Reading: Psalm 104
Last week I was
hiking with my family in the mountains of north Georgia paying
attention to a small stream beside us. All of a sudden the water
volume in the stream more than doubled. I looked for a tributary, or
some other source of this water, but all I could see was water coming
out of the ground at the edge of the stream, evidently from a spring.
My soul rejoiced in the greatness of God who waters the earth.
According to Psalm 104 that is exactly what my soul should do in
response to this spring of water. (See Psalm 104:10-12)
Psalm
104 is a meditation in the greatness of God with the goal that we
worship God. It begins,
“My soul, praise Yahweh! LORD my God, You are very
great...”, and then begins
considering evidences of God's greatness. I counted over 30
references in this psalm to God's activity reminding us of the
greatness of God—how active God is in our everyday lives, how
active He is in ways that often go unnoticed. That isn't to say we
don't reap the benefit of His activity; we do. However, it often
remains unacknowledged. We often do not stop to consider and return
praise to God for the many ways He sustains us. Psalm
104 is given to help us consider God's activity and return
appropriate credit to God for what He does.
Some
key verses that
help summarize this activity of God are:
He
waters the mountains from his upper chambers; the land is satisfied
by
the fruit of his work.
(Psalm
104:13)
Man
goes out to his work and to his labor until evening. How
countless are Your
works,
LORD!
In wisdom You have made them all; the earth is full of Your
creatures.(Psalm
104:23-34)
The
land, or the earth, is satisfied by the fruit, the effect, of God's
work. Man can labor for a day but must rest, but God's labor, God's
work is unending; it is countless. Our work is only productive
because God's work is constantly active. Do
you think of God as active? Do you think of God as working?
Often times, I think our view of God is that he made the world in six
days and has been resting ever since. However, the scriptures
indicate that he rested on the seventh day. He has been working ever
since upholding all things by the word of His power (Hebrews 1:3).
Part
of what robs God of the praise that is due His name in our day is the
same thing that robbed Him of the praise due His name in Biblical
times: idolatry.
Both
now and then, people in rebellion against God attribute the works of
God to inanimate objects (idols). Then they made statues which
represented various gods (of the sun, or the moon, etc.). Each of
these 'gods' were really personifications of created things. They
were not the worship of the Creator (Romans 1:25). Today we do the
same thing in our naturalistic, materialistic1
culture. We attribute the works of God who sustains all things to
inanimate objects, such as “nature” or “the laws of science”.
People refuse to acknowledge a personal God who created all things,
but constantly attribute rational, personal attributes to inanimate
things like nature (“mother nature”) because we can't escape the
rational nature of the way the world operates.
Christians
are subtly being influenced by this worldly culture. (At
least I am; I need the reminder of Psalm 104!)
One of the ways this might be seen is in a common definition used for
“a miracle.” A miracle, some say, is an
interruption in the normal or natural course of events.
This definition seems to imply that it requires no activity of God
for the “normal course of events” to continue as they do. That
could not be further from the truth. James K. A. Smith describes
Augustine's understanding of a miracle:
Augustine
describes them as “extraordinary” actions that are meant to
refocus our semiotic attention on the “miraculous” nature of the
ordinary. A “miracle” is not an event that “breaks” any
“laws” of nature, since nature does not have such a reified
[material, embodied] character; rather, a miracle is a manifestation
of the Spirit’s presence that is “out of the ordinary”; but
even the ordinary is a manifestation of the Spirit’s presence.
Augustine enjoins us to see nature as miracle.2
In our materialistic culture,
whenever we see a rational, constant working that seems intelligent
in its working and can be counted on we call it “a law”. But we
can't see the law, we can't find the law, we can only say that it
must exist because it is always there, always present. We credit
an inanimate thing (a law) with what only an animate (in the sense of
living and active), faithful Person (Lawgiver) can do.3
Though many are content to credit
idols (nature, or other inanimate things) with the works of God, this
usually changes when God ceases His works on their
behalf.
When
you hide your face, they are terrified; when you take away their
breath, they die and return to the dust. (Psalm
104:29 NIV)
The
moment God hides his face—ceases to provide His faithful works on
our behalf which sustain us in all of life—terror strikes us.
No one in the middle of the ocean pleads with nature to save them and
give them one more chance. No one in the proverbial foxhole prays to
nature to protect them and get them home to their family. When we are
angry about how things turn out, no one blames nature. They are
quick to blame God for the bad, while not crediting Him for the good
(Proverbs 19:3). Hypocrisy isn't confined to believers.
May
Psalm 104 remind us of the many ways God is constantly working on our
behalf and result in praise, glory and honor being given to Him
through Jesus Christ.
Love the Gospel, Live the Gospel,
Advance the Gospel,
Jerry
1By
materialistic I am referencing the idea that all that exists is the
material, or matter. It is the denial of the spiritual.
2Smith,
James K. A. (2010-06-15). Thinking in Tongues: Pentecostal
Contributions to Christian Philosophy (Pentecostal Manifestos) (pp.
104-105). Eerdmans Publishing Co.
3For
a much more eloquent discussion of this subject see Redeeming
Science, by Vern Poythress,
Chapter 1, Why
Scientists Must Believe in God: Divine Attributes of Scientific Law.
Crossway Books.
