I Will Praise the Lord

Hello! Welcome to Psalms of the Saviour! I’m Joshua VanZandbeek, and today we are going to be looking together at Psalm 104. Psalm 104 is a praise Psalm, allowing us the chance to meditate on God’s mighty work in creation, and how He is sovereign over all of it.

Psalm 104 is 35 verses long, which is too much for us to read entirely right now! However, I’d like to read with you the ending few verse of this Psalm, as they summarize the Psalmist’ thought here.

Psalm 104:31–35 ESV

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! 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. Let sinners be consumed from the earth, and let the wicked be no more! Bless the Lord, O my soul! Praise the Lord!

We have recently been walking through a sermon series on the seven signs in John’s gospel, looking at what they reveal to us about Christ. As we think back to Jesus’ earthly ministry, we saw many times where He showed His sovereignty over Creation. Calming the storm in Mark 4:35-41, walking on water John 6:16-24, Turning water into wine in John 2:1-12, and many others. When Jesus came into Jerusalem one week before His passion, He told the pharisees who objected to the people’s praise of Him that, if they kept silent, even the rocks would cry out. Time and again Jesus proved himself to be worthy as sovereign Lord to receive the praise and worship found in this Psalm. It is our purpose, as part of God’s creation, to praise Him as the Creator.

Psalm 104 does just that, praising God for His creative works. The psalmist looks at all of God’s creation around him, how vast it is and how small even he is in comparison, and cannot help but burst out in praise. It is a meditative journey through Genesis 1-2, focusing not only God’s original creative work, but how He sustains it and cares for it. Moreover, we can look forward to the day when Christ, as the conquering King, will return and usher in God’s new creation. This is an ultimate demonstration of God’s knowledge and sovereignty!

In the last verses of this psalm - the ones we just read - there is this cry for the glory of the Lord to endure forever. They express the Psalmist’s intent to praise the Lord for all of His days, because Yahweh is worthy of all the Psalmist’s praise. We too can and should engage in this praise. May this psalm be a push for your heart to cry the same as the psalmist:

Psalm 104:33–34 ESV

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.

As we close, I have two questions for you to think on:

Does your observance of God’s creative and redemptive work cause you to rejoice over what God has done?

In what ways is your heart drawn into worship and adoration of the Lord?