Psalm 104
Tonight’s reading is Psalm 104.
It’s 35 verses. This is one of the longer songs. If you remember last week, we
looked at Psalm 103, where we looked at, it was praise of God
for his works, his works of redemption, his works of steadfast love,
his works of satisfying his children. And then you pair it with 104
and you have a Psalm of praise. to God for creation. And then
it even has a wonderful little phrase towards the end that we’ll
look at, that God himself rejoices in his creation. So let’s hear
God’s word together. This is Psalm 104, beginning
at verse one. Bless the Lord, O my soul, Oh
Lord, my God, you are very great. You are clothed with splendor
and majesty. You cover yourself with light as with a garment,
stretching out the heavens like a tent. He lays the beam of his
chambers on the waters. He makes the clouds his chariot.
He rides on the wings of the wind. He makes his messengers
winds, his ministers a flaming fire. He set the earth on its
foundations so that it should never be moved. You covered it
with the deep as with a garment. The water stood above on the
mountains. At your rebuke, they fled. At the sound of your thunder,
they took to flight. The mountains rose. The valleys
sank down to the place that you appointed for them. You set a
boundary that they may not pass so that they might not again
cover the earth. You make springs gush forth in
the valleys. They flow between the hills.
They give drink to every beast of the field. The wild donkeys
quench their thirst. Beside them, the birds of the
heavens dwell. They sing among the branches.
From your lofty abode, you water the mountains. The earth is satisfied
with the fruit of your work. You cause the grass to grow for
the livestock and plants for the man to cultivate, that he
may bring forth food from the earth and wine to gladden the
heart of man, oil to make his face shine, and bread to strengthen
man’s heart. The trees of the Lord are watered
abundantly, the cedars of Lebanon that he planted. In them, the
birds build their nest. The stork has her home in the
fir trees. The high mountains are for the
wild goats. The rocks are a refuge for the
rock badgers. He made the moon to mark the
seasons. The sun knows it’s time for setting. You make darkness
and it is night when all the beasts of the forest creep about.
The young lions roar for their prey, seeking their food from
God. When the sun rises, they steal
away. They lie down in their dens. Man goes out to his work
and to his labor until the evening. Oh, Lord, how manifold are your
works. In wisdom, you have made them all. The earth is full of
your creatures. Here is the sea, great and wide,
which teems with creatures innumerable, living things both small and
great. There go the ships and Leviathan, which you form to
play in it. These all look to you to give
them their food in due season. When you give it to them, they
gather it up. When you open your hand, they are filled with good
things. When you hide your face, they are dismayed. When you take
away their breath, they die and return to their dust. When you
send forth your spirit, they are created and you renew the
face of the ground. May the glory of the Lord endure
forever. May the Lord rejoice in his works.
Who looks on the earth and it trembles, who touches the mountains
and they smoke. I will sing to the Lord as long
as I live. I will sing praise to my God while I have being.
May my meditation be pleasing to him for I rejoice in the Lord.
Let sinners be consumed from the earth and let the wicked
be no more. Bless the Lord, O my soul. Praise
the Lord. Amen. This is God’s holy word
for us. If you attend a musical presentation
like a symphony, one of the things you might notice as you attend
various composers’ work is that the different music reflects
their personalities. The different pieces and movements
and sounds and tones and instruments, it reflects much about the composer. The same with an art show. You
can visit an art show and you can see as you look at various
sculptures and canvases that people and their personalities
are reflected much and in various ways in their creations. And the same is very true of
God. You can look at creation, you can look at the world and
everything in it, and it reflects much about our creator, our God,
who he is and what he must be like. In verse 31 of Psalm 104,
there’s an interesting phrase that says, may the glory of the
Lord endure forever. May the Lord rejoice in his works. And then in verses, the beginning
verses one to four, it talks about us blessing the Lord. For
God is very great and he is clothed with splendor and majesty. It
speaks of his creation. reflecting much about him. And
so tonight, as we look through these 35 verses of Psalm 104,
I want us to kind of take a survey of a couple things. One is the
splendor and majesty of God. The second is God, the creator,
sustainer. And then finally, God is the
source of life. So those are the three ways we’ll
look at this. The first in verses one to four,
the splendor and majesty of God. It speaks of God being clothed
with splendor and majesty. He covers himself with light.
