The Majesty and Glory of Your Name
Psalm 8:1
The Majesty and Glory
of Your Name
Over the next few weeks, we will be studying King David’s Psalm 8. It is one of the Psalms that shows, the title of this short series describes, the “Majesty and Glory” of God. There is a song by the same title, performed by both Sandi Patty and Clay Crosse, with my favorite version being the latter.
What Psalm 8 accomplishes is magnifying God. Growing up, I heard that term “magnify”...and I had this vision in my mind of the older folks in the congregation pulling out their magnifying glasses and looking at the scripture. In a sense that was right, in that to magnify means “to make large” or “to make great”; the Hebrew term in the Old Testament is used 115 times and the Greek term in the Greek New Testament 8 times. In the Bible in it’s entirety, the term is used in a broad range of meaning for both men and God, but most often when applied to men it was negative. However, when spoken of by men referring to God, it was meant to honor God, to exalt Him or to make Him “large” to others.
It’s important to remember that we cannot make God any larger than He is already. God is whom He is, and has always been whom He is. He cannot be added to or taken away from. Jesus, God the Son and therefore God as well, is the same yesterday, today and forever (Hebrews 13:8). The best example of what it means to magnify God is found in an illustration in astronomy. The famous Hubble Telescope in orbit around the earth takes magnificent pictures of planets, moons, stars and far away nebulae that are more than breathtaking. However, it does not make those heavenly bodies any bigger than they actually are; it’s that you and I cannot see them with the naked eye and we make them visible by magnifying them through the lens of the telescope. God is bigger than we can imagine; we discover more and see more of the majesty and glory of God by reading and studying His Word.
Rejoice In The Lord!
To the Chief Musician. On the instrument of Gath. A Psalm of David. Psalm 8:1a (NKJV)
Here in verse 1, the title is “To the Chief Musician. On the instrument of Gath. A Psalm of David”. The Psalms are, for the most part, poetry like writings that were set to music; they were lyrics. This Psalm was sent to the “Chief Musician”, the term refers to the superintendent of the worship in the temple, or, in David’s case, the tabernacle and the nation of Israel. The term also means “to glitter” (Strong’s) or “to excel, to be bright, to be preeminent” (Brown, Driver, Briggs). The master musician then was in charge of all music, and his job was to make music that was outstanding; should we not do this as well with anything we do for God? Our actions can either shine a light on God, making Him more visible or also putting the telescope on God bringing the person who is far away from God closer to Him so he or she can see Him for whom He is.
There are many ideas about “On the instrument of Gath”. Other translations are “On the Gittith” (NASB, NIV, HCSB). Basically, it is thought that it was a stringed instrument played by the people of Gath or because of victory over Goliath, who was from Gath or in honor of Obed-edom the Gittite, in whose home the ark of the covenant rested. In any case, it’s important to remember that this is a joyous song, a song of victory even.
Myself, I’m not much on slow dirges. Yes, they have their place, and we do hear some of the more mournful songs of the faith during Passion Week as we should be perhaps more somber in remembering the sufferings of our Lord. I’ve been to funerals where sad, sad music is played and, well, for the Christian I feel it’s wrong. We should rejoice in the Lord: what He has done in our lives, what he is doing in our lives, and what he will do in our lives and when we die the music should be happy because we have gone to be with Jesus.
We should be joyful. There will be no pessimists in Heaven, as those who currently lean toward pessimism will become joyful in the presence of the Lord. Paul wrote: Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I will say, rejoice! and in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. (Phil 4:4,1 Thess 5:18, NKJV).
Each and every thing that you experience in life all meant to glorify God in some way. How? Because those times of obvious blessing are times when we should not look to ourselves but instead to God as the source of blessing. In those times of trial, God is preparing you for something by either building your endurance and strength and/or giving you skills and gifting to comfort those in the same circumstance in the future (2 Cor 1:3,4) In times of blessing, or in times of trial rejoice.
There’s the LORD, And There’s The Lord
O LORD, our Lord... Psalm 8:1b (NKJV)
Let’s look at O LORD, our Lord. Why is it written this way, in all capitals and the second time in lower case capitalized first letter? Actually, there are two different words used, one for LORD (Yehovah, Yahweh YHWH) and the other Lord (Adon or Adonay).
The New Exhaustive Strong's states that Yehovah is defined as “(the) self Existent or Eternal”, referring to God as the only eternal and self existent being. The term is an expansion of the actual, without vowels YHWH and vowels were added to come up with Yahweh, the name that God uses personally (Exodus 3:14-15, I AM). In short, God Is, has always been, and always will be; Yahweh is more commonly used in spoken Hebrew and is Israel’s name for God. In short, David is recognizing God as God.
Adon (or Adonay) basically describes the one who occupies the position of a "master" or "lord" over a slave or servant (Vine's Expository Dictionary of Biblical Words). The first term, Yahweh, states God is God, but the second term says that God is our Master and we are His willing slaves. That may well rankle some people, and is not surprising when it does because we do not want anyone telling us what to do! Human nature is to exalt one’s self, and not have anyone telling us what to do or what to believe, but the mark of a mature Christian is to be obedient to God and follow His commandments.
