Psalm 8 is our reading this morning.
Psalm 8.
O Lord, our Lord,
how majestic is your name in all the earth.
You have set your glory above the heavens,
out of the mouth of babes, babies and infants.
You have established strength because of your foes
to still the enemy and the avenger.
When I look at your heavens,
the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars,
which you have set in place,
what is man that you are mindful of him
and the son of man that you care for him?
Yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings
and crowned him with glory and honour.
You have given him dominion 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 along the paths of the seas.
O Lord, our Lord,
how majestic is your name in all the earth.
Amen.
Well, good morning, everyone.
If you're visiting with us this morning,
my name's David.
I'm one of the pastors here.
It's great to have you here this morning.
Well, having just given thanks for and prayed
for these little human beings,
if next Sunday we got everyone to bring in their pet puppy
and we did the same thing,
we got them on stage
and we thanked God for our pet puppies
and prayed for them,
would you find that appropriate?
We love our puppies, right?
We name our puppies.
We give them names.
We dress them,
or some people do at least.
We send them to puppy school.
We order puppy chinos at the cafe.
We get pet insurance.
We let them sleep in our bed and cuddle them.
Some even call them their children.
And yet, intuitively,
I'm guessing all of us would think
having a puppy Thanksgiving and prayer service
service is out of place.
And anyone who took it seriously,
I don't know how to be politically correct
and finish that sentence.
But only human beings can ask the sort of questions
we find in Psalm 8
and contemplate the universe like Psalm 8,
what we've heard read.
What is my place in this universe?
Human beings,
we all ask that question.
There's something very different to human beings
than puppies.
What is my life about?
What is a human life about?
Where do I find value and purpose?
Asking those questions
and trying to find our value and purpose
in this great universe,
can I suggest is what a human being does.
We can't help it.
Can I suggest that's worship?
Now, I know I'm introducing a religious term there,
but it's not just when we gather like this
that we worship.
Worship is not a religious thing only.
It's a human thing.
We can't help it.
We all do it.
Because if you look in this universe and go,
what is important?
What am I going to base my life on?
What am I going to fill my mind and heart with?
What gives me purpose and value?
You're worshipping that thing,
whatever it is.
It's not a religious thing only.
It's a human thing to worship.
Here's a non-Christian who says that very thing.
David Wallace at a graduation speech at a university said,
there's no such thing as not worshipping.
Everybody worships.
The only choice we get is what to worship.
If you worship money and things,
then you'll never have enough.
Never feel you have enough.
He kept saying,
worship your body and beauty,
and you'll always feel ugly.
And when time and age start showing,
you will die a million deaths before they finally grieve you.
You worship power.
You'll end up feeling weak and afraid.
And you'll need ever more power over others to numb you to your own fear.
If you worship your intellect,
being seen as smart,
you'll end up feeling stupid,
a fraud,
always on the verge of being found out.
That was his conclusion.
He's saying,
we all worship.
That's just a human thing.
What's important in life?
Why am I important?
We all do it.
The only choice we get is
what we look to,
what we worship,
what we centre our lives on.
In Psalm 8,
we find a human being
contemplating the universe,
and we find him overwhelmed
at someone great,
and he's overwhelmed at his place
in this incredible universe.
My father-in-law, Clay,
I know anyone who comes to this church
knows who he is,
but for those visiting,
he's stuck stars
on Sam and Rory's bedroom ceiling,
and it's the constellations
that we would see
from our vantage point here in Australia.
And he's gone to great effort
to get the precise ratios of the distance.
Anyone who knows Clay knows why.
He's ordered it so beautifully
on the kid's ceiling.
My dad, Gary,
always loves to go back
to the country sky in Townworth
because his telescope is there.
He wants to be in the cold night air
just staring up at the sky.
He gets up in crazy hours
in the middle of the night
to go take pictures of Aurora Borealis.
What makes these grown men
act like children?
Obsessed with the night?
What's going on?
Well, they're in good company.
King David,
who wrote this psalm,
this song,
is doing the exact same thing.
