We are in the fifth week of the circuit breaker, and for many of us, it’s probably the first time we’re experiencing such a situation. Unprecedented times call for unprecedented measures that require wisdom – wisdom to conceive of an appropriate response and to deploy that response as effectively as possible.
We live in a broken world and we often have to choose between imperfect options. Often, many of our options involve some form of loss. So in these situations, what we need most if wisdom to pursue the course of action that would be most honoring to God and to all the stakeholders involved. In God’s grace, He helps us choose Him and choose the things that glorify Him the most.
In each situation, there are two kinds of wisdom at play – firstly, the wisdom of God and secondly, the wisdom that God’s people strive towards. This study of Psalm 104 will focus on the first kind of wisdom. We hope that in such a time as this, God’s revelation of Himself in His Word will be a source of hope and encouragement to all of us as we come to it together.
Psalm 104 is a creation psalm. It shows us the wisdom of God as it is seen throughout creation.
(A) THE PERFECT KNOW-HOW OF GOD
What is wisdom exactly? Let us consider what it is and what it is not.
Firstly, wisdom is not knowledge. Knowledge, which is acquired by accumulating information, is indeed one of the building blocks of wisdom, but it does not equate to wisdom itself. Wisdom has more to do with discernment and insight into this information. Secondly, wisdom is not intellect. It is not intelligence. Although being able to draw upon our intellect in making wise decisions is good, it is often said that even if we had all the intelligence in the world but not have wisdom, we would just be clever fools. Finally, wisdom is not love, compassion or empathy. All of these are desirable traits and they contribute to wisdom, embellishing it and working alongside it in the application of wisdom.
What, then, is wisdom? And what is the wisdom of God in the context of Psalm 104? In his book, Knowing God, theologian J.I. Packer offers this definition of wisdom: “Wisdom is the power to see, and the inclination to choose, the best and highest goal, together with the surest means of attaining it.”
Another theologian, Dr. Steven J Lawson, puts it this way: “[Wisdom means that] God always has the highest end in mind, and (employs) the best means by which to attain this highest end.”
In these definitions, we see that the outcome of the situation matters. Wisdom is not just about planning but also about doing – employing the best means to attain the best outcome. In other words, when we speak of God’s wisdom, we are referring to the attribute of God where He always chooses to produce the best possible outcome through the best possible means. More simply, God always designs perfect ends and employs perfect means. And because the best and highest end of all is always the glory of God, God always chooses the means that glorify Him the most.
Another way of thinking about wisdom has to do with the idea of “know how”. We see this in Exodus 31, where Bezalel, a craftsman, was given wisdom in the art of making the furnishings for the tabernacle. In this sense, wisdom entails knowing how to formulate a plan as skilfully as possible and carrying it out in the best and more effective manner.
Therefore, what is the perfect wisdom of God? Although wisdom does not equate to knowledge itself, we know that perfect wisdom cannot exist without the knowledge of all the facts that are pertinent to any purpose or plan. This is where the wisdom of God differs from the wisdom of man. Our all-knowing God is able to see each and every thing in its proper relation to everything else. He is able to work out what He sets out to do with utmost precision. Knowing this gives us a glimpse into how God can work out His perfect ends with perfect means.
Why should this attribute of God – His perfect wisdom – be important to professing Christians? Here are two reasons: Firstly, if God is all-powerful and all-knowing but is not also all-wise, then we could conceivably have a God who has all power, all knowledge and all control, but might misuse them. So wisdom entails this skilfulness of formulating a plan and carrying it out in the best and most effective manner, and it co-exists with God’s other perfect attributes. It is important that we recognise and affirm the wisdom of God as one of His many perfect attributes. Secondly, if God does everything in perfect wisdom, then what does it mean when things in my life and in the world don’t go the way I expect them to?
For some answers, we look at Psalm 104.
(B) CREATION AS WITNESS: GENESIS REVISITED
In Ps 104:1, the phrase “O LORD my God, you are very great!” jumps out at us because expressions like these are rare in our contemporary worship and reading of modern English. As the Psalmist offers himself to God, saying “Bless the Lord, O my soul”, proclaiming the greatness of God explicitly, we see a picture of wholehearted worship. The psalmist is applying himself to his song of praise. He is willing himself to be present in his worship. So often, we worship God half-heartedly; we take a while to get our hearts into a worshipful state. Yet here, in Psalm 104, he rallies his whole being to offer praise unto YHWH.