God is LORD (Yahweh), in other words, He is God whether you like it or not, whether you believe it or not. Your belief or rejection of God does not change the fact that He is God, and that His Word is true. All people know that God exists, it’s just a question of whether they suppress that knowledge. Why would someone want to suppress that knowledge, that God exists? Because they do not want Him to be their Master, their Adonay, and the try to talk their conscience into believing that God does not exist so that they will not have to deal with Him.
What have you done with God? If you have not accepted Jesus Christ--the Son of God--as your Savior and as your Lord, your Adonay, then you are lost. Today is the day to make your peace with Him.
Beyond The Beauty Of Creation
How excellent is Your name in all the earth... Psalm 8:1c (NKJV)
One of my great loves is to walk on trails in the woods. We made a trail on the family farm a few years ago, and one of my great joys was to walk with my dogs on the 1 ½ mile loop, enjoying both nature and the companionship of my furry friends. Photography is a passion as well, and photographing my dogs and God’s creation is a particular passion.
This summer, Lord willing, I’ll be taking pictures of waterfalls in Tennessee while on vacation along with other beauties of nature. When I think of the beauty of the earth, waterfalls ranks just ahead of sunsets, sunrises and trails in the woods! Katharine Lee Bates saw the beauty of nature in “America The Beautiful”, speaking of spacious skies, amber grain and my favorite “purple mountain majesties”, which brings us to an important, key word: majestic.
The Hebrew word in the NKJV above is rendered excellent, but most other translations translate the Hebrew words as majestic. Majestic is a better word, and in the context you can see why. How majestic is Your name in all the earth--of everything on earth God’s majesty outweighs them all.
The Hebrew word for excellent or majesty, addiyr (pronounced ad deer’) is translated in the KJV as excellent, famous, gallant, glorious, goodly, lordly, mighty (-ire one), noble, principal, worthy (Strong’s) but again as majestic in others. Let’s compare some of these shades of meaning with nature; compared to everything on the earth, God is above in glory and in beauty:
Excellent: In school, when we got an “A” on our report card, “A” was designated as “Excellent”, being “best”. God is above all, and the beauty of God is found in his perfection in each and every way.
Famous: How much more famous can God get? Everyone knows God. Interestingly, Jesus did not seek fame; His chief goal was to be obedient to God the Father and right after that was to seek and to save the lost, yet He made of Himself no reputation.
Gallant: Jesus was gallant in His ministry here on terra firma; he was courageous beyond compare. How many people do you know that would willingly be separated from God the Father on a Roman cross of suffering?
Glorious: We truly don’t understand the glory of God, and we will not until we meet Him one day in Heaven. Defined as extraordinary excellence, beauty or splendor, none compare to God.
Mighty: God’s power is beyond compare; He who created the entire universe from the parts that even form molecules. God created all physical laws as well
Worthy: Only God is truly worthy of worship, not any of His creation be it man, insect, animal or plant.
Hubble’s Revelation...
Who have set Your glory above the heavens! Psalm 8:1d (NKJV)
One of my favorite memories from my childhood was one that is hard to come by today. When I was a child growing up in the 1960’s in rural Richhill Township, it was a time of innocence but also a time of little industry in our area. Because of this, we didn’t have the bright lights in the sky from Bailey Mine like we do today, and we also didn’t have many “dusk to dawn” lights nearby either. When it was dark, it was DARK! Because of this, you could see the stars clearly.
My brother and I would take a big quilt outside, lay it down on the grass, and “sleep under the stars”. All of the stars were so visible because there was no artificial light that would obscure the view; it was more than incredible. It was as though the stars were suspended in a clear gel, they almost jumped out at you.
The end of verse 1 states Who have set Your glory above the heavens! As we have discussed before, there are three different meanings to “heavens” or “heaven”: sky, outer space and Heaven proper, God’s domicile. To which meaning does this verse apply? Good question, but I feel it’s the first, the sky.
One commentator I read feels that here God sits outside and above the universe, and I suppose that might be the case--it sure sounds good, and does magnify God--but again, I think here the sky is the view. The context would seem to indicate this-- “Majestic is Your name in all the earth, Who have set Your glory above the heavens!--first we see the earth and all it’s creatures, then what comes next? The skies. Also, God’s abode proper is most often refered to in singular, Heaven. But what we see here, I believe, is a reference to both the heavens--skies--and the heavens that lie beyond--outer space.
Just looking at the majesty, glory and splendor of the stars in the sky as a kid, well, I just couldn’t see how anyone would ever say that God does not exist. However, NASA put the Hubble telescope in orbit around the earth back in 1990, and after some technical problems were solved it has produced the most stunning pictures of stars, planets, nebulae and more. These are all just part--just part!--of the glory of God. The Shekinah Glory of God--the visible presence of God that hovered above Israel in the wilderness as a pillar of fire, and above the Ark of the Covenant in the Tabernacle--is only a mere sliver of the glory of God, and it was incredible to behold.
So, the next time you look to the skies at night, especially if you are in a place where you can really see the stars, remember that you are beholding some of the glory of God. It will surpassed by the glory of God that we will see when we meet Jesus face to face; however, if you want to see even greater glory than this, discover God within the pages of the Holy Scripture!
