BigHistory

Psalm 8

Few people get terribly excited about history!

“Big History” seeks to tell the story from Creation until the present.Some teachers are trying an

approach called “Big History.”

BIGHistory

Course description for a “Big History” class: The entire expanse of human civilization – 5,000

years – makes up a mere two percent of the human experience.

Approximately 98 percent of human history occurred before the invention of agriculture.

All the matter we know of in the universe is likely to be no more than one billionth of the actual matter that was originally created.

At present, we cannot drill deeper than about seven miles into the Earth, which is just 0.2 percent of the distance to the center (4,000 miles away).

Traveling in a jet plane, it would take 5 million years to get from our solar system to the next-nearest star.

BIGHistory

“Big History” seeks to tell of human experience from Creation to the present with different scientific disciplines. Psalm 8 takes an interdisciplinary approach to God. Psalm 8.

But, instead of “Big History,” we see a “Big God” who can do so very much!

v 2

The Case for God

BIGHistory

“Out of the mouth of babies and infants, you have established strength because of your foes, to still the enemy and the avenger” (v 2, ESV).

BIGHistory

The author doesn’t tell us who God’s foes are. Yet, anyone opposed to Truth is opposed to God. We typically think of “enemies” in terms of

denominationalism. But, David is speaking about God’s majesty & glory.

Pantheism deifies & glorifies nature itself. Naturalism tells us the cosmos just happened this way

by accident. The polytheism of the psalmist’s day declares that

different “gods” were in charge of different forces. How can God counter such a belief system?

BIGHistory

God establishes his truthful existence “out of the mouths of babies and infants.” In other words, the cooing & babbling of babies

testifies to God’s majesty. How?

BIGHistory

An infant knows just as much about the origins of the universe as those who deny God. When a baby is born, he knows nothing of the

origins of the universe. Those who deny God know nothing of the origins of

the universe. “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God’ ” (Ps

14:1, ESV). The very existence of an infant testifies to the

truthfulness of God. How could something as majestic as a human birth

be just happenstance?

vv 1-3

The Cosmos and God

BIGHistory

“O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory above the heavens. Out of the mouth of babies and infants, you have established strength because of your foes, to still the enemy and the avenger. When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place” (vv 1-3, ESV).

BIGHistory

The cosmos boggles the mind. A beam of light takes eight minutes to cross the 93

million miles between the Earth & the sun. If our solar system were the size of a quarter, the

Milky Way Galaxy would be the size of North America.

If you were to count the stars in our galaxy, one per second, it would take you 2,500 years to count them all.

The Milky Way contains billions of stars, but our galaxy is only one of at least 200 billion galaxies.

BIGHistory

God used great power at Creation! “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the

earth” (Gen 1:1). Job 38:4-11. “All things were made through [Jesus], and without

him was not any thing made that was made” (Jn 1:3, ESV).

vv 4-8

God and the Creature

BIGHistory

“What is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him? Yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor. You have given him dominion over the works of your hands; you have put all things under his feet, all sheep and oxen, and also the beasts of the field, the birds of the heavens, and the fish of the sea, whatever passes along the paths of the seas” (vv 4-8, ESV).

BIGHistory

David beholds the wonders of the universe & is flabbergasted that the Creator would care about man. God loves us with an indescribable love!

“God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (Jn 3:16, ESV).

“God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ” (Eph 2:4-5, ESV).

“See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are” (1 Jn 3:1, ESV).

God made everything, but he still cares for me!

BIGHistory

Man holds a unique place in God’s creation. Man bears the image of God.

“Let us make man in our image, after our likeness” (Gen1:26, ESV).

Man bears similarities with God. No other created thing bears the image of God.

BIGHistory

All things have been placed under man’s feet. Man has control over all other created things.

“Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. And as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything” (Gen 9:3, ESV).

There is much of the Earth that we have used to our benefit.

But, God, not man, has ultimate control. “O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all

the earth!” (v 9, ESV). God is King & he reigns supreme.

Do you need to come & honor his sovereignty?