Grosey's Messages

Psalm 19  The Self-Revelation of God

To the choirmaster. A Psalm of David.

 1 The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.
 2 Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge.
 3 There is no speech, nor are there words, whose voice is not heard.
 4  Their voice  goes out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world.

In them he has set a tent for the sun,  5  which comes out like a bridegroom leaving his chamber, and, like a strong man, runs its course with joy.
 6 Its rising is from the end of the heavens, and its circuit to the end of them, and there is nothing hidden from its heat.

 7 The law of the LORD is perfect,   reviving the soul; the testimony of the LORD is sure,  making wise the simple;
 8  the precepts of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the LORD is pure,  enlightening the eyes;   9 the fear of the LORD is clean, enduring forever; the rules of the LORD are true, and righteous altogether.
 10 More to be desired are they than gold, even much fine gold;  sweeter also than honey and drippings of the honeycomb.   11 Moreover, by them is your servant warned; in keeping them there is great reward.

12 Who can discern his errors?  Declare me innocent from hidden faults.
13  Keep back your servant also from presumptuous sins; let them not have dominion over me! Then I shall be blameless, and innocent of great transgression.

 14 Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer.

How God Reveals Himself To People Today

Apologetics is the giving of an answer for our reasons for having faith.

Psalm 19 is possibly one of the most philosophical Psalms. It gives us a continuing solid basis for apologetic argument, that guides us as we present the gospel to unbelievers.

Persuading unbelievers towards faith in Christ has changed over the centuries.

Justin Martyr, in the second century and Eusebius in the third century used a different apologetic method to us today. Primarily they used the Old Testament Scriptures and demonstrated how the Lord Jesus Christ fulfilled the prophecies of Scripture to demonstate the truthfulness of the Christian position.

For us the situation has indeed changed.

Later on Thomas Aquinas used 5 arguments to prove the existence of God philosophically.

Aquinas's (1225 –1274)  rational arguments appealed in the era when the rationalism of Aristotle was the dominant position. Thomas believed that truth is known through reason, rationality (natural revelation) and faith (supernatural revelation). Natural revelation is the truth available to all people through their human nature and powers of reason. For example, he felt this applied to rational ways to know the existence of God.

Thomas's five proofs for the existence of God take some of Aristotle's assertions concerning principles of being.

the argument from "first mover";

In the world, we can see that at least some things are changing. Whatever is changing is being changed by something else. If that by which it is changing is itself changed, then it too is being changed by something else. But this chain cannot be infinitely long, so there must be something that causes change without itself changing. 

the argument from causation;

In the world, we can see that things are caused.  But this cannot be an infinitely long chain, so, there must be a cause which is not itself caused by anything further. 

the argument from contingency;

But if everything were contingent and thus capable of going out of existence, then, nothing would exist now. But things clearly do exist now. Therefore, there must be something that is imperishable: a necessary being. 

the argument from degree;

We see things in the world that vary in degrees of goodness, truth, nobility, etc.  Aquinas then adds the premise: what is most in a genus is the cause of all else in that genus. From this he deduces that there exists some most-good being which causes goodness in all else

the argument from final cause or ends ("teleological argument"). 

We see various intelligent objects in the world behaving in regular ways. This cannot be due to chance since then they would not behave with predictable results. So their behavior must be set. But it cannot be set by themselves since they are non-intelligent and have no notion of how to set behavior. Therefore, their behavior must be set by something else, and by implication something that must be intelligent. 

These arguments were more beneficial in the Universities of Europe where Greek Philosophy was prevalent.

Later other philosophical positions would influence the universities, such as Hegellian developmentalism and communitarism that truth is a progressive force in the world, that will give rise to Marxist communitarian practices. Later, in contrast, Kierkegaard promoted the idea of individual experience as being so important.

In our current world, the debate has shifted radically away from the universities and from the academic approaches to apologetics. "It is in the marketplace of ideas, not (only) in the seminar rooms of universities, that Christianity must fight for its life. The television studio, the national press, the university cafeteria, are the new arenas in which the truth claims of Christianity are tried and tested. Christianity must commend itself in terms of its relevance to life, not just its inherent rationality." McGrath.

"Classical apologetics has tended to treat Christianity simply as a set of ideas, meeting a series of intellectual barriers that can be neutralized, or perhaps even overcome, by judiciously deployed arguments… However, rational argument has become more difficult to follow in the age of the thirty-second sound bite advertisement.

Psalm 19 introduces us to a way of presenting apologetics, that prepares people to understand the gospel.

