It's Friday! Put things in perspective with our weekly Psalm.
Psalm 115 (NIV)
1 Not to us, Lord, not to us
but to your name be the glory,
because of your love and faithfulness.
2 Why do the nations say,
“Where is their God?”
3 Our God is in heaven;
he does whatever pleases him.
4 But their idols are silver and gold,
made by human hands.
5 They have mouths, but cannot speak,
eyes, but cannot see.
6 They have ears, but cannot hear,
noses, but cannot smell.
7 They have hands, but cannot feel,
feet, but cannot walk,
nor can they utter a sound with their throats.
8 Those who make them will be like them,
and so will all who trust in them.
9 All you Israelites, trust in the Lord—
he is their help and shield.
10 House of Aaron, trust in the Lord—
he is their help and shield.
11 You who fear him, trust in the Lord—
he is their help and shield.
12 The Lord remembers us and will bless us:
He will bless his people Israel,
he will bless the house of Aaron,
13 he will bless those who fear the Lord—
small and great alike.
14 May the Lord cause you to flourish,
both you and your children.
15 May you be blessed by the Lord,
the Maker of heaven and earth.
16 The highest heavens belong to the Lord,
but the earth he has given to mankind.
17 It is not the dead who praise the Lord,
those who go down to the place of silence;
18 it is we who extol the Lord,
both now and forevermore.
Praise the Lord.
Canons of Dordt
Point 1 - God's Unconditional Election
7 - Election
Election is God’s unchangeable purpose by which he did the following:
Before the foundation of the world,
by sheer grace, according to the free good pleasure of his will,
God chose in Christ to salvation
a definite number of particular people
out of the entire human race,
which had fallen by its own fault from its original innocence into sin and ruin.
Those chosen were neither better nor more deserving than the others, but lay with them in the common misery.
God did this in Christ,
whom he also appointed from eternity to be the mediator,
the head of all those chosen, and the foundation of their salvation.
And so God decreed
to give to Christ those chosen for salvation,
and to call and draw them effectively into Christ’s fellowship through the Word and Spirit.
In other words, God decreed
to grant them true faith in Christ, to justify them,
to sanctify them,
and finally, after powerfully preserving them in the fellowship of the Son, to glorify them.
God did all this in order to demonstrate his mercy, to the praise of the riches of God’s glorious grace.
Summary
The opening verse of this week's Psalm is one worth memorizing and reminding yourself of often. So much of what we do - both socially and professionally - is geared toward advancing ourselves. We work hard to get the stuff we need in order to flourish, and often even our social and familial relationships get used to further our own agendas. But the Psalmist here helps us pray for a much needed correction: Not to us, LORD, not to us, but to your name be the glory.
Look at all that God has created that is worthy of glory! As David puts it in Psalm 19 - The heavens declare the glory of God, the skies proclaim the work of His hands. But it's not creation that the psalmist points to here in Psalm 115. This time he points to something even more glorifying to God: The LORD's love (ḥěʹ·sěḏ) and faithfulness.
The psalmist contrasts God's love and faithfulness with the world's idols. In the time and culture that this Psalm was written in, idols had a physical form, with unspeaking mouths, unseeing eyes, unhearing ears and unsmelling noses all made by human hands. Today our idols look much different - much more abstract. But just like in ancient times, their purpose remains the same. An idol is anything you trust in or glorify more than the LORD.
Psalm 115 reminds you that when you fear the LORD rather than your fabricated idols - that is, when you put your trust in Him, He will be your help and shield. The LORD will bless you and cause you to flourish. Herein lies a beautiful irony: when your focus is on glorifying the LORD rather than yourself, He will glorify you!
Dig Deeper
It's verse 3 that grabs our attention today:
Our God is in heaven;
he does whatever pleases him.
We've wrestled with some tough realities of God's sovereignty these last couple of weeks, and we're really only getting started! We've learned that God, before He created anything, choose some for salvation and choose to leave others in their sin. To us this often seems so arbitrary and even capricious and we desperately want to know why God ordained what He did.
But as you work your way through these difficulties, take comfort in what the word omnipotent truly means. So often we take its literal meaning - ALL / POWER - to its logical conclusion: that our all-powerful God can do absolutely anything.
But that's not the way we're to understand this word theologically. God cannot do all things! He cannot do something that would compromise His own attributes. He cannot do something unloving or something that's not completely good, just to name a couple.
We define God's omnipotence the way that Psalm 115:3 does, that He does whatever pleases Him. That is, whatever is good, loving, true, just, and merciful, God can and does do! God never reveals to us why He's chosen some and passed over others; that remains a mystery to us. But as you come to understand that His grace is stronger than you are, always remember that everything God does is good, whether it makes sense to you or not.
ACKNOWLEDGE WHO GOD IS: Our Father, who is in heaven, who does whatever pleases Him;
ALIGN YOUR LIFE WITH GOD'S WILL: Pray that in all of your activities and relationships, that glory be given not to you, but to the name of the LORD;
ASK GOD FOR WHAT YOU NEED:
Read the New Testament in a year! Today: Acts 17
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