Psalm 145:3 – Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised, and his greatness is unsearchable.
It is easy to see that the Psalmist desires to communicate the greatness of God. He does this by stating three certifiable facts: one pertains to the Lord, the other to the proper response of all creation, and the last to the depth of His greatness, and by implication of all three, there arises the eternality of our heavenly occupation.
First, “Great is the Lord.” We need to be careful what we call “great.” We are inclined to use words very loosely in this day and age. Coffee is “great”. Football is “great”. Stuffed crust pizza is “great”. The Coliseum is “great”. America is “great”. The Psalmist, however, reserves this word for the Lord. It is the same idea that can be drawn from those words of Jesus to the rich young ruler, “Only God is good.” This would exclude everything else from properly fitting this term “good” or, in our text, “great”. And for ancient Israel, God was displayed as truly great. He is the Creator, the Redeemer, the Warrior, the Rock, the self-existent and infinitely free God, perfect in justice and mercy, transcendent and immanent. And has not proven Himself so to His church, blessed in the Beloved Christ. Our God is great: a great Father, a great King, a great Lord, a great Savior, a great Treasure, the Delight of the Christian soul. Great is the Lord. Veneration is the correct response!
Thus, “and greatly to be praised.” The overflow of beholding our great God is great praise, that is, as God is great, and our hearts behold some degree of His greatness, our response is a degree of praise that equals and arises to that which we have beheld. There is a balance in the statement, “Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised.” In truth, the statement is remarkably unbalanced, and for this reason, God has granted His children eternity for the same occupation. Simply put, the Lord is infinite in all of His attributes, and thus it is quite impossible, though good and right and spontaneously essential, to equally praise Him on account of His greatness. If we were to greatly praise God every second of every minute of every hour of every day for the rest of our lives, we would not come close to the praise that ought to be and will be ascribed to His name in heaven forever. And so it is a remarkable grace that God requires, grants, and loves what praise we give to Him – and for this He should be greatly praised!
Third, to bring more clarity to the issue, “and his greatness is unsearchable.” This expresses what I have said. And here, our eternal occupation is implied. The logic of God’s Spirit is sweet at this point. (1) The Lord is great. (2) He is to be greatly praised. (3) But the greatness of the Lord, for which we are to greatly praise Him, is itself “unsearchable.” Herein, the eternality of our eternal occupation is laid bare. For God will forever be great. And His greatness is unsearchable. This life is certainly not long enough to search out what is unsearchable (though, in His grace, we can praise Him for what He has revealed of Himself). And with that in mind, only eternity will grant us the time to search out what is of such greatness, such infinite glory and depth, that it is dubbed “unsearchable.” And so, as we behold ever new vistas of God’s greatness forever, so our employment will forever be the exercise of greatly praising our God. And thus, our employment now is, by God’s grace, a foretaste of our joyful employment forever. Let us then be about beholding our God in the face of Jesus Christ, in all of Scripture, and in our lives; let us be marked by a passion for biblical praise.
Filed under: Christian affections, Gleanings
