16 Sep Meditations on the Psalms #215
Psalm 104 Part 4
“He laid the foundations of the earth, that it should not be moved forever” (v5). I remember watching the twin towers come crashing down in 2001. What we build is temporary. In some cases, obsolescence is planned (as in automobiles, electronics, or clothing styles). In other cases, moth and rust do their work to undo our efforts. But the psalmist has experienced the permanence embodied in the world on which he has firmly planted his feet. He believes that nothing will move it forever.
The Lord revealed a different vision to the prophet Isaiah. “For, behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former things shall not be remembered, nor come into mind” (Isaiah 65:17). The new heavens and earth will restore the paradise of the original creation of which this psalm is singing. In them, righteousness will dwell (2Peter 3:13). But that doesn’t cancel the permanence of Yahweh’s creation. It will remain intact until he deems its renewal complete.
“You covered it with the deep as with a cloak. The waters stood above the mountains. At your rebuke, they fled. At the voice of your thunder, they hurried away. The mountains rose, the valleys sank down, to the place which you had assigned to them” (vs6-8). These verses recount Genesis 1:9-10, where God gathered the waters together so that the dry land would appear. The point is not what happened, but the wonder of it. At God’s word, the miracle happened.
“You have set a boundary that they may not pass over; that they don’t turn again to cover the earth” (v9). This recounts the Lord’s words when he asked where Job was when He laid the foundations of the world––and “shut up the sea with doors” and “marked out for it my boundary, set bars, and doors, and said, ‘Here you may come, but no further. Here your proud waves shall be stayed?’” (Job 38:8-11).
It also brings to mind the story of Noah and the flood––and the covenant that Yahweh made never to cut off all flesh again by the waters of a flood (Genesis 9:8-17).
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