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Psalm 148:4

Psalm 148:4 Even the clouds praise Him! God is so carefully maintaining and managing our planet that even the depths of the great oceans and the moisture held by the clouds are under His command! The great masses of rain-filled clouds that journey around the earth are not just random phenomenon that can be rationally explained, they have a purpose, they work to a divinely conceived plan. They are the waters that fill God’s storehouses or cisterns, that are emptied and filled above the earth’s crust as He commands and calculates what, where and when they should operate. So, the clouds are the “deep” above us and they pour out their contents to fill our rivers and streams that eventually flow to the oceans which are the “deep” below. It’s only as I read these verses that I realise afresh just how fundamental to our existence the divine management of the planet really is. Again, it throws doubts over the claims that climate change is caused solely by man’s abuse of the earth and its resou...
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Psalm 148:3

Psalm 148:3 Praise Him, sun and moon This is not the first time that we’ve been made aware that the psalmists believed that all creation, even inanimate objects, join in worshipping their Maker. It’s not just the psalm-writers, Job believed it and so did Isaiah. In fact, this is a premise that is adopted throughout Scriptures, and we would do well to meditate upon it for a moment. We are people living in a scientific age where it’s possible to identify the processes that give life ,accurately, and to ascribe all matter on earth to particular categories and states of existence. Thus, rocks and stones, mountains and deserts and all other matter has apparently been in existence for millions, if not billion of years and is basically dead! That Is, until amazing discoveries are made of some of the precious minerals and Rare Earth elements that are now fundamental to our modern technologies. Trees, plants and all forms of vegetation exist through processes like photosynthesis and give and ta...
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Psalm 148:1-2

  Psalm 148:1-2 Another hymn of praise to the Lord from all of creation We are just three Psalms away from the end of this glorious and unique collection of hymns and songs. This offering is dedicated to every created aspect of the heavenly and earthly spheres, that all things that God has made should be willing to praise Him, even inanimate objects like the stars or the weather! The icing on the cake of this symphony of worship is the nation of Israel, or all God’s chosen people, that we too should unite in bringing Him tribute and expressing our gratitude and wonder at who He is and all that He has done.     V1-2    The origins of worship are in the heavens and the first 6 verses of Psalm 148 call upon the celestial beings and objects to recognise the Creator who brought them into being. This is a common theme of the Psalms, that actually we owe the Lord our gratitude and undying admiration, simply because we exist! The few insights that the Scr...
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Psalm 147:20

We may think It’s great to be American or English, French or German or maybe Chinese or Indian, the list is a long one and could embrace every nation, race and language across the world, but however proud we are of our heritage, in Biblical terms one nation surpasses all others. It is Israel, and in this day and age, that is a very controversial and provocative thing to say. What are the grounds for such an opinion? Read these verses carefully. “ The Lord said to Abram, “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.””   Genesis 12 :1-2. See also Genesis 15. “There above the stairway stood the LORD, and he said to Jacob: “I am the LORD, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac. I will give you and your descendants the land on which you are lying. Your descendants will be like the dust of the earth, and you will spread out to the west and to the east, to the north and to the south. All peoples on ea...
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Psalm 147:19

Psalm 147:19 He has revealed His Word After all that we have read and mused upon in recent days; we now come to the crux of this song of praise. It is the revelation of God through His Word. Creation is wonderful and we have thought about many of its different aspects, but the unique gift of God is His Word, this is the only means by which we can begin to know Him and determine His will.  The emphasis is on the fact that He initially gave His Word to Jacob and His laws and decrees to Israel. All of the Old Testament was written for and to the Jews, every New Testament writer was Jewish, Jesus Christ was a Jew, without them we would not have the revelation of God’s Word. We owe Israel big time, even though they have been lax in keeping God’s truth and even sharing it, although what would the world be like without the passion and courage of the early Apostles?  The underlying truth is that God loves to share Himself with the human race, and the best method is to use language tha...
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Psalm 147:18

Psalm 147:18 Master of the Universe! What lovely words these are!! They reveal to us a God who is completely in control of everything, even the weather! It is so arrogant of men to think that they are able to organise and administer the climate. It is only godless people who think that way, we have no control, we cannot melt hailstones or snowfalls, we are not able to manipulate the seasons or the activity of the sun and moon and the speed at which the earth spins on its axis. For all their lack of knowledge and scientific know-how, the ancients were in a far better place than us, they had wisdom above knowledge and could give credit for all patterns of weather to the One who created the earth and who controls its climate.  What an uplifting verse this is, it describes the transition from winter to spring and in the north of Israel, the snows of Mount Hermon melt every year, and waters flow down to the River Jordan to irrigate the land and to provide for humans and animals. These t...
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Psalm 147:17

Psalm 147:17 Who can withstand His icy blast? In Exodus 9:13-35 we read of the plague of hail that brought severe damage across Egypt.  “Throughout Egypt hail struck everything growing in the fields and stripped every tree. The only place it did not hail was the land of Goshen, where the Israelites were.”  V25-26. Notice that the destruction in Egypt was total, but this hailstorm was selective and Goshen, which is in eastern Egypt, was unaffected because the Israelites lived there.  Is it wrong to surmise that some of the worst so-called natural disasters, hit those places that are not God-fearing but avoid other places that are? If this is so, these things cannot be blamed on the vagaries of the world’s climate. In Egypt’s case the storm was targeted. Psalm 78 describes this same scenario; “ He destroyed their vines with hail and their sycamore-figs with sleet. He gave over their cattle to the hail, their livestock to bolts of lightning. He unleashed against them His hot...
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