“O Lord, our God, how excellent is Thy Name in all the earth” Psalm 8:1 KJV
“O LORD, our Lord, How majestic is Your name in all the earth….” Psalms 8:1 NASB
Psalm 8 is another of the grand Messianic Psalms, being quoted directly or indirectly at least on four occasions in the New Testament. It relates God’s original intention for a man to rule over the earth with “all things beneath his feet.” “But we see not yet” is the sad interjection of the Spirit of God in Hebrews 2. Sin, as it invaded the garden and then the human family, had initially seemed to have frustrated the plan of God. The writer to the Hebrews details for us how God will eventually triumph despite Satan’s short-lived victory.
But Psalm 2 is filled with wonderful contrasts and gems for meditation.
The Psalm begins and ends with worship for God’s wonderful Name. Here is a Name that is excellent in all the earth (vv 1, 9). His Name is the summation of all He is. Yet, in contrast, that Name became the theme of drunkards as they sang their bawdy songs in their drunken stupor. He, Whose name evoked worship in the courts above, became the subject of entertainment here below.
God’s glory is displayed in the majesty of the created heavens. The wisdom and power which brought galaxy upon galaxy into being by the mere word of His mouth are all on display in the starry heavens above our heads. The contemplation of God’s glory caused the psalmist to ponder in amazement that God should even consider humanity. Yet it was that same humanity that took His Son and nailed Him to a tree. But there, once again, the glory of God was revealed, but this time the revelation of that glory eclipses by light years the glory of creation.
Never was the wisdom, power, goodness, grace, holiness, and mercy of God so revealed as at Calvary! We see, literally, the “glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Cor 4:6).
Our Psalm reminds us that the heavens are the work of His finger. Yet, to accomplish redemption, it took the right arm of His strength (Isa 59:16). Far greater effort, even if the language is metaphorical, in the might of the arm than the dexterity of the fingers.
The Psalmist was lost in worship and wonder when, in light of God’s glory as seen in creation, that God would be “mindful” of us. Why should a God of such absolute self-contentedness ever deign to think upon creatures who can add nothing to Him or give Him anything in return? Did the writer have any suspicion that the God of creation would not only be mindful of us but would one day, in incarnation, dwell among us? That the sovereign Whom angels serve would Himself become “lower than angels to die in our stead?”
With the blazing light of the New Testament before us, we can look back at Psalm 8 and join with the psalmist in singing, “O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is Thy name in all the earth.”
Consider:
Can you find other contrasts and links with New Testament truth in this Psalm?