SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 7/10/2012 5:53:56 AM
My Worship Time Focus: Psalm 104 PT-1
Bible Reading &
Meditation Reference: Psalm 104:1-9
Message of the verses: In Today’s SD we will begin to look at Psalm
104 by looking at several different Bible commentators introductions to the
psalm. I believe that this is a good way
to get an idea of what the psalmist is saying in the psalm.
“INTRODUCTION
TO PSALM CHAPTER 104
It is very probable
that this psalm was penned by the same hand, and at the same time, as the
former; for as that ended this begins, with
"Bless
the Lord, O my soul!"
and concludes with it too. The style indeed is somewhat
different, because the matter is so: the scope of the foregoing psalm was to
celebrate the goodness of God and his tender mercy and compassion, to which a
soft and sweet style was most agreeable; the scope of this is to celebrate his
greatness, and majesty, and sovereign dominion, which ought to be done in the
most stately lofty strains of poetry. David, in the former psalm, gave God the
glory of his covenant mercy and love to his own people; in this he gives him
the glory of his works of creation and providence, his dominion over, and his
bounty to, all the creatures. God is there praised as the God of grace, here as
the God of nature. And this psalm is wholly bestowed on that subject; not as
Psalm 19, which begins with it, but passes from it to the consideration of the
divine law; nor as Psalm 8, which speaks of this but prophetically, and with an
eye to Christ. This noble poem is thought by very competent judges greatly to
excel, not only for piety and devotion (that is past dispute), but for flight
of fancy, brightness of ideas, surprising turns, and all the beauties and
ornaments of expression, the Greek and Latin poets upon any subject of this
nature.” (Matthew Henry)
“In vivid
poetic detail, the psalmist sings of the Lord’s creation (cf. Gen. 1, 2; Job
38-41; Pss. 19:1-6; 148:1-6; Pr. 30:4; Is. 40:1-6; Jn. 1:1-3; Rom. 1:18-25;
Col. 1:16, 17). He refers to the original
creation (cf. 104:5) without forgetting the fall of man and the cursed earth
(104:23, 29, 35). He alternates reciting God’s greatness by 1) personal praise
to the Creator (104:1, 2, 5-9, 20-30), and 20 declaring God’s handiwork to his
human audience (104: 3, 4, 10-19, 31-35).
The flow of the psalm loosely follows the order of creation as first
reported in Gen. 1:1-31 but closes (v. 35) with an allusion to the end time
events recorded in Rev. 20-22.” (The
John MacArthur Study Bible)
“This is a
magnificent hymn celebrating the glory of the Creator and the incredible
greatness of His creation. Paul may have
had this psalm in mind when he spoke to the Athenian philosophers (Acts
17:22-34, especially vv. 24-28), for it presents a God who created and now
sustains a beautiful and bountiful world that reflects His glory (v. 31). The writer of the psalm certainly had Genesis
1 in mind when he wrote, even though he did not follow all six days of creation
in detail, nor did he include the creation of man and woman (see. vv. 14,
23). He began with light (v. 2; Gen.
1:1-5) and continued with the separation of the upper and lower waters (vv.
2-4; Gen 1:6-8) and the separation of land and water (vv 5-9; Gen 1:9-10). The provision of vegetation is mentioned (vv.
14-17; Gen 1:11-13), as well as the placing of the sun and moon (vv. 19-23;
Gen. 1:14-19), and the creation of land and sea creatures (vv. 24-25: Gen.
1:20-28). The psalm declares that our
God is very great (v.1), very wise (v. 24), and very generous (v. 27). In spite of the fact that creation is in
bondage to sin since the fall of man (Rom. 8:18-23), we still live in an
amazing universe run by divinely ordained laws that are so remarkable we can
sen people to the moon and bring them back!
Whether the scientist uses the telescope, the microscope, or the x-ray,
he beholds the wonders of God’s creation.” (Warren Wiersbe)
The Greatness of Our God (vv. 1-9): “1 ¶
Bless the LORD, O my soul! O LORD my God, You are very great; You are
clothed with splendor and majesty, 2
Covering Yourself with light as with a cloak, Stretching out heaven like
a tent curtain. 3 He lays the beams of
His upper chambers in the waters; He makes the clouds His chariot; He walks
upon the wings of the wind; 4 He makes
the winds His messengers, Flaming fire His ministers. 5 He established the earth upon its
foundations, So that it will not totter forever and ever. 6 You covered it with the deep as with a
garment; The waters were standing above the mountains. 7 At Your rebuke they fled, At the sound of
Your thunder they hurried away. 8 The
mountains rose; the valleys sank down To the place which You established for
them. 9 You set a boundary that they may
not pass over, So that they will not return to cover the earth.”
