Thursday, March 5, 2009

Reflections on Psalm 98

 
    Psalm 98 (Contemporary English Version)

  1. Sing a new song to the LORD! He has worked miracles, and with his own powerful arm, he has won the victory.
  2. The LORD has shown the nations that he has the power to save and to bring justice.
  3. God has been faithful in his love for Israel, and his saving power is seen everywhere on earth.
  4. Tell everyone on this earth to sing happy songs in praise of the LORD.
  5. Make music for him on harps. Play beautiful melodies!
  6. Sound the trumpets and horns and celebrate with joyful songs for our LORD and King!
  7. Command the ocean to roar with all of its creatures, and the earth to shout with all of its people.
  8. Order the rivers to clap their hands, and all of the hills to sing together.
  9. Let them worship the LORD! He is coming to judge everyone on the earth, and he will be honest and fair.




This psalm is within a group of praise psalms (95-100) of a general nature to be used in worship. There is fairly common consent among commentaries that this is a prophetic psalm concerning the Messiah. These include Jewish writers as well. Some say that a psalm identified as a "new song," as is this one, is a psalm with prophetic reference to the Messiah. I will have to take their word for it since to me it is not so plain. I can see a couple of passages that might be construed as a reference to the gospel going to the gentiles. For instance, verse 2 says, "He has revealed His righteousness in the sight of the nations." Also, verse 3 says, "all the ends of the earth have seen our God's victory." Verse 6 refers to the "Lord, our King." This might be speaking of the Messiah since God is not normally given this reference. Finally, in verse 9 it says, "He is coming to judge the earth." I can see this might be a reference to the Messiah's second coming. My comments here are peppered with the word 'might,' making these rather tenuous statements in speaking of references to the Messiah. I am not comfortable with this tenuousness, so I prefer to read this psalm simply for its praise value and what it reveals concerning God.

So what does it reveal concerning God? It says that God is victorious and that He has made His victory and righteousness known to all nations - including all people. We are not told how He has made them known, but I believe we are to infer from this that all who choose to accept what has been revealed about God can know of His victory and righteousness. Neither are we told what victories the Lord has won, but verse 3 leads me to believe it has to do with remembering His "love and faithfulness to the house of Israel." Possibly it is victories won on her behalf. Certainly, God's intent in His covenant with Israel was that all the nations would know about Him through His relationship with Israel. So I am led to believe that it is through God's fulfillment of His covenant with Israel that the world is to know of His victory and righteousness. The result is that everyone is to celebrate, and not just all people, but nature as well.

The celebration of God's righteousness is not complete at this point, however. For at the conclusion of the psalm we see not only celebration for the demonstration of God's righteousness that has already occurred but also for what is to come. Often when reference is made to God's judgment at the end of time, it is with a note of fear. But in this case it is mentioned with a note of celebration. Why? Because God will judge in the end as He has done so throughout history - righteously and fairly.

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