Psalm 67 – Let All the Peoples Praise God
The Psalms are far more beautiful than our English translations can shed proper light on. The middle portion of our Bibles are filled with ancient Hebrew poetry that’s crafted beautifully as a way to help connect the truths of God with the hearts of God’s people. They’re meant to be read and sung in such a way that they stick in the minds of their audience. One strategy employed by the psalmists for accomplishing this goal is the literary technique of Chiasm – a literary structure of linking parallel lines throughout a poem in order to center the audiences thought on the main point.
In Psalm 67 – a short psalm about God’s blessing to all peoples, the psalmist employs Chiasm to hone in an aspect of God that what will truly make the nations glad. When we think of what might make the nations glad – we might first think of prosperity or peace, beauty or blessing. But the psalmist says that the gladness of the nations is rooted in God’s equity.
Right in the center of Psalm 67, the author writes:
3“Let the peoples praise you, O God;
let all the peoples praise you!
4Let the nations be glad and sing for joy,
for you judge the peoples with equity
and guide the nations upon the earth.
5Let the peoples praise you, O God;
let all the peoples praise you!
I was struck by this as I was recently reading through the psalms: that God’s equity, His justice, will be praised by the peoples of the earth! What does this mean? That even on the day of judgment, no one will be able to refute God for the equity with which He judges. Those who do wrong, who reject God and His ways, will on the day of judgement, in seeing God, know that He is right in His judgements. And for those that have trusted in Christ as Lord and savior, they will rejoice knowing the cost of what they deserve is astoundingly something they shall not have to pay because of Jesus’ payment on their behalf. God’s equity in judgment will be a reason for all the peoples to praise Him.
Now, that might seem like a hard truth, but it is a foundational one. The fall of humanity was directly linked to rejecting God’s judgment of good vs. evil. And, y’all, the human heart is AWFUL at determining justice because our standards for it are finite and fickle. Church, may we long for the day when all the peoples will praise God when they see His equity firsthand. And may we be the first to praise God who, while we were still sinners, made a perfectly equitable way to acquit us from our sins and reward us with glory and honor.
In His Mercy,
Pastor Ryan A.
Categories: Evergreen Connection