Psalm 8:3-4 When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have ordained;… I. WE ARE IMPRESSED WITH GOD'S INFINITE INDEPENDENCE OF HUMAN HELP. We cannot touch one of His stars; we cannot control their courses; we cannot increase or diminish their light. Yonder they shine, away from our poor patronage, indifferent to our powerless opinion. When, then, God asks our help in anything, He does so for our good, and never to fill up the circle of His own ability. How these star-lit heavens rebuke my officiousness! II. WE SEE THAT CREATION IS ESTABLISHED UPON A BASIS OF ORDER. There is no controversy in all those heavenly spaces! The stars are quiet. There is no collision of orbits. Everywhere there is sovereign law. The moral significance of this is plain. See what God would have in the moral universe! In the individual heart; in families; in churches; in nations. God is the God of order, and order is peace. III. WE SEE THE INFINITE SUFFICIENCY OF GOD TO PRESERVE ALL THE INTERESTS WE COMMIT TO HIM. If He can sustain that firmament of worlds, can He not sustain our little life? Can He who numbers the stars not also number the hairs of our head? Is our house greater than God's heavens, that He cannot be trusted with it? "Commit thy way unto the Lord, trust also in Him, and He shall bring it to pass." Does His work in the starry creation ever fail? Does the starlight waste because of the insufficiency of God's glory? O Thou who carriest the worlds in Thine hands, carry, too, my poor life! IV. WE SEE THE ESSENTIAL DIFFERENCE BETWEEN PHYSICAL SOVEREIGNTY AND MORAL CONTROL. The weakest man is greater than the most magnificent star! God has made man greater than the heavens, though physically he dwindles into nothingness in presence of their vastness and glory. In what does his superiority consist? In all that is implied in the term "will." Man can say "No" to God. Physical government is an act of sovereignty, but moral control involves the consent of the life that is governed. The house cannot be shaken, but the tenant may spend his days in controversy and bitterness against the builder. Why cannot human life be as peaceful as the quiet heavens? Because human life has a will of its own. God seeks by all the tender persuasiveness of His love, as shown in Jesus Christ, to bring that will into harmony with His own; — when that is done, there will be a great calm. A consideration so conducted will (1) Enlarge and strengthen the mind. (2) Show contrastively the power and weakness of man. (3) Excite the highest hopes regarding human destiny. (4) Tranquillise the impatience and fretfulness incident to an incomplete life. (Joseph Parker, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; |
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