As you’ve heard, this year our new teaching theme is, “The Love of God: Vast, Unmeasured, Boundless, Free.” We read together a great psalm that celebrates the love of God. Let me invite you now if you would to take your Bibles in hand or turn in one of our church Bibles to Psalm 136. We won’t read it again, we’ve read it together already, but it will help you to have your copy of the Scriptures open before you. Page 520 in the church Bibles.
As part of our teaching theme, we begin today a short, thematic series introducing different aspects of the love of God – God’s love for Himself within the fellowship of the blessed Trinity, God’s love for His creatures, God’s love for sinners in His Son, our Savior, the Lord Jesus, God’s love for His children, believers saved by grace. Today, we’re going to think about God’s love in general, God’s love covering a number of those facets in this magnificent psalm that celebrates His love.
There are two, obvious, standout features of this psalm that help us grasp its message. They, I’m sure, already struck you as we read it together. First of all, you notice the psalm begins and ends with a summons to give thanks – verses 1 through 3, verse 26. The outcome that our passage wants to produce in all our hearts is thanksgiving. It is gratitude. Having read through, meditated upon Psalm 136, this is what the psalmist wants you to feel and experience and practice. He wants thanksgiving to well up in our hearts and from our lips in praise to God. It’s the first obvious thing. This is a summons to give thanks.
The second obvious thing, maybe the most obvious thing about this psalm, of course, is the refrain, repeated twenty-six times over, giving us the great reason for thanksgiving. Give thanks – why? “For His steadfast love endures forever.” And taken together, those two simple observations really provide the key to this psalm. Here is what it wants to do in us. It wants to generate thanksgiving in our hearts, rising from our lips, by inviting us into a renewed encounter with the eternal, enduring, steadfast love of the living God.
And to draw us into that renewed encounter with God’s love, the psalmist rehearses for us four ways in which His love is put on display. First, in verses 1 through 3, we give thanks to God for His steadfast love because of who God shows Himself to be. Second, verses 4 through 9, we give thanks for the steadfast love of the Lord because of God’s work of creation. Third, 10 through 22, we give thanks for the steadfast love of the Lord because of His work of redemption. And finally, 23 through 25, we give thanks for the steadfast love of the Lord because of His work of preservation. So there’s our outline. We give thanks for the steadfast love of God because of who God is and because of His wonderful works of creation, redemption and preservation.
We’ve read the text already, so let me simply ask you to join me as we pray and ask for the Lord’s help and blessing on the ministry of His Word. Let us all pray.
O Lord our God, You make Your Word in the hand of Your Spirit the great instrument of Your love. May it be an instrument of love to all of us as we meditate upon it together now. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Sometimes, perhaps you felt this way as we read it together, readers of Psalm 136 find the repeating refrain, “For His steadfast love endures forever,” a bit tedious. We’re trying to pay attention to the flow of the message as it unfolds, which clearly progresses, doesn’t it, in chronological sequence. It begins with God Himself, then moves to creation, then on through Israel’s history, right up to the moment that the psalmist was presently writing. But as we try to follow the flow of the psalm, each new sentence is interrupted by this refrain. And so we’re tempted, perhaps, to view the repeating line like a little child who is poking his mother in the shoulder while she is trying to have a conversation with a friend. “Mom, mom, mom, mom, mom!” It’s an unhelpful distraction. It’s an interruption.
But of course that’s a mistake, isn’t it? As we read Psalm 136, the refrain, “For His steadfast love endures forever,” that’s not the interruption, distracting us from the message; it is the message! And the other lines interweaving with it are the supporting act. The steady repetition isn’t the distracting prod of a nagging child; it is, perhaps better, the heartbeat, the vital organ that pumps life to the whole system. The steadfast love of the Lord that endures forever is the heartbeat of Christian thankfulness. That’s the big idea. The steadfast love of the Lord that never ceases is the heartbeat of Christian thankfulness.
In fact, I wonder actually if the repetitious form of this psalm isn’t itself actually part of the message. Could it be that the psalmist is testing us, almost daring us to be annoyed or bored or impatient with the refrain? “His steadfast love endures forever. His steadfast love endures forever. His steadfast love endures forever” – in order to unmask something deeper in our hearts. This psalm wants us to ask ourselves whether we have grown impatient not so much with this rhetorical device in the text but with the reality itself. Do you find yourself saying, when we announced the new teaching theme for this year, “The Love of God,” somewhere in the deep, dark recesses of your heart, “His steadfast love endures forever – big whoop. Heard it. Got it. What else is new? His steadfast love endures forever. Old news.”
