Psalm 67
So let’s give our attention to
God’s word, Psalm 67. It says to the choir master with
stringed instruments, a psalm, a song. May God be gracious to
us and bless us and make his face to shine upon us, that your
way may be known on the earth, your saving power among all the
nations. Let the peoples praise you, O
God. Let all the peoples praise you. Let the nations be glad
and sing for joy, for you judge the peoples with equity and you
guide the nations upon earth. Let the peoples praise you, O
God. Let all the peoples praise you. The earth has yielded its
increase. God, our God, shall bless us.
God shall bless us. Let all the ends of the earth
fear him. Amen. This is God’s holy word. Every Sunday in our prayers,
every Sunday night in our prayers, and a lot of other times on Sundays,
you’ll hear something like this. Lord, help us to grow in grace.
Help us to grow in our knowledge of Jesus. Help us in our daily
living to represent what it means to be a new creation in Christ
so that the watching world will look at us and they’ll see that
we’re different and they’ll say, who are you and where did you
come from? And we can then tell them about Christ and all that
he is and is able to do. We pray that our lives would
reflect the power of the gospel, that our lives would be a fruit
of the gospel. And that comes right out of Psalm
67. It comes out of the multiple
requests or well wishes, as it were, in Psalm 67. Notice in
verses three and five. It says let the peoples praise
you Oh God, let all the peoples praise you and again, it says
it just the same in verse five So you have one set of the same
statement and then notice in verses one and seven They don’t
say the exact words twice but similar blessing thoughts verse
one says may God be gracious to us and bless us and In verse
seven, God shall bless us. And so we have these double sayings,
these bookends, if you will, these inclusios. And so our Sunday
prayers, our prayers that we will live a faithful Christian
life before the watching world, and that people will see that
and want to know about our God, come right out of the way God
says that he will work in the world. So there’s a couple things
for us to think about here in Psalm 67. The first, is God’s blessing and his benediction,
or I said it backwards, God’s benediction and his blessing.
Now, you know, the benediction and the blessing are kind of
two of the same things, but what I’m trying to get at here is
when God gives his benediction on us, it is then a blessing
to others. And so benediction and blessing,
verses one and two, it says, may God be gracious to us and
bless us and make his face to shine upon us. Okay, there’s
a purpose to that. It’s good for us, right? But
that’s not what he’s talking about here. Verse two, that your
way may be known on the earth, your saving power among the nations. So why God’s benediction on us? Why the Lord bless you and keep
you? Why the Lord make his face shine
upon you and be gracious to you? Why the Lord lift up his countenance
upon you and give you peace? Well, it does have advantages,
it does have blessings to you, but it’s so that, one of the
reasons, it’s so that others will see God’s power and God’s
ways. We’ll talk about that in just
a moment. But you know, if you’re Bible people, this comes, this
language comes right out of Numbers chapter six. Remember in the
wilderness, God said to Moses, Moses, you and Aaron and his
sons are to bless the people. And when you bless the people,
you say, the Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face
to shine upon you and keep you. The Lord lift up the light of
his face upon you and give you peace now and forevermore. And
so one of the things that we believe ought to be in Christian
worship is the benediction, the blessing. And there are other
biblical benedictions, but Numbers chapter six is the oldest and
it’s the most well known. but there is a point to God’s
benediction on his people. It’s so that then they are a
blessing to the world. One of the things you’ll notice
in Psalm 67, it’s called Missionary Psalm for a reason, it gives
hints, it gives glimpses or future looks to God, including people
other than Israel, his covenant people. It gives hints of the
inclusion or the bringing in of the Gentiles. Now I want you
to think for just a moment about God’s benediction and then the
blessing of the people of God on others. It would not be possible
for God to bless us unless sin is covered, unless
sin is paid for. And so you think about the words
of the benediction, the Aaronic, not the ironic, but the Aaronic
after Aaron, the Aaronic benediction. In order for God to bless us
and to keep us, what did he have to do to Christ on the cross? He had to curse him. He had to
let him go. He did not shine the light of
his face upon him, but he turned his back upon his own son. He put his wrath and his curse
and all his fury on Christ in order to bless us. And so you
think about this idea of benediction and blessing with the new covenant
in mind. God in Christ has blessed us.
