THE VOICE OF THE LORD
Text: Psalm 29
Introduction
One of our favorite hymns is, “How Great Thou Art.” In it we sing about some of the sublime features of God’s creation. We sing of worlds, of stars, and of rolling thunder; of woods and forest glades and the sweet singing of birds; of lofty mountains grandeur, of the sound of the brook and the feel of gentle breezes. We praise and adore God because of the greatness of God implied in these things.
The theme of this hymn is a biblical theme. There is a theme in scripture, that the natural world displays the majesty and glory of the spiritual God who created it.
For example, one Psalm speaks of how the heavens, with sun and stars, “declare the glory of God.” Our text this morning is another example. It too sees the majesty of God in his natural works, and cries, “How Great Thou Art!”
But the phenomenon of nature that our text observes is very specific. Like the other Psalm mediated on sun and sky, this Psalm focuses on the Storm -- the “rolling thunder” of the beloved hymn.
I
Seven times the Psalm speaks of “the voice of the Lord.” “The voice of the Lord,” however, is plainly referring to thunder. The Psalmist hears the voice of his God in the thunder and lightning of a mighty storm.
This is not the only place in the Old Testament where thunder is called “the voice of the Lord.” In Exodus 9:28, where Pharoah says, “Enough of God’s thunder and hail,” what is translated “God’s thunder” literally says, “Voices of God.” “No more Voices of God!” Pharoah says. And Job 37:3-4 speaks of how God lets loose his lightning across the earth, and that, “after it, his voice roars, he thunders with his majestic voice.”
In truth, it was not uncommon for the ancient ear to hear God’s voice in the thunder. The common belief in times past, was that God was the direct cause of thunder and lightning. This has been true of all peoples and all religions. The Canaanites, who lived among the children of Israel, saw the work of Baal in the storm. The Greeks believed that Zeus hurled the thunderbolts, and the ancient Germans heard the hammer of Thor when the thunder pounded.
But these facts take nothing away from the power of this Psalm. The Psalmist is well-aware of how the heathen view the storm. So he takes the storm away from their gods, and gives it back to the One who truly made it. It is not Baal or Jupiter or Thor, but it is the voice of Yahweh the Lord of Israel, the one and only God, that sounds forth in the storm.
In our day we do not tend to see any natural event as directly caused by God. We emphasize the natural causes of things. We theorize on the rushing of hotter air up and colder air down, and the resulting violent frictions between the water droplets they carry. We hypothesize electrical charges produced and massed together, like two poles of a giant battery, and the great spark, miles long, that flies between these charges. It is a spark of some millions of volts, powerful enough to explode the air in between. The flash of this spark, we explain, is the lightning, and sound of this explosion is the thunder.
Yes, there may be a natural explanation, but let us not conclude that, therefore, God is explained away. Some people draw the conclusion that to understand the workings of nature is to rule God out. It is better, however, to see the dual cause of these things -- the natural causes, but also the spiritual, divine cause, which is the ultimate cause explaining how things began and how they continue to exist. God remains the ultimate cause of all things.
So it is not a question of seeing either the work of God, or the work of nature in the thunder and lighting. It is not a question of either-or, but of both-and. Even with our more complicated, scientific views of things, we can see God in the natural world, -- perhaps (I believe) even better than before.
So then, even in our modern, scientific age, we can perceive the God of Israel in the thunder and lightning of the storm. We can do as our Psalmist did. We can hear the thunder and think of God.
II
This scripture, our text, moves us to hear God’s voice in the thunder. If we will do that, we will be able to appreciate something about God that tends to be de-emphasized in popular religion. We will appreciate the majesty of God -- or, as the Psalm says, God’s Glory.
When we speak of the majesty of God, we mean the greatness of God. We mean the yawning gulf that lies between his greatness and our smallness. The voice of a human compared with the voice of thunder, gives us an illustration of the difference between human beings and their Creator.
The tendency of popular religion, however, is to de-emphasize God’s majesty, and emphasize God’s closeness. People like to think of God as a friend always at their side, with whom they can talk in a familiar way. But the danger is that of forgetting the majesty of God, and making him too much like ourselves. The danger is that God becomes something too small to solve our problems, and unworthy of the time spent in praise and adoration. Our faith becomes weak, and our worship lifeless.
