January 31, 2021
1 Praise the Lord!
I will give thanks to the Lord with my whole heart,
in the company of the upright, in the congregation.
2 Great are the works of the Lord,
studied by all who delight in them.
3 Full of honor and majesty is his work,
and his righteousness endures forever.
4 He has gained renown by his wonderful deeds;
the Lord is gracious and merciful.
5 He provides food for those who fear him;
he is ever mindful of his covenant.
6 He has shown his people the power of his works,
in giving them the heritage of the nations.
7 The works of his hands are faithful and just;
all his precepts are trustworthy.
8 They are established forever and ever,
to be performed with faithfulness and uprightness.
9 He sent redemption to his people;
he has commanded his covenant forever.
Holy and awesome is his name.
10 The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom;
all those who practice it have a good understanding.
His praise endures forever.
Have you ever solved a Rubik’s Cube? I have tried a couple times, but to no avail. It has six sides, each with a different color. Once scrambled, the pattern defies me. Like many things you need to see how everything fits together to be able to solve the mystery. It is exciting to watch someone work their magic on this puzzle, when you see all six colors take their place within its form.
We start here today, because our Psalm has a mystery, a word puzzle within it. Psalm 111 is an acrostic, meaning each line starts with the next consecutive letter of the Hebrew alphabet: aleph, bet, gimel, dalet. Within this structure we hear majestic praise for our Lord. The Psalm begins and ends with praising God! One commentator declared, “If anyone ever asked for a rubric to understand God’s identity, and how we sing God’s praises, the answer is found in Psalm 111” (Working Preacher, Yolanda Norton).
It starts like so many psalms with “Praise the Lord!” In the Hebrew it is Hallelujah, which is actually two words, “Hallelu” (הללו) and “Yah” (יה). “Hallelu” is an exhortation to a group of people to praise someone or something. “Yah” (יה) is a version of “YHWH” (יהוה) – an English transliteration of the covenant name of Israel’s God. You might recall that God’s name is so holy that devote Jews do not utter it, instead they use the four letters YHWH which we translate as Lord. Hallelujah can mean Praise the Lord and Thanks be to God. It is utter reverence, thanksgiving, and praise for our wonderful Creator. Hallelujah proclaims the divine and sets the tone, and then acrostic starts.
Here are three things to note in this rubric for praising God: God’s wonderful deeds, the Lord is gracious and merciful, and the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
Scripture is filled with testimony about God’s wonderful deeds. “The Hebrew word translated “wonderful deeds” is niphla’oth.” It means “something that I simply cannot understand,” or “something different, striking, remarkable; something transcending the power of human intelligence and imagination.” The word is used many times in recounting the events of the exodus from Egypt. We find it in the stories of the ten plagues, the crossing of the Red Sea, the manna, the provision of water in the desert. All of these are referred to as “wonderful deeds,” things transcending the power of human intelligence and imagination.” (Nancy deClaissé-Walford, Working Preacher)
This psalm highlights three wonderful deeds all coming from the primary deed of the exodus of God’s people and their escape from bondage. First, God provides food (v. 5) harkening back to God manifesting manna and quail while God’s people wandered in the wilderness. This reminds us today that God continues to provide for us. Caring for us in physical, emotional, and spiritual ways, God offers food for our souls as we lean into the wonderful deeds of our God. Secondly, God keeps promises. God’s covenant with the people is mentioned twice because it is foundational to God being trustworthy and just. The Mosaic Covenant is the one built on the Ten Commandments and the eternal promise that God will always be with us on our journey. We praise God today because God remains with us even as we await vaccines and hope for an end to this pandemic. Finally, God gives land to the people with the inheritance of the nations (v. 6). God not only freed His people, God gave them a land to call their own holding up the promise.
Take a moment to consider the wonderful deeds God has done in your life. The moments you have praised God for blessings, encouragements, strength, and hope. I think we are living through a time that could be likened to the parting of the Red Sea. We need God in this moment more than ever. Recalling God’s wondrous deeds helps us get through this time with hearts continually praising our Lord.
We praise God because God is gracious and merciful. Commentator Wil Gafney offered an interesting take on God’s mercy. The description of God as “merciful” in v 4 does not do justice to the underlying Hebrew. The root of the word rachum is the word for womb, rechem. It is both the organ and the feeling that emanates from it in the same way that “headache” signals a body part and a feeling. (She) translate rachum as “mother-love” while others like Phyllis Trible translate it as “womb-love.” In the famous story about Solomon (wisely deciding between two women about their child)…, it was the birth mother’s “mother-love” that motivated her to surrender her child to the other woman though it is often poorly translated as “mercy” or “compassion,” (1 Kings 3:26). (Working Preacher). Praising God for such fierce motherly love is easy to do and draws us closer to our parental Lord.
We sing Hallelujah, glorifying God’s wondrous deeds and gracious mercy. But I was curious about how fearing the Lord fits into this puzzle of praise. Numerous times in Bible studies we have confronted this idea of fearing the Lord. Often, we have pushback on the idea of fearing God. This made me wonder why fearing the Lord was part of this Psalm of praise.
There are two main meaning for the word fear: “an unpleasant emotion caused by being aware of danger or a feeling of respect and wonder for something very powerful” (Merriam Webster). Today fear is all about danger. I am afraid of COVID. I fear for the health of our democracy. But we seem to have lost the fear of respect and awe. Scripture declares, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” When we are in awe of God we start to move in right paths. The line before gives us a clue. “Holy and awesome is God’s name” (v.9). We know that “the fear of the Lord” is a good thing; it is a positive aspect of our faith, because we respect God. The word fear (yara’) appears in the bible as a synonym for love, cling to, and serve. I long to fully love, cling to and serve God! If that is fearing the Lord, sign me up! At its root fear denotes obedience to God’s will. “The Hebrew word for “fear” is powerful in meaning, but it has more to do with feelings of awesomeness. It is more about being in the presence of the holy other with cautious reverence than it is about the sweaty-palmed, shaking, gasping for breath kind of fear we often experience. When we enter a relationship with the God of the Bible, it is a high calling. It is a dangerous, a reverent, a fearful relationship” (WP, Yolanda Norton).
Praise is the rubric of our faith. Praise helps us to recall all of God’s wondrous deeds. Praise allows us to rest in God’s merciful mother-love. Praise moves us from terrified fear, into awesome fear of our gracious God so that we can abide in wisdom and cling to our Lord.
Hallelujah is about being in awe of the Lord, fearing God is also about being in awe of the Lord. May we all praise God by remembering God’s redemptive and salvific activity in the world; as a recollection of God’s provision. May we all praise God by living into covenant such that we honor family, community, humanity, and all of creation. May we all praise God and live out God’s commandments. In doing so our praise is best reflected in our ability not only to name God’s work in the world but to participate in God’s work as a reflection of who God is.
Hallelujah Amen.