He stretches out the heavens like a tent. He lays the beams
of his chamber on the waters. You get a picture there of Jesus
clothed in light. He has a tent and his room or
whatever is laid out over the oceans. It’s laid out over the
waters. And maybe some of our fellow men, not fellow Christians,
but other fellows and people that we live around, they think
creation is to be worshipped. They think the aspects of creation
have divinity in them. And this gives us a picture that
God is over creation, that creation just shows but a glimpse of his
majesty and his glory. The Bible speaks of two ways
of knowing God, particularly in Psalm 19. There are two ways
we can know God. The first is we can look at creation.
And as Paul teaches in Romans 1, we have to look at creation
and The fact that there is a God is not deniable, that plenty
do deny it, but we can look at creation and look at the wonders
of the earth and see that there’s a God. A few weeks ago, I visited
with my hematologist for my annual visit, and he’s not a Christian
as far as I can tell. He’s a brilliant man, and every
time I get with him, he explains to me the intricacies of this
blood condition I have. And he rambles off into endless
discussion about this gene and that gene and this combination
of genes and that combination of genes, dominant and recessive
and all that works. And I’m lost because I was lost
back in biology class years ago. And he just stops this last time
and he says, there has to be a God. Now he doesn’t know which
one, I don’t believe. He couldn’t name him, he couldn’t
describe him, but he looks at the intricacies of the human
body and he has to say, there must be a God. And so creation
can point to the fact that there is a wonderful God, but revelation
or the scriptures points specifically to who that God is and what he
has done for the redemption. of man. And so tonight, as we
look at the splendor and majesty of God in these first four verses,
one of the things we have to remember is a point, not the
whole point, but a point of God making the world and everything
in it. And so we would look at it and say, what a majestic and
splendid God we have. We can look at creation and we
can see something about him. We can know things about him.
and we can stand in awe of His splendor and majesty. Creation
says much about the Creator, that He’s great, as Psalm 104
says. He is majestic and He is full
of splendor. I don’t know how often you think
about it, If you don’t think about it much, you should think
about it more. I know that I say this a lot, but we’re attached
to our gadgets and our eyes are fixed on these amazing screens
that we carry in our pockets. But I encourage you to step outside
late at night and look at the stars, if they’re not blurred
by the local shopping centers, parking lot lights. But look
at the heavens. Look at what God has made. This
autumn, go for a walk. Walk and see the colors of the
trees and the beauty of the seasons. Look at what God has made. and
be amazed. But creation shows us the splendor
and the majesty of Almighty God. And that’s the first couple of
verses point out to us. The second section, we want to
consider God as the creator and sustainer, makes up verses 5
to 23. And I want to mention this before
we dig into it. really verses one to 23 have
a little bit of a parallel of the six days of creation. God
creating light, God making land, God separating land from the
sea, God putting land animals and then plants to feed them,
God making man, God putting stars and sun and moon to rule the
day and to change the seasons, all that. There’s parallels to
the Genesis account in Psalm 104. The parallels aren’t necessarily
the point. but you can see the author had
a very high view of creation. And so as we consider God the
creator, sustainer, I think for a moment, if you will, about
an ecosystem. Maybe some of you in elementary
school, you made one of those terrariums, you know, you take
a fish aquarium, you put a little soil in it, you put some plants
in it, you put a little bowl of water in it. And if you want
to put a turtle or something, you do that too. And then you
take saran wrap and you cover the top. And what does that do?
It seals it off. But that little bowl of water
creates condensation on the saran wrap. And what does that do?
