Psalm 147:7-11: Does God Prohibit the Kilt?

 Presented to the Alberni Valley Salvation Army, 25 January 2025 and Swift Current Corps 23 January 2011 as well as 28 January 2018, an on-line homily by Captain/Major Michael Ramsay

This is the 2025 version.

 

To view the 2018 version, click here: https://sheepspeaks.blogspot.com/2018/01/psalm-14710-mans-legs.html

To view the 2011 version, click here: https://sheepspeaks.blogspot.com/2011/01/psalm-14710-neither-delighteth-he-in.html

  

Psalm 147:10: “His pleasure is not in the strength of the horse, nor his delight in the legs of a man.” I thought this was an appropriate passage to look at on Robbie Burns Day. For Christmas one year Susan bought me some Bible Commentaries on Psalms. In one of these books, Peter C. Craigie, from Scotland, writes:

 

…. It was the custom in Scotland for boys to wear the kilt to church on Sunday; to this day I can recall singing the words of Psalm 147:10 ‘Neither delighteth he in any man’s legs’. I pondered at that time the question of whether scripture condemned the kilt.

 

When I read Peter Craigie’s quote I knew immediately what I should preach on while I am wearing my kilt for Robbie Burns Day. Do we know who Robbie Burns is? Robert Burns (1759-1796) was an 18th Century Scottish poet and songwriter who wrote hundreds of lasting tributes to Scottish life in both song and poetry. Of himself, he wrote:

 

The poetic genius of my country found me, as the prophetic bard Elijah did Elisha—at the plough, and threw her inspiring mantle over me. She bade me sing the loves, the joys, the rural scenes and rural pleasures of my native soil, in my native tongue; I tuned my wild, artless notes as she inspired (ROBERT BURNS, Edinburgh, April 4, 1787).

 

Robert Burns is a poet; he is not to be confused with Scotland’s patron saint; do you know who that is? …St. Andrew from the Bible. St. Andrew’s Day is the 30th of November, and it is a national holiday in Scotland. Robert Burns Day is the 25th of January and this is a good time for the Scottish diaspora, people of Scottish heritage in this country here to get together, wear the kilt, eat haggis, and listen to the bard’s poetry, bagpipes, and watch or try some highland or Scottish country dancing.

 

Last night Susan, our parents, Sarah-Grace and I went to the Robbie Burns dinner put on by PAHDA at Echo as we do almost every year to watch Heather dance. When we were in Toronto and before, Sarah-Grace would dance too. Robbie Burns Day is always a lot of fun

  

Verse 10 of our text today is not referencing the kilt, Highland Dancing or Robert Burns. in the NIV it reads: “His pleasure is not in the strength of the horse, nor his delight in the legs of the warrior [or 'man' in place of 'warrior' depending on the year published];” the rest of this sentence is contained in Verse 11: “the LORD delights in those who fear Him, who put their hope in His unfailing love.”

 

Psalm 147:10 is not talking about wearing a kilt, bathing suit, or shorts when it says that God doesn’t delight in a warrior’s legs. This passage is not addressing Christian modesty. It is telling us that if we put our faith in something instead of God – in this example the passage is specifically referencing the military: ‘horse’ being calvary and ’warrior’ being ‘warrior’ – if we put our faith in people, the military, or anything else, instead of God, we will not impress God - who is the creator, preserver, and governor of all things.

 

The prophet Samuel warned the ancient Hebrews that if they were a unified country under a single political leader that the leader would press their children into military service (1 Sam 8:1-22). King Solomon and his heirs did just this and more as they ignored this advice of Psalm 147 and put their faith in themselves, their military, their legs, and their horse until God finally had enough and put an end to the Kingdom of Israel (2 Chr 36:17-21).

 

Putting their faith in their military or the military of regional superpowers was futile. I think Canada is discovering the challenges of trusting in the benevolence of superpowers these days.

 

What about us individually? Who do we trust? We know that putting faith in anything instead of God, we know that not trusting God is basically a rejection of Him and His Kingdom. A New Testament equivalent is contained in Matthew 6:24-27:

 

No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money. Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life? 

