Psalm 8

 

Psalm 8

Taken from Favourite Psalms by John Stott

How Majestic Is Your Name

To the choirmaster: according to The Gittith.[a] A Psalm of David.

 O Lord, our Lord,
    how majestic is your name in all the earth!
You have set your glory above the heavens.
2     Out of the mouth of babies and infants,
you have established strength because of your foes,
    to still the enemy and the avenger.

3 When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,
    the moon and the stars, which you have set in place,
4 what is man that you are mindful of him,
    and the son of man that you care for him?

5 Yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings[b]
    and crowned him with glory and honor.
6 You have given him dominion over the works of your hands;
    you have put all things under his feet,
7 all sheep and oxen,
    and also the beasts of the field,
8 the birds of the heavens, and the fish of the sea,
    whatever passes along the paths of the seas.

9 O Lord, our Lord,

    how majestic is your name in all the earth!

What is a Human Being?
"This short, exquisite lyric" as it was called by C S Lewis begins and ends with the refrain "O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!"  Here is a recognition of the majesty of God's name, or nature, which his works reveal in both earth and heaven. The enemies of God, blinded by their proud rebellion, do not see his glory; but they are confounded by babies and infants. Jesus quoted these words when the children acclaimed him in the temple with their hosannas, while the chief priests and scribes indignantly objected (Matthew 21 verses 15 and 16). God is still glorified in the simple faith of children and in the childlike humility of Christian believers (see Matthew 11 verse 25 and 26; 1 Corinthians 1 verses 26 to 29).

What particularly evokes the wondering worship of the psalmist is God's condescension toward human beings (verses 3 and 4) and the position of dominion which he has granted to them on earth (verses 5 to 8). Seen in relation to each other, these 2 truths enable us to have a balanced judgment of humankind and to give a proper answer to the psalmist's rhetorical question, What is man? (verse 4), that is, What does it mean to be a human being?

The littleness of human beings (verse 3 and 4)
The question was prompted by a consideration of the night sky. If David was the author of this psalm, there an be little doubt that he was referring to the experience of his youth. In his shepherd days, tending his father's flock in the hills near Bethlehem, he often slept under the stars. Lying on his back, he would survey the fathomless immensity above him, seeking to penetrate the clear depths of the eastern sky. He recognized that the heavens, with the moon and the stars, were the work of God's fingers (verse 3) and as he contemplated their greatness and mystery, he cried out: What is man that you are mindful of him and the son of man that you care for him? (verse 4).
If this was David's reaction, nearly 3000 years ago, how much more should it be ours who live in days of astro-physics and the conquest of space? As we consider the orbiting planets of our solar system, so infinitesimally small in comparison with countless galaxies millions of light years distant, it may seem to us incredible that the great God of the universe should take any note of us at all, let alone care for us. Yet he does; and Jesus assured us that even the hairs of our head are all numbered.

The greatness of human beings (verses 5 to 8)
The psalmist moves from the littleness of a human being, in comparison with the vastness of the universe, to the greatness which God has given him on earth: You have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honour. You have given him dominion  over the works of your hands (verses 5 and 6).

Our position of only slight inferiority to the heavenly beings, or even to God himself, is supremely seen in our rule. God has invested human beings with royal sovereignty, crowning us with glory and honour (verse 5) and delegating to us the control of his works. It is even stated that God has put everything ... under his (man's) feet.

The psalmist is referring primarily to the animal creation - beast both domesticated and wild, the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea, and all other creatures inhabiting the depths of the ocean (verses 7 and 8). This is not poetic fiction. As the universe yields more and more of its secrets to scientific research, so our dominion increases. Yet even now humankind is not, in fact, lord of creation, with everything under our feet, as is recognised in the 3 New Testament quotations of these verses.

According to Hebrews 2 verse 5 and the following verses: " .. at present we do not see everything subject to them." It is immediately added, however: "But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, now crowned with glory and honour." Humankind has sinned and fallen, and consequently has lost some of the dominion which God had given us; but in Jesus, the second Adam, this dominion has been restored. it is in him rather than in us that humankind's dominion is exhibited. By his death he even destroyed the devil and delivered his slaves (verses 14 and 15). He has now been "crowned" and exalted to God's right hand.

Although the Psalm's description of humankind's dominion is true rather of the man Christ Jesus than of us, it applies to us also if we have come by faith to share in his exaltation. The apostle Paul wrote that the exceeding greatness of God's power, which exalted Jesus and "put everything under his feet" is available to us who believe (Ephesians 1 verses 19 to 22).

Indeed, we have experienced it, for it has raised us from the death of sin, exalted us with Christ and made us sit with him in the heavenly places, where we are partakers of his victory and dominion (Ephesians 2 verses 5 and 6).

Even this is not the end. Although Christ is exalted far above all rule and authority and all things are potentially under his feet, not all his enemies have yet conceded their defeat or surrendered to him. Only when he appears in glory and the dead rise, will he destroy "all dominion, authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet." The last enemy to be destroyed is death. For he "has put everything under his feet" (1 Corinthians 15 verses 24 to 26)