We See God's Revelation In the skies  (1-6)

We See God's Revelation In the scriptures (7-11)

We See God's Revelation In the soul (12,13)

We See God's Revelation In the Saviour (14)

God didn't have to reveal Himself at all to anyone. He could quite well have let humanity go on in complete ignorance of our purpose for being alive, or God's purpose and desire for us. He chose in His mercy to reveal Himself to humanity.  And Psalm 19 introduces us to how God speaks to the human heart.

We See God's Revelation In the Skies

We used to sing, In the stars His handiwork I see, He that ruleth land and sea.

We see His greatness              We see His goodness

1 The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.
2 Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge.
3 There is no speech, nor are there words, whose voice is not heard.
4  Their voice  goes out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world.

In them he has set a tent for the sun,  5  which comes out like a bridegroom leaving his chamber, and, like a strong man, runs its course with joy.   6 Its rising is from the end of the heavens, and its circuit to the end of them, and there is nothing hidden from its heat.

God's Revelation of Himself in creation is abundant (1,2)

God has revealed himself to all people through his creation, more specifically, through the universe. The heavens, referring to the sun, stars, and planets, declare the glory of God. This divine glory is the sum total of all God's holy character and attributes which are made known to man. The skies, referring to the lower atmosphere, clouds, weather, and so on, proclaim the work of his hands. The creation above testifies to the existence and excellencies of a Creator, God himself, who made it. The truth about God—that he is who and what he is—is made known through the skillful work of his hands.

19:2. God's Revelation of Himself in creation is unceasing:

Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge. This knowledge is the general revelation of God's character, especially his eternal power, goodness, genius, kindness, and faithfulness (Rom. 1:20). This disclosure is a "soundless sermon" continually communicated in the skies.

The implication is that God has revealed Himself and can be rationally known through what is seen and made. Our own rationality, something we have in that we are created in the image of God, resonates with the rationality that is found in the creation, which reveals to us rationally that God's glory is evident in His creation. That same human reason that can investigate nature and uncover its ordering should also prove capable of grasping something—however slight—of God himself. The resonance of reason is grounded in the creatorship of God. Thomas Aquinas's "five ways" arguments suggest that the Christian belief in God is completely consistent with the world as we know it. It is justified, then, to identify pointers toward the existence of God, drawn from outside Scripture.

God's Revelation of Himself in creation is universal (3,4)

This revelation of God in the creation appeals to us not just because we have a rationality, but also because God has made us to have the inward sense of His reality. Calvin called it the sensus divinitas. The inward sense of the Divine.

McGrath "Through the grace of God, the creation points to its Creator. Through the generosity of God, we have been left with a latent memory of him, capable of stirring us toward a fuller recollection of him. Although there is a fracture between the ideal and the empirical, between the realms of fallen and redeemed creation, the memory of that connection lives on, along with the intimation of its restoration through redemption."

Apologetics can make use of a God-given starting point in the very nature of the created order itself. The witness to God within his creation, the "signals of transcendence" (Peter Berger) in human life, can act as a trigger, stimulating people to ask questions about the meaning of life or the reality of God. Those points of contact are meant to be there—and they are meant to be used."

"Gentlemen," said the great Napoleon, as he stood on the deck of a man-of-war in the Mediterranean, looking at the glories of an Italian night and listening to a knot of wise men who were proving that that there was no God: "Gentlemen, there is no God, you say! Then who made all this?" There was silence.

The orderedness of the world speaks of a Creator behind it.

Both Albert Einstein and former atheist Oxford Professor of philosophy Antony Flew acknowledged that the orderedness of the macro universe (for Einstein) and the Purposefulness of the micro universe for Flew spoke of a divine orderer who made it all by design. 

C S Lewis wrote: "What is behind the universe is more like a mind than it is like anything else we know. That is to say, it is conscious, and has purposes, and prefers one thing to another…It made the universe, partly for purposes we do not know, but partly, at any rate, in order to produce creatures like itself…to the extent of having minds." C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (New York: Macmillan, 1952), 31–32.

In his work Escape from Reason, Francis Schaeffer notes: "Christianity has the opportunity, therefore, to say clearly that its answer has the very thing modern man has despaired of—the unity of thought. It provides a unified answer for the whole life. True, man has to renounce his rationalism; but then…he has the possibility of recovering his rationality."

God's revelation of Himself in creation is suppressed (5,6)

His revelation of Himself in Creation is limited by the distortions that have entered the world through sin.  We ourselves are the primary distortion. We have the wrong glasses on most of the time and cannot see clearly the God who has revealed Himself. Romans 1 says:

18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. 19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them.