The way the Psalmist begins the psalm reflects his perspective of God as a big God. He comes before God with exuberant awe, wonder, and praise of a big God. This perspective is a good starting point for us to follow. Today, we’re prone to compressing God into a pseudo-rational box of inquiry. We often say that we cannot accept or affirm something until we’ve fully comprehended or grasped an issue. But it is interesting that the New and Old Testament saints who knew God, walked and talked with Him, knew that God was way bigger than themselves, and this was not for lack of rational thought! People like Joseph and Daniel were top civil servants in some of the most powerful civilizations in the ancient world. They were fully rational, high-functioning individuals who trusted in this God who was infinitely bigger and wiser than themselves.
Throughout the psalm, the Psalmist wasn’t simply processing these truths intellectually or assenting to them as passed down by his forefathers, but was actually summoning his very being to embrace the things he was about to offer up in praise to YHWH. He was wrestling with these truths and commanding himself to praise and worship. As we will see, he ends the psalm on the same note as well.
Ps 104:1-4 gives us a picture of a grand, regal, kingly, authoritative, and commanding God. They evoke images of sovereignty – having authority or being above all things. This language is usually applied to a king or a monarch, such as Queen Elizabeth. The Psalmist is proclaiming who this big God is.
Being sovereign means that the King of the universe can do anything he wants with it – and He did – in the opening chapters of Genesis. This king is under no obligation to tell us how he created, but he most certainly tells us what he did. Here, the Psalmist draws on that revelation and recounts the events of creation. In Ps 104:5, he says, in essence, that what God has built, He built well. The earth’s solid foundations will not be moved unless God moves them. The only one capable of moving the earth as the one who built it – that is God Himself.
After making the earth, God covered it with water (Ps 104:6), which the Psalmist describes as draping a garment over something. Gen 1:9-10 tells us that every single land mass and mountain was submerged in the beginning, but by the very word of God, the continents emerged to take their appointed place.
Have you considered the absolute wonder of our place in the universe? In space, a zero-gravity environment, God fashioned each of the planets; He lined them up around the giant star. Each planet possesses its own gravitational field. In our case, God laid the earth’s foundations around a core and covered the entire surface with water, and He assigned it a gravitational force so specific that all of it holds together and not a single drop of water is spilt from surface of the earth unless God commands it.
From these verses, it is abundantly clear that this is a God who establishes boundaries. The God who created the universe established its physical boundaries and the corresponding laws of Physics, Mathematics, and of the natural sciences. And while creation itself is subject to these laws, its Creator, being God Himself, is above them. Occasionally, God intervenes in His created universe – in the act of creation, in the flood, in the parting of the Red Sea – and these are what we call miracles.
The language in Ps 104:9 shows that the Psalmist had the Noahic flood in mind. In the flood account in Genesis 7, we are told that the waters prevailed so mightily upon the earth that all the high mountains on the whole earth were covered. The waters prevailed above the mountains, covering them fifteen cubits deep (Gen 7:19-20) and this lasted 150 days (Gen 7:24) – almost half a year. But in Genesis 8, God remembered Noah and He made a wind blow over the earth and the waters subsided (Gen 8:1-2), and He promised never to send a flood to destroy the earth again (Gen 8:21).
Almost 3000 years later, this same God, in the person of Jesus Christ, rebuked the waters of the storm and calmed them (Matt 8:26-27). These are oceans that make huge oil tankers – a super marvel of human engineering – look like toy boats in a bathtub! These verses should comfort us, especially when we wrestle with fear. They remind us of who Jesus is. This is the same God who established the boundaries of the world. In His wisdom, He parted the waters from dry land and at His command, the flood receded. This is our God!
In Ps 104:10-12 and Ps 104: 16-23, the Psalmist seems to shift gears as if he were playing with Google Earth. From these primordial bodies of water, he zooms in to the tiniest of springs and says “God, this is Your handiwork too.”
God knows what every living creature needs and He provides for them. He has also created an order for all things – a time and place for everything. God is behind all creation and sustains all creation. God’s creation is purposeful, intentional and sufficient, and behind all of this purpose and intention, there is intelligent design. There is an ecology to the world and an ecosystem in every place – from bodies of water to plants to animals of the earth, all find their place in God’s plan and order.