I think we need to let – and the psalm was designed to help us – grasp again the steadfast love of the Lord. The refrain is meant to fall like a hammer hitting the same nail over and over and over till it breaks through this sense of, “Yeah, the same old same old,” and begins at last to penetrate the love of God for you in all its astonishing wonder and beauty and glory.
Now the expression, “The steadfast love of the Lord,” translates – you might know – translates a famous little Hebrew word “hesed.” “Hesed” is the special covenant love of God by which He binds Himself, like a husband vowing to join Himself to His bride forever, by which God joins Himself in love to His people. And the psalmist says that love, that love of God for us is like granite. The waves of time and trials may crash against it, but nothing erodes it, nothing removes it, nothing shatters or undermines it. It is steadfast love and it endures forever. All earthly loves ebb and flow, don’t they. They fail and fall. All earthly loves are unstable compounds. They are mixtures. Even the best of us, our loves are mixed with self-interest, insecurity, naivety, infatuation, lust. “But the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. His mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning. Great is Your faithfulness.” “All other ground is sinking sand.” But the steadfast love of the Lord endures forever. It is a solid rock, a place to stand, safe and secure for eternity. And the psalmist wants us to know that love for ourselves – not just know about it, but know it. Experience the love of God for ourselves in fresh ways.
In four ways in particular. Way number one – We see the love of God, His steadfast, eternal love, on display in His own character. Look at verses 1 through 3. The steadfast enduring love of the Lord that ought to make us give thanks is revealed, verse 1, by the goodness of the Lord. “Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good, His steadfast love endures forever.” And then in verse 2 and 3, we give thanks for His steadfast love seen in His uniqueness and in His sovereignty. He is the “God of gods” and the “Lord of lords.” These are Hebrew idioms meant to express the point that He is the only true God and He is the final and supreme Lord. The so-called gods of the world are demonic fictions, but He is the God of gods. And there are many lords, many kings, many powers – natural, supernatural – but He is the “Lord of lords.” All other power is derivative and subordinate and nothing can oppose His rule. God is good, verse 1. And He is unique and He is sovereign, verses 2 and 3.
And the order of all of that is really important, isn’t it? There’s great wisdom in beginning not with the sovereignty of God but with the goodness of God. Because if God was perfectly sovereign – He is – but not good, Lord of all ruling everything – He is – but not good in all that He does, He would be a monstrous tyrant. But He is good all the time as He reigns and presides from His throne. Nowhere is that reality more fully revealed to us than in the Lord Jesus Christ. God the Father has given to Jesus the name that is above every name. That “at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord to the glory of God the Father.” He is, Revelation 17:14, “the Lamb who conquers, Lord of lords” – here’s the echo of Psalm 136 – “and King of kings.”
But that title of final supremacy and ultimate Lordship belongs to Jesus because He loved us and gave Himself for us, His triumph over sin and death and hell at the cross and His empty tomb. And the goodness and the sovereignty of God and the uniqueness and the exclusivity of God, they are really put on display for us to see, aren’t they, here, at the cross, like nowhere else. Look at the cross and see the King of kings, the God of gods, the Lord of lords Himself, crucified for sinners. The good and righteous sovereign Lord of all pouring out His love for us, dying in our room and stead – He is the one who now sits on the throne of all things upholding and governing all His creatures and all their actions, and He does it all because He is good all the time. Give thanks to Him, the psalmist says, who is unique and sovereign and good in all that He does, for His love endures forever.
Then look down at verses 4 through 9. The first way we are helped to give thanks for the steadfast love of God is because of the display He makes of His own character. But the second way has to do with creation. We give thanks for His steadfast love seen in creation, verse 4 says. We are to give thanks “to Him alone who does great wonders.” And really the rest of the psalm expounds those wonders – creation, redemption, preservation. Creation, first of all. God, by His understanding we are told, has made the world. And interestingly, Saint Augustine, the early church father, sees on that verse, they notice how it echoes Proverbs chapter 3 where God says that by understanding He established the heavens. And how later in Proverbs, Proverbs chapter 8, that wisdom and understanding, by which all things were made, is personified; it becomes a person. “I was beside him,” wisdom says, “like a master workman, when he laid the foundations of the earth.” And that image, Augustine notes, is in the background in John chapter 1 verse 1. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God, and all things were made through Him.” The wisdom, the understanding here, is the second person of the blessed Trinity, the Lord Jesus Christ.
