Nielsen’s Nook

The following is a recent translation of Psalm 70 from the Hebrew of BHS:

(i) To the Choir Master. For David. For the memorial offering.[1]

(1) O God, make haste to deliver me;
O YHWH, make haste to help me!

(2) Let those who seek my life
be ashamed and disgraced.
Let those who desire my distress
be turned back and humiliated.

(3) Let those who say, “Aha! Aha!”,
return to the consequence of their shame.

(4) Let all who seek you,
rejoice and be glad in you!
And let them say, “Great is God”
who love your salvation.

(5) But I am poor[1] and needy,
O God hasten to me!
You are my help and my deliverer,
O YHWH, do not delay!

The memorial offering is something to meditate on this morning. In Hebrew we read lehazekir (לְהַזְכִּֽיר), coming from the root zakar (זָכַר), to remember. It refers to an offering that:

appears in Leviticus 2:2 and Numbers 5:16 in reference to a cereal offering accompanied by frankincense. Similarly, in Isaiah 66:3 it refers to an offering of frankincense. Elsewhere it is used to refer to invoking God’s name (Ex 20:21; Amos 6:10). Thus it may refer to a public ritual including both an offering and a petition for God’s aid. (IVPBCOT Job 42:15)

In that sense perhaps, the infant Jesus, received a kind of memorial offering from the Wise Men who brought with them gifts of frankincense, an offering to remember the God who had taken on human flesh.

¹¹And going into the house they saw the child with Mary his mother, and they fell down and worshiped him. Then, opening their treasures, they offered him gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh. (Matthew 2:11, ESV)

In this act of worship, they opened their treasures to the Lord, making a memorial forever inscripturated in the pages of the Bible. This little baby was King of the Jews, the Messiah come to deliver his people. This is the opposite of the picture we get in Revelation 18:11-13 where those in Babylon ironically have an abundance gold, frankincense and myrrh that no one will buy; they have forgotten the Lord and “in a single hour all this wealth has been laid waste.” (Rev 18:17).

The problem of remembering God in the biblical sense has always been over against forgetting him. The former leads to an obedience described in Deuteronomy 6 and the latter results in wandering from the Lord.

As I have written elsewhere, there is none save one who has ever remained upon the mountain top. Moses came down Sinai only to be beckoned to Pisgah and shown that from which his own sin had disqualified him. So Moses died ahead of his people. In the case of Jesus upon the mount of transfiguration the disciples are thrown prostrate in holy fear. When they look up Jesus is still standing. Jesus comes down willfully only to climb upon a skull shaped mount[3] named Golgotha in Aramaic, coming to us as calvaria in Latin.� He alone remained upon the mount, dying not only ahead of his people, as Moses, but also dying instead of his people that in his life we have life.

In this way, there is much to be said about the Lord’s Supper as it shows forth the death of the Lord Jesus.� Our liturgies on Sundays are acts of covenant renewal, memorial offerings of the New Order.� The Lord’s Supper reminds us in the biblical sense of Jesus’ death ahead of us and instead of us.� Just as its Old Testament precedent, the Lord’s Supper is not then an empty sign, merely drawing the death of Jesus to mind.� It is the memorial of biblical and cosmic proportions in which the life of Christ, the benefits of redemption, are communicated to believers who receive them by faith.� In this way, the memorial continues to be effectual, strengthening us towards obedience.

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[1] לְהַזְכִּֽיר “for the memorial offering”

[2] The word ‘anav (עָ� ָו) is the same word that is used in Isaiah 61:1 proclaiming the day of the Lord to be when good news is proclaimed to the poor.

[3] Dictionary of Biblical Tradition in English Literature, Golgotha.