I’m writing school reports at the moment. It’s something I hate doing. We have a system where you’re expected to write 50-100 words per student so that in the end over all your reports you’ve written tens of thousands of words most of which begin or end with “Johhny needs to be more focused in class” or “Jane is a pleasant student”.
But I came across a website recently where there was a whole list of supposedly real report comments. I’ve got my doubts about that claim, but here are a selection:
• “While Daniel remains at school a village somewhere is being deprived of an idiot.
• Sandra sets low standards for herself and consistently fails to achieve them
• Dylan contributed to his biology class this semester by providing a perfect example of a primate.
Nowadays we’ve got to be very careful what we write. It seems that, while parents want honest reports in plain language, when it comes to some of their little darlings you can’t be too honest. There was even a directive from the department of education telling us that we can’t criticize a student just in case we’re sued, just in case it damages their self-esteem.
It’s all tied in to this little “self-esteem” idea. It’s the idea that we’re all supposed to know we’re important, worthwhile, valuable. And even more than that – that we’re inherently good and skillful and super intelligent and the most important person in the world.
Now I’m all for people feeling they’re worthwhile but all too often I see “healthy self-esteem” quickly become arrogance, egocentrism and narcissism. And the main problem is that we don’t as humans understand where we fit into the world. We see our lives and our earth and this whole universe as primarily human or anthrocentric. Man is at the centre of the world and the centre of my life is me.
But when we look at this psalm we get a different perspective. Man is no longer the centre of the universe. We don’t look at the great achievements of men and think “what an amazing bunch of people we are.” No, we start and we finish with God.
Vs 1 – “O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!”
In many ways this is a very simple psalm but its implications are breathtaking. It moves us to reflect on who God is. As that classic children’s song says, it reminds us that “God is so big and so strong and so mighty, there’s nothing my God cannot do.” He is an awesome God, but it’s not something we always feel or appreciate.
An old Southern Baptist preacher, Vance Havner, once said …
“Too many church services start at 9:00am sharp and end at 10:00am dull.”
I do find some comfort in this statement because we rarely start at 5:30 sharp, but I venture that isn’t the real point. I’m sure you’ve been to a Christian gathering which you’ve just found boring and a bit lifeless.
But when we reflect on the God of Ps 8, it shouldn’t be this way. Not because Christians are always jovial, bouncy people but because of the God we worship.
We get this feeling of awe and wonder and excitement in this psalm. It’s a song by King David and as we’ve already read, he begins and ends this song with the same line:
O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!
David knows that God is worth celebrating.
So in this song that mingles joy and awe, he rehearses the facts about who God is and what He has done.
And most significant among those things in this psalm is his creation.
I love the description in vs. 3. The heavens and the moon and the stars are the work of God’s fingers which he has set in place. It’s the image of a model-maker crafting his work. To God, the universe is not some massive edifice he’s constructed. It’s the tiny, intricate work of his fingers like some hobbyist or gemstone expert with his magnifying glass and miniscule pair of tweezers. God is so huge that the billions upon billions of light years that is the width of this universe are all encompassed in the palm of his hand. We want to limit God but he has no limit.
I’m sure I’ve mentioned this from this pulpit before, but there’s a great picture in Isaiah 6 where God is giving the prophet this great commission to preach to the people of Judah and Isaiah receives this vision. Solomon had built this great temple where God lived amongst his people. It was a massive building but in the vision the train of God’s robe filled the temple. The little end bit that drags along the ground on God’s robe fills his house.
I was walking through Evatt Park last night with Chris and Cameron. It was a clear night, there’s fewer bright lights in the park to cloud your view and I was looking at the stars. It’s really an awesome spectacle when you consider the sheer scale of it. The scope of it is incredible. I love the outdoors and I particularly love fishing and climbing down cliffs and being near the ocean. I hear people talking all the time about how fantastic a view is or how amazing a park or a waterfall or a sunset or a mountain range is. People spend thousands of dollars traveling all across the world to see these natural wonders but not that many of them think about who made it. The stars might be incredible but they’re merely the work of God’s fingers. Indeed, the second half of vs. 1 points out that God has set his glory above the heavens. He made all and he is over all.
The psalmist is much more impressed with the creator than with the creation. Psalm 19 says PS 19:1 The heavens declare the glory of God;
the skies proclaim the work of his hands.
PS 19:2 Day after day they pour forth speech;
night after night they display knowledge.
God’s creation points to the greatness of the LORD, like a good painting points to the skill of the artist.
But where do we fit into all this? Are we just another part of creation declaring God’s glory? Well, yes and no.
David thinks about the hugeness of God and then makes the obvious point in vs 4 – if the stars and moon are the works of your fingers, how insignificant are we? What are we that you would care about us?
It’s a good question and a right question, but it’s not a question that most people in the world ask. The far more common question is “God, I’m important why aren’t you looking after me” or “I deserve better why aren’t I getting it?”