The greatest danger, however, is that we lose appreciate for Jesus. We lose appreciation for how much we need Christ as our mediator. Because God is so terrible and great, we need someone to take us by the hand, and bring us into an appropriate fellowship with God. For God is not like us, that we might approach him familiarly, as with an equal. We need help.
Now do not misunderstand. This is not to take away anything from the boldness with which we can approach the throne of God in Christ (Heb 2:71-18). It is only to warn us not to forget that God is still “wholly other” than we, and that a certain humility and awe need to go along with that boldness. So we look to Jesus, like his disciples before once did, for what we need to properly approach God: “Teach us to pray,” they asked him.
This Psalm reminds us that, however available God has made himself to us, because of the work of Jesus his Son, God is not like us. He is eternal, infinite, almighty. He is to us like thunder is.
What happens when we are in the presence of thunder? When we see a sudden flash of lighting nearby, hear the great clap of thunder, what do we feel? Is it the easy, lightness one feels, when sitting around with a friend? No, there is an awe that comes over us, before this terrible display of nature’s power.
If you think about it, there are two sides to our response to the voice of thunder. First, there is fear. We sense the power that is there, to destroy. In the Psalm, he speaks of the lightning splintering the great cedars of Lebanon, snapping them like toothpicks. But there is something else besides fear and trembling. There is also a fascination, even a joy, that we have been in the presence of something so rare and terrible and beautiful. In the Psalm he speaks of the mountains being made to skip about like colts in a pasture.
There was a story in the news recently of some young people who were struck by lightning and killed. They had climbed on top of a roof, so they could watch a storm as it came in. The illustrates the fascination and pleasure that people have with lightning and thunder, which can even overwhelm the fear we have of its destructive power.
We have this two-fold, paradoxical feeling in the presence of lightning and thunder, of fear and trembling, yet of joy and adoration. We are helped to see, then, the kind of feeling that should come over us, when we come into the presence of God.
So here is a spiritual exercise, that the Psalm leads us to take. Think of the emotions that come spontaneously whenever lightning strikes, that paradox of terror and joy, of trembling fear and adoring fascination. Then transfer these same emotions to the God whose voice is in the thunder. For in the thunderous explosions of a mighty storm, we are granted a hint of the even greater majesty of God.
III
Notice, however, that there is one attribute of God that, in particular, we are led to admire by the Psalm. The Psalm praises the voice of God. Surely, it is easy for us to feel the majesty of God’s voice, when we hear it in a great clap of thunder. But this is not the only way God’s voice comes to us. It comes to us in other ways, which are equally majestic.
The writer of Hebrews says that God has spoken to us in diverse manners and ways. Let’s think of the ways, past, present and future, that the voice of God comes.
In the past, God has been known to speak directly to people. He has kept his visible presence hidden from us, but from time to time he has let his audible presence be experienced. The great example is Israel at Mount Sinai. God’s voice thundered before the people when he spoke the words of the 10 commandments. They trembled so before it, that they begged Moses to go before God, so that they need not hear the voice anymore. They marveled that anyone could hear this voice, and live.
At other times God sent his voice mediated through something, so that humans need not hear it directly -- for it is clear that we could not bear it, if we did. He spoke through dreams and visions. He spoke through angels and prophets. He has spoken through the written word, through scripture. And, above all, he has spoken through his Son, Jesus Christ.
The scriptures speak, however, of a time when, once again, we will hear the voice of God, direct and without mediation. We will hear the voice of Christ calling to the dead, “Come forth,” and they will all come. We will hear his voice from the throne of judgment, saying to us either, “Depart from me,” or, “Enter in to the joys of your Lord.” The book of Revelation says that we will hear a voice from God’s throne, which proclaims the dawn of the new eternal day: “Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.” (Rev 21:1-4). If it is an experience to hear the voice of God in a thunder clap, what kind of experience will it be to hear his voice, welcoming us to eternity, and promising us eternal happiness?
