Text: Psalm 8
There are moments in our lives when we cannot help but sing our praises to the Creator of the universe.
Maybe you’ve felt it standing on the side of a mountain…
resting on the sand with your toes in the ocean…
quietly sitting on a deer stand in the middle of the woods…
kneeling in the garden amongst the zinnias…
staring up into the heavens on a cool dark night…
That sense of awe.
Wonder.
Majesty.
Swedish pastor Carl Boberg had those feelings overcome him in the aftermath of a thunderstorm.
As he later reflected:
It was that time of year when everything seemed to be in its richest colouring; the birds were singing in trees and everywhere. It was very warm; a thunderstorm appeared on the horizon and soon there was thunder and lightning. We had to hurry to shelter. But the storm was soon over and the clear sky appeared.
When I came home I opened my window toward the sea. There evidently had been a funeral and the bells were playing the tune of “When eternity’s clock calls my saved soul to its Sabbath rest”. That evening, I wrote the song, “O Store Gud”.
As a paraphrase and reflection on Psalm 8, it allows us to pause in praise as we reflect on the wonders of creation. How could we not think of the Creator? How could we not sing of the Lord’s goodness?
As I’ve shared with you over these years, astronomy and physics have always had a special place in my own call story. While I began my studies seeking to better understand the universe, that search led me straight to religion and faith and deeper questions about God.
Dr. Olsgaard and I were working on an independent study when he handed me this book, God and the Astronomers, where Robert Jastrow describes precisely this shift:
It is not a matter of another year, another decade of work, another measurement, or another theory; at this moment it seems as though science will never be able to raise the curtain on the mystery of creation… [the scientist] has scaled the mountains of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries. (p. 106)
When we stop.
Really stop.
Stop and think about the vastness of the universe, the mystery of how it all came to be…
How could we not worship and bless God’s name?
So this morning, as we think about this hymn, I want us to spend some time in awesome wonder considering the world’s that God has made and our place in it.
And rather than talk about it, I want to invite you to see it from a new perspective with this short film from National Geographic.
Then sings my soul, my Savior God to thee… how great thou art.
You know it is amazing to hear those voices of astronauts who describe being able to hide the whole planet behind their thumb.
Just as the psalmist invites us to notice, when we start to pay attention to this great expansive cosmos… we begin to recognize just how small we are.
Just how insignificant our place.
Just how little we know.
And the incredible wonder that the Creator who made all of that, also made me.
Who am I in vastness of the universe?
As Eugene Peterson writes in the Message translation of Psalm 8 asks God:
Why do you both with us? Why take a second look our way?
Who am I that God would notice me… much less come to earth, take on human life, live and die for me?
The version of “How Great Thou Art” that has made its way into our hymnals and hearts holds in tension that awe of creation and the story of redemption and salvation.
As many of the songs we have experienced this summer, the hymns journey from the original author to our hymnals was long and winding and was carried by missionaries. Originally, the eight verses were sung to a Swedish folk tune and was published in the songbook of the Mission Covenant Church of Sweden.
In the early 1900s it was translated to German by a nobleman who heard the song in Estonia.
That German version made its way to Russia and was published in a Russian-language Protestant Hymnbook.
It was there that English missionary Stuart K. Hine and his wife came across the song. As they traveled through the Carpathian Mountains, he created a paraphrase of the first three stanzas in English and finished the final one back in England after WW2.
Hine’s version starts with the wonder of creation from Boberg, but he adds verses three and four with a focus on atonement and salvation.
The third verse was inspired by a woman named Lyudmila. She had learned to read by studying the Bible and when the Hines arrived in their village, they heard her reading aloud from the gospel of John to a houseful of guests. While they remained outside, they listened in as these folks heard for the first time the good news and literally cried out how amazing it was that Christ would die for them.
In the vast scope of the universe…
The sun and moon and stars…
How awesome is it?
How incredible?
How breathtaking?
That God notices you.
That God loves you.
That God went through death for you.
What is our response?
How could we possibly begin to give thanks?
We start with praise… singing, shouting, giving thanks to our God.
But we also respond with a life filled with gratitude, service, and love.
As a lesser known verse, translated by Hine, reminds us:
O when I see ungrateful man defiling
This bounteous earth, God’s gifts so good and great;
In foolish pride, God’s holy Name reviling,
And yet, in grace, His wrath and judgment wait.
For as the Psalmist is quick to remind us, we were placed here in this moment for a reason and a purpose.
To have dominion over creation.
Put in charge of God’s handcrafted world.
Tasked with responsibility for the ground beneath our feet, the air we breathe, and all creatures that inhabit it… including our neighbors.
O mighty God! Brilliant Lord! How great thou art!
May we ever live up to this task.
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