(NKJV 19 because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them.

NASB 19 because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them.)

20 For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world,  in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. 21 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools, 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.   24 Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, 25 because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.  26 For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. …  28 And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done.

Our Knowledge is Imperfect.

McGrath "We must admit that this knowledge is imperfect, broken, confused, and darkened, like a cracked mirror or a misty window. Anything that reveals less than the complete picture potentially presents a distorted picture. A "natural knowledge of God" is thus a distorted knowledge of God. But as a starting point it has real potential and value."

Calvin turns to consider the effect of sin upon human rationality.

Calvin regards the fall of humanity to have a significant and detrimental effect on the imago Dei. This image is not destroyed by sin; on the basis of Calvin's analysis, this would result in humanity being reduced to the level of other creatures. Nevertheless, both the human intellect and will are corrupted. The human mind is now unable completely to recognize and respond to 'right reason'; the human will becomes enslaved to desires and passions focusing on the creation, rather than the creator.29

Now since reason, by which humanity distinguishes good and evil, understands and judges, is a natural gift, it could not be completely eliminated [through the fall], but was partly weakened and partly corrupted . . . ; [Humanity remains] a rational being, different from the animals because it has been endowed with understanding . . . Likewise the will, because it cannot be separated from human nature, has not perished, but is so ;" enslaved to wicked desires that it cannot pursue the right.

One of Calvin's more significant theological conclusions to depend upon this analysis is that the natural human tendency is towards idolatry — that is, a worship of the creature in place of the creator. This has important consequences for Calvin's views on natural theology, which he regards to have a genuine yet limited role in positive theological reflection. It also compromises the relational capacity of the imago Dei, in that what was intended to lead humanity towards God now has the potential to deflect it from precisely that relationship.

McGrath "True knowledge of God" (Calvin) can only derive from revelation; yet God, in his mercy, has provided anticipations and hints of such saving knowledge in the world. A natural knowledge of God serves its purpose well when it intimates both the necessity and possibility of a fuller knowledge of God than that hinted at by the natural order."

We See God's Revelation In the Scripture

7 The law of the LORD is perfect,   reviving the soul; the testimony of the LORD is sure,  making wise the simple;
 8  the precepts of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the LORD is pure,  enlightening the eyes;
 9 the fear of the LORD is clean, enduring forever;  the rules of the LORD are true, and righteous altogether.
 10 More to be desired are they than gold, even much fine gold; sweeter also than honey and drippings of the honeycomb.
 11 Moreover, by them is your servant warned;  in keeping them there is great reward.

NKJV

7 The law of the LORD is perfect, converting the soul; The testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple;

8 The statutes of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart; The commandment of the LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes;

9 The fear of the LORD is clean, enduring forever;    The judgments of the LORD are true and righteous altogether.

10 More to be desired are they than gold,   Yea, than much fine gold; Sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb.

11 Moreover by them Your servant is warned, And in keeping them there is great reward.

Lawson: "He gave six descriptions of the sufficiency of God's written Word (vv. 7–9) which goes far beyond what natural revelation does. While the sun and the skies above reveal the existence and infinite power of God, Scripture reveals the only way to know God personally.

Scripture is Perfect (7-10)

The law of the LORD is perfect (Heb. tamim), meaning whole, complete, sufficient, lacking nothing, or comprehensive, reviving the soul. It is so perfect that it can convert, transform, and refresh the entire inner person.

The statutes of the LORD are trustworthy, meaning they are neither unstable nor fallible but unwavering and immovable. Not like shifting sands, God's commands cause a person to stand firm while making wise the simple."

It is interesting that the Psalmist picks up on the moral effects of God's Word

Lawson: "the precepts of the LORD are right; they lay out the proper path through the intricate complexities of life, steering a person to the right course in life. God's Word always directs God's people in the right way, the way that pleases God."

Where the laws of natural science describe the way things are physically, God's Word describes the way things should be morally.

Lewis argues that the only explanation of morality lies with God.

Unless there is a God, there cannot be objectively binding moral obligations.

Objectively binding moral obligations exist.

Therefore there is a God.

Thus the morality of the commandments resonates within the individual with the God-ordered conscience of the individual. This is the Natural Law theory that Paul speaks of in Romans 2:12 For all who have sinned without the law will also perish without the law, and all who have sinned under the law will be judged by the law. 13 For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified. 14 For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. 15 They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them 16 on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus. (Romans 2:12-16).

