WORSHIP AT HIS FOOTSTOOL

With this psalm, we terminate this theme of the month on “The House of the Lord and Worship”. Although they have other applications, Psalms 93-99 are the royal kingdom psalms; they contain thoughts of the throne of God and the fact that He reigns as King, 93. 1; 95. 3; 96. 10; 97. 1; 98. 6; 99. 1. In this sense they are millennial in character, and hence are suitable to terminate the theme.

The psalmist was using tabernacle-temple language with which to describe this higher heavenly scene: “he that sitteth between the cherubim”, “worship at his footstool”, “priests”, “holy hill”, and this is extended into Psalm 100, “his gates”, “his courts”. In the tabernacle, the two cherubim were part of the mercy seat placed upon the ark, but in the temple they were free-standing objects whose wings overshadowed the ark below. Between these cherubim, the presence of God would be found amongst His people. God promised to Moses that there He would meet with him, and would commune with him regarding all His commandments, Exod. 25. 22. It was in the tabernacle that Moses heard “the voice of one speaking unto him from off the mercy seat … from between the two cherubim”, Num. 7. 89. In the temple, king Hezekiah recognized in prayer that God dwelt “between the cherubim”, 2 Kings 19. 15. So the cherubim are used in the contexts of worship, prayer and instruction.

We do not have either material ark or cherubim today, but we do have the Lord’s presence amongst believers in a local church, where the chief functions are worship (breaking of bread), prayer, and instruction (the apostles’ doctrine), Acts 2. 42. These are holy occupations, a fact stressed three times in Psalm 99, “it is holy”, v. 3; “he is holy”, v. 5, and “the Lord our God is holy”, v. 9.

Within the prophetic vision-temple, no reference is made to ark or cherubim in Ezekiel 40-47, but the presence of the Lord, His glory and the place of His throne are evident, Ezek. 43. 4-5. Moreover, all would be “most holy”, v. 12.

At that time, the Lamb’s wife, holy Jerusalem, shall descend from heaven the glory of God shall be there, but no temple, for God “and the Lamb are the temple of it”, Rev. 21. 22.

“The throne of God and of the Lamb”, Rev. 22. 1, 3.