The opening words of Psalm 8 might be familiar, as they are often used in worship music. The most familiar version that comes to my mind was sung by Sandy Patty, who was popular when I was in college. I attended one of her concerts at Thomas Road Baptist Church in Lynchburg. Dr. Falwell was still alive; now I’m really dating myself!

Psalm 8:1 – O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is Your name in all the earth, who have displayed your splendor above the heavens!

“LORD” (always in capital letters) is the Hebrew word for Jehovah. This is the name God revealed Himself to be to Moses (Exodus 34:6). It means He is self-existent and eternal. “Lord” is the Hebrew word we know as Adonai, meaning master, sovereign, and owner. David clarifies who this psalm is about – the self-existent creator who is master over all the earth!

The Hebrew word for majestic is adîr; its literal meaning is “wide, large, powerful.” It’s often used to describe the oceans and seas. God’s mastery over His creation extends infinitely in all directions. This echoes Paul’s sentiments in Ephesians 3:18-19 in which he desired the believers to know the breadth and length and height and depth of God’s love, and His power which can do far more abundantly than all we could ask or think.

True worship of God always enlarges our view of God. He gets bigger, and we get smaller.

This psalm is a study in contrasts, as though David wants us to consider our Creator from two perspectives.

Psalm 8:3-4 – When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and the stars, which You have ordained; what is man that You take thought of him, and the son of man that You care for him?

And earlier in this same passage…

Psalm 8:2 – From the mouth of infant and nursing babes you have established strength because of Your adversaries, to make the enemy and the revengeful cease.

Look up! Meditate on the vastness of the universe. Marvel at its beauty and be amazed at its power. Be reminded that God knows each star by name and has intricately designed this massive creation to function in beauty and order to sustain our lives.

Look down! Consider the newborn child sleeping in his mother’s arms. Tiny features, so vulnerable and small, completely dependent on those who love him. The whisper of a fragile heart beat; the sweet breath of tiny lungs sustaining his life.

This is our God.

He created all things to reveal His own glory, from the smallest to the greatest, all dependent on Him, and all displaying His majesty in the earth.

Why would a God with this kind of creative power care about us? Why would He think enough of you and me to put us in this world and give us the responsibility to care for His creation? Why would He make us, as David says, a little lower than Himself?

Psalm 8:5-8 – Yet You have made him a little lower than God, and You crown him with glory and majesty! You make him to rule over the works of Your hands; You have put all things under his feet, all sheep and oxen, and also the beasts of the field, the birds of the heavens and the fish of the sea, whatever passes through the paths of the seas.

And why…as the gospel tells us…would this same God send His Son into the creation, to suffer under its fallen state?

Philippians 2:5-8 – Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

The One who created our world subjected Himself to the creation, for the same reason it was created—for the glory of God.

John 17:1-5 – Jesus spoke these things; and lifting up His eyes to heaven, He said, “Father, the hour has come; glorify Your Son, that the Son may glorify You, even as You gave Him authority over all flesh, that to all whom You have given Him, He may give eternal life. This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent. I glorified You on the earth, having accomplished the work which You have given Me to do. Now, Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was.

What’s the takeaway from this psalm?

We sing with both our lips and our lives, “O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!” We tell others, “Look at creation and see Your creator!”

The same God who hung the stars is the One who hung on a cross for You.

The same God who creates life in a mother’s womb is the One who will create a new life in you.

O LORD, our Lord! How majestic is Your name!