I went to a Billy Joel concert on Friday night and I’m proud to say that I’m a Billy Joel tragic. One song that he didn’t sing on Friday was a song from his River of Dreams Album called 2000 years.
It’s sort of an ode to human history – all very inspirational - and some of the lyrics are quite telling:
In the beginning
There was the cold and the night
Prophets and angels gave us the fire and the light
Man was triumphant
Armed with the faith and the will
THat even the darkest ages couldn’t kill
There will be miracles
After the last war is won
Science and poetry rule in the new world to come
Prophets and angels
Gave us the power to see
What an amazing future there will be
There’s some oddly religious imagery in there but the key phrase is that “man is triumphant”. There’ll be difficulty, there’ll be strife but humanity will prevail.
Compare that with Psalm 39:
PS 39:4 "Show me, O LORD, my life’s end
and the number of my days;
let me know how fleeting is my life.
PS 39:5 You have made my days a mere handbreadth;
the span of my years is as nothing before you.
Each man’s life is but a breath.
Selah
PS 39:6 Man is a mere phantom as he goes to and fro:
He bustles about, but only in vain;
he heaps up wealth, not knowing who will get it.
The reality is we are nothing compared to God. We need to get this anthrocentric view of the world out of our heads and instead be theocentric – God centred. Our lives come and go in one breath. We’re born, we sin, we’re dead. We’re forgotton, we’re irrelevant. Our lives are in vain.
That’s the self-esteem message for the school students of today!
But that’s hardly the whole story, is it? Look with me at verses 5-8 (read out). Despite God’s greatness and despite out irrelevance God still loves us and cares for us and honours us. Vs 5 says he made us a little lower than the heavenly beings. An alternate translation which you’ll see in your NIV text note is that he made us a little lower than God, a little lower than himself. It takes us back to Genesis 1 where we are made in God’s image, in God’s likeness. And he makes us rulers over all these things he has created.
This isn’t because we are worthy. It’s not because we make good rulers of the creation. It’s simple because God chose to do it.
That might not sound so startling, but when you start to understand that you can start to understand how you fit in to the world. How we all fit into the world.
It’s a mistake to be taken in by the whole self-esteem movement and think that you’re worthwhile and valuable because you’re talented and skillful and an all-round nice person if only others would give you a chance.
But it’s also a mistake to think that you’re a waste of space, worthless and valuable for nothing. For every student that I teach who massively over-rates their own importance there’s another who is convinced that there’s nothing about themselves that’s worth valuing.
A Biblical understanding of the world starts and ends with God. We find our worth as human beings not in our skills or in our goodness or in our friends or in our possessions or even in our collective humanity – we find it in God. We find it in the fact that we we’re created by him and for, and in his image.
And even more incredibly, God became one of us so that he could save us. You heard Hebrews 2 read earlier where this passage is quoted in relation to Jesus. He is the ultimate “son of man” who is ruler of all.
This is a great leveler. If you’re tempted to think that you’re better than someone else, more valuable than someone else, be reminded that your value doesn’t lie in anything you do or anything you are. It lies in God, this awesome creator.
That’s another thing that so many people in our world have trouble with. They think they’re better than others for a whole range of reasons. I’m more intelligent, I contribute more to society, I’m more beautiful, more wealthy, more moral. I come from a particular place or I live in a particular suburb. It’s all rubbish.
You may have seen in the news recently about the decision of Tamworth council to stop allowing the resettlement of Sudanese refugees there. There were a number of reasons, according to the mayor. They’re all criminals, he said. They bring diseases. The people of this community don’t want them here. If you keep sending them, there might be another Cronulla riot.
Recently a friend of mine who works for a charitable organization involved in helping refugees also received a letter about Sudanese refugees. It was from the business council of a large country town in northern NSW. It said, that although the Sudanese were very nice people they had to stop sending them to this town. They hadn’t done anything, but they were driving down housing prices and business profits because people didn’t want to live near them. We’re not racist, the business council claimed, but we don’t want them here.
Not racist my foot! The whole episode deeply angers and ashames me. Especially as my friend, a trustworthy Christian man, insists that the Sudanese Christians fleeing persecution are some of the gentlest and kindest people he knows. But they are black, and we’re better than them, aren’t we???
No, because our value does not lie in our race or our abilities, or even our behaviour – because no one is good enough for God in the end. Our worth as human beings lies in the Lord. And we have all been created in his image.
O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!
The frame statements in verses 1 and 9 are crucial, as you’ve probably already worked out. They not only summarise the majesty of God but they also reflect what an immense privilege we have as Christians. He is Yahweh, his name is majestic throughout all the earth. But he is also our Lord. As David, the writer of this psalm, was Yahweh’s chosen king so we also have been chosen by him. He is our Lord, he is our God. And we are his people.
