April 9thPsalm 104
Dear God,
Help us to be gentle with your creatures and handiwork so that we may abide in your eternal salvation and continue to be held in the hollow of your hand. [Amish Evening Prayer]
‘God is the perfect poet. Who in his person acts his own creations?’ (Robert Browning]
Psalm 104 presents a grand tour of God’s creation and God’s care of the cosmos. As a joy-filled hymn the psalm celebrates the staggering number and diversity of God’s works (a key word occurring some six times). The diversity in creation is not a curse, says our psalmist, but a gift, the product of God’s unsurpassable wisdom.
This week I just want to take note of some of the highlights of this psalm; next week I will reflect on the psalm in light of present day ecological concerns.
*The journey of this psalm actually begins in Psalm 103 in which the focus is on God’s gracious activity in the lives of human beings (salvation) while Psalm 104 focuses on all of creation as the centre of God’s gracious providence. These two psalms form an essential theological pairing: the God of salvation and the God of creation are identified as one and the same and woe to anyone who rends them asunder!
* THE psalm appears to be an exuberant poetic reflection on the evaluation of creation found in Genesis 1.31: ‘It was very good.’
* Unique to this psalm is the claim that creation is sustained not by God’s covenantal commitment but by God’s unabashed joy.
* IN this psalm, the human is only one among many creatures that depend
on God for life.
* THE praise of non-human creatures occurs some 50 times in scripture.
Ps. 65.13 – meadows sing.
Ps. 98 - seas roar and floods clap their hands.
Job 38 - stars sing for joy.
Ps. 148 – sea monsters to snowflakes praise God.
Rev. 5 - a vast choir.
*’When you send forth your spirit (breath), they are created.’ (v.30). This is the same verb used in Genesis1.1, a verb used only of God in the Old Testament.
* Matthew Sleeth’s collection of “Teachings on Creation through the Ages” in The Green Bible yields such jewels as:
There is no creature so small and abject, but it reflects the goodness of God. - Thomas a Kempis
One blade of grass or one speck of dust is enough to occupy your entire mind in beholding the art with which it has been made. – Basil the Great (329 - 379)
Jonathan Edwards thought that the blue sky spoke of God’s mildness and gentleness.
The oft-quoted 19th-century naturalist J.B.S. Haldane claimed, with tongue in cheek, that God had “an inordinate fondness for beetles” because there were so many of them.
*Cherokee theologian Randy Woodley suggests that the phrase, “community of creation” would be an appropriate contemporary translation of the Kingdom of God that Jesus preached. “Community of creation” emphasizes Jesus’ continuity with the shalom traditions of the Hebrew Bible and hopefully leaves behind the unfortunate military directions that “kingdom” inspired at some points in Christian history. It also alludes to Christ’s role as creator as well as redeemer. In addition, for Woodley, the “community of creation” is an important conceptual bridge between Christianity and the emphasis on harmony that is part of Native American traditions.
*THE psalm culminates in an exultant doxology (v.31-35). The psalmist cannot keep from singing (v. 33), and it is appropriate that the first hallelujah (“Praise the LORD!) in the Book of Psalms concludes Psalm 104. The psalmist’s celebration of life as a gift yields a life characterized by humility, gratitude, joy, and praise. What else can we do in light of the preceding affirmations except to praise. The doxology is a prayer that YHWH will continue to delight in God’s works, for without God’s delight, earth dies.
In the second volume of his Church Dogmatics, in the chapter on "The Eternity and Glory of God," Karl Barth offers the following words of advice to anyone who feels inspired to reflect theologically:
The theologian who has no joy in his work is not a theologian at all. Sulky faces, morose thoughts and boring ways of speaking are intolerable in this science. Our psalmist would have understood.
Planets humming as they wander, stars aflame with silent song:
galaxies that spin on, endless; melodies afar but strong.
God’s creation tunes its carol, far beyond our mortal gaze.
Heav’nly bodies help us listen to the boundless song of praise.
[Voices Together, 175]
https://www.youtube.com/live/i_L0L-s4B28?si=G6JEgxB0mbN_YmMG (start at 37:45 to listen to the song).
*A good way to reflect/celebrate this psalm is to go for a long walk or bike ride!