God’s Rich Blessing to Earth and Man

Introduction

Why does anything continue? Our earth is beautiful and testifies to the great God who created it. How has this continued, given our failure to care for it at times? Humanity has continued to grow and expand yet we have not faced wide extinction. God has been good to humanity from the beginning, yet man fails to accomplish this. We will see why this is a mistake.

The next four psalms will center on gratitude. We have examined several psalms where the writer was in danger or grave danger. We have read many cries for God’s help and deliverance. God has repeatedly come through. The Lord of hosts is worthy to receive praise because He has been good to His servants.

Background

We don’t have a specific historical setting for this psalm. The mentions of bountiful harvest and forgiveness of sin fits well with the Feasts of Tabernacles. The Feast of Tabernacles was an 8-day feast beginning on the 15th day of the 7th month, called Tishri, and ending on the 22nd day. The opening and closing days were set apart as holy convocations to the Lord with gifts given to God on each day. It was a memorial celebration of the period of the wilderness wanderings directly following the exodus from Egypt. It was a time of joy and gladness, not weeping and mourning. It also It is also called the Feast of Booths because the people were required to live in booths at this time. The feast of Tabernacles come directly after the Day of atonement.

We do have several important themes: God is a gracious God whom forgave sin. God answers prayer by His mighty power. God is due gratitude because of His goodness toward His people. God sustains the earth His creation by His power. All people of the earth will marvel at the God Israel and recognize Him as the only hope. Creation gives praise to its God.

We can break this psalm up into parts:

Praise for God’s forgiveness of sin and drawing of His people (vs. 1 – 4)

God’s awesome power in answered prayer and rule of the earth (vs. 5 – 8)

The Lord’s blessing upon the physical earth (vs. 9 – 13)

Verses 1 – 2: David begins by declaring the God is Israel is well deserving of praise. All people are to give Him praise. It is also possible David is referencing being in silent awe at the awesome majesty of the great God. All promises to God will be fulfilled because of His goodness in coming to the aid of his people. If the background is indeed the Feast of Tabernacles, the people would bring gifts to the Lord throughout the week. God has been faithful and is worthy of adoration. The God of Israel has graciously answered the prayers of His people. While He revealed Himself to Israel only at first, all peoples will eventually come and submit to Him as they witness God’s favor upon His people.

Verses 3 – 4: David acknowledges that the sins of Israel have been great but that the Lord freely chose to forgive them for their rebellion. The words of the late great Matthew Henry are more than fitting: “Our sins reach to the heavens, iniquities prevail against us, and appear so numerous, so heinous, that when they are set in order before us we are full of confusion and ready to fall into despair. They prevail so against us that we cannot pretend to balance them with any righteousness of our own, so that when we appear before God our own consciences accuse us and we have no reply to make; and yet, as for our transgressions, thou shalt, of thy own free mercy and for the sake of a righteousness of thy own providing, purge them away, so that we shall not come into condemnation for them. Note, The greater our danger is by reason of sin the more cause we have to admire the power and riches of God’s pardoning mercy, which can invalidate the threatening force of our manifold transgressions and our mighty sins.”[1] Not only does the Lord graciously pardon, He draws people to Himself. In His presence they are truly blessed: they have forgiveness of sin, true joy, and other good things only he can provide. All the faithful will be satisfied with what the Lord has provided in His temple.

Verses 5 – 8: David gives God praise because He answers the prayer of His people by His mighty power. He is the God who saves, the only one who can do so. He has shown Himself as the great King, Lord above all nations. Everything He has done was righteous. All the peoples of the earth will come to place their confidence in the God of Israel, peoples of all lands and seas. It is the Lord who made the mountains by His power. He rules the seas and brings them to peace. It is the God of Israel who rules over the nations. He constrains their power and battles against one another. He is the sovereign creator God and His acts are witnessed throughout the whole earth. Everyone sees what the Lord does and stands in awe of it. All peoples are called to worship Him and experience His blessing. Soon all peoples and all creation will give God praise.

Verses 9 – 13: It is the Lord who provides water for the crops to grow and people the drink and use. The bountiful harvest is the good gift of God. He brings it about () It is the Lord whom brings forth its beauty. Flocks of animals and abundant grain come by the Lord’s sustainer power and they also give God praise for His goodness.

Practical Application

We see in this psalm the awesome grace and power of the redeemer God. God’s creation relies on God’s grace. Creation and humanity which inhabits it exist and are sustained by His grace and for His glory. We stand here today because of His gracious redemption. When we consider the magnitude of these truths, our weakness and despair and His awesome power and majesty, our hearts should cry out in praise. It also should be silent in awe. We are told in this psalm that all people will see God as the only hope in this world. Considering what God has done, believers today should rejoice in the task of spreading this gospel all over the world and to those who come to us.

We see in this psalm that a strong connection between creation and redemption. The God who creates is the God who redeems. Redemption involves new creation (, ). Even before there was a creation there was a plan for redemption. Shortly after creation, when the fall occurred, the plan of redemption kicked into gear. Salvation is re-creation and it is a joyous event. I wonder what we will become when we grasp this truth.

[1] Henry, M. (1994). Matthew Henry’s commentary on the whole Bible: complete and unabridged in one volume (p. 834). Peabody: Hendrickson.