Everything, Praise the Lord
Psalm 148
Friends it is just days after Christmas and inevitably the excitement and energy of the day has begun to wane. The packages with bows have been opened, stocking hung with care by the chimney have been emptied. The children excited momentarily in the glow of new toys, have lost interest, and have started to plan the letter for Santa for next year. Family, if you were fortunate enough to gather, have left and gone home. The bloom is off the rose and it is not even New Year’s Day.
Some people have already taken down the tree, for others the tree is on the endangered list. The lights and decorations that have been so festive over the past few weeks will come down next and boxed up once the new snow melts away.
The radio stations and television channels have returned to regular programming. The endless cycle of holiday songs, movies and shows are shelved until just after Thanksgiving next year. Although the Hallmark Channel has yet to turn the page and continues the 24/7 Christmas marathon.
The stores have marked down the left-over Christmas candy, cards and decorations. Some thrifty souls have scored great deals while less fortunate souls grumble as they wait in the return line. The secular observance of Christmas has moved on.
Even the Lectionary has moved on from Bethlehem and Christmas. The Gospel lesson today finds us with Mary and Joseph, that after the eight days of purification for Mary they have taken Jesus to the temple for his circumcision. There they run into Anna and Simeon who have finally completed their own periods of expectantly awaiting the one who is to save Israel.
Our season of purposeful expectant waiting for the arrival of Jesus has also come to an end. This year through Advent we have listened to the words of the prophet Isaiah foretell the destruction of Jerusalem because of their disobedience and the scattering of many of the Israelites throughout the region and many taken by force to Babylon.
Despite God’s judgement and punishment, Isaiah has promised that God will come to his people and will send a shepherd, a Messiah, to save them and return them to the Promised Land and into a right relationship with God. We have anticipated all this during the Advent season, and we have celebrated the arrival of Jesus. But as Christians our scripture today tells us that there is another lesson that we must learn from Christmas. Our message lesson today commands, Everything, Praise the Lord!
Theologian Beth Tanner tell us that, often when we think of praise, our thoughts turn to Sunday gatherings and human voices lifted in song. But Psalm 148 reminds us God’s whole creation is commanded to offer up praise to God.
Steven Cole says that Psalm 148 is a glorious psalm of praise and the message is clear. The command to praise the Lord is repeated nine times in the first five verses and twelve times in the entire psalm.
Barton Bouchier wrote: This psalm is a glorious vision of that coming day, when not only will the knowledge of the Lord be spread over the whole earth, as the waters cover the sea, but from every created object in heaven and in earth, animate and inanimate, from the highest archangel through lowest being, down to the tiniest atom—young men and maidens, old men and children, and all kings and princes, and judges of the earth shall join together in a praise filled anthem to the Redeemer that we see and hear at Christmas. The message of Psalm 148 is simple: Everything and everyone in heaven and on earth should praise the Lord.
The psalmist starts with Angels and Holy Company, “Praise Him, all His angels; praise Him, all His hosts!” As we see throughout the Bible one of the main functions of these angelic beings is to praise the Lord. In fact, we recently read the Apostle John tell us about his vision in Revelations 5:
Then I looked and heard the voice of many angels, numbering thousands upon thousands, and ten thousand times ten thousand. They encircled the throne and the living creatures and the elders. In a loud voice they were saying: “Worthy is the Lamb, who was slain, honor and glory and praise!” Then I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and on the sea, and all that is in them, saying: praise and honor and glory and power, for ever and ever!”
As we have seen at Christmas, through song and scripture, the Angels are the ones always leading the way for us to praise God. Friends if we are not learning to praise God here on earth, we are going to feel rather out of place in heaven!
Why do the things of Heaven praise Him? All his angels, all his heavenly hosts, the sun and moon; the shining stars, you highest heavens, the planets and the cosmos, and the waters above the sky, why do they praise Him? They praise Him because He created them. They owe their existence to the command of God, who said, “Let there be…” when he created the heavens and the Earth. Cole: God didn’t have to work hard for billions of years to create the universe. Rather, He spoke and by His infinite power, the universe came into being. Matter is not eternal. God is eternal. Matter exists because God commanded it to exist.
James Boice gives us three ways that these heavenly bodies are an example for our worship. First, their worship of God is always visible. We see them in the Heavens, always visible to our eyes.
Second, their worship of God is constant. It does not vary. “He established them forever and ever.”
The third reason is that these stars are a model for us in that they always obey God. The celestial bodies follow the laws of physics that God has established. Friends we should be so obedient in praise to our Creator!
The psalmist goes on to say that everything non-human should also praise the Lord. He begins with the ocean deeps and the creatures that dwell there. “Sea monsters” and the other large creatures in the sea. The mountains and hills, fruit trees and all cedars to are to praise the Lord, followed by beasts, cattle, creeping things (insects, reptiles), and birds. For they, like the heavenly creations, were spoken into existence by God and they owe praise to him because of that.
Now then if all of the other creations of Heaven and Earth owe praise to God because he caused them to be created, then what about mankind, we to were created by God as well. That is true, but the reason that we owe eternal and continual praise to God is much more intimate and personal. That is why this scripture is relevant at Christmas.
The psalmist tells us that man should praise God because he is in a personal relationship with him, because Jesus came down to us at Christmas and revealed Himself to us. Among His people His glory is that of a redemptive love, a strong deliverer and bringing them us near to him. That is the climax of the psalm, as it is of the gospel: ‘Behold, the dwelling of God is with men. He will dwell with them, and they shall be his people’ (Rev. 21:3).
The psalmist starts with the most powerful people on earth; kings, princes, and judges, then he mentions young adults, older people, and children. You see that no one is exempt from the duty and privilege of praising the Lord. The point is that all people, from the greatest and most powerful to the least and weakest should praise the Lord. We should have a joyful preoccupation with God.”
Praising the Lord doesn’t mean repeating, “Praise the Lord,” over and over. Rather, praising the Lord is to rejoice in who God is and what He has done, especially, in what He has done to redeem you and draw you near to Him through the cross of Jesus Christ (Eph. 2:13).
Cole tells us that “Genuine praise contains both a rational and an emotional element. With our minds, we must understand who God is, as revealed in His Word. Otherwise, we are not worshiping the true God, or at least, God as He is truly revealed to us. But, also, when you understand who God is and what He has done in sending His own Son to die for your sins, it affects your heart. It fills you with joy and thankfulness. It humbles you to realize that your sin put Him there. It motivates you to follow Christ and praise Him with all your heart.”
Hear the Good News my friends………….
We are compelled to praise him, not because a scripture tells us we must but because we are “His people”, because He chose us and He redeemed us. We are not our own; we’ve been bought with a price. We are “His godly ones.” We are set apart from this world by the Lord. We must be growing in holiness.
Finally as our lesson in Galatians today tells us “when the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship. Because you are his sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, “Abba, Father.” So you are no longer a slave, but God’s child; and since you are his child, God has made you also an heir. Friends praise God that we are members of an eternal family!
Paul writes (Eph. 2:13, 17-18), “But now in Christ Jesus you who formerly were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ…. And at Christmas He came and preached peace to you who were far away, and peace to those who were near; we have our access through the Spirit to the Father.”
Well the secular Christmas festivities may be over for another year, but the spiritual reawakening, the joyful preoccupation with God continues unabated. Dear Ones, you are near to God through arrival of the Christ child and the blood of Christ, so the command is appropriate and righteous: “Everything, Praise the Lord!”