Download the Bethlehem Baptist Church Mobile App
Available for iOS and Android
January 27, 2019
Jason Meyer | Psalms 104:31-35
Sanctity of Life: Sharing God’s Delight in What God Has Made
The sanctity of human life cannot be reduced to an abortion issue. The abortion issue sometimes gets boiled down to a legal issue or a political issue. It often gets further reduced to hot takes about what we are against (abortion). But sanctity of life is so much bigger. It cannot be reduced to a political issue or even a moral issue—it is a creation issue—and therefore a God issue. Sanctity of Life is all about God and what he has made. And it cannot be proclaimed merely as what we are against based on what God is against. We also need to be known by what we are for. So the issue has to be framed as what God delights in and thus what we delight in. The sanctity of life is all about sharing God’s delight in what God has made. That is the approach that Psalm 104 takes. Let’s learn from this Psalm.
Psalm 104 has two main divisions: Verses 1–30 and verses 31–35. I believe that both of these are poetic reflections on Genesis 1. Many people see verses 1–30 following the account of creation in Genesis 1 (e.g., Derek Kidner).
The patterns are clear enough and close enough to demonstrate that Psalm 104 is a poetic reflection upon Genesis (poetic reflection based on the historical narration of Genesis 1).
But what about the second part (vv. 31–35) where God rejoices in all his works? I think this is a poetic way of saying Genesis 1:31. Behold God looked at all that he had made and it was very good. He was pleased with it! He delighted in what he had made.
This Psalm has two main divisions: (1) Verses 1–30 are all about the creation delighting in the Creator, and (2) verses 31–34 show the Creator delighting in the creation. There is a final discordant note as well in verse 35. Not everything rejoices in God. Some refuse to rejoice and rebel against the One who made them.
Outline
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!
The Psalmist is sharing not just a wish that God would rejoice in his works, but a confidence that the Lord does rejoice in his works. The real question here is why would the Lord rejoice in his works? We know that the creation should rejoice in the Creator. But why does the Creator rejoice in His creation? Everything he does is right, so why is it right that he delight in what he made?
The clue is found in the parallel arrangement of verse 31. The Lord rejoicing in his works is another way of saying he delights in his glory. The glory of the Lord is the public display of his holiness or God-ness (the sum total of his perfections). Psalm 96 talks about the “splendor of his holiness.” God’s awesome perfections or attributes were put on display in creation.
Here, Jonathan Edwards has been so helpful to so many of us. God delights in creation because God delights in himself and creation puts his glory on display (Edwards 111). God’s chief design in creation is to make himself known (to manifest his glory). For God to be glorified means for God to be known for who he is (his holiness or God-ness). This means that creation shows his might, wisdom, goodness, (Edwards emphasized) and his happiness (The End for Which God Created the World, p. 101). Of course, Edwards is simply saying what so many theologians have seen. John Calvin said the same thing in calling creation a theater of God’s glory.
The psalm, for example emphasizes God’s happiness, but also his wisdom (v. 24) “How many are your works, O LORD! In wisdom you made them all.” In other words, although God is invisible in his essential being, he reveals himself through the visible world he has made.
This is what makes Christianity so different from other religions at the time of the psalmist (and today). Many religions identified nature with various gods (i.e., sun good, river god, moon god). They worshipped nature as gods—in worshiping god they worshiped nature because they could not see a distinction.
By seeing the Creator and his creation as separate, creation could be set free from false worship for the sake of true worship. Natural objects are not objects to be worshipped; they are all reminders for why we should worship God. “By emptying Nature of divinity—or, let us say, of divinities—you may fill her with Deity, for she is now the bearer of messages” (C.S. Lewis, Reflections on the Psalms, pp. 81–83)
The Psalmist focuses on two images in verse 32. The trembling of creation and the smoking of the mountains. (I think we have here the picture of an earthquake and a volcanic eruption.)
Think for a moment of both the overflow of God’s delight in himself in creation but also the rejoicing that it created. I love Pastor John’s meditation on Job 38:4–7. God asks Job where he was when God created the universe and “all the angels shouted for joy.”
If the angels are spirit beings, then there was no matter or anything like matter. No angel had seen a star, cloud, sunset, or anything that has form, weight, motion, texture, or color. But now God says, “Watch this.”
“Imagine the awe and wonder that exploded among the angels. They had never seen or even imagined matter. They are all ‘ministering spirits’ (Hebrews 1:14) and have no material bodies as we do. When God brought material stuff into existence with all its incredible variety and utterly unheard of qualities of sight and sound and smell and touch and taste, this was totally unknown to the angels. God had made it all up. It was not like the unveiling of a new painting made of all the colors and paints we are all familiar with. It was absolutely, totally, unimaginably new! And the response of the sons of God was to shout for joy.” (Piper, Pleasures of God, p. 85)
Indeed, delight (like singing for joy) is the only fitting response to the reflection of the Creator in creation. That is exactly where the Psalmist goes in verses 33–34.
