Sermon: October 23, 2022

**Unfortunately due to issues with this week’s audio, the live recording was not available. Here Rev. Ryan has recorded his sermon again after the fact.

Preacher: Rev Ryan Slifka

Scriptures: Psalm 65

We’re continuing our sermon series on the Psalms this week. The Psalms being more or less the songbook of the Bible. Jesus’ hymn book you could say.

Last week our guest preacher Foster Freed preached on a portion of the 119th Psalm. One downside of that Psalm Foster pointed out was its focus on just how great the singer of the Psalm was at keeping God’s commandments. “Your commandments make me wiser than my enemies,” sings the Psalmist. “I am more understanding that all my teachers,” and “I hold back my feet from every evil way.” Like Foster, I have a little trouble saying these words. Because if there’s anything I don’t need, is more temptations to think highly of myself. Egomania waiting to happen.

Today’s Psalm, however, swings us in the completely opposite direction. This week we’ve got Psalm 65. Where last week the Psalmist was extolling his or her own piety before the Lord, this week all the glory belongs to God. Where last week the focus was on the righteousness of a single individual, this week’s scope is massive, beginning with the individual and community to humanity to all of creation. And the subject is what God’s up to in the world. It’s kind of the opposite of ego.

Now, to be clear, it doesn’t avoid the individual, the personal. Rather, God’s work in your life and mine is the starting point.

“Praise is due to you,” sings the Psalmist. “Praise is due to you, O God, in Zion.” The Psalm starts in a specific place, Mount Zion, the location of the Jerusalem Temple. The holiest of Holy places, the special place of encounter with Yahweh, the Creator God. The place where heaven and earth intersect.

And what happens in its walls? Vows, we’re told are performed. This God answers prayer—or at least hears them, depending on the translation. All flesh in fact, can come to this God and pour out their hearts to the Creator of the universe. That’s incredible. Like, what are we to the source of infinite galaxies, that God should mind us? Pay attention to a word?

But wait—there’s more. “When deeds of iniquity overwhelm us,” the Psalmist proclaims, “you forgive our transgressions.” Or as another translation puts it, “our crimes you atone.”[i] So not only does this God hear the prayer of tiny little creatures, this God actually sympathizes with them. With us. Specifically in our faults and failures. This God knows, understands our pain, our suffering, our guilt. And forgives.

Of course, within the walls of the temple they would have understood forgiveness as something processed through sacrifice. The sacrifice of animals, produce and the like. But the people of Jesus understand Jesus as the new temple. Jesus as the location where heaven and earth fully intersect. And forgiveness as something given once and for all by the self-sacrifice of God in his Son on the cross. Same principle, though. God sees us for what we truly are—broken, prone to wander. And wipes the slate clean, rather than wiping us off the map.

The end of this section, in fact, speaks of God’s desire to draw us ever closer to her, rather than to push us away. “Happy are those whom you choose and bring near to live in your courts;” it says. “We shall be satisfied with the goodness of your house, your holy temple.” This is an example of what we often call “communion”—unity, oneness with God. It’s an image of longing, that God longs to draw us closer in intimacy. This is one of the meanings of the incarnation—of God becoming flesh in Jesus Christ, fully human fully divine. Jesus is the temple where heaven and earth intersect. And points us to God’s ultimate purpose—that in the words of the Apostle Paul, God will be “all in all.” So that every longing in us will be satisfied. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow little old you, and little old me, all of our lives. And we will dwell in the house of the Lord. Forever.

Now, God’s personal relationship with us tends to be easy for, say, those of us who identify as evangelical, Pentecostal, or other kinds of so-called “conservative” Christians. For many of us who identify as liberal or progressive, though, not so much.

I’m reminded of an interview with the famed atheist Richard Dawkins, who admitted that perhaps there is an intelligence in the universe, but it doesn’t go around answering prayers and forgiving sins.[ii] Liberal or progressive Christians can be like Dawkins, who sees the universe as a wondrous, perhaps even miraculous place, but can’t bring ourselves to believe in a Creator who might know us, or care about our individual lives.

But this Psalm suggests that this is in fact the case. Not only does this infinite God hear and care about the doings of little old you and little old me. This God is a God of infinite mercy. God knows, our sin, our limitations, knows them personally, in fact. And has dealt with them personally. And longs to draw us each of us close, rather than push us away.

God is personal. That’s good news. If we miss this, we’re missing a complete aspect about God.

But God isn’t only personal. Here’s a weakness for evangelicals and conservatives. While it’s true that Jesus is our personal Lord and Saviour, God is more than that. God is more than personal. God is a social Saviour. God is social.

So we started with the individual in the temple. Next, the psalm pans outward. Next we get an image of God vis-à-vis all of humanity. “By awesome deeds,” it continues. “By awesome deeds you answer us with deliverance, O God of our salvation.”

We talked about this a few weeks ago, but the awesome deeds referred to are God’s miraculous works with God’s people in the Old Testament. Deliverance from slavery in Egypt. Bread from heaven in the wilderness. Water from a desert rock. Crossing the river Jordan into the promised land. Return from exile in Babylon. In each case, God saved, God delivered God’s people. From oppression, from violence, from starvation, and from imprisonment and exile. You’ll notice that this isn’t just between God and the individual, but God’s saving work is with a group, a community, a people.