It drips and acts like rain. And it becomes an ecosystem that
takes care of itself. It’s a self sustaining system. And that’s what our world is
like. God made the world and everything in it. He made things
to work. together. The study of ecology
studies ecosystems. It studies biological communities. It studies how plants and animals
and things interact together in their environments and it’s
a wonderful thing to see. Maybe you go to the ocean and
you watch the tide go in and out. You crawl through the streams
and the estuaries at the coast and you see how the plants and
animals live amongst each other. It’s amazing to see and that’s
what this section shows us. And as you look at God, the creator,
sustainer, you find it in three different descriptions. First
in five through nine, he talks about setting the earth on its
foundations. He speaks about covering the deep as with a garment
with waters. He talks about raising up the
mountains. He talks about the valley sinking down. He speaks
of boundaries so that water may not cover the earth. Again, he
speaks about springs coming forth in the valleys, flowing between
the hills and giving water to the animals. So he speaks of
the creator of the land who divides out the seas. He establishes
land and he establishes seas and he keeps a boundary between
them. Then in 10 to 18, he talks about
how he gives water, food, and homes to all his animals. He gives springs in verse 10
to gush forth from the valleys. He gives drink to all the beasts
of the field. In the heavens dwell the birds.
They sing among the branches. From God’s perch in heaven, he
waters the mountain. He satisfies the earth with the
fruit of his work. And it speaks of grass for livestock,
plants for man to cultivate. We get food, we get wine, we
get oil. We get all these wonderful products.
I think several years ago, a young child was asked, where does chicken
come from? And they said, Harris Teeter.
So it’s probably good, if you don’t know where things come
from, to maybe take a trip to the country and look at a farm,
see where things come from. get it, get it figured out. But
that’s what, that’s what the psalmist is observing here is
God has made a way for everything that he made to survive. He put
seeds in plants so that they can reproduce and on and on. So the things that he has made,
he also gives them a way to sustain, but he gives them everything.
And then 19 to 23, God, the creator sustainer gives time and lights.
He gives day and night. We’re in the midst of, fooling
with his provision, aren’t we? We flung our clocks backwards,
which hopefully gave you an extra hour of sleep and made some of
you on time for church today, which is a good thing in the
spring and all that’ll get messed up. You’ll be cranky and late,
but he gives time. He gives lights. He gives day
and night. Look at verses 19 to 23. He made the moon to mark
the seasons. The sun knows it’s time for setting.
You make darkness and it’s night. The beast of the field, they
go out. They creep about. I like that phrase. The lions
seek for their prey. They roar, but it comes from
God. The sun rises, and these animals
steal away. They lie down in their dens,
and man goes out to his work. Isn’t that interesting that while
man is out in the field working, where’s the beast? He’s asleep
for the day. And man goes into his house,
locks the door, and lights his fire, and the beast come out
at night. God’s made it all work out where each can go out and
have their day in the field. But God gives us the time, the
seasons, and day and night. And so God not only created the
world and everything in it, but he created the way for it to
be sustained. Now that doesn’t mean that God
is uninvolved. We read from Colossians just
a little bit ago, and we recognize God upholds the world that he
made by his wonderful and powerful hand. So creation shows us the
splendor and majesty of God in verses one to four, and then
in five to 23, we see God the creator and sustainer. But in
verses 24 to 30, we see God as the source of life. Oh Lord, how manifold are your
works and wisdom. You have made them all. The earth
is full of your creatures. Here’s the sea, great and wide,
which teems with creatures innumerable, living both small and great.
There go the ships and Leviathan in which you form to play in
it. And verse 27, these all look to you to give them their food
in due season. When you give it to them, they
gather it up. When you open your hand, they are filled with good
things. When you hide your face, they are dismayed. When you take
away their breath, they die and they return to dust. When you
send forth your spirit, they’re created and you renew the face
of the earth on the ground. For some reason, when you get
a dog, teach you to train the dog by, when they do the thing
you ask them to do, you do what? You give them a treat. You give
them a reward. Well, it creates a sense of entitlement in them.
