Psalms 104:1 - Meaning and Application

When we come to any act of worship, we must stir ourselves up to meet God in it (Isaiah 64:7). David does that here. He seems to say to his own soul, “Come, soul, where are you? What are you thinking about? This is holy work, even angels’ work. Set yourself to it with real purpose: Bless the Lord, O my soul!”

In these verses, the psalmist first looks up to God’s glory in the upper world, which faith sees even though the eye cannot. He begins with reverence and awe: “O Lord my God, you are very great!” It is the joy of God’s people that their God is a great God. The honor of a king is the pride and delight of loyal subjects.

David describes God’s greatness by comparing it with the way earthly kings try to appear in public. Their royal display, even that of eastern kings who loved splendor most, is like the light of a firefly beside the sun at full strength. Kings are thought great, first, by their clothing. What are God’s robes? “You are clothed with honor and majesty” (Psalm 104:1). God is seen in his works, and they show him to be infinitely wise, good, and great.

“You cover yourself with light as with a garment” (Psalm 104:2). God is light (1 John 1:5), the Father of lights (James 1:17), and he lives in unapproachable light (1 Timothy 6:16). Light is the closest visible thing to the nature of a spirit, so God uses it as a picture of himself. As people are seen by the clothes they wear, so God reveals himself in this shining glory, though his face cannot be seen.

Kings are also known by their palaces or tents when they go out to war. What is God’s palace, what is his pavilion? “He stretches out the heavens like a curtain” (Psalm 104:2). He did this at creation when he made the firmament, which in Hebrew has the sense of something spread out (Genesis 1:7). He still holds the heavens in place, and they remain by his command. The air stretched around the earth is like a curtain around a bed, keeping the earth warm and softening the brightness of the upper world.

Though God covers himself with light, he also makes darkness his shelter in mercy toward us. Thick clouds are a covering to him. The greatness of this vast pavilion should make us ask how great he is who fills heaven and earth. He has chambers, upper rooms, as the word means, and he lays their beams in the waters above the firmament (Psalm 104:3). By his power, air and water stand firm in their places as if held by beams and rafters.

Kings travel in state with horses and chariots, and these add to their glory. But God makes the clouds his chariots, and he rides on them strongly, swiftly, and far above all opposition whenever he acts in special providence over this world. He came down in a cloud like a chariot to Mount Sinai to give the law, and to Mount Tabor to proclaim the gospel (Matthew 17:5). He also walks, gently yet majestically, on the wings of the wind. He commands the winds and uses them for his own wise purposes.

God is also great in his attendants, his heavenly servants. “He makes his angels spirits” (Psalm 104:4). The apostle quotes this to show Christ’s superiority over the angels (Hebrews 1:7). These angels are called his angels and his ministers because they belong to his rule and do his will. They are said to be spirits, and they are also compared to wind and fire, meaning they are swift, pure, and active. They are spiritual beings, not bodily like we are. Because they are spirits, they are less burdened than human beings and closer in kind to the glory of God.

They are bright and swift, like fire, like a flame. In Ezekiel’s vision they moved and returned like lightning (Ezekiel 1:14). That is why they are called seraphim, or burning ones. Whatever angels are, they are what God made them. He gives them their being, keeps them in being, and uses them as he wills.

Then the psalmist looks down and around at God’s power in the lower world. He is not so taken up with the glory of heaven that he forgets the far parts of God’s rule, not even the sea and dry land. “He has founded the earth” (Psalm 104:5). Though he hung it on nothing (Job 26:2), it stands as firmly as if built on the strongest foundations. He has set the earth on its base, so that though human sin has shaken it, and hell’s malice attacks it, it will not be moved forever, that is, until the end of time, when it will give way to the new earth.

God has also set bounds for the sea, for the sea belongs to him too. At creation, he brought it within limits. At first the earth, the heavier body, was covered by the deep (Psalm 104:6). The waters stood above the mountains, so the earth was not fit for man to live on. Then, on the third day, God said, “Let the waters under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear” (Genesis 1:9). The psalm calls this command God’s rebuke, as if he spoke in displeasure because the earth was covered and unfit for human dwelling. Power went with that word, so it is also called the voice of his thunder, a mighty voice that produces great effects (Psalm 104:7).

At your rebuke, the waters fled, as if they had suddenly realized they were out of place. They rushed away, and they seemed to call to the rocks and mountains to hide them. As the psalm says elsewhere, “The waters saw you, O God; the waters saw you and were afraid” (Psalm 77:16). Even those moving waters felt the force of God’s terror.

But was the Lord angry with the rivers for their own sake? No, he rebuked them for the sake of his people. It was to make room for human life, as in Habakkuk, where God acted for the salvation of his people (Habakkuk 3:8, 13). Men were not meant to be left like fish of the sea, crowded without air to breathe (Habakkuk 1:14). So the waters quickly withdrew (Psalm 104:8).

They went over hill and valley, up by the mountains and down by the valleys, until they reached the place God had appointed for them. There they settled down. The willing way even these restless waters obey God should teach us obedience to his word and will. Should man alone of all creatures be stubborn?

Their retreat, and their resting where God placed them, should also teach us to accept the ordering of God’s wise providence, which sets the bounds of our dwelling places. God keeps the waters within their limits (Psalm 104:9). They are forbidden to go past the border he has set, so they do not return to cover the earth.

They did cover the earth once, in Noah’s flood, because God commanded it. But they have not done so since, because he restrains them and has promised never again to destroy the world by water. God himself points to this as a display of his power (Job 38:8 and following), and he uses it to call us to fear him (Jeremiah 5:22). If we thought about this rightly, it would keep the world in awe of the Lord and his goodness, since the sea could quickly cover the earth if God did not hold it back.