God’s wisdom is manifest in His thoughtfulness and care for creation. God is the earth’s gardener, zookeeper, interior designer and timekeeper.
God is the earth’s gardener.
He waters the earth’s mountains (Ps 104:13) and He looks after the trees of the earth (Ps 104:16), which are called “the trees of the LORD” – the trees of YHWH. They are watered abundantly. He planted the cedars of Lebanon. The cedar tree is the national symbol of Lebanon and is one of the oldest and grandest trees in the world. Think about how these trees grow – nobody planted or watered them, nor tends to their diseases, yet they flourish and flower. These trees were planted by God Himself; it is He who waters them. They are the LORD’s.God is the earth’s zookeeper.
He gives drink to the beasts of the field (Ps 104:13), he feeds both livestock and mankind with the grass and the plants of the ground (Ps 104:14), he feeds the young lions their prey (Ps 104:21). Even the predator is fed by God and can claim no credit for its kill!God is the earth’s interior designer.
He designs and assigns homes to each creature (Ps 104:17,18). The birds build their nests in trees, the stork has a home, the high mountains are for the wild goats, and the rocks are a refuge for the rock badgers.God is the earth’s timekeeper.
He alone keeps time and made the sun and moon to delineate day and night (Ps 104:19), he regulates circadian rhythms such that each of his creatures has their appointed place (Ps 104 :20,22-23) and operate according to God’s wise plan for creation.
God is able to play all these roles in His absolute wisdom. In the same spirit, Jesus reminds His disciples not to be anxious – precisely because of God’s infinitely wise provision. He says in Luke 12:22-24, “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat, nor about your body, what you will put on. For life is more than food, and the body more than clothing. Consider the ravens: they neither sow nor reap, they have neither storehouse nor barn, and yet God feeds them. Of how much more value are you than the birds!”
God sustains the ecology of the world so that it continues to provide what creation needs to flourish. However, unlike the animals that God feeds unconditionally, man is tasked with cultivating plants to bring forth food from the earth (Ps 104:14-15) and labouring (Ps 104:23). With God’s provision and man’s work, what is brought forth from the land is wonderful. God’s earth gives us the raw materials for wine, oil, and bread – and each of these carries their own blessing, significance and goodness. In God’s wisdom, each of these things was intended for the edification of man.
From Ps 104:24, the psalmist continues to be amazed as he looks at nature and creation. He proclaims, “O LORD, how manifold are your works! In wisdom have you made them all; the earth is full of your creatures.” It is clear that he sees nature not as the result of random events, but as the wise and intentional work of God. Even Leviathan, mentioned in Ps 104:26, which is often described elsewhere in the Old Testament (Ps 74:14, Isa 27:1) as a multi-headed sea monster (Heb tanin) that symbolises hostility to God, was made by God to play in the ocean!The vastness of the ocean cannot be understated – it really teems with creatures innumerable (Ps 104:25).
Speaking of provision, Ps 104:27 reminds us that all creatures great and small, from the tiniest of bugs to the fiercest predator, all look to God to provide for them in due season. When God gives, they receive, or more specifically, they gather. This word ‘gather’ is also used in Exodus where God provided the Israelites with manna and they went out to gather them. Gathering connotes picking up or collecting from the ground. It presupposes that God is providing the thing being gathered from heaven, and it paints a picture of dependency. Indeed, as the Psalmist says in Ps 104:27-30, all of creation depends on God, whose very Spirit or breath sustains life and renews it.
The Apostle Paul reminds us of this in Colossians 1:15-17, where this same God, in the Person of Jesus Christ, created all things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, thrones and dominions and rulers and authorities—and in him all things hold together. When God sends forth His Spirit, new life is created.
(C) APPLICATION AND RESPONSE
The wisdom of God in creation
We have seen how the wisdom of God is manifest in creation. Paul reminds us that everywhere we look, we see the wisdom of God, such that we cannot deny what can be known about God (Rom 1:19-20). One wonderful outcome of the circuit breaker is that the air is clearer, the sky is bluer and the wildlife are coming out to play. When we take time to look around, we cannot deny God’s wisdom in the beauty of creation!
Apart from creation, there are at least two other ways in which God’s wisdom applies to us – firstly, in our salvation, and secondly, in our current circumstances.