And it’s not restricted to just God’s people, either. The Psalmist says, “you are the hope of all ends of the earth.” The Psalmist then proclaims God’s power to set the mountains in place, and that in the same way tsunamis are stilled, so is “the tumult of the peoples.” That God’s in the business of settling societies in the same way God settles the sea. That in every nook and cranny of creation, inside every border, and under ever flag human beings wake up and go to bed in awe of God’s incredible deeds. God’s saving work with God’s people isn’t exclusive to them, to us, but it’s a sign for all people as to what is possible with God.

Now, this is what liberals and progressives tend to excel at. God doesn’t just care about the state of our individual souls. God’s also about what we might call systemic issues. The state of our common life. God cares about human suffering. God cares about justice for the oppressed and downtrodden. Food for the hungry, clothing for the naked, housing for the homeless, help for the helpless. Foreign policy, the relationship between states, the wealthy ones and the weak ones. Democracies and totalitarian regimes, in war and in peace. “He rules the world with truth and grace… and makes the nation’s prove… the glories of his righteousness and wonders of his love, and wonders of his love.”[iii]

Jesus not only died for me. Jesus died for my neighbour, too. Meaning that my salvation is bound up in my neighbour’s. For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son. From Ryan Slifka standing alone before the Lord in need of forgiveness, to the addict perishing on the street, to millions of Uyghurs in slave labour camps to millions of Ukrainians and Russians torn apart by violence and bloodshed. That’s because the Christian hope is for all of humanity. It’s for the nations as much as it is for you and for me. God is social, as much as God is personal.

God is personal, and God is social. But there’s also one other aspect of God’s saving work. A crucial one that is often missed by conservatives and liberals alike. Though not all. One of the major criticisms of the Bible, the church, the Christian message is this: that it is anthropocentric. Anthropocentric, meaning “human centered” or “human focussed,” to the exclusion of all other creatures and the rest of creation. An influential essay by the environmentalist Lynne White Jr. in the late 1960’s more or held Christianity and the Bible responsible for our ecological crises. God creates a world for humans to subdue, to use and discard as we like, with our true goal to leave this life behind to be disembodied spirits in heaven. So who cares about the great barrier reef if it’s just a stepping stone out of this world?[iv]

Now, there have certainly been Christians who have thought this way, and continue to think this way. No doubt about it. But the last section of this Psalm tells us a different story.

“You visit the earth,” sings the Psalmist. “You visit the earth, and water it.” I just love that imagery. God visits the earth. An obvious echo of the book of Genesis, where God’s just strolling through the garden of Eden. But here God’s more than strolling. God’s got on gardening gloves.

“You greatly enrich [the earth],” it says. “the river of God is overflowing.” God’s growing wheat fields, and soaking crops with sustenance. One commentator says that here the Psalm praises God as a sort of “cosmic farmer.”[v]

But cosmic farmer’s not the only job God has. “You crown the year with your bounty… the hills gird themselves with joy. The meadows clothe themselves with flocks… and the valleys deck themselves with grain. They shout together and sing for joy.

God’s apparently in the tailoring business, too. The abundant produce, the sheep dotting the hillside, the enormous fall harvest. It’s like in the old Disney movie, where the birds and mice all assemble Cinderella’s gown for the ball. God clothes the earth, all creation, with abundance, with life, with joy. Like a bride on her wedding day.

And this is, of course, no accident. The book of Revelation at the end of the Bible speaks of a “new heaven and a new earth.” God dwelling among God’s people and all of creation, like God dwells in the Jerusalem temple. Because the end goal of the scriptures is not the escape from this world, but the redemption, the completion of creation. The eternal marriage of heaven and earth.

The Christian message is not only personal, it’s not only social. But it’s universal. It’s cosmic. From the tiniest cell to the greatest galaxy, and everything in between. God is making all things new.

This Psalm gives us the whole scope of God’s involvement in our lives and in our world. Whereas we tend to focus on one piece of the puzzle, God’s invested in the whole picture The thing is, we tend to think too small. But God’s concern is the whole of life.

This Psalm says that the God we meet in Jesus Christ has come to save you. To heal you and set you free. If anyone remembers the Glenn Jackson, a retired minister who attended St. George’s 7 or 8 years ago: He always used to say in the grand scheme of things, “you’re a speck of dust on a speck of dust… but God would die for you.” God is personal. God’s business is healing YOU. The Creator of the universe. You and your sins. You and your problems. You!

And this Psalm also says that the God we meet in Jesus has come to save your neighbour, too. To heal them and set them free. Faith can’t be something just between us and God, but is lived out in love of neighbour. For the weak, the oppressed and downtrodden. God is social. The leaves on the tree of life are for the healing of the nations.

And finally, this Psalm says that the God we meet in Jesus Christ is the Lord of all Creation. One who isn’t satisfied with you or me, or humanity alone, but blesses and has come for every speck of dust, every atom, every star in the sky, and every bee and every tree. In him and through him all things were made, and in him and through him, every inch of our universe will one day be filled with the glory of God, and take its place as the temple of the living Lord.

So praise the Lord who dwells in Zion. For God visits the earth to water it, forgives our transgressions. by awesome deeds he answers us with deliverance. Personal, social, cosmic. The good news is good news for everyone, everything under the sun. And more.

Amen.

[i] Robert Alter’s translation.

[ii] Not sure which. Perhaps a debate with Alastair McGrath.

[iii] Isaac Watts, “Joy to the World,” Voices United #59.

[iv] See the influential essay Lynn White Jr., "The historical roots of our ecological crisis," in Science. 155 (1967): 1203–1207 https://www.cmu.ca/faculty/gmatties/lynnwhiterootsofcrisis.pdf

[v] James Luther Mays, The Psalms: A Commentary for Teaching and Preaching (Westminster: John Knox, 1994), 220.