It was a
little over a year ago while living in Hawaii that I began to study more about
the creation due to a discussion that I had with a relative. We had to agree to disagree that the earth
was young, which of course was my view, since that is what I believe the Bible
teaches. At any rate the study of
creation begin to cause my spiritual juices to begin to flow, and not it ranks
up there with the study of the end times as one of my favorite themes in the
Scriptures, so it is with great anticipation that I begin to look at Psalm
104. I want to comment on verse seven
with regard to the psalmist writing “At the sound of Your thunder they hurried
away.” It was in a baseball game that
was played in Arlington Texas this past Sunday, July, 8, 2012 that there was
such a loud blast of thunder that all of the ball players from both sides along
with all the umpires ran off of the field, and headed for cover. There was no rain, just an extremely loud
blast of thunder. One of the players was
quoted as saying that he thought the Jesus was about to return to the earth.
I think
that one of the greatest injustices that is happening in the world today is the
study of evolution, something that I have said in earlier SD’s. It is amazing that one can look at this
world, this universe an think that it happened by some kind of an
accident. I attended a men’s breakfast
late last year and the speaker commented about a Rolex watch that he was
wearing that had been awarded to him, and his remarks were that the watch was a
very fine watch, and that one could see that it had to have a designer, for it
did not just happen by some kind of cosmic accident. His point was that this is what the
evolutionist are teaching about something this is millions of times more
complex than a watch.
The
psalmist begins the psalm with the description of a King so great that He wears
light for a robe and has a palace in heaven above the waters (“God made the
expanse, and separated the waters which were below the expanse from the waters
which were above the expanse; and it was so.” Gen. 1:7) God can use the clouds for His chariot and is
moved along by the wind. Verse four
speaks of messengers, and these are His angels (“And of the angels He says,
"WHO MAKES HIS ANGELS WINDS, AND HIS MINISTERS A FLAME OF FIRE.’” Hebrews
1:7). We read in verses 6-7a that the
earth was covered with water and God spoke and the waters went into the place
where God wanted them to go. Peter
writes that the earth was made of water “2Pe 3:5 For when they maintain this, it escapes their
notice that by the word of God the heavens existed long ago and the earth was
formed out of water and by water.” I
think at times we underestimate the value of water, for our bodies are made up
of a great majority of water and we need water.
My wife plants tomato plants most years and it is my job to give them
water, and God will turn the water that I give them into tomatoes. (I suppose some people just look at that as a
cosmic accident.)
I want to
go back to verse five and talk about the Lord just hanging the earth out in the
middle of space. The verse says that the
earth will not totter. This is a
remarkable statement, for the earth is in perfect balance at it travels through
space, and if it were not then the people who live on the earth would fly off
the earth because of the vibration. ‘”He
stretches out the north over empty space And hangs the earth on nothing.’” (Job
26:7)
Dr. Wiersbe
writes “In all this creative activity, the Lord has revealed Himself in His
power and glory. ‘The heavens are
telling of the glory of God; and their expanse is declaring the work of His
hands’ (19:1, NASB). Day and night, the
visible things of creation shout aloud to the inhabitants of the earth that there
is a God, that He is powerful and wise, and that all people are accountable to
Him (Rom. 1:18-32). Are the people
paying attention?” Good question!
Spiritual meaning for my life today: Evolution is something that causes great
anger to well up in me because it is a lie and people believe lies so that they
do not have to be accountable to God, but the fact remains that all of the
people in the world, both those who are dead, alive and yet to be born are
accountable to God. God makes Himself
known through His creation but people would rather believe a lie.
The Heavens declare the glory of
God!
My Steps of Faith for
Today: Continue to abide in the
Vine, and continue to study His Word.
Memory verses for the week:
2Peter 1:1-5
1.
Simon Peter, a bond-servant and apostle of Jesus
Christ,
To those who have received a faith
of the same kind as ours by the righteousness of our
God and Savior, Jesus Christ: 2. Grace and peace be
multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord; 3. seeing that
His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness,
through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and
excellence. 4. For by these He has
granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may
become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in
the world by lust.
5. Now for
this very reason also, applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral
excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge,
7/10/2012 7:23:40 AM
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