destroy those who oppose Him. The lesson comes from a great controversy paradigm, and it will not introduce the real biblical theme of a sovereign God who reveals Himself truthfully through those He chose to write the Bible.
Adventism’s god, however, does not exert sovereign authority over his enemies. Instead, Adventism teaches that humans choose not to spend eternity with their gentleman-God who respects their free will, and Adventists see the Psalms as evidence that they can express their joys and sorrows to this God who will sympathize with them but who may or may not rescue them from their troubles directly.
After all, Adventists have a problem with their gentleman-god who honors their free-will over all other values: if there are enemies opposing each other and people from each side of the fight appeal to God for help, how can a fair and empathic god respond fairly to both sides of the argument? Who gets to decide whose claims are correct?
The Psalms, however, approach God from the perspective of people who know God’s promises and who know God’s righteous requirements. Ultimately, the Psalmists understand that they are appealing not to an empathic god who guards individuals’ feelings but to a God who keeps His covenant promises and honors His own word and accomplishes His own purposes.
The NASB95 background notes further says this:
Unquestionably the supreme kingship of Yahweh (in which He displays His transcendent greatness and goodness) is the most basic metaphor and most pervasive theological concept in the Psalter—as in the OT generally.…To be a creature in the world is to be a part of His kingdom and under His rule. To be a human being in the world is to be dependent on and responsible to Him. To proudly deny that fact is the root of all wickedness—the wickedness that now pervades the world.
God’s election of Israel and subsequently of David and Zion, together with he giving of His word, represent the renewed inbreaking of God’s righteous kingdom into this world of rebellion and evil.
Adventism does not focus on this sovereign, electing, covenant faithfulness of God. The great controversy worldview prohibits Adventists from understanding that God—not their own free will—is the ultimate value in the universe.
God will accomplish His will, and He reveals His will to us through the Bible. The Psalms are a revelation of God’s covenant people appealing to the One who, they know, has promised to vindicate them and to destroy His enemies.
His people know that the realization of His promises will happen in His timing, but they appeal to Him knowing that He will hear and He will answer with justice, mercy, and righteousness.
Adventism has reduced the Psalms to a collection of prayers and hymns for our comfort and for models to us for expressing ourselves. At the same time, Adventism has taught its members not to see the sovereign, faithful, covenant-keeping God revealed in the Psalms.
Even the psalms that foreshadow the Lord Jesus—His suffering and victory and exaltation and enthronement—Adventism has failed to make clear to its members.
The words of the psalms are not merely the culturally-biased interpretations of men’s thoughts. They are the words of God which He gave to His chosen writers—including the writers of the psalms. We are to read the psalms as revelations of our faithful Yahweh, our God who always keeps His promises. We cannot stop Him.
On this side of the cross, we can see depths of meaning in the Psalms that the psalmists only vaguely understood, and we can see that even our Lord’s salvation of us as He took the shame of our sin was foreshadowed in the prayers of His people. (See Psalm 22, for example.)
The psalms are not a how-to-pray manual; rather, they are expressions of reality that acknowledge a sovereign, faithful God who will destroy His enemies. Yahweh is not waiting to be vindicated; He will vindicate His people!
There is no one who levels a challenge against God who must be answered. Rather, God’s enemies know that He is sovereign over them, and the Psalms remind us that, if we trust and believe Him, we can pray and cry to Him with confidence whatever we face. We know He will protect and defend us, and our prayers acknowledge our dependence and trust in Him. †
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