Welcome to Day 2885 of Wisdom-Trek. Thank you for joining me.

This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom.

Day 2885 – Wisdom Nuggets – Psalm 135:15">36:1-9 Daily Wisdom

Wisdom-Trek Podcast Script – Day 2885

Welcome to Wisdom-Trek with Gramps! I am Guthrie Chamberlain, and we are on Day 2885 of our Trek. The Purpose of Wisdom-Trek is to create a legacy of wisdom, to seek out discernment and insights, and to boldly grow where few have chosen to grow before.<#0.5#>

The Title for Today’s Wisdom-Trek is: The Cosmic Anthem of Enduring Love<#0.5#>

In our previous episode on this grand, poetic landscape, we scaled the magnificent, soaring finale of Psalm One Hundred Thirty-Five, verses fifteen through twenty-one. We witnessed a devastating, razor-sharp polemical assault against the silent, breathless idols of the nations. We watched the psalmist ruthlessly strip away the mystical propaganda of the pagan cultures, exposing their silver and gold statues as completely mute, blind, and deaf. We confronted the terrifying law of spiritual assimilation—realizing that those who place their trust in hollow, manufactured systems will inevitably become just as hollow and spiritually dead as the idols they worship. We closed our trek by stepping into the vibrant, living courts of Jerusalem, joining the unified, roaring anthem of the true assembly, shouting Hallelujah to the living King who dynamically rules the cosmos from His embassy on Mount Zion.<#0.5#>

Today, we transition directly from that daytime temple victory into what is universally recognized as the absolute mountain peak of Hebrew liturgy. We are entering the opening movement of Psalm One Hundred Thirty-Six, verses one through nine, in the New Living Translation. In the ancient Jewish tradition, this masterpiece is known as the “Great Hallel”—the supreme song of praise, traditionally sung during the Passover seder. This psalm takes the theological truths we uncovered in our last episode, and sets them to a beautiful, rhythmic, and antiphonal chant designed to reshape our entire understanding of reality. As we step onto this new trail, we will hear the thunderous voice of the congregation responding to every single line of divine truth with an unyielding, cosmic refrain. Let let us adjust our lenses, quiet our hearts, and join the grand procession.<#0.5#>

The first segment is: The Supreme Sovereign of the Celestial Council<#0.5#>

Psalm One Hundred Thirty-Six: verses one, two, and three.<#0.5#>

Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good! His faithful love endures forever. Give thanks to the God of gods. His faithful love endures forever. Give thanks to the Lord of lords. His faithful love endures forever.<#0.5#>

The liturgy opens with a majestic, triadic call to worship that establishes the absolute, unrivaled supremacy of the Creator. We hear the temple leader shout the declaration, and the massive congregation roars back the eternal echo: “His faithful love endures forever.”<#0.5#>

To fully unlock the immense, explosive weight of these opening verses, we must view this language through the profound lens of the Ancient Israelite divine council worldview, as masterfully taught by Doctor Michael S. Heiser. In our modern, Western theological context, we often read terms like “God of gods,” or “Lord of lords,” as mere rhetorical hyperbole—poetic ways of saying God is the biggest and the best. But to the ancient Near Eastern mind, this was a highly technical, legal description of celestial hierarchy. The psalmist is explicitly naming the Elohei ha-elohim—the supreme, uncreated Sovereign who presides over the entire assembly of heavenly beings.<#0.5#>

We must recall the foundational cosmic geography of Deuteronomy, chapter thirty-two, verses eight and nine. When the Most High divided the nations at the Tower of Babel, He allocated the different people groups to the oversight of lesser spiritual beings—the sons of God, the territorial elohim. These spiritual principalities subsequently rebelled, becoming corrupt, demanding worship for themselves, and plunging the pagan world into darkness. They set up their own rival thrones, claiming absolute lordship over their respective empires.<#0.5#>

The psalmist stands in the temple courts and hurls a massive, polemical challenge into the unseen realm. By commanding the people to give thanks to the “God of gods,” and the “Lord of lords,” he is legally reasserting Yahweh’s supreme authority over the entire cosmic rebellion. He is stating that the rebel principalities of Babylon, Egypt, and Rome are merely created entities, middle-management spirits who owe their very existence to the High King. They may claim to be gods, but Yahweh is the Sovereign over their council. Their authority is localized and temporary; His supremacy is absolute and universal.<#0.5#>

Notice the specific engine that powers this supreme governance. Why does the universe remain secure under the God of gods? Because “His faithful love endures forever.” The Hebrew word used here is our foundational, majestic anchor word: Hesed. It refers to a loyal, stubborn, covenant-keeping affection that refuses to let go. The psalmist is making a radical claim: the ultimate, structural fabric of the cosmos is not blind power, chaotic fate, or erratic anger—which is what the pagan nations believed about their capricious deities. The bedrock of the universe is the relentless, fiercely loyal Hesed of Yahweh. Every star hangs in space, and every legal decree of the divine council is issued through the filter of this enduring love.<#0.5#>

The second segment is: The Miraculous Architect of Cosmic Order<#0.5#>

Psalm One Hundred Thirty-Six: verses four, five, and six.<#0.5#>

Give thanks to him who alone does mighty miracles. His faithful love endures forever. Give thanks to him who made the heavens so skillfully. His faithful love endures forever. Give thanks to him who placed the earth on the water. His faithful love endures forever.<#0.5#>

The anthem transitions from the composition of the celestial council, to the initial acts of creation, demonstrating that Yahweh’s Hesed is the driving force behind the physical architecture of our world. We are commanded to praise the One “who alone does mighty miracles.”<#0.5#>

