Psalm 148: 1-14

Chapter after chapter God goes on and on about storehouses for snow, spectacles of the night sky, deer giving birth to fawns. What does all of that have to do with anything given the overarching (and wrenching) concerns of the rest of the Book of Job? Well, in part it has to do with the deep mysteries of creation by which God reframes the questions of Job and his friends. But let us not fail to notice something else: the splendors of his own creation and the wide panoply of creatures he fashioned is never far from God’s mind. God loves all that stuff. He delights in all those things and creatures. He receives a kick out of it all and feels praised by it all. All of which is pretty much the point of also Psalm 148.

Recently “60 Minutes” did an update on a previous show about the Hubble Space Telescope. Hubble has given us hitherto unimaginable information about the far reaches of the universe. But now, it has peered even further into deep space to show us that what formerly seemed to be empty black spaces are, in fact, filled with billions of galaxies. Such scientific data can be a challenge to our faith, or it can move us to even more praise. Our God is “exalted above the heavens….” Can you imagine? Those distant galaxies and any planets in them that might be inhabited by sentient beings are commanded by Psalm 148 to join us humans in giving praise to Yahweh. That puts the miracle of Christmas in an even brighter light.

Near the middle of C.S. Lewis’s sixth book of “The Chronicles of Narnia,” The Magician’s Nephew, there is a marvelous scene in which the characters in the story get to look back to see how it was the great lion, Aslan, had created Narnia (and the whole universe really). It was through a song. Aslan sings the creation into being. And as he sings, the creatures that get created—starting with the stars and other heavenly things—join in the song to create still more and more things and creatures. There is something utterly lyric—literally and figuratively—for Lewis to picture creation just this way. It reminds one of God’s words to Job about how at the dawn of time all the morning starts sang together for joy. Indeed, there is musicality to God’s great work of creation. Small wonder that a poem like Psalm 148 reminds all those created realities to join the cosmic choir of praise once more. It also reminds me of the stunning creation sequences from Terrence Malick’s film The Tree of Life as they are accompanied by stunning music. Like Job, in that movie the story of creation comes in (quirky) answer to the deep questions we ask about life’s tragedies.

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Fifteen years ago I wrote an article in a magazine for preachers about the different voices of preaching. It had occurred to me that preachers can make use of a variety of voices in our preaching to bring the Word alive for those who are called to listen. Now, I don’t mean ventriloquist voices, but rather the voices of speech: declarative, interrogative, imperative, and so on...

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