 

Psalm 147:10: “His pleasure is not in the strength of the horse, nor his delight in the legs of a man.” Psalm 147:11: “the LORD delights in those who fear him, who put their hope in his unfailing love.”

 

Now ‘fear’ can mean a lot of things in the Bible. The word translated ‘fear’ in this verse, ‘yare’, in the tense and context, refers quite simply to a moral reverence. It is a kind of deference but it does not include any of the moral dread that is involved with other variations of the word ‘fear’. An example of this ‘fear’, ‘yare’ in our society is sort of like when one is in court and the judge tells you specifically to remove your hat, you do it. This ‘yare-fear’ would probably be – in this context - more like if someone meets me when I am out of uniform and they are using rather rough language with a lot of profanity and swear words. As soon as they recognize me or find out that I am an Officer/ pastor, they immediately apologize for every swear word they ever uttered in their whole life it seems! ‘Watching their language’ is out of respect for my vocation, my calling. It is not out of fright. Likewise, we, in the Lord’s courtroom, need to respect his authority and we can also put our faith in His unfailing love.

 

This unfailing love, (checed), relates to a strong sense of goodwill especially as can be relied on in real times of need (cf. Deuteronomy 7:7,12; Psalm 89:24, 28, 33, 49; 2 Samuel 7:15; Isaiah 55:3).[10] Sometimes this word is translated as ‘mercy’ or ‘kindness’. This word, checed, relates to one you can turn to in a crisis. We all have friends and family but we know that when the chips are down there are some we can trust more than others. This word for love or mercy applied in this context refers to one who will never let us down in a time of need. And that one is God.

 

The Lord delights in those of us who respect Him – who care enough about Him and His feelings to watch our language around Him. And He can be trusted in our time of need because of His unfailing love for us (cf. John 3:16ff.). We don’t need to rely on horse and men’s legs. We don’t need to rely on cavalry and infantry. We don’t need to rely on man or Mammon. We don’t need to rely on people or money. We don’t need to rely on anyone in place or instead of God. God will provide.

 

How about us here today? Do we ever fall into this trap of trusting someone or something instead of God? Do we sometimes put our faith in money, the strength of the horse or the legs of a man? Do we ever put our faith in something that can let us down– instead of relying on God? 

 

So today I would like to encourage you. If there is anyone or anything in our life that we are tempted to put our trust in ahead of God, if we have been let down by others, if we have been let down by circumstances, if we have been let down by ourselves, there is still one who can deliver us. There is one, and probably only one who will never let us down – and that one is God. Really if everyone and everything else in life does let us down, God promises that He will never leave us or forsake us.

 

So today, with all the real things that our troubling us, let us trust God. He loves us and will take care of us.    Let us pray

Psalm 147:7-11: Does God Prohibit the Kilt?

Presented to Alberni Valley Salvation Army Men's Breakfast, 25 January 2025 by Major Michael Ramsay

 

7 Sing to the Lord with grateful praise;

make music to our God on the harp.

 

8 He covers the sky with clouds;

he supplies the earth with rain

and makes grass grow on the hills.

9 He provides food for the cattle

and for the young ravens when they call.

 

10 His pleasure is not in the strength of the horse,

nor his delight in the legs of a man [or ‘the warrior’];

11 the Lord delights in those who fear him,

who put their hope in his unfailing love.

 

Psalm 147:10: “His pleasure is not in the strength of the horse, nor his delight in the legs of a man.” I thought this was an appropriate passage to look at on Robbie Burns Day. For Christmas one year Susan bought me some Bible Commentaries on Psalms. In one of these books the author, Peter C. Craigie, from Scotland, writes:

 

…. It was the custom in Scotland for boys to wear the kilt to church on Sunday; to this day I can recall singing the words of Psalm 147:10 ‘Neither delighteth he in any man’s legs’. I pondered at that time the question of whether scripture condemned the kilt.[1]

 

Now, of course, this poem/psalm isn’t speaking about the kilt. When it says God doesn’t delight in the legs of a man (many translations actually say ‘warrior)’ or the strength of horse, it is talking about infantry and calvary. That was something God has spoken about lots: we can’t put our faith in the military or in anything else but him – everything else will let us down.

