A Song for Saturday
An EasyEnglish Translation with Notes (about 1200 word vocabulary) on Psalm 92
Words in boxes are from the Bible.
Words in brackets, ( ), are not in the Hebrew Bible.
The notes explain words with a *star by them.
The translated Bible text has yet to go through Advanced Checking.
Jesus said, "Thank you, Father". (Matthew 11:25)
The Jews (people that were born from Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and their children) had a story that Adam sang this song the day after God made him. The Jews called that day the Sabbath, the 7th day. We call it Saturday. Really, we do not know who the person was that wrote Psalm 92. We call the person that wrote a psalm the psalmist. Maybe it was after God had done something good for his people Judah or Israel. Many Bible students think that it was when King Cyrus of Persia beat King Belshazzar of Babylon. Cyrus then sent the Jews home to their own country. For 70 years, the Babylonians had made them live in Babylon. Now they were free!
Study the psalm in 5 parts:
· Verses 1 - 3 say that it is good to tell the *LORD that he is great and to use music to do it.
· Verses 4 - 6 say that God has done something good. You would have to be silly not to see it.
· Verses 7 - 9 tell us that even if the enemy is strong, God will destroy them.
· Verses 10 - 11 tell us that God has made the *psalmist very strong. And also that God has destroyed his enemies.
· Verses 12 - 15 tell us that all *righteous people will be strong.
Verses 1 – 3: In this part there are two words for God and three words for things that make music. We call these things "musical instruments". They are the lute, harp and lyre. The psalm calls God "LORD" and "Most High". "LORD" means that he is always alive. "Most High" means that he is more important than anyone else is. In verse 2, "do what you have promised" suggests that God has done something good.
Verses 4 – 6: Now the *psalmist says that God has done something good. The *psalmist is now very happy. Only a silly man would not see what God has done. What God thinks is often hard to understand. Only fools would not agree that grass and weeds grow everywhere.
Verses 7 – 9: Grass and weeds grow everywhere! So do bad people. But God will destroy them and they will never come back again. Really, they destroy themselves, as Hosea 13:9 tells us. It says, "You have destroyed yourselves (yourselves means more than one yourself)".
Verses 10 – 11: Here Bible students think that the *psalmist was a leader of the people. If he wrote the psalm before Babylon beat the *Jews, then that leader was the king.
They made people king by pouring special oil over them. We are not sure what the wild animal was. Maybe it was a wild ox. An ox is a kind of cow.
Verses 12 – 15: Now the *psalmist talks about righteous people. Righteous is a word that means "very, very good". Only God is really righteous. But God makes people that love him righteous too. It does not mean that they are good. It means that they love God and want to obey him. They will not be as grass and weeds that do not live long, verse 7. Instead, they are as trees. They are as palm trees that produce fruit called "dates"; and as the cedar tree which lives for centuries. "The temple of our God" in verse 13 is the same as "the house of the *LORD". It was a special building where the people went to meet God.
1. Count how many times me, my or mine come in the psalm.
2. How many times does "*LORD" come in the psalm?
3. If you have a Bible, read Ezekiel 18.
4. Learn to say Psalm 92:8 by heart. (This means without looking at the words.)
© 2001-2002, Wycliffe Associates (UK)
This publication is written in EasyEnglish Level A (1200 words).
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