I bring that up – it feels like a little bit of a detour, but I bring it up because it will help us answer the question, “How does creation help me see the steadfast love of God that endures forever?” Well you’ll notice in verses 6 through 9 the psalmist summarizes the creation account from Genesis chapter 1. The making of the dry land, the setting of the heavenly bodies in the sky to rule the day and the night, and interleaving each of those descriptions of creation is the heartbeat of the psalm continuing to pound out the rhythm of God’s steadfast love. “So how does creation show me His steadfast love?” That’s our question. Certainly it shows me His wisdom, His power, HIs greatness. These are things revealed, plainly seen, in the things that have been made – Romans chapter 1. I can stand in awe of His artistry and His skill when I look out at the world and at the heavens. But how does it speak about His love?
Certainly I think we can say there is a kind of general love of God revealed in the way He has ordered the cosmos for the life and flourishing of all creatures, especially of human beings. God could have made the world a drab, gray, dreary, dull place; instead, He’s made it beautiful and mysterious and grand. And all of that speaks in some sense of a general love of God. But I think we can go further than that to the question, “How does the great wonder of God’s work in creation show us His steadfast love, His covenant love that endures forever?” I think the psalmist would say, “How can it not?” Certainly taken together the whole Bible will say, “How can it do anything other than show me the steadfast love of God?” It is, after all, the handiwork of the one “in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge,” Colossians chapter 2 verse 3. “By whom,” Colossians 1:16, “all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones, dominions, rulers or authorities. All things were created through Him and for Him.”
There is a Christ-centeredness built into creation itself. It’s for Him. It’s made by Him with Him in view. Not just made by Him with us in view, but the whole plan of God, that by His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, He would demonstrate His love for sinners and save them by Himself, becoming a creature. Think of it – the infinite, eternal and unchangeable God made flesh, without ceasing to be what He always was, He became one of us. The Creator made a creature, stepping onto the scene of the world He had made in order to rescue and redeem us. The very fabric of the cosmos is, as Calvin put it, “the theater of God’s glory.” Or we might call it the venue of redemption, the scenery upon which God might display to us and turn the diamond of His steadfast love that we might stand in wonder and adore Him for it.
And that brings us neatly to the third way in which God’s steadfast love is displayed here. Yes, in creation, which provides the stage for this third way in which God shows His love – redemption. Look at verses 10 through 22. The psalmist recounts now Israel’s history, their exodus from Egypt, the striking down of the firstborn in Egypt, in verse 10. The bringing of Israel out of bondage by a strong hand and an outstretched arm in verses 11 and 12. His dividing the Red Sea so that Israel might pass over on dry land and pharaoh and his armies are deluged and judged and destroyed, 13 through 15. His leading the people through the wilderness in verse 16. His defeat of Sihon and Og and the other kings and nations that occupied the land that God was going to give His people for an inheritance, verses 17 through 22. This story, repeated so often in the Old Testament scriptures, is the paradigm, the great picture and emblem of salvation in the Old Testament.
And there are two features of it that keep repeating in Psalm 136 retelling. Did you see them? Two features of this act of God in rescue and salvation – judgement and deliverance. Judgement and rescue. They keep appearing all the way through this narrative. So the Passover was judgment on Egypt but deliverance for Israel. The Red Sea was judgment on pharaoh but rescue for Israel. The defeat of Sihon and Og and the kings and nations of Canaan – judgment on them but a promised inheritance for Israel. Judgment and rescue. That pattern is fundamental to the way God saves His people. And of course it prepares us for, points us to the supreme exodus that God accomplished for sinners by His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ at the cross. There was judgment. At the cross, judgment. Judgment falling on Him. Judgment due our sin. And there was rescue. Christ, our true Passover Lamb, slain that we might live. His blood our hiding place. There was judgment on Satan. The cross his supreme defeat. All his plans thwarted, his destruction assured. And there, in the same scene, at the cross, is rescue for us. The grip of sin and Satan, broken. We are set free.
