Psalm 8
February 23, 2025 Heavenly Father, we praise your name – all that your name
stands for, all that you are. We joyfully acclaim you for the majesty of your rule and
for its extent. There is no part of this planet, no realm of earthly existence, where
you do not reign.
We are amazed that, though your glory exceeds the heavens, you have chosen to display it
throughout the earth in the representative rule that you have bestowed upon us humans. How
remarkable that you should exalt us in this way and give us the privilege of reflecting your rule
over all the earth – even over wild animals, which we cannot control, the birds, which we
cannot reach, and the creatures of the sea, which we cannot observe. All this you originally
placed under our feet.
But we confess, Father, we humans lost the rule. We corrupted your design. In Adam we
overreached and demanded independent rule. And we became slaves – to sin, to death, and to
that great rebel Satan. We feel the effects of that fall daily. We often don’t feel like rulers. The
world, the flesh, and the devil often seem to have the upper hand. We feel ruled and overruled
by painful circumstances, struggles of soul, infirmities of body, and sins like anger, pride, lust,
retaliation, apathy, anxiety, insensitivity, materialism, racism, laziness, self-righteousness—and
the list goes on. We confess our trading of your rule, and the display of your rule, for various
expressions of enslavement.
But we praise you that you made Jesus, your Son, the Son of Man, a little lower than the angels,
that he might taste death for everyone—that he might suffer the penalty for our rebellion, that
he might gain back, in our behalf, the rule we forfeited. You raised him from the dead. You
seated him at your right hand, putting all things under his feet. Your crowned him with glory
and honor. You joined us to him, seating us in the heavenly realms where all things are under
our feet as well. In union with him, we get to experience anew the realities of this psalm.
So here we are today, Father—believers in the Son of Man, Jesus the Messiah, fulfiller of this
psalm. In our weaknesses and vulnerabilities, our great needs and dependence, we are like
babies and infants. Yet as such we raise our hearts and our voices in praise to you for making
us rulers in Christ, for setting us on a path of ultimate victory, not defeat, in him. What enemy
can ultimately stand against us? By our praising we silence our accusing and lying demonic
foes, our clamoring and campaigning indwelling sin, our contemptuous and intimidating
society. Our rule shows your rule. There is no rule like yours, no name like yours, no realm
greater than you!
May we grow in our praise of you, and may we pass this good news along to others, through
our lives aligned with it and our words speaking it.
In our journey as a church through the book of Daniel, presently pondering the incident of the
fiery furnace and the faith and faithfulness of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, our thoughts
turn to the persecuted church throughout the world. Protect and uphold and encourage these
brothers and sisters of ours who are suffering because of Christ. May their faith be refined and
strengthened. May their witness be clear and fruitful. May they display the worth of Jesus as
they endure hardship for his sake.
As we think of present circumstances in our own church fellowship, we thank you for the babies
who are preparing to be born. We pray this morning for Abbie and David and little baby
Nelson. Bless them all at this threshold of childbirth. We ask for your protecting and sustaining
grace upon them, and for great joy for David and Abbie as they welcome their first child.
We pray in the name of the risen Christ. And all God’s people said, “Amen.”