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.
Now the Psalmist vows that he will sing for joy as long as he lives. An entire lifetime of praise would be inadequate in the face of what God has done and continues to do. He also asks that his meditation would be pleasing to the Lord because he rejoices in the Lord. God is pleased when we take pleasure in him like he takes pleasure in himself.
That means that our discipleship is a matter of sharing God’s delight in being God and all of the expressions of that. Our discipleship can never stop short at mere moral compliance or moral conformity or moral submission. The Pharisees had those things (outward conformity, but inwardly filled with dead men’s bones and uncleanness). We submit to God because we delight in God. We don’t submit to God’s will by some act of raw, disinterested obedience that feels forced like arm-twisting. It would be like submitting to the command to eat ice cream.
Obedience should come from a heart that loves God and delights in him—that is what honors God. Any obedience we offer that is devoid of love for God or delight in God is not real God-honoring obedience. What does the creation’s delight in God look like in this Psalm?
One of the major themes is a dependence upon God for all things. In verses 1–9, the verbs were mainly past tense: what God has done. Verses 10–18 switch to the present time to show God’s active involvement in creation and care of creation. He did not wind up the world like a clock maker and let it go. He actively and attentively cares for it.
God gives his creation what it needs to live (water for animals, vv. 10–13; homes in the trees and mountains, vv. 12, 17–18). For domesticated animals (like cattle) he gives grass for food (v. 14). For humans, he gives wine, oil, and bread—the three life staples in the Ancient Near East. Wine was important when water is unsafe, oil was applied to the skin in dry, hot climates, and bread was the food that kept people alive. Look at how the first part of the Psalm builds to a climax in verses 27–30.
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.
There is a delight in our dependence on God, not our independence from God (which we often see in our culture). Again part of the work of discipleship as a people that delight in God has to be the theme of delighting in our dependence upon God. That is why verse 35 introduces such a seemingly discordant note.
Let sinners be consumed from the earth,
and let the wicked be no more!
Bless the Lord, O my soul!
Praise the Lord!
This Psalm reflects on the truth that we are no longer living in Genesis 1. Sin has entered the world. People are living in rebellion against God. People are lovers of self and lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God. People are not just sinners, but the “wicked.” The wicked in Scripture are those who flaunt their independence from God—they boast in their freedom, their self-rule, and self-proclaimed wisdom and light.
In other words, they delight in their independence; they are here cast as those who do not delight in God’s ways. They are portrayed in a sense as profoundly out of touch with the rest of creation, which operates not with self-reliance, but dependence on God for life and breath and everything else. The wicked are dependent upon God for all of these things, but they don’t worship God for it or thank him for it. They are thankless rebels who flaunt their independence from God (while being sustained by God all the way).
Romans 1:19–21 offers a strikingly similar picture as Psalm 104.
For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened.
God is known to the world through the world itself. God’s invisible attributes (eternal power, divine nature) are clearly seen through the creation. Everyone is without excuse. This knowledge of God should lead to honoring him as God and giving thanks to him as God, but instead humanity became futile and foolish and dark. We all instinctively know that the creation should thank the Creator. The creation reveals the Creator’s power and wisdom.
This understanding of humanity as made in the image of God is the key to understanding how God went from saying “good” (when things were made) and “very good” (when humanity was made). Humanity has the unique privilege of being made in the image of God. Think about areas in which our delight in God needs to find expression in prizing the image of God.
1. Gender (heart attitudes; verbal or physical assaults on the goodness of gender)
God made humanity male and female in his image. God gave people gender as a good gift. So of course we are against all forms of sexism (like devaluing women for example), but we also need to emphasize what we are for: We want to be a local church where both genders are prized and both can flourish in the God-given gifts and roles he has for us. Gender distinctions can be upheld and delighted in along with the partnership that God has called us to as part of a unified family (brothers and sisters accomplishing the Great Commission together).
2. Ethnicity (heart attitudes; verbal or physical assault on the goodness of ethnicity)
Our people should be able to have discussions about political proposals in a way that talks about the nations in a way that reflects the heart of God. So we must be committed to having conversations that are not racial-ized. For example, on the immigration debate and border security. I think we can all agree that it is a good thing to keep our borders secure. We can agree that a criminal element makes border security important. At that point of agreement, the “what,” we can have a debate about the best way to do it. But here is another place we should all agree. We can have this debate about “how” without language that is racial-ized and criminalized.
We cannot make globalizing, racial-ized, sweeping references to the peoples of Mexico as if they are all thugs, drug dealers, and criminals. I always think of my Hispanic brother-in -aw who came from Mexico. Or I think of brothers and sisters in Christ there (not citizens of America, but fellow citizens in the kingdom of heaven). Ethnocentrism or nationalism will not be an idolatrous delight if our hearts are aligning with God’s heart on the nations of the world.
