Jesus and the Psalms Part 1 

I picture Jesus every year making the long walk to Jerusalem “as was their custom” (Luke 2:42-432) for the Passover. Every year as they made the ascent, they would have sung Psalms 120 –134. They are 15 succinct and happy songs, tracing the history of Israel and even at times becoming messianic. Knowing Jesus’ use of these Psalms makes them relevant and powerful. 

The Book of Psalms should be precious to us if only because it most clearly promises the death and resurrection of Christ, and describes his kingdom, and the nature and standing of all Christian people. It could well be entitled a “Little Bible” since everything contained in the entire Bible is beautifully and briefly comprehended, and compacted into a Manual of prayer, worship, and faith. Psalms are the most quoted OT book in the NT.  
Of Particular significance to me is the number of psalms that were used or quoted from directly in the last 24 hours of Jesus’ life on earth – at least 8. Especially psalms 22 & 30, plus the Hallel Psalms (113-118) used at the Passover meal the night before He died. These are incredible when you read how dramatically they portray what was about to happen, and then the aftermath beyond the cross. Jesus’ use of the Psalms puts the divine seal on Ezra & Nehemiah’s compilation. Of the 7-sentence sermon that Jesus preached from the cross, 3 of the statements come from the psalms. 

When guiding the Jerusalem leaders Jesus asked, “What do you think of Christ?” He then turned to the authority of the psalms and specifically Psalm 110. His question coupled with psalm 110 plunges us into the unfathomable wonder of the incarnation of God. How could David refer to his son as Lord? This probing question was but the application of what Jesus would later declare, that he himself is the object of all the Scriptures of the Old Testament, summarizing their threefold division in Luke 24:44 as “the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms,” with the Psalms standing as the summary representative of all the Writings.