The Bible Study Podcast, episode 387. Today, the Bible Study podcast continues the study of Psalms with Psalm 48.

Welcome to the Bible Study podcast. I'm your host, Chris Christensen. Not quite in full voice today, so this might

be a little shorter episode. Psalm 48 is again a Psalm of praise and again one of the songs of the Sons of

Cora. And it starts like this. Great is the Lord, the most worthy of praise in the city of our God,

His Holy Mountain, beautiful in its loftiness,

the joy of the whole earth, like the heights of Zafron is Mount Zion, the city of the great

king. God is in her citadels. He has shown himself to be her fortress. When the kings joined forces, when they advanced together,

they saw her and were astounded. They fled in terror, trembling seized them there,

pain like that of a woman in labor. You destroyed them like the ships of Tarshish,

scattered by an east wind. So the writers of the psalm are remembering the protection of God and specifically the protection

of God of the city of David, of Mount Zion, of Jerusalem, the city of our God and his

holy mountain.

I'm not sure exactly which particular attack on Jerusalem they are remembering or what

the event is that caused the

creation of this psalm. I certainly thought of the time during the reign of Hezekiah

when the people are surrounded by the Assyrians and they're quite sure they're going to be

destroyed, or at least the Assyrians are quite sure they're going to be destroyed. And yet the

city is delivered by God, not by the strength of its armies, but by the angel of the Lord. And if you're

not familiar with that, that's coming from Second Chronicles 32 when Sanakurab threatens Jerusalem.

And let me read some of that because we have some time today. After all that Hezekiah had so

faithfully done,

Sanakurab, King of Assyria, came and invaded Judah. He laid siege to the fortified cities,

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