Devotion for the Fifth Sunday of Easter (Year C)

Today we focus on the Psalm of the Day and how it talks about God as Creator. Our devotion comes from Blessed Is the Man: Psalms of Praise.

Scripture Readings

Acts 11:1–18
Psalm 148
Revelation 21:1–7
John 13:31–35 or John 16:12–22

Devotional Reading

The first reason the psalmist gives for his worship of the Lord is God’s work as the Creator—Creator of all things in view and beyond view. For the psalmist, creation reveals, serves, and glorifies God. As John writes in Revelation 4:11 that God is “worthy . . . to receive glory and honor and power” for His work of creation, so the psalmist summons all of creation to praise Him who made it. Calling all things—animate and inanimate—to praise the Lord is to say that all those created things give testimony to Him and invoke the praise due Him. That is a theme throughout the Scriptures. The testimony of the Word of God and the response of the psalmist in worship here first acknowledge the glory of God reflected in creation and proclaim His power demonstrated in it. . . .

The composer of Psalm 148 affirms that all of the creative work before us was by “decree” (v. 6). God spoke it—that is, commanded it—into existence (Genesis 1). Psalm 33:6 affirms that “by the word of the LORD the heavens were made, and by the breath of His mouth all their host.” It continues in verse 9: “For He spoke, and it came to be; He commanded, and it stood firm.” These passages speak of purpose. God, from eternity past, purposed a plan to be fulfilled in time. It started with creation, is progressively unfolded in the Old Testament, and culminates in the New Testament in the person and work of Jesus Christ. The writer to the Hebrews states it this way in the opening verses: “Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days He has spoken to us by His Son, whom He appointed the heir of all things, through whom also He created the world” (1:1–2).

So Psalm 148 calls us to worship the Lord who is the Creator, and it proclaims that all of creation joins in the testimony of Him and gives praise to Him. All of creation serves His purposes in redemptive history to give Him praise and glory. In our fallen state, we are unable to acknowledge God as Creator, let alone show Him praise for creation. Although Ecclesiastes 12:1 commands us to “remember also your Creator in the days of your youth,” we cannot. In that unjust state of rebellion against Him, we deserve His just and eternal wrath. But in Christ, He grants us mercy, sparing us from the eternal separation and wrath due us, and gives us grace, endowing us with eternal fellowship with Him. Because of that grace and mercy, and indeed, by grace, we, too, can call all that is around us to praise—to praise Him who made it. Let us do so, in prayer and in how we live our lives, to our Creator.

Devotional reading is from Blessed Is the Man: Psalms of Praise, pages 156–58 © 2010 Concordia Publishing House. All rights reserved.

Hymn

Hymn is “Let Everything That Has Breath Praise the Lord” © 2018 Concordia Publishing House. All rights reserved.