Weekly Devotional 9th of August, 2024
by Bruce Billington
Weekly Devotional 9th of August, 2024
We are continuing to explore the knowledge of God as expressed in the Psalms. This week we will continue with Psalm 104 by an unknown author.
Psalm 104:1-4 “Bless the LORD, O my soul! O LORD my God, You are very great; You are clothed with splendour and majesty, Covering Yourself with light as with a cloak, Stretching out heaven like a tent curtain. He lays the beams of His upper chambers in the waters; He makes the clouds His chariot; He walks upon the wings of the wind. He makes the winds His messengers, Flaming fire His ministers.”
Where do we begin to describe the stunning beauty of nature? How can we begin to grasp the mind-boggling processes of the natural world? Without question, humans have accomplished many spectacular things in this world. But they all pale in comparison to the glory and beauty of nature—the things God has made.
As I take time out to view all these wonders, I can do no more than just praise God for all that He has made, how it all works and what all these things bring to planet Earth. As a result, we should heed the call to be worshippers. We should constantly thank and praise God from the innermost part of our being. We should fight against being sluggish in this regard. If you feel you don’t have it right now, ask the Holy Spirit to put a new song of praise in your heart (Psalm 40:3). Our great and majestic God is worthy of praise and the very act of it lifts our own spirit as well. Psalm 33:1 tells us that praise is becoming to the upright.
In describing God’s majesty, the psalmist describes how He is clothed in royal splendour, and He wraps Himself in light. The honour or splendour in which God is clothed in His magnificent creation. On the first day of creation, God created light (Genesis 1:3–5). Speaking poetically, the psalmist described God as covered with light, like a king who arrays himself in a radiant robe.
This recalls the time when Moses asked to see God’s glory. God warned Him that no man could look upon Him and live. Therefore, when God passed by Moses, He covered him with His hand (Exodus 33:18–23) allowing Moses to only see His hind portions. When Moses returned to the people after being in God’s presence, his face glowed with the light of God’s radiant glory. It was so bright that he had to cover his face with a veil (Exodus 34:32–35). Scripture tells that at the return of the Lord, the New Jerusalem (the capital of the new heavens and earth) will not need the light of the sun or the moon; it will be brilliantly illuminated by the light of God’s glory (Revelation 21:23). What joy it is to think about this.
The study of light in this context is very interesting. It is a symbol of God’s holiness (1 John 5:1; 1 Timothy 6:16), and His holiness shields Him from all defilement. At the same time, it exposes the sin and darkness of this world while illuminating the way of eternal life. Theologian John Calvin noted that, through this light (Jesus Christ), the invisible God “appears in a manner visible to us.”
Verse 3-4 tells us that he “lays the beams of His upper chambers in the waters; He makes the clouds His chariot; He walks upon the wings of the wind. He makes the winds His messengers, Flaming fire His ministers.”
God loves the elements of nature that He has made, and He uses them for His own purposes making the clouds and the wind His messengers and flaming fire His ministers. John Calvin provides us with a wonderful thought here when he says,
The scope of the passage is shortly this, that we need not pierce our way above the clouds for the purpose of finding God, since he meets us in the fabric of the world and is everywhere exhibiting to our view scenes of the most vivid description.
He goes on to tell us that when,
God makes the waters the foundation of his heavenly palace, who can fail to be astonished at a miracle so wonderful? God rides on the clouds, and is carried upon the wings of the wind, By these words we are taught that the winds do not blow by chance, nor the lightnings flash by a fortuitous impulse, but that God, in the exercise of his sovereign power, rules and controls all the agitations and disturbances of the atmosphere.
Wow – what a mighty God we serve and what an expression of His majesty and creativity we live in.
God bless you.
Bruce Billington.