Psalm 29

Together with the psalms 8, 19, 33, and 104, this psalm is one of the "Psalms of Nature." A Dutch Bible translation has as caption above the psalm "God's majesty in a thunderstorm."¹ George Knight in his Commentary on the Psalms finds in this psalm a parallel with some old Canaanite poetry in which Baal is glorified. It is, however, obvious that thunder is not the only topic of this psalm.

The tension in this psalm is brought about by the fact that God is glorified because He disrupts the balance of nature. The psalm begins in Heaven: "In the splendor of his holiness." One would think that a psalm that describes a thunderstorm would be completely played out on earth. It seems, though, that the psalmist wanted to draw a line between earth and heaven in order to put things on earth in their right perspective. The "mighty ones" in vs. 1 are, undoubtedly, angels. The RSV translates the phrase with "heavenly beings," and TLB calls them "angels." It could be that he meant the four living creatures, which we encounter in the book of Revelation,² and also in Isaiah's and Ezekiel's visions.³ Their task is to praise the Lord continuously. If this interpretation of the beings is correct, we see here the strange feat that a frail human being on earth encourages archangels to worship and praise the Lord in heaven! We, who live on this earth, have little notion about praise and adoration. What do we know about the heavenly glory? How could we stand before the throne of God, and worship Him, after all that happened on earth in the fall, after all the hurt and injury we caused our Creator with our sin? If we found ourselves standing before the throne of God, we would probably have the same reaction Isaiah had, about whom we read: " 'Woe to me!' I cried. 'I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty.' "⁴ There would be no hope for any of us without atonement. We do not know if David ever received a vision of God on His throne, such as the Apostle John had, and described in the book of Revelation.⁵ Maybe David only tried to imagine what "the splendor of His holiness" was like. We have a clearer vision, based on the revelation given to John, so that we may add to the adoration of the heavenly beings our own: "To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be praise and honor and glory and power, for ever and ever!"⁶ This adoration we may add to the adoration, which the heavenly beings bring to God. The marvelous thing is that the angels and archangels respond to David's call for worship. David's intention in referring to this heavenly praise is, evidently, to prove that the God who is heard in the thunder is the God who is worshipped in heaven.

A thunderstorm is a majestic event on earth. Shafts of lightning and peals of thunder are part of God's glory in heaven, according to John's account in Revelation. Describing the vision of God's throne, he says: "From the throne came flashes of lightning, rumblings and peals of thunder."⁷ I wonder, though, if there would have been thunderstorms on earth if man had not fallen in sin. Probably, this kind of accumulation of electricity in the sky, and the brutal discharge of it, would not have taken place in a perfect or a well-balanced universe. So this kind of revelation of God's glory may be related to an imbalance in nature caused by human sin. This is a strange thought, especially if we realize that flashes of lightning and peals of thunder are an integral part of God's glory in heaven.

God's speaks to man in thunderstorms. A classic example is that of Martin Luther who, during a thunderstorm, made a promise to enter a monastery. Yet, the voice of thunder is not a well-articulated speech; it only supplements that which God communicates to us via our moral consciousness and the special Revelation in His Word. We could call a thunderstorm the orchestration of God's speaking, more than the content of His message. If thunderstorms were the only way God spoke to us, we would not know what He was saying. There would not be an understandable communication between God and man.

What God is saying to us in this psalm is that sin has not made it impossible for Him to reveal Himself to us via a creation that has rebelled against His sovereignty. This is the conclusion we draw from the mention of the thunderstorm and the flood (vs. 10). So we find in God's speaking elements of wrath. Ever since the fall, nature which ought to be subjected to our rule, has turned itself against us. The mystery consists in the fact that God communicates to us via those hostile elements.

The result of God's speaking appears to be, first of all, negative and destructive. He breaks in pieces the cedars of Lebanon, causes earthquakes in the desert, and panic in the animal world. Evidently, more is intended here than the appearance of merely natural phenomena. Elsewhere, the cedars of Lebanon symbolize pride and arrogance, and the desert is a symbol of the barrenness and destruction caused by sin. The KJV renders vs. 9 with: "The voice of the LORD maketh the hinds to calve and discovereth the forests: and in his temple doth every one speak of his glory." In the NIV we read: "The voice of the LORD twists the oaks and strips the forests bare. And in his temple all cry, 'Glory!' " Even the calving of the deer is not natural, because the fawns are born prematurely. A deer stands for independence in nature, no longer under the dominion of man, because man has wrested himself from under the dominion of God. The majestic oak tree represents the same image, if we follow that reading. This rebellion, this declaration of independence appears unable to maintain itself in the presence of God.

The first result of the coming of the Word of God to us in the form of a thunderstorm is that our house of cards collapses. This demolition is necessary before anything constructive can take place. In all this the psalmist puts the emphasis on the glory of God. "The voice of the LORD is powerful; the voice of the LORD is majestic… And in his temple all cry, 'Glory!' " God's glory causes sinful man to perish in that it reveals that the essence of sin is a lack of glory. The Apostle Paul says: "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God."⁸ That which on earth seems to be destruction and demolition appears in heaven as the essence of glory. That is why man has a tendency to hold God responsible for the evil in the world, whilst actually, all God's glory does is to unmask the essence of evil.

The flood was the climax of God's judgment over the sin of the world. It seems to be a complete contradiction to say: "The LORD sits enthroned over the flood." In our thinking God's majesty and this judgment are irreconcilable. God's glory and rule bring about the ultimate judgment upon a world that opened itself for all kinds of demonic influences. In a sense the flood was the reaction of nature itself, as God had created it, upon the sin of man. The earth spewed out its inhabitants, as later Canaan would spew out its inhabitants that had broken their relationship with God. Nature has its own built-in defense, which makes it reject that which is foreign to her and which goes against her. Just as our bodies reject foreign bodies, so does nature. This defense mechanism is of divine origin. That is why we can say: "the LORD sits enthroned over the flood." For sinful men who drowned in the flood, God's presence above the flood increased its terror, but for Noah and his family this meant salvation. God sat enthroned over the flood upon which the ark floated. The rainbow that appeared subsequently confirmed this.

The actual theme of this psalm is that there is a two-fold reaction to the revelation of God's glory. There are those for whom God's glory is the aroma of Christ and the fragrance of life, but for those who are perishing it is the smell of death.⁹ The glory of God's voice means destruction and judgment for those who perish, but strength and peace for those who are saved. If this were not so, the conclusion of this psalm would be rather strange after the mention of the thunderstorm and the flood: "The LORD sits enthroned over the flood; the LORD is enthroned as King forever. The LORD gives strength to his people; the LORD blesses his people with peace." God's children know that the voice of God that thunders is a voice of blessing and peace for them. However hostile nature may be to us, we see in those psalms, which have nature as their topic, that there is a harmony between Him who created all and that, which surrounds us. We should not forget this principle.

² See Rev. 4:6^b,7

³ See Isa. 6:2; Ezek. 1:5-15

⁴ Isa. 6:5

⁵ See Rev. ch. 4

⁶ Rev. 5:13

⁷ Rev. 4:5

⁸ Rom. 3:23

⁹ See II Cor. 2:15,16

Copyright (c) 1999, 2000
E-sst, LLC
All Rights Reserved
Please see the License at Copyrights for restrictions and limitations
Note: Copyright does not apply to KJV text.