As we use the Word of God, the ten commandments, there is an echo and resonance within the human heart about the rightness of these words.

7 The law of the LORD is perfect,   reviving the soul; the testimony of the LORD is sure,  making wise the simple;   8  the precepts of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the LORD is pure,  enlightening the eyes;   9 the fear of the LORD is clean, enduring forever;  the rules of the LORD are true, and righteous altogether.

The implications in apologetics are far reaching.  Some years ago as a chaplain in a prison I ran into an inmate who at a previous session had expressed that he had attempted to murder someone.  He said that night, "You got nothing to say to me Preacher!" "Ah" I responded, "I know something about you that you don't know I know. And that thing I know about you, I know it scares you to death!" Confused, he responded, "What do you know that I know?"   "I know you know there is a God, and I know you know you got to face Him as your Judge, and I know that scares the pants off you!" 

He jumped back in shock! "Who told you! Who told you! You are right! But who told you?"

In the words of Arthur Leff, it is all about the "Great Sez Who?"  "In the absence of God ... each ... ethical and legal system ... will be differentiated by the answer it chooses to give to one key question: who among us ...ought to be able to declare 'law' that ought to be obeyed? Stated that baldly, the question is so intellectually unsettling that one would expect to find a noticeable number of legal and ethical thinkers trying not to come to grips with it... Either God exists or He does not, but if He does not, nothing and no one else can take His place." Leff ends this essay in a most shocking way: "Neither reason, nor love, nor even terror, seems to have worked to make us "good," and worse than that, there is no reason why anything should. .. As things are now, everything is up for grabs. Nevertheless: napalming babies is bad. Starving the poor is wicked. Buying and selling each other is depraved.... There is such a thing as evil. All together now: Sez Who? God help us."   Sez Who? God says! Lawson "The precepts of the LORD are right; they lay out the proper path through the intricate complexities of life, steering a person to the right course in life. God's Word always directs God's people in the right way, the way that pleases God."

Scripture is Precious (10)

The Scriptures are more precious than gold, even pure gold. "This means God's Word is infinitely more desirable and valuable than anything this world has to offer. Likewise, the sacred writings are sweeter than honey, fully satisfying our spiritual hunger and a source of great pleasure and enrichment." Lawson.

Scripture is Powerful (11)

Moreover, by them is your servant warned; in keeping them there is great reward.

Rebuking sin (11)              Revealing sin (12)      Restraining sin (13–14)

The Holy Spirit applies those words to our minds and our lives, causing faith to be born from understanding. This, in the famous words of the Westminster Shorter Catechism,

Conversion "is the work of God's Spirit whereby, convincing us of our sin and misery, enlightening our minds in the knowledge of Christ, and renewing our wills, he doth persuade and enable us to embrace Jesus Christ freely offered to us in the gospel."

We See God's Revelation In the Soul (12,13)

Awareness of a sense of emptiness resonates throughout secular culture. One thinks of Boris Becker, the noted tennis player, who came close to taking his own life through being overwhelmed by this sense of hopelessness and emptiness. Even though he was enormously successful, something was missing:

"I had won Wimbledon twice before, once as the youngest player. I was rich. I had all the material possessions I needed: money, cars, women, everything…I know that this is a cliché. It's the old song of the movie and pop stars who commit suicide. They have everything, and yet they are so unhappy…I had no inner peace. I was a puppet on a string."

Or one thinks of Jack Higgins, a highly successful thriller writer at the top of his profession, author of best-selling novels such as The Eagle Has Landed. He is reported to have been asked what he now knew that he would like to have known when he was a boy. His reply: "That when you get to the top, there's nothing there."

Becker and Higgins are excellent witnesses from the world of secular culture to the fact that most people are aware that something is missing from their lives, even if they are not able to put a name to it or may not be able to do anything about it. But the Christian gospel is able to interpret this sense of longing, this feeling of unfulfillment, as an awareness of the absence of God—and thus to prepare the way for its fulfillment.

The Marxist analysis of human experience recognizes this feeling of dissatisfaction and claims to cure it. When the revolution comes, this sense of emptiness (which is a direct result of capitalism) will disappear. But in those parts of the world where the revolution came, the sense of alienation and dissatisfaction remained.

This feeling of dissatisfaction is one of the most important points of contact for gospel proclamation. In the first place, that proclamation interprets this vague and unshaped feeling as a longing for God. And second, it offers to fulfill it. There is a sense of divine dissatisfaction with all that is not God. This divine dissatisfaction has its origin in God and ultimately leads to God. Sartre is right: the world cannot bring fulfillment. Here he echoes the Christian view. But the Christian view goes on to affirm that here, in the midst of the world, something that is ultimately beyond the world makes itself available to us.