These are the ways God’s voice has come in the past, comes in the present, and will come in the future. In all of these, his voice – even traveling through the avenue of human voices and human pens – should strike us with just as much terror and awe as the thunder of a storm.
IV
The voice of God comes at different times and different ways, but it comes also in different tones. It came in a powerful thundering to Israel at Sinai, but it came to Elijah in a still small voice.
The voice does indeed come in different tones, and for this reason, we might mistake it for what it is or miss it. Or, we might fail to give it the response it is due. For, whatever tone it comes in, it is no less majestic.
Sometimes it comes to us in a gentle, didactic tone. It reasons with gentle persuasion. It pleads with loving interest. It gently guides us, like a father might speak to his daughter or son.
Sometimes, it comes in a sweet, consoling tone. God is called “The God of all comfort,” and his voice can comfort us when we need it most. He encourages, he consoles, and promises. He says what we need to help us through the hour of trial.
Then again, at other times, the voice is heavy and hard, reproving us when we are stubborn, commanding us when we are disobedient.
God’s voice might be soft or hard, gentle or jarring, consoling or commanding. But whatever the tone of his voice, we cannot but be grabbed by it, like thunder might grab us.
When thunder comes, everything else falls silent in comparison. There is no other thought in our minds but of this majestic outburst of nature that we have witnessed. When God speaks, in whatever tone, everything in us must fall silent, every objection, every rationalization. We tremble in fear, we rejoice in amazement, but we also listen and obey.
V
So then, we have this Psalm, which moves us to listen to the thunder of a storm, and hear the voice of God. It moves us to appreciate the majesty of God, the wide gulf that lies between his greatness and our smallness. And it focuses our attention on the majesty of his voice, which, we must remark, remains just as majestic wherever and however it may speak.
But we have not yet considered the most important thing. The most valuable thing for us to consider from the Psalm – as with all the Psalms & all the scriptures Old Testament and New – is how it preaches Christ to us. Yes, even this scripture preaches the good news – the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
How does this Psalm preach Christ?
In another hymn-like passage in Gospel of John, Jesus is called the Word. Christ Jesus is the divine Word, who was in the beginning with God, by whom all things were made. He is the Word made flesh, who dwelt among us, so that we could behold his glory.
Jesus Christ, as the Word, is the very voice of God embodied.
It is clear, then, how this Psalm of the voice of God preaches Christ to us. We are moved to put the words "Jesus Christ" in the Psalm, wherever it says "the Voice of the Lord."
The Psalm describes a natural storm as it moved through Palestine. But it describes just as well another storm that moved through Palestine, Jesus Christ. It describes very well the earthly ministry of Jesus.
When the Psalm speaks of the Voice being in the wilderness, it speaks well of Jesus, when he went to the wilderness to be baptized by John and be tempted by Satan. It was there that the voice thundered from heaven, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”
When it speaks of the Voice being in the multitudes of trees of a forest, it speaks well of Jesus, when he went among the crowds. Those who recognized him as the voice of God were known to fall down before him, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.”
When it speaks of the Voice being in the mountains, it speaks well of Jesus, sitting before the people, teaching them a sermon on a mountain. We are told that they were amazed at him, because he spoke with a power beyond their experience. It speaks well, too, of Jesus on the mountain of transfiguration, standing there with two older instruments of the voice of God, Moses and Elijah. At that time, a word thundered down, identifying him as the Voice of God. “This is my beloved Son; hear him.”
When it speaks of the Voice being over the sea, it speaks well of Christ Jesus, in the boat, as he often was, with his disciples. It speaks of the voice that said to the winds and the waves, “Be still.” To the amazement of his disciples, the waves obeyed his voice. The sea, it seems, recognized the voice for what it was. It speaks well, too, of Jesus walking out to his disciples upon the sea, which terrified them when they saw it. But they were consoled when they heard his voice, “Be of good cheer, it is I.”
And when it speaks of the Voice being among the cedars of Lebanon, it speaks well of the Savior, when he was hanged on a tree, the cross of Calvary. What seemed at the time to be a moment of the very heaviest weakness and despair, was found at last to be the moment of greatest power, the power to save every human being from their sins.