He's looking at the stars going,
you have set your glory above the heavens.
He's just looking at this universe
and he's overwhelmed.
The light from the sun
takes only eight minutes to get to earth,
but the nearest star in the southern cross,
nearest star to us,
takes 90 years.
Now, the vastness of the universe,
you cannot fit in your head.
No one can.
It's too mind-boggling.
There's billions of stars and galaxies
behind billions of stars and galaxies.
Now, if the universe was made
just for our home
and our dwelling as human beings,
it's a bit excessive.
It's a bit...
Couldn't you just make the solar system
and that's...
Even then,
probably didn't even need that.
But,
if the universe was made
so that with David,
we can be like children
and just look up at the stars
and go,
wow,
God,
creator,
the grandeur
overwhelms me.
Then the universe is a pretty good size
for us to look up
and see just how amazing God is.
you are the greatest.
Majestic is your name.
The work of your fingers.
It's not his arm
as if it took a lot of strength.
He created it all with his fingers.
It's just...
He's that powerful.
He's like an artist with care.
He's declaring from the depths of his heart,
when I look at this universe,
it is impossible to add to your greatness, God.
When we sing,
we are not adding to God's greatness.
We can't add anything.
We're enjoying.
We're just enjoying his greatness.
That's what we're doing.
Your glory is above the heavens.
Your greatness is above the heavens.
And then verse 2,
it seems a bit odd.
Out of the mouth of babies and infants,
you have established strength or praise
because of your enemies.
What is that doing there?
I think what David is saying is,
okay, it's impossible to add to God's greatness,
but it's also impossible for you and me
to take away from God's greatness.
Enemies,
many people,
in the name of science,
make unscientific spiritual claims,
spiritual claims,
trying to remove God from this world,
from our minds,
from society.
Others, with their words,
try and redefine God
as this impersonal,
I don't know,
force,
like in Star Wars.
You've just got to connect in
and just,
you don't have to listen to God's words.
Others try and make themselves
the master of their life
and sing with Frank Sinatra,
I did it my way.
But then there's
religious people who,
false religion,
not true religion,
but false religion,
who
come to church,
but in their heart,
they're using God to get
X,
whatever X is.
I will pray to you to get X,
I will go to church to get
whatever it is,
health,
the benefit of my children even.
Whatever X is,
is your real God,
if you're using God
to some other end.
false religion,
tells God,
this is what you should be like.
You should be doing this in the world.
You should be doing this in my life.
False religion
claims to believe in God
and goes,
no,
this part of my life is mine.
Don't touch it,
God.
When you look at this universe,
you don't have a,
you don't ask the God of the universe
to come in and be your advisor in life.
You don't come and say,
hey,
can you counsel me in this situation?
God's not your personal assistant.
When you look at the universe,
we are made for him.
All these attempts,
there's non-religious attempts,
there's religious attempts
to try and rob God
of his place in the universe
and in our hearts.
Now,
what's God going to do about that?
How is he going to restore his honour?
Is he going to send angels?
Is he going to send armies?
Nope.
He's happy with children.
He is going to silence his enemies
with what we heard this morning,
the children singing,
my God is so big,
so strong and so mighty.
There's nothing my God cannot do.
That's true.
God uses the weak.
Those little children
are one day going to be proven
to be right.
They're in the position of strength.
They know what's going on in the universe.
With ease,
God created the universe.
With ease,
he's going to silence his enemies.
He's happy with children.
Praising him.
That's all he needs.
It's impossible
to add to God's greatness.
It is impossible
to take away
from his greatness.
And David,
contemplating
the universe,
asks a question
I think we all ask
in verses 3 to 4.
When I look at your heavens,
the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars
which you have set in place,
what is mankind,
what is man
that you're mindful of him
and the son of man
that you care for him.
Only human beings
ask this question.
What is my place
in this vast universe?
And it's a scary question.
does the universe care?
Now those who want to find
their meaning
without reference to God,
here's the kind of conclusion
you need to draw.
Here's Stephen
Jay Gould.
He's an evolutionary biologist.