Augustine's cry, "I am groaning with inexpressible groanings on my wanderer's path, and remembering Jerusalem with my heart lifted up towards it—Jerusalem my homeland, Jerusalem my mother."⁶ We are exiled from our homeland—but its memories haunt us.

Human desire, the deep and bittersweet longing for something that will satisfy us, points beyond finite objects and finite persons (who seem able to fulfill this desire, yet eventually prove incapable of doing so). It points through these objects and persons toward their real goal and fulfillment in God himself.

This is the paradox of hedonism. Even in our contentment we still feel in need of something that is indefinably missing. It is as if God leaves us with a certain weariness with nature that can be satisfied only by pressing on beyond nature to its source and goal in God himself. If meditation on the goodness of God does not drive us to him, perhaps weariness with the pleasures of the world will have the intended effect.

Pleasure, beauty, personal relationships: all seem to promise so much, and yet when we grasp them we find that what we were seeking still lies beyond them. There is a "divine dissatisfaction" in human experience that prompts us to ask whether there is anything that may satisfy the desires of the human heart.

12 Who can discern his errors?  Declare me innocent from hidden faults.
13  Keep back your servant also from presumptuous sins; let them not have dominion over me!

Then I shall be blameless, and innocent of great transgression.

We See God's Revelation of Grace in the Saviour (14)

All kinds of dehumanizing forces in the world threaten to reduce us to the level of the impersonal.

In our times in lockdown, the angst that is felt can be due to a sense of meaninglessness. When all you have is the latest thing on TV, meaning becomes little more than the drivel on what used to be called "Days of Our Lives"

A deep-seated threat of meaninglessness can be discerned in our addiction to TV that replaces our lives with the acted lives of fictional characters.

Angs, an anxiety about losing our way in the vastness of an impersonal world and being reduced to cosmic insignificance. Angst reflects a deeply rooted fear of meaninglessness and pointlessness. Such anxieties are already there in your audiences. There is the desire for the Meaning of life.

But listen to the Psalmist: "Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer.

Your words. The words of your mouth. The mediation of your heart. Let them be acceptable. God cares what you say and think!  And since He cares about what you say and think! Then what yu say and think is not meaningless! We do not feel secure in the world. This awareness is a powerful stimulus to look for some grounds of assurance. Where Luther asked, "Where may I find a gracious God?" many today ask, "Where can I find security and peace of mind?"

To paraphrase Augustine: our hearts are restless because they have yet to find a resting place, yet alone to discover that the only resting place that grants true rest is God himself!

But how do we move from the apologetic presentations in God's Revelation in the Skies, God's Revelation in the Scriptures, God's Revelation in the Soul, to God's Revelation in the Saviour?

The Lord Jesus spoke of Himself in each of these ways.

He said, I am the way the truth and the life. I am the Light of the world. Do you want to know truth. It is only found in a relationship with Him. What is Truth? He is the Personal and propositional truth!

He said, I am the Bread of Life. Do you want to find purpose, meaning and significance in life? It is found only in Him. Eat the Bread of Life: Partake of the Lord Jesus as Your only Saviour!

He said, I am the Good Shepherd, the Good Shepherd lays down His life for His sheep.  He has laid down His life for you as your words and your thoughts and your lifestyle didn't ever live up to the demands God's righteous laws put on you!

Christ, Calvin says, is not "received merely in the understanding and imagination. For the promises offer him, not so that we end up with the mere sight and knowledge of him, but that we enjoy a true communication of him." Both the person of Christ and the benefits he won for us by his obedience on the cross and through his resurrection from the dead are made available to us by faith. You need a Rock. Truth! You need a Redeemer! Jesus! You need a Rock of truth. You need a Redeemer.  And there is a Rock and a redeemer. It is the Lord Jesus.  Will you lay hold on Him today?

Apologetics assures us that there is a God to be found and that he is profoundly worth finding—then points us to where God may be met in Jesus Christ.

Blaise Pascal, who was profoundly aware of the limitations of philosophical ways of thinking about God. Pascal believed passionately that philosophy had squandered the insight that the God of the Bible is intensely personal. After his death, a crumpled piece of paper was found sewn inside his shirt. The words on this piece of paper have become legendary; they are intensely relevant to our theme. "God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob, not of philosophers and scholars, God of Jesus Christ, my God and your God. Your God shall be my God."

Is He your Rock?

Is He your Redeemer?