The use of the word “alone” is another intentional, razor-sharp polemic against the rebel spirits. The pagan cultures credited their localized deities with all kinds of supernatural feats, believing that Baal brought the rain, or that Ra managed the sun. But the psalmist clears the stage, declaring that when it comes to true, cosmic, and foundational miracles, Yahweh operates completely without rivals. He needs no help from the divine assembly; His own voice is entirely sufficient to organize the void.<#0.5#>

He proves this by pointing to the skies: “Give thanks to him who made the heavens so skillfully.” The Hebrew text implies that the heavens were designed with deep, mathematical wisdom and artistic precision. In the ancient biblical worldview, the creation of the heavens was an act of establishing boundaries, building a beautifully ordered home where life could safely flourish, completely insulated from primeval chaos.<#0.5#>

The psalmist then moves his focus down to the geography of our home in verse six: “Give thanks to him who placed the earth on the water.” To the ancient Near Eastern mind, this imagery was filled with intense, dramatic tension. They believed that the dry land was established, and anchored, directly over the dark, deep, and roaring waters of the primordial ocean—the realm of Yamm, which represented the terrifying forces of unmitigated chaos. Left to themselves, the wild waters would instantly rise up to swallow the land, flooding the world back into a formless void.<#0.5#>

But Yahweh executed a mighty miracle of stabilization. He flattened the earth, drove back the roaring tides, and placed the dry ground securely “on the water,” pinning the chaotic deep beneath His feet. He built a structural breakwater for humanity. When the congregation chants, “His faithful love endures forever” after this verse, they are recognizing that the very ground they stand upon is a direct gift of divine mercy. The earth remains solid, and the chaos waters are kept at bay, simply because the loyal Hesed of the Creator actively maintains the boundaries of creation every single second.<#0.5#>

The third segment is: Overruling the Astral Principalities<#0.5#>

Psalm One Hundred Thirty-Six: verses seven, eight, and nine.<#0.5#>

Give thanks to him who made the heavenly lights— His faithful love endures forever. the sun to rule the day, His faithful love endures forever. and the moon and stars to rule the night. His faithful love endures forever.<#0.5#>

The first movement of this epic liturgy reaches its climax by looking back up at the celestial clockwork governing our days and nights. “Give thanks to him who made the heavenly lights—the sun to rule the day, and the moon and stars to rule the night.”<#0.5#>

To fully appreciate the spiritual warfare embedded in this section, we must look at the sun, moon, and stars through the eyes of the ancient world. To the surrounding pagan nations, the celestial bodies were not inanimate spheres of gas or rock; they were powerful, active deities. Shamash was the Babylonian sun god, representing judging, blistering heat; and Sin was the moon god, ruling the mysterious terrors of the night. The pagans believed these astral principalities held absolute, independent control over human destiny, mapping out fortunes through astrology, and demanding worship from the masses.<#0.5#>

But the Genesis creation blueprint, which the psalmist is beautifully singing here, completely strips these astral deities of their divine status. Notice that the text doesn’t even call them by their pagan names; they are simply referred to as “the heavenly lights”—lamps, clocks, and calendar markers manufactured by the hands of Yahweh. They did not create themselves, and they possess absolutely no independent sovereignty. They are servants, operating under strict orders from the true King.<#0.5#>

The psalmist notes that they were appointed “to rule.” The sun rules the day, and the moon and stars rule the night. In the divine council theology, this language of “ruling” connects directly to the cosmic administration of the universe. God assigned these celestial lights to manage the seasons, the boundaries of time, and the rhythms of the physical world. <#0.5#>

Yet, after every mention of their assigned rule, the congregation interjects with their thunderous refrain: “His faithful love endures forever.” This repetition creates a magnificent theological guardrail. It reminds the listening principalities, and the human travelers, that the ruling authority of the sun, moon, and stars is completely derivative. The celestial lights can only rule because Yahweh’s Hesed permits them to. The sun rises with warmth, and the moon pushes back the midnight shadows, not because the pagan astral gods are powerful, but because the enduring, loyal love of the Creator is actively managing the solar system for the benefit of His image-bearers. The cosmic hierarchy is perfectly aligned under the feet of the Maker of heaven and earth.<#0.5#>

The fourth segment is: Resting in the Rhythmic Assurance of Hesed<#0.5#>

Psalm One Hundred Thirty-Six, verses one through nine, provides us with a magnificent, deeply stabilizing rhythm for our modern lives, completely reorienting our focus in a chaotic world.<#0.5#>

It teaches us that no matter how loud the noise of our culture becomes, and no matter how arrogant the modern principalities of darkness appear, they are entirely outmatched by the God of gods and the Lord of lords. The shifting systems of this world are merely middle-management illusions; the true Sovereign remains effortlessly on the throne of reality.<#0.5#>

As you walk your trek today, internalize the beautiful, antiphonal structure of this psalm. The Great Hallel is designed to train your mind how to handle the data of a broken world. When your circumstances shout an immediate problem, your soul must instantly respond with the unyielding echo of faith: “His faithful love endures forever.” <#0.5#>

When the chaotic waters of anxiety and stress threaten to rise up and overwhelm your mind, remind yourself of the Miraculous Architect who placed the earth securely on the water, pinning down the chaos through His loyal affection. When you look at the shifting seasons, or face the dark, uncertain midnight watches of your life, remember that the sun, moon, and stars are just lamps in your Father’s house, operating under His strict command. You are not a victim of blind fate, or malicious spiritual forces. You are the treasured possession of the High King. Rest your mind in the unshakeable, rhythmic assurance of His covenant Hesed, knowing that the same enduring love that skillfully forged the cosmos is actively guarding your footsteps, today, tomorrow, and across all of eternity.<#0.5#>

If you found this podcast insightful, please subscribe and leave us a review, then encourage your friends and family to join us and come along tomorrow for another day of, ‘Wisdom-Trek, Creating a Legacy.’<#0.5#>