Our dog thinks that every time he goes out and comes back in,
he should get a treat, which would not only break the bank,
but he would break the scale. Nevertheless, he comes in the
house and he looks at you. And he gives you that puppy dog
look. I deserve a treat. I went out. I came back in. I
deserve a treat. And he looks at you with these
longing eyes. He wags his tail. He has this
great anticipation. And when you let him down because
you can’t finance the number of treats or hope that he’ll
be healthy enough to eat them all and not be so overweight. He disappoints, but it’s like
this with God in verse 27. All of God’s creation looks to
him to give them their food in due season. You have children,
they rely on you for their supper. You have an older person in your
home that you take care of, an older generation, they look to
you. So we know what this is like, but God is the one who creates and he provides.
He’s the source of life. Every Sunday morning before we
begin our service, we say, our help is in the name of the Lord.
You finish the rest. It is he who made the heavens
and the earth. We’re affirming there that we
cannot worship, we cannot serve, we cannot live except that God
gives us these things. God is the source of life. We
depend on him. And so the vast creation also
depends on God. But one of the things we ought
to rejoice in, as the psalmist does, is that God gives us life.
We affirm it, don’t we? In him we live, move, and have
our being from Acts. We affirm it by saying, thank
you, Lord, for giving us your gifts. We affirm it by asking
for daily bread, thanking him for daily bread. But we don’t
look to him like maybe something or some beast or being that’s
really dependent. Because we make our money, we
go to the grocery store. If we run out, we go to the neighbors
and borrow an egg or we make a late run to the grocery store.
But we ought to think a little more about God being the source
of life. Not just groceries, but what
else? He gives you every breath you take. And what does he do
at our last breath? He takes it away. And so we ought
to be full in mind that God is the one who is the source of
life, not just for beast, but for man also. Apart from God,
we have nothing. Verse 30 says, when you send
forth your spirit, they are created. And when you renew, or you renew
the face of the ground, then you can skip down to verse 35.
Let sinners be consumed from the earth. Let the wicked be
no more. God can give. and God can take away. So just
a quick overview of this Psalm shows us that creation displays
the splendor and the majesty of God. Creation also shows us
God as creator and sustainer, and also that he’s the source
of life. And as we wrap up our thoughts
on this Psalm, I want to point out to you something pretty amazing.
It starts in verse 35. God rejoices in his creation.
It says, may the glory of the Lord endure forever. May the
Lord rejoice in his works. Who looks on the earth and it
trembles, who touches the mountains and they smoke. Can you imagine
what it would have been like in heaven? As God and all the
angels that he created to serve him, all his ministering spirits,
they looked, I guess you’d say they looked down, who knows?
But they looked on creation day one, let there be light. There
was light. God took what was empty and formed
it. He filled it. And each day, can
you imagine what they saw and how much they rejoiced? But the
picture this psalmist gives us is that God himself rejoices
in his works. He was pretty excited about what
he made. When your kid disappears for
the afternoon in their bedroom and they And they’re cutting
with scissors and, you know, they got their paper and their
glue and they come out and say, look at what I have made. That’s
rejoicing in creation, isn’t it? And that’s what God does
when he makes the world and everything in it. He rejoices in his own
creation for it was made for his glory. You can imagine all
the oohs and the ahs and the clapping of hands and the gasp
when God made this world. But the question is, do you rejoice
in God’s creation? Do you rejoice in the beauty
of the earth? Do you rejoice in the changing seasons? Do you
rejoice in the majesty of God on display? God has made us and
he has redeemed us to worship him. And so all who come to him
by faith in Christ have the wonderful joy and privilege, even the duty
to look at the world and everything in it, to see God’s hand in it
and to thank him, but also to rejoice. And so let’s make that
our prayer as we go to him. Lord, we thank you for the world
and everything in it. We thank you for the way you’ve
made it, the way you care for it, the way we see your mighty
hand, your good hand, as you show your glory, your majesty
and your splendor through what you’ve made. Help us to see it,
to be thankful and to rejoice. And we thank you that as we rest
in Christ alone for our salvation, as we are made useful in this
world to serve in your kingdom, that we can see these things
and rejoice and be glad. Hear us as we make our prayer
in Christ’s name. Amen.