God in Christ has kept us. God in Christ has turned his
face toward us. He’s been gracious to us. And
so then, as the light of the face of the Lord Jesus shines
on us, we are to be Christ-like to the world. So we’re God’s
people, we’re blessed. We’re God’s people, and what’s
the purpose? What’s the purpose of you being a blessed Christian
and you going out these doors? It’s so that Yahweh, it’s so
that Almighty God is known to the peoples of the earth. So
that’s the big idea, so to speak, benediction and blessing. In
the second stanza, verses three through five, we have this idea
of getting to know our God. We want people to know our God.
We want people to know our savior. We want people to know who he
is and what he’s done and what we’ve experienced him to be.
And so getting to know our God, we find that theme in verses
three to five. It says, let the peoples praise
you, O God. Let all the peoples praise you.
Let the nations be glad and sing for joy, for you judge the peoples
with equity. You guide the nations upon the
earth. Let the peoples praise you, O
God. Let all the peoples praise you. Well, how did the people
of the earth get to know our God? I know we just said we’re
looking at stanzas 2 with verses 3, 4, and 5, but if you go back
to verse 2, you get the answer, that your way may be known on
the earth. You’re saving power among the
nations. Take those two things, the way
of God and the power of God. How will people get to know our
God, how will they get to know that there’s something different
about us and about Him? Well, the first thing is people
who are looking into our lives, they have to be able to say,
there’s something different about you. And you know, how do we
like to say, you know, when somebody we’re acquainted with has lost
weight or they look good or something seems to be going well, we say,
will you bottle that up? give it to me right we say something
like that well that’s kind of in a sense what this psalm is
about we want others to see our prosperity our blessing by God
and one of the ways they’ll see that is that God is at work in
us God is at work and on display in our lives there’s an Old Testament
story that illustrates this very well remember Abraham called
out of Ur of the Chaldeans, he goes into Israel, he goes into
Canaan, sets up an altar, pitches his tent, he lives, there’s a
famine, he goes to Egypt. He bumps into a guy named Abimelech,
and Abimelech was a wealthy man like Abraham, eventually Abraham
and Abimelech meet up a little bit later, and Abraham sees Abimelech,
Abimelech says to Abraham, I know that you’re a man of God and
God has blessed you, whatever you touch, Whatever you do is
blessed by God. And so I want to make a treaty
with you. You ever have a neighbor that says, I don’t know what
it is about you, but I like it. I’m not into that Christian stuff,
maybe, like you are. Jesus, good for you, not good
for me. But I like you as a neighbor. I like your way of life. It’s
a blessing to me and my household. That’s what Abimelech did. And
so here’s a question for us. If our neighbors, were to put
us on trial and they were to say, what evidence can you give
that God and his power is at work in your life? Would there
be enough to convict you? Would there be enough to put
you in jail for letting the power of God be on display in your
life? Well, that’s one aspect of how
the world will get to know us. They see the power of God on
display. And that comes in all kinds of ways. One of the things
I very often pray for, you know, we get a lot of our members in
these rehabilitation facilities and, you know, we can go in there
and say prayers about, you know, dear God, help so-and-so’s leg
to get better and help them to get to go home soon and sit in
their own chair and, you know, eat Wheaties out of their own
cereal bowl and drink juice out of their favorite cup. We all
want that, right? We don’t want to be stuck somewhere.
