Psalm 47

Psalms 47:6-9 (ESV)

[6] Sing praises to God, sing praises!

Sing praises to our King, sing praises!

[7] For God is the King of all the earth;

sing praises with a psalm!

[8] God reigns over the nations;

God sits on his holy throne.

[9] The princes of the peoples gather

as the people of the God of Abraham.

For the shields of the earth belong to God;

he is highly exalted!

 

There is a now and not yet aspect to these verses. It is true that God is the King of all the earth right now. As evidenced in the book of Job, the Enemy can do nothing against the people of God without God’s permission. As evidenced in Romans 13, Titus 3, and 1Peter 2, even governments and governmental leaders exist only by the hand of God. “God is the King of all the earth; sing praises with a psalm!”

 

Nothing touches us that has not gone through his hands. Psalm 66 teaches us that sometimes God puts his people through fire and water, yet in the end he brings them into a place of abundance. There will be a time when “The princes of the peoples” will “gather as the people of the God of Abraham.” There will be a time when God’s reign over the nations will be visible, a time when “every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Php 2:10-11). Until that time, we who are believers can rejoice in the midst of trials that God is the King of all the Earth, and that one day all will be set right. In the meantime, we keep our eyes on Jesus, and trust him.

 

These are unprecedented times only in the sense that we’ve never seen our world in the state it is in today, but imagine what it was like before God destroyed it with a flood. Solomon, in Ecclesiastes 1:9 observes, “There is nothing new under the sun.” From the days of Cain on, things have appeared as though God has lost the battle. Evil continues to increase as we see people calling “evil good and good evil” (Isa 5:20). This is nothing new. But in the face of what feels like new evil, we need only remember that God is the King of all the earth, and one day “The princes of the peoples [will] gather as the people of the God of Abraham.” We’re not there yet, but that day is coming. Trust him! And while we wait, let us “sing praises with a psalm!”