 

Canada is really worked up right now. Canada, for decades, we mistakenly put our faith in free trade with the US. It didn’t ever work great but now that we are no longer economically self-sufficient the US looks like it is declaring a trade war on us, as was always inevitable from the time we signed the agreement. We can’t put our faith in foreign countries. We can’t put our faith in their militaries, their economies or ours.

 

Even more so in our own day to day life – not just countries and politicians, people let us down all the time. We believe someone when they tell us something. We trust someone when they say they are going to do something. We rely on someone when maybe we know better. The truth is we do need to work well with each other, support each other, trust and love one another but there is only one who will never let us down – and that one is God. And really if everyone and everything else in life does let us down, God promises that He will never leave us or forsake us.

Romans 5:8-11: God’s Enemies.

Presented to The Salvation Army Alberni Valley Ministries, 02 October 2022 and 12 Jan 2025, by Major Michael Ramsay

 

Our passage today, Romans 5:8-11, is about reconciliation:

8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

          9 Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him! 10 For if, while we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life! 11 Not only is this so, but we also boast in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.

  

This passage, especially Verse 10, speaks about being enemies and this inevitably reminds me of war. Especially these days when the war rhetoric is at such a feverish pitch! War then inevitably reminds me of Remembrance Day and our need to never forget and never get drawn into a global catastrophe like the world wars again. Remembrance Day is a key event in our community and in the Royal Canadian Legion’s calendar. 

 

I am the legion padre and as such am honoured to participate in quite a few different legion events. The Legion is about remembering our service people and wars and how many died longing for peace – dreaming of the day when we have no more enemy to fight.

 

Verse 10 of our text today says this: “For if, while we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life!” We were Christ’s enemies: When we were not under Christ’s leadership, we were by definition under our own or another’s leadership. We were not citizens of His kingdom and therefore we were citizens of a rival and that rival was at war with Christ. and thus (and possibly even by our own actions, deeds, words, and thoughts) we were His enemies. 

 

One might say, “Don’t be silly; I wasn’t God’s enemy! When I didn’t know God, I didn’t do anything against Him. I did good things. I didn’t hurt anybody. Just because I didn’t serve Him, that doesn’t mean that I was ever God’s enemy, does it?”

 

The Apostle Paul contrasts two groups of people in his letters: citizens of heaven (people who follow Jesus) whom he calls ‘saints’ and citizens of anyplace else whom he calls ‘sinners’. Paul defines the sinner simply as a member of a movement at war with Christ. This member is an enemy of God, in much the same way that whenever Canada invades another country, I, as a Canadian, am their enemy. Even if I don’t bomb their hospitals and schools myself, even if I disagree with the war, I am their enemy as I am a member of this country. Likewise, a sinner is simply anyone who is not presently experiencing the joys of “life with Christ” because they are not yet with him, they are with the enemy (cf. Ro 5:1, 12:12, 14:17, 15:13). 

 

We know that pretty much all countries at war do terrible things – just look at the news about what Israel and the US are doing in the middle east right now! Politicians, soldiers, citizens of countries at war do and our responsible for terrible things!

 

During the second Word War, we know of the horrible things Germany and Japan did. The other side, our allies and Canada as well. We treated our fellow Canadians of German, Italian, Ukrainian and especially Japanese ancestry as our enemies. We confiscated the assets of Canadians of Japanese origin and moved these citizens into interment camps. (The famous Canadian scientist and environmentalist, David Suzuki, spent part of his early life in a Canadian internment camp.) We treated people as our enemies. And as is shown through the official government apologies and tax money paid in reparations by Canadians who were not even alive during the Second World War, the repercussions and the liability for our nation’s actions rest with all of us.[1] 

 

I read a book a while ago, Girl #85: A Doukhobor Childhood.[2] It tells the story of Canadians of Russian decent here in BC whom our government took from their families, banned their language, their culture, their traditions, and put them in residential schools that were more like jails in the latter half of the 20th Century - during the lifetime of many people in this room. And, of course, as we now have TRC, Orange Shirt Day here, we all are at least vaguely familiar with the IRS that First Nations children were sent to across this country. The one here, run directly by the Canadian government, I understand, was particularly bad. The actions of politicians and others whom we may never have met, and may have died before we were ever born, have caused much damage and made us enemies of people we have never met. There has been all kinds of hardships and abuses suffered directly and indirectly (and many of those responsible such as the political parties who planned and orchestrated these things and some of the individuals who perpetrated the horrors) and as a result all of us have suffered a rift, a division from what happened and so we are all in need of reconciliation.

