Jesus, Undaunted – Psalm 96

A text – Psalm 96

96:1 O sing to the LORD a new song; sing to the LORD, all the earth.
96:2 Sing to the LORD, bless his name; tell of his salvation from day to day.
96:3 Declare his glory among the nations, his marvelous works among all the peoples.
96:4 For great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised; he is to be revered above all gods
96:5 For all the gods of the peoples are idols, but the LORD made the heavens
96:6 Honor and majesty are before him; strength and beauty are in his sanctuary.
96:7 Ascribe to the LORD, O families of the peoples, ascribe to the LORD glory and strength.
96:8 Ascribe to the LORD the glory due his name; bring an offering, and come into his courts.
96:9 Worship the LORD in holy splendor; tremble before him, all the earth.
96:10 Say among the nations, “The LORD is king! The world is firmly established; it shall never be moved. He will judge the peoples with equity.”
96:11 Let the heavens be glad, and let the earth rejoice; let the sea roar, and all that fills it;
96:12 let the field exult, and everything in it. Then shall all the trees of the forest sing for joy
96:13 before the LORD; for he is coming, for he is coming to judge the earth. He will judge the world with righteousness, and the peoples with his truth.

A reflection:

This morning as I am reading this passage, I am struck by verse 5: “For the gods of all the peoples are idols, but the LORD made the heavens.” What the Lord God, the Creator, has made “is firmly established; it shall never be moved” (verse 10). And then, “for he is coming to judge the earth…with righteousness ad the peoples with his truth.” All the other cultures around the Hebrews had a god for this and a god for that, mostly in little statue form. They must have seemed tiny and finite and powerless to the children of Israel – to this psalmist, anyway. The God of Israel was, in every way, BIG.

When Jesus did come, he had a mission – to die and be raised to life so that the power of death would be ended. He would turn death into one short step for human beings to take on the way to eternal life with the magnificent Creator God described and praised earlier in the psalm. When we die, we, too, will be raised to new life.

When Jesus did come, was he, the son of the big creator God, daunted by the stupidity, forgetfulness, and greed of the human beings he lived among? He really should have been turned off by the humans God loves. But he wasn’t. He had compassion for all our faults and showed us a different way to be. And he died for us despite our failures. He broke death and built a bridge for us to an eternal future with him. He gave us a glimpse of how loving our Heavenly Father is. So now we bless that Heavenly Father for Jesus’s coming to save us, and bless Jesus for doing so, and bless the Holy Spirit for helping us to see the truth. Our Triune God is big, and yet this God sees the tiniest specks of goodness in us and loves us for them.

A prayer:

Lord God, Thank you for loving us. Thank you, in your huge capacity, for finding the small goodness and mercy in us and helping it to thrive and grow. Help us, too, to grow love and mercy so that we can better believe in you and be nourishment for a fault-filled world. Let us be part of your Kingdom.  Amen.