But you know, one of the things I very often pray for, because
I think very often it’s the purpose, sometimes God puts us in these
places. I pray that every person who comes into contact with our
people when they’re sick, they’ll see their smiles, they’ll see
their courage, they’ll see that their demeanor is different,
that their attitude is, may be Christ-like, and they’ll see
that the power of God is at work in this person or this family,
and that these nurses and these doctors and these therapists
and these caseworkers may ask about Christ. Isn’t that a good
thing to pray for? What a wonderful opportunity
we have wherever we go. So sometimes we have to, I think,
see what may be a curse or a difficulty for us as an opportunity to get
somewhere else and show the power the power of God. And so is it
on display in our lives? But there’s a second thing or
a second way that people can get to know our God. If you look
at the latter part of verse two, it says, or the first part, it
says that your way may be known on the earth. The word of God
needs to be at work in each of us. The word of God needs to
be at work in each of our homes. The word of God needs to be at
work in our church. And so when the outside looks
in, they need to say, and they may say it in a derogatory way,
they may say it in a neutral way, and they may also say it
in a way that says, I like that, and that’s good, and I want to
be part of that, whichever of the three ways. But they should
see that the word of God is central, that the word of God is plainly
read, and preached, and proclaimed, and sung, and prayed, and believed,
and trusted, and obeyed. And it’s our job to declare the
word of God to the world. We live in a day now that says,
what is that famous quote? Preach the gospel, use words,
if necessary, use words. I think Saint Francis of Assisi. And there was a rebuttal to that
put out in recent years that said, preach the gospel, it is
necessary to use. And so we must remember that
the church, yes, while it is an example, and yes, while Psalm
67 says, be an example so others can see Jesus at work, it is
necessary to declare the word of God. One of the things we
have to remember is that the primary ministry of the church
is to be a prophetic voice in the world. It’s a declarative
ministry, the church is. And so we read in verse two,
the first part that your way may be known on the earth. Well,
how has God made his way known to us? He’s made it known in
his word. And so what should we declare
to the nations? We should declare the word of God. And so the power
of God on display in the church and the word of God being declared
in the church is our greatest witness. An outsider, a person who’s not a Christian,
a person who is investigating the church, who’s looking and
searching and all the rest, should come into our midst, and whether
or not they come to faith in Jesus Christ, and this is coming
to our midst in our church, coming to our home, or bumping to us
in the workplace, they should be like those pagans in the Old
Testament who say, surely God was in this place. And so the
job of the church is to let others get to know our God. Yes, by
the way we live, by putting the power of God on display, but
also by declaring the word of God. The final stanza here in
verses six and seven tells us about some future blessings. And I don’t know if you’ve noticed,
but The word may appears at least in the English Standard Version
a couple times. It’s what we might call wishful thinking.
May God be gracious to us. May God bless us. May God make
his face to shine upon us. May the way of God be known.
May the saving power of God be known. It’s a potential. It’s a prayer for blessing. But
as you get to verses six and seven, the language is more firm. It says, the earth has yielded
its increase. God, our God, shall bless us.
God shall bless us and let all the ends of the earth fear him. It speaks of future blessings.
It speaks of future realities. Now, as we have to do in all
Old Testament cases, we have to look at what were the future
realities for Israel, and then what were the future realities,
maybe the eschatological realities for all Christians in the new
heavens and the new earth? Well, for Israel, it was harvest
blessings. I mean, we’re still in the couple
of Psalms that are harvest related. God was gonna bring them grapes. He was gonna bring them grandkids,
we like to say, about the covenant blessings. God was gonna prosper
their households and their farms. There was gonna be a harvest.
But it also speaks of the future harvest where God gathers from
the four corners of the earth all his elect as they’ve heard
the gospel and responded in faith to Jesus. And one of the great
blessings we have is eternity before God’s throne. Think about
the opening verses. May God be gracious to us and
bless us and make his face shine upon us that your way may be
known on the earth, your saving power to the nations. How is
it that God will give us ultimate blessing, ultimate benediction?
What does Jesus tell us that will be the greatest reality
for the Christian? It will be to behold the face of God, to
see that wonderful face, to see his presence, to see his glory,
to see his radiance, his face, and his countenance shining on
us as we surround the throne. And so that’s one of the great
blessings we have to look forward to. as all the nations are gathered
as one before God’s gracious face, as they see Christ, as
they see the one who took the curse so that we could be blessed. Let’s stop for just a moment
and pray together. Our Lord and God, we thank you
so much that you use us to make yourself known, you use us to
declare your praises. Each of us is a trophy of grace,
as the apostle Paul teaches us. And as we are trophies of your
grace, people can look at our lives and see that we were lost
but now found. We were in darkness but now light.
We were dead but made alive in Christ. Help us to live in a
way by your word and spirit with your help. Help us to live in
such a way that our faithfulness to you shows others that you’re
a God who blesses. You’re a God who keeps. You’re
a God who shines your face. You’re a God who lifts your countenance
toward us. all through Christ who took the
curse for us so that we might be blessed and that we might
be a blessing. Help us to see this wonderful
privilege and call upon our life and to live out of that reality
this week. We ask for your grace to do it
in Christ’s name. Amen.