The thunderous Voice of the Lord, remembered in a storm by the Psalmist, came again through Palestine, as the Psalmist described.
Jesus did not display the full heavenly glory that we see illustrated by the sound of thunder. He laid that aside to take our nature. But his earthly ministry was nevertheless thunderous, especially on a spiritual level.
What Jesus did in his ministry on earth, was indeed thunder and lightning from heaven, sweeping over the plains and hills of Palestine.
VI
But if the Psalm preaches what Jesus was in the past, how much more does it preach what he is at present, and what he will be in the future.
We see this in the testimony of the New Testament, to what Jesus did after raising from the dead, and sitting down at the right hand of God.
There was a sound from heaven like the rushing mighty wind of a storm. There were flames of fire, shining like lighting, on the heads of men. In this way the reign of God’s Messiah was announced and the gospel was first preached. The words of the Psalm were proclaimed: “The Lord sits enthroned over the flood; the Lord sits enthroned as a king forever.”
This happened on the day of Pentecost, the day when Israel commemorated the voice of God at Sinai that gave them the law. It is interesting that this Psalm, Psalm 29, was traditionally read during the feast of Pentecost. For the Psalm was fulfilled again on this day, when the sound of the wind was heard, the fire was seen, and the Voice of Jesus thundered for the first time in the preaching of the apostolic Gospel.
Christ Jesus thunders from heaven still, in greater ways even than he did while on earth. The Voice of the Lord, Jesus Christ, still sweeps over the earth. It spoke to Saul of Tarsus, and struck him down. He was hit by God’s lightning. And he was changed forever. John heard the voice too, speaking with the sound of mighty waters, exhorting the churches to be faithful in their tribulations.
The voice may not come so directly as it did in these examples, but it comes just as powerfully, and just as majestically. Christ Jesus still rumbles and flames across the face of the earth, striking the hearts of men and women. Sometimes, when a storm moves through, afterward things are no different than they were before. But at other times things are changed forever. The same is true with Christ, the Voice of God.
One day, the Lord will strike the whole earth, and change things in an absolute, final way. He will bring the present age to an end. On that day, the prayer of the Psalmist will be answered, when he prayed, “May the Lord give strength to his people! May the Lord bless his people with peace!” “Peace,” the shalom so valued in the Old Testament, that perfect, harmonious, tranquility, that wholeness of happiness, will be the gift of our King to his people.
So then, let’s hear this too from the Psalm. Let’s appreciate the voice of thunder, the reality of the glory of our living Lord Jesus. Here is a thunder that still rumbles and flames in the earth, striking everywhere, even in your own life, changing forever the hearts of men and women. And it is a thunder that has the power to blast away the present age, and bring the day of peace for the people of God.
Conclusion
These are the considerations that we are led too, from the words of the Psalm. We are left now with this question, so vital, so critical: How will I respond to the voice of God, wherever and however it comes?
When we see and hear a great storm, with its mighty clouds, its terrible thundering and lightning, its sweeping rain and hail, we are naturally terrified and amazed. When a great bolt of lightning strikes nearby, followed closely by an explosion of thunder, we are struck dumb before it. If this is how we are before thunder, how should we before God?
These majestic forces of nature are symbols of the majesty of God. If we cower in fear or rejoice in fascination at the thunder, how much more when the voice of God speaks!
Friends, it is speaking right now to you, in your living Lord, Jesus Christ. He is saying, “Come and follow me!” He says, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. Let me into your life.” His voice commands us: “Walk with me, obey my teachings, go where I send you.” It pleads with us: “Shine my light in your life.”
We should tremble with fear, but rejoice in fascination, at the voice of our Savior. We can only be struck silent, all our objections and rationalizations scattered away by the thunder of his voice. We can only rise up and obey.
“Today if you will hear his voice, harden not your heart.” May God grant that you and I, each one of us, obey the Voice of the Lord, and do it immediately, to the praise of his glory. Amen.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS:
Arthur Weiser, Commentary on Psalms, OTL
C.H. Spurgeon, "The Voice of the Lord is Full of Majesty" (sermon)
Paul Apple, "The Majesty of God" (sermon)
