I want to look at three Psalms on God's glory. One is about how we can experience God's glory from creation itself. The second one is how we can discern God's glory from man's stewardship over nature. Finally, the last one is on how we see God's glory in his sovereignty over man's salvation. What we have is an increasing pull-back from nature to man's place in nature to God's rule over all things, all of which glorify God.
Psalm 104
What we have here is a description of what mankind has been doing since the beginning: assigning physical attributes to the invisible God using nature as descriptors. God clothes himself in light, stretches out the sky like a tent, and uses the waters as a housing structure. He rides on the clouds like a chariot (do you see how man corrupted these images into false gods like Zeus?), stands upon the wind, and uses the elements to communicate with humanity. No true Christian thinks of God as an old man in the sky, despite what the ungodly tell us what we believe, but when we know that God is sovereign over all of nature--even the unpredictable elements--it's hard not to imagine the power of the almighty God behind a chaotic thunderstorm and realize that he is communicating his glory to us. In fact, this is what we should do. We should think of God as all-powerful and potentially destructive to the evil that man has brought about. If we live in awe and fear of God, we will respect him and put our faith in him. Read the rest of the Psalm and know that God is in control over all the seemingly random things in nature:
He established the earth upon its foundations,
You covered it with the deep as with a garment;
The waters were standing above the mountains.
At Your rebuke they fled,
At the sound of Your thunder they hurried away.
You set a boundary that they may not pass over,
So that they will not return to cover the earth.
He sends forth springs in the valleys;
He waters the mountains from His upper chambers;
He causes the grass to grow for the cattle,
He made the moon for the seasons;
The sun knows the place of its setting.
You appoint darkness and it becomes night,
O Lord, how many are Your works!
In wisdom You have made them all;
The earth is full of Your possessions.
There is the sea, great and broad,
And Leviathan, which You have formed to sport in it.
They all wait for You
To give them their food in due season.
You give to them, they gather it up;
You open Your hand, they are satisfied with good.
You hide Your face, they are dismayed;
You take away their spirit, they expire
And return to their dust.
You send forth Your Spirit, they are created;
He looks at the earth, and it trembles;
He touches the mountains, and they smoke.
Psalm 8
Here is where we see the glory of God through mankind. He made man's mouth for singing his praises, even from infancy. The Psalmist tells us that with all the works of nature that we read about in Psalm 104, there is no need for God to even create man in the first place. So much glory of God lies in nature, that it almost seems that mankind is an afterthought. But no! Man is God's crowning achievement, and God has made him to be a steward over majestic creation, representing God as like a regent, taking care of the kingdom until the true king can step into the role. All of creation is put under the dominion of man, and our job is to glorify God by taking care of such. Do we succeed? No, which is why we need to read the 107th Psalm.
Psalm 107
Finally, we have the ultimate Psalm of God's glory--God being glorified through the redemption of mankind. He put us in charge and we botched it. We let the enemy in through the gates, and we have no life in ourselves. God created nature, then he created a reasoning creature to take care of it--both for his glory. Then the reasoning creature fell into sin and death, and now God gets to be glorified by recreating all things, beginning with the reasoning creature.
Man has starved himself by cutting himself off from God's life. He cries out to the Lord who delivers him. Man is in the desert. God steers his way to a majestic city of eternal life. Mankind consists of rebels in chains, prisoners in misery, lost laborers. Mankind cries out to the Lord who saves them. God sets man free from his bonds and brings him out from under the shadow of death. Man lives under a self-imposed plague, and the Lord heals man with his word. Mankind has made shipwreck of our faith. We plunge deeper and deeper in misery. The very nature we were commissioned to subdue has overtaken us. We failed in our stewardship and nature has ruined us. But the Lord stills the storm and hushes the waves. He guides us to the desired haven.
God created everything. He sustains all things. He controls all things. He will recreate all things. He has already begun recreating all things, beginning with you. You dwelt in desert places, because of your sin. God delivered you from sin though Jesus Christ's death on the cross. Your faith in this particular deliverance determines your re-creation. Are you being recreated into the likeness of his son? Are you being recreated for the new heavens and the new earth? Are you being recreated for everlasting life? Or are you still under the shadow of death? Are you still sinking into the dark of the deep, drowning in sin and misery? Have you embraced the son? Or are you to wander in the desert for eternity?
