the heavens reveal God: His law is radiant: Psalm 19

The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they reveal knowledge. They have no speech, or language; where their voice is not heard. Yet their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world.

In the heavens God has pitched a tent for the sun. It is like a bridegroom coming forth from his pavilion,

like a champion rejoicing to run his course. It rises at one end of the heavens and makes its circuit to the other; nothing is hidden from its heat.

You might have been told that science challenges faith, even denies that God created the cosmos and us, that all things are a product of accident. But scripture tells us that ‘science is the study of the handiwork of God.’ As David says the skies proclaim the work of His hands. You may have seen pictures of deep space by the Hubble telescope. To all who trust in the Holy Spirit given word of the Lord they confirm what Paul says in Romans 1:20 ‘since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities – His eternal power and divine nature – have been clearly seen.

David also tells us that day after day the heavens pour forth speech; there is nowhere their voice does not proclaim the work of God’s hands. To our ears the universe is silent. So we tend to hear David’s words as ecstatic poetry. But Einstein predicted that the universe is not silent. And his prediction has been found to be true. Sound is caused by vibrations. The universe vibrates, and its vibrations generate sound. As the American Scientific magazine says: ‘The universe is a musical that we’ve been watching all the time as a silent movie.’ Of course that’s never been a secret to God and through the Holy Spirit David reveals it to us.

The heavens proclaim the glory of God. Sadly some people see the moon and worship it. Abraham before God called him lived in Ur of the Chaldeans, a city dominated by the worship of the moon. In our times, on midsummer solstice modern druids gather to worship the sun in its rising over Stonehenge. And every morning hundreds of thousands of non-believers read their newspaper horoscope to see what the stars will do for them today.

David speaks of the power of the sun: he describes it as rising at one end of the heavens and making its circuit to the other; and that nothing is hidden from its heat. But he also knows that it is made by God saying, He, that is God pitched a tent for the sun. The sun is like a bridegroom coming forth from his pavilion, like a champion rejoicing to run his course. These are very human pictures of the sun. David sees nothing divine in the sun.

Then out of these reflections on creation David tells us that the

Law of the Lord is perfect, trustworthy, wise, righteous, joyful, radiant with light, pure, enduring forever, more precious than gold. Sweeter than honey. To us the Law is a thing. You may keep it or choose to ignore it; you may campaign to change it, or even abolish it. And we treat the Law that way because for us the Law is an object; a servant made through people by people to serve people.

But David pictures it entirely differently. The words He uses tell us that the Law has personality: it is wise, joyful, pure, trustworthy, radiant, precious. Things do not have such qualities, only persons. David does not see the Law as an object. He sees it as the living expression of the God who made it. The Law is personal. Not just God-made but God-living, given for the true living of His people. Our laws are made in the name of the King. But in the Old Testament God’s kings never made laws. Their legal work was to ensure that the people lived in the Law of the Lord. Beginning with themselves. [Hence they were told to read the Book of the Law, for themselves and to the people]. Sadly some of them chose to ignore the law or to break it but they could never abolish it for as the living expression of God it is eternal. For God’s OT people the Law was not a servant of the people, but rather the people were the servants of the Law or rather the Lord who made it: by it God’s servants were warned and in keeping it they would find great reward.

Prophetically David sees a glimpse of what the Gospel reveals to us. As John tells us the Law was given through Moses; [notice not by Moses] [but] grace and truth come through Jesus Christ. Now Jesus tells us, He did not come to abolish the Law but to fulfil it – that is to bring it to its concluding perfection, which is Him self. After all He was the speaker and writer of the Law that was given to Moses. The Law became fully personalised Christ Jesus and as we live in the presence of the Holy Spirit so we are warned of what is wrong to do but also enabled and equipped to do what it is right to doso findinggreat reward. In knowing Jesus Christ and obeying Him we lives worthy of the Lord, and may seek to please Him in every way. Amen

Sing: How sweet the name of Jesus sounds