We're here simply because
one odd group of fish
had a peculiar anatomy
that just happened
to be able to transform
itself into legs
for terrestrial preachers.
We're here just because
comets struck the earth
and wiped out dinosaurs
and gave mammals a chance.
We're here just for those reasons.
We yearn for a higher answer
but none exists.
Now this explanation,
though superficially troubling,
if not terrifying,
is ultimately liberating.
We have to construct
any meaning ourselves.
Any sense of human dignity,
any sense of human rights,
they're just feelings
that it helped our ancestors
to evolve.
It's not actually real.
Today you'll go into
a psychology session
and the problems
in your life
is because of low self-worth
and then you'll go
to a science class
and say,
well, you're actually
nothing special.
You're just evolved fish
and when the universe
runs out,
no one will remember
anything that you do.
There's a play
by Samuel Beckett
called Breath
and it lasts for 35 seconds
and you go in
and it's dark
and the lights
slowly come on
as you hear
whoosh
and the lights dim
as you hear
whoosh
and that's the end
of the play.
That's life.
If there's no God,
what's my place
in this universe?
Well,
we're surrounded
by the culture
that's saying
you don't have a place
in the universe.
Your universe
doesn't care about you.
Now,
even if you believe
in God,
it's a frightening question.
If we start
to get our head
around who God is,
his greatness,
why would he care
about little me?
I'm so finite
and fragile
and limited
before this unlimited God.
I'm here today
and gone tomorrow
before this everlasting God.
Does he care about me?
What's our place
in this universe?
And there's two
amazing answers
that Psalm 8 gives us.
The first is
we are created
to rule
God's world
as his representatives.
David uses two names
for God in this psalm.
O Lord,
our Lord.
The first one,
Sovereign Lord.
He's all-powerful.
We've already covered that.
But then
he's saying
Yahweh,
the personal name
of God.
He's saying
our Lord.
He's speaking
to this God.
He's not this
distant being.
God has created
us to know him.
Personal relationship.
And then David
recalls God's
original design
in Genesis chapter 1
of our purpose
as human beings
which launches him
into even more
worship of God.
If we just hear
the verbs,
you have crowned him.
You have crowned
mankind
with glory
and honour.
You have given him
dominion,
rule.
God's entrusted
the work of his hands
to you and me.
you have put
all things
under his feet.
Now these
terms are usually
reserved for God.
Glory,
honour,
dominion,
crown.
He's talking about
human beings.
Why has God
created us
like him
to represent him,
to rule the world
and show his
goodness,
his patience,
his justice,
his forgiveness,
his care
in all we do,
in all our
interactions.
He's put us here
to represent God.
God.
We're here to know
this God
and enjoy him
and we're here
to represent him
in all we say
and do.
Even changing
a nappy,
you can represent,
you're representing
God.
It's a beautiful
picture.
The God of the
universe
cares.
He's crowned us
with glory
and honour.
Now,
this sounds good
in theory,
but is it
our daily
experience?
Why is there
such beauty
in the world
but also
bombs?
Do we see
people treating
each other
as being
crowned
with glory
and honour?
Do the words
coming out
of my mouth
and your mouth
to other people
treat human
beings
with such
dignity?
We were made
to control
the world
under God
and yet
I can barely
control myself.
The man
writing this,
he failed
big time.
He did
some awful
things
to human
beings
crowned
in glory
and honour.
It's not
our daily
experience.
So,
by all
means,
if you're
at the
beach
overlooking
a sunset,
use
psalm,
pray
psalm,
sing
psalm.
mate,
it's
fitting
for that
because how
else are
you going
to describe
what you're
seeing?
It's a
beautiful
word
to praise
God.
But
a bigger
answer that
psalm 8
gives us
is what
God has
done to
restore us
to glory
and honour.
our
creator
doesn't
just
look down
and know
us,
he's
come down
as one
of us.
God
had promised
in the
Bible
another king
like David
who would
save and
put this
world right.
He would
save us.
God
Jesus
when he
walked
on earth
he came
into the
capital
city,
David's
capital
city
and he
announced
himself
as the
promised
saviour,
as the
promised
king.