3. Abortion (physical assault on unborn children)
Abortion is one of the most horrifying examples of failing to delight in what God has made. It is not as if abortion is totally separate from gender and ethnicity. Think of how many baby girls are aborted in China. Think about how many African-American babies are aborted here.
Abortion was the leading cause of death in the world in 2018 (41.9 million). The numbers of deaths from from abortion in 2018 was greater than all deaths from cancer, malaria, HIV/AIDS, smoking, alcohol, and traffic accidents combined.
In fact, on January 22 (the anniversary of Roe vs. Wade), the New York State Senate passed the Reproductive Health Act that significantly expands abortion rights at the New York State level. What was a little unnerving was the spontaneous cheering after the bill passed. I said on Twitter that the cheering was chilling. They were delighting in this bill with spontaneous political singing. Then they lit the spire pink to celebrate the passing of the bill. This is the polar opposite of delighting in what God has made—this is delighting in the independence to undo what God has done.
Conclusion: Hallelujah?
In the face of so many issues that seem to flaunt rebellion in God’s face, what do we do? How can we still rejoice when we are surrounded by so much rebellion (delighting in independence from God not dependence upon God)? Or to put it another way, how can this psalm end on the note of “Hallelujah”—praise the Lord—in the face of such rebellion and sin and wickedness?
Hallelujah? Bless the Lord—even when sinners are consumed from the earth and the wicked be no more?
The word Hallelujah is frequent in our songs, but not in the Bible. It is a transliteration: Hallelu (praise) Yah (the LORD).
It takes place in both Psalm 104–106, again in Book 5 of the Psalms and then not again until Revelation 19 where the praise of God (Hallelujah) is directly connected to the judgment of God
Revelation 19:1–3
After this I heard what seemed to be the loud voice of a great multitude in heaven, crying out,
“Hallelujah!
Salvation and glory and power belong to our God,
for his judgments are true and just ….
Once more they cried out,
“Hallelujah!
The smoke from her goes up forever and ever.”
This Psalm emphasizes how out of touch and how out of place rebels are in God’s world. But in the world to come, they will be out of place very literally. There will be a total separation between the redeemed who delight in the Triune God and those who rebelled against God and rejected his offer of salvation. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth in one place and everlasting joy in the other. One part of Revelation 19 looks at the fate of one and the next verses of Revelation 19 (vv. 6– 7) say a Hallelujah for the other.
Then I heard what seemed to be the voice of a great multitude, like the roar of many waters and like the sound of mighty peals of thunder, crying out,
“Hallelujah!
For the Lord our God
the Almighty reigns.
Let us rejoice and exult
and give him the glory,
for the marriage of the Lamb has come,
and his Bride has made herself ready.
This holy bride is composed of people from every tribe and tongue and nation that has washed its garments white in the blood of the Lamb. In the gospel, we know that God has done the work so that we can delight in him forever. We will enter a world that is no longer fallen and no longer full of rebellion against him. Indeed, heaven is the invitation to “enter into the joy of your master” (Matthew 25:21). Heaven is a world of joy—not just a world where you enter and have joy for God, but where you enter into the very joy of God.
Psalm 103 and 104 both begin and end with the words “Praise the Lord, O my soul.” Psalm 103 highlights the goodness of God in salvation (all his benefits), while 104 focuses on the greatness of God in creation (all his works). Psalm 103 portrays God as the father with his children, while Psalm 104 shows that he is the Creator with his creation.
Conclusion: Awakening
We must be awakened to the horror of abortion and not become numb to the numbers. I have an illustration that I hope will help you feel the horror again.
After that illustration, we will have a moment of lament and prayer asking God to put an end to the nightmare of abortion. And then we will sing a song about the greatness of God (don’t become cynical about his power or about his mercy). How can we be cynical about whether or not God is powerful? Can God really do anything about the horror of abortion? Will it ever end? Nothing is too difficult for the God who has Genesis 1 on his resume.
But I call you also not to be cynical about whether or not he is merciful. Would God really have redeeming love for someone who had her own unborn baby put to death? What about someone that was an abortion doctor and performed many fatal procedures? What about the boyfriend or husband or parents that pressured a young woman into that dreadful decision? Could there be mercy for them? O don’t doubt the mercy of the God who has John 3:16 on his resume. He sent his only Son. Abortion may say to a child: “Your life for mine.” But the gospel says, “My life for yours.”
Main Point: The sanctity of life is all about sharing God’s delight in what God has made.
Discussion Questions
Application Questions
Prayer Focus
Pray for a grace to be awakened to the horror of rebellion in God’s good world. Pray for a grace to share God’s delight in God and all the expressions of his glory.