Some of you remember how Derek Thomas, a former, beloved pastor in this congregation, used to invert the words of the Aaronic blessing to depict what was happening in the experience of the Lord Jesus at the cross to show us how what His mercy, blessing, rescue, deliverance for us was judgment for Him. You remember the words of the Aaronic blessing? We often use it here at baptisms, don’t we? The priests of the old covenant were to raise their hands and pronounce the benediction, the blessing of God, over the people. “The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make His face to shine upon you and be gracious unto you. The Lord lift up His countenance upon you and give you peace.” It’s a great summary of the blessing we enjoy in the embrace of God’s hesed, His covenant love.
But at the cross, Derek likes to say, the Father who says these words to us says to His Son, “The Lord curse you and abandon you. The Lord turn His face from you and take all His grace and favor away from you. The Lord shun you with His presence and give you hell.” That’s what happened at Calvary, isn’t it? The wrath and judgment of God rolling down upon our Passover Lamb, the Lord Jesus, that by His blood we might go free, we might be pardoned, embraced under the benediction of His steadfast love. Galatians 3:13, “Christ redeemed us from the curse by becoming a curse for us.” God’s benediction on us because of His malediction on Jesus Christ.
“Here is love,” we just sang it, “vast as the ocean, loving kindness, as the flood, when the prince of life our ransom, shed for us His precious blood.” Why should you give thanks amidst all the trials and sorrows of your daily grind? Give thanks to God for He is good, and He demonstrates His steadfast love that endures forever for you in that while you were still a sinner, Christ died for you. The cross is the great proof, isn’t it, of His steadfast love. The cross is the proof. Look at your sin and despair. Look at your own wisdom, all hope will crumble and fall. Look at your best righteousness and know you will never stand before the judgment of God. But look at the cross and don’t you dare ever doubt again that God loves you in Jesus Christ. His steadfast love endures forever.
We give thanks to God for His steadfast love seen in who He is, seen in His great wondrous work of creation, seen especially in His work of redemption by His Son, the Lord Jesus. And finally, we give thanks to God for His steadfast love seen in His work of preservation. Look briefly at verses 23 through 25. Do notice the change of person, the change of speaker. “It is He who remembered us in our low estate…rescued us from our foes.” So not just reflecting on history now, Israel long ago, but we ourselves have been made the recipients of this redeeming love and grace and rescue. And notice the change of tense, verse 25 – “He who gives food to all flesh.” Present tense, still today. The same God who created and sustained all things, 4 through 9, who intervened in Israel’s history to save His people, 10 through 22, He’s not done.
We can’t read the Scriptures and say, “That was them; it’s not me. That was then, it’s not now. It’s too late for me. God doesn’t offer this to me. It’s not available to me. No, no,” the psalmist says, “He remembered us in our low estate. He rescued us. He gives to all flesh food. Right now, still today, God is full of steadfast love and it endures forever.” It is a prodigal love, an expansive, extravagant, generous love. It gives Christ to all who seek Him. He who saved, saves still. He who loved, loves still. This steadfast love is for you. He keeps, He rescues, He nourishes, He saves today and all the days, for His steadfast love endures forever.
So as you take all of that in, what is it the psalmist wants from you? How should you respond? Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good. Give thanks to the God of gods. Gives thanks to the Lord of lords, who alone does wonders, who gives His Son, raising Him in victory from the grave, to be a perfect Savior of sinners. For His steadfast love endures forever.
Let us pray.
Our gracious God and loving heavenly Father, we bow before You. How we adore You for Your love. Forgive us for taking Your love for granted, for thinking of it as old news. Forgive us for presuming upon it, as though, because You are a God of love, we can live as we please. Forgive us for wonder growing cold and astonishment that the infinite, eternal, unchangeable God would look on a sinner like me and love me all the way to the cross. Forgive me, forgive us, for letting that just roll off our backs, zip through our heads. Help us, beginning now today and in the days ahead of us, to be captured afresh by the astonishing generosity of Your love for sinners. Wake us up to the wonder of it. And as we see and savor Your love anew, awaken in us such love for You and love for neighbor that will bring You honor and glory. For we ask it in Jesus’ name, amen.