The wisdom of God in salvation
Recall that in God’s perfect wisdom, He always chooses the highest ends (the greatest good), and He chooses the best means by which to arrive at these highest ends. These highest ends are always the glory of God and the good of His people, and they are never in conflict.
These come together in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Looking at 1 Corinthians 1:21-31, we see that it pleased God to save those who believe (ends) through the folly of what we preach, which is Christ crucified (means). He also chose the low and despised in the world (means) so that no human being might boast in the presence of God (ends). Finally, through being in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption (means), let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord (highest end).
As God implements His plan of salvation, we may not see how each of the pieces fall into place or how the mechanism works, but with hindsight, revelation, and testimony, we can witness the glory and the wisdom of God in salvation.
1 Cor 27 tells us that God chose what appeared foolish to the world to reconcile us to Himself in humility. We see this in Jesus Christ, the carpenter King and a servant to His people. God chose the way of salvation through Christ because it was the perfect way to achieve the greatest goal – the humility of man and the glory of God. He also did this so that we may be justified, made righteous, sanctified, and redeemed.
Moreover, God has made His perfect wisdom available to us through Christ. Jesus Christ is the wisdom of God (1 Cor 1:24), in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge (Col 2:3), and He has become to us wisdom from God (1 Cor 1:30) for those of us who are in Him – what a wonderful thing! Part of our salvation is receiving the very wisdom of God from God, in the person of Jesus Christ who lives in you. We can access this wisdom by humbling ourselves, repenting, and submitting to Christ in godly fear. This fear is indeed the beginning of wisdom (Prov 1:7). And we are to apply this wisdom, in keeping with God’s intentions for our salvation, to bring glory to God through our lives.
Going by its definition, Godly wisdom enables us to apply the knowledge we have to pursue the outcome that most honours God. Often, this is also the most morally upright outcome. Because God is the source of all wisdom, wisdom is intrinsically moral. If we remove this moral aspect, what we have is mere shrewdness. We do not just want to be shrewd, but we want to be wise and God-honouring.
The wisdom of God in our current circumstances
If we rightly see the wisdom of God for what it is, how would that perspective affect our current circumstances? If God does everything in perfect wisdom, what does it mean when things in my life don’t go the way I expect them to? What does that mean for our individual circumstances, be it illness, career struggles, difficult relationships, or COVID-19?
If we’re currently struggling, Scripture has encouragement for us. Scripture may not have the most specific answers to our specific problems, but it offers us the greatest and clearest answers:
The Spirit of God helps us in our weakness and is interceding for us according to the will of God. We can be assured that for those who love God and are in Christ, all things work together for good (Rom 8:26-28). But remember that the highest good is always God’s glory, and God may choose to work that out in different ways.
In everything, by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God (Phil 4:6). God does hear the laments of His people and it is a blessing to be able to cry out to God.
Cast all your anxieties on him because he cares for you (1 Pet 5:7). Remember that the God of all wisdom cares for his creation, of which you are a part.
Remember Jesus Christ, who is before all things, and in whom all things hold together (Rom 8:26-28). He offers us peace, even in tribulation, because He has overcome the world (Jn 16:33).
When things in our lives don’t go the way we expect them to, remember Psalm 104. Remember this big and infinitely wise God. We can be assured that God is using everything that is going on right now for His glory. Our present circumstances are the means through which God will glorify Himself. His wisdom, which is one of care, of intention, and of purpose, will always prevail. His wisdom sustains and provides in season. Therefore, our posture, like all of creation, should be one of dependency, ready to gather up what God provides. The sooner we grasp this, the more ready we are to respond.
Our response
And so our response, like the Psalmist in Ps 104:31-33, should be to sing. Having grasped the wisdom of God, his instinctive response is to praise Him – “May the glory of the LORD endure forever; may the LORD rejoice in his works…I will sing to the LORD as long as I live; I will sing praise to my God as long as I have being.”
What an appropriate response! Having begun in exuberant praise and wholehearted worship of God, the Psalmist declares the wonders and the glory of creation. And as He sees God’s wisdom, his instinctive response is to sing in praise of God!
And so together with the Old and New Testament saints, we, too, erupt in praise: To the only wise God, our Saviour, in light of all his wisdom, be glory, majesty, dominion and authority, before all time and now and forever (Jude 1:25), and we sing, wholeheartedly –
Bless the LORD, O my soul!
Hallelujah!