There
was a
parade
like whoever
wins the
world cup
I'm guessing
there's going
to be a
great parade.
This
parade
it would
be more
ecstatic.
They were
looking forward
to this
saviour for
thousands
of years.
There was a
parade
and the
children got
caught up
in the
praise and
just praising
Jesus and
the enemies
of Jesus
were like
do you hear
what they're
saying?
They're
praising you.
They should
be praising
God.
That's
blasphemy.
Tell those
kids to be
quiet.
And Jesus
quotes Psalm
8 verse
2.
Haven't
you read
out of the
mouths of
babies and
infants?
In other
words, I'm
the God of
Psalm 8.
It was my
fingers that
made the
heavens.
These little
children are
absolutely
right to
praise me.
And just
days later
these enemies
put him on
a cross
to silence
him.
Now their
plan would
have worked
except for
one thing.
Whose hands
these were
that they
were crucifying?
Hands that
touched the
blind and
they saw
for the very
first time.
Hands that
took a
dead 12
year old
cold limp
hand by the
hand and
raised her back
to life and
gave her back to
her parents.
Jesus'
majesty is
above the
heavens.
He showed
himself as
our creator.
And so he
rose to life
on the third
day.
All
authority in
heaven and
on earth is
under Jesus'
feet.
Our creator
came down and
did that for
us.
God
so all
human beings,
all of us
ask the
question,
what is my
place in the
universe?
You can only
find an answer
to that in
Jesus.
He didn't
just look down
from heaven,
he came down.
Even while
we were
putting our
lives on
everything except
for him,
even while we
were using
power to live
for ourselves
rather than
represent him,
even while we
were mistreating
the dignity
of human
beings,
he came
down.
And those
hands, those
fingers,
crucified for
us, to
rescue us, to
restore us
back to
himself, back
to the
dignity to be
crowned with
glory and
honour.
We have
lost every
right for our
creator to care
about us and
yet he did
that.
Does our
creator, is
he mindful of
you and
me?
Well,
that's how
much you
were in his
mind, that he
came down and
died for you.
psalm 8 leaves
us with a
choice.
All human
beings
worship.
We're all
singing and
living for
something, trying
to find our
purpose in
life somewhere.
You can't
help it, we
can't help it.
Our only choice
is where
are you going
to find your
purpose?
Whose song
are you going
to sing?
You can
join the
chorus of
those who
keep telling
us there
is no
meaning in
life, there
is no
God, who
try and rob
our creator
of his
greatness, who
try and rob
human beings
of our purpose
in the world,
who try and
rob themselves
of the peace
and wonder
of knowing
this God, who
try and use
God rather
than being
overwhelmed by
his love and
his greatness.
You can join
that chorus
or you can
join the
chorus of
children and
just be weak,
dependent,
and just
receive everything
as a gift
from Jesus.
who has come
and done
everything to
restore our
place.
He says when
he comes to
fix this world,
it's going to
be his children
are going to
rule.
He's done all
that for us.
So whose song
are you going
to sing?
To try and
put my
little kids
to sleep
at night,
I always
reach for
the children's
song.
Jesus
loves me,
this I
know,
for the
Bible tells
me so.
Little
ones,
sorry,
I don't know
why it's
getting too
big.
Little
ones to
him belong,
they are
weak,
but he
is strong.
Jesus
loves me,
he who
died,
heaven's
gate,
to open
wide,
he will
wash away
my sin,
let his
little
children
come in.
So it's
up to you,
what song
are you going
to sing?
Will you pray
with me?
Let's pray.
Father, I'm
deeply aware my
words can't
capture your
greatness of
in creation or
what you've done
to save us,
but your
words can.
I just pray for
each one of
us, you
would press on
our hearts
just the
wonder of
who you
are and
that you
care enough
that you
came down
to rescue
us, that
you love
us that
much.
Fill us
with that
wonder so
that we
may know
you and
live for
you and
treat others
with the
respect that
you call
for.
I pray
this in
Jesus'
name.
Amen.