 

The author of Hebrews puts it this way, in the context of our relationship with God, he says that every time we sin we are taking up arms against Christ (Hebrews 10:28-30). Therefore, as Paul argues in his letter to the Romans, before we served Him, our moral self-government warred perpetually against Christ, whether we knew it or not – and we have suffered the consequence of it. Now, lest we think all is lost and that we cannot possibly be reconciled with each other and God, Paul writes, Romans 5:6, “at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly.” Verse 8: “but God demonstrates His own love for us in this: While we were still sinners Christ died for us.” Verse 10, “while we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to Him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life!” and not only this but, Verse 11, “also boast in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.”

 

So here is the thing about reconciliation. There is nothing you and I can possibly do reconcile ourselves to God. The rift is too big; humanity was the perpetrator of that rift and we are not in a position to initiate reconciliation. We can confess, we can repent, but we cannot reconcile without the full participation of the victim and without forgiveness. Desmond Tutu says, “there is no future without forgiveness”.[3] Reconciliation is the healing of a rift. It is repairing relationships. It is making things whole again. Reconciliation is never a one-way street. Reconciliation can only occur as people walk side-by-side as brothers and sisters. 

 

Wally Samuel, a Nuu-chah-nulth elder, said, I believe, on one Orange Shirt Day, that reconciliation begins when we work again, when we have jobs again , when we are part of society again alongside others again. I think of Hereditary Chief Jeff Cook who is a member of Rotary, on the board of Directors of the Sage Haven Society and the Bulldogs. I think of Judge Wolf. I think of Remi, Christina, and others who work alongside us everyday as part of our team here. This is reconciliation in action in the Canadian context and the Port Alberni context and in our context here in this place. We have all been offered this great opportunity to live out reconciliation with our friends here whom we love.

 

I think of those addicted and living with alcoholism who were once at war with themselves and others through their addiction, who have now been freed and are living sober, clean lives helping and encouraging others. Pointing them to the freedom of reconciliation.

 

It is the same with you and I and God. Jesus has made it possible for you and I and everyone to be reconciled to God. He has made it possible for you and I to come and live and work with and for Him. He has forgiven us. As such He invites us to join Him in His work, in our work, by loving our neighbour, serving others. by -for example- working on the food truck, serving in the soup kitchen, volunteering at the Thrift Store, in the Food Bank, at the seniors homes, with the kids programs and kitchen programs upcoming, with worship team and Bible studies and if we have done all that we can possibly do with any of those things and we can’t possibly do anymore, we can still live out our reconciled lives with Christ by tithing, read our Bibles, and just spending time cuddling up to God, sharing with Him the news and the joys of our life here. We are invited to reunite with our Heavenly Father today . We are invited to live reconciled lives. As such, it is my hope that we will all live out our lives fully reconciled with God – even beginning today. 

 

Let us pray.

 

www.sheepspeak.com

 

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[1] Michael Ramsay, Salvogesis Guidebook to Romans Road (The Salvation Army: Vancouver Island, BC, 2022), Chapter 5

[2] Helen Chernoff freeman, Girl #85: A Doukhobor Childhood (FriesenPress, Victoria, BC, 2013)

[3] Desmond Tutu. No Future Without Forgiveness (New York, NY, USA, Double Day, 1999)

 

 

January 12, 2025

 

Responsive Reading: Psalm 118

 

Blessed be the Name of the Lord

Cry of My Heart

Step by Step

 

Offering

Prayer

Scripture Romans 5:8-11

 

This Little Light of Mine

I Have Decided to Follow Jesus

My Jesus I Love Thee

 

Message

 

Amazing Grace

Just as I am

Jesus All for Jesus

 

Extra Extras:

 

Send the Fire

Benediction