“O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!” This song of David points to the glorious reputation of God. Unfortunately, God’s reputation is no longer what it was – but as followers of Jesus, we have an opportunity to re-build the God’s reputation with those all around us.
Message
Have you ever thought about how a single photo or image can instantly bring a certain person to your mind? The person’s name, achievements, and successes come to your attention – all sparked by a single visual cue.
- When we see a quarter we think of George Washington, a founder and early leader of our country.
- When we see a Nazi arm band we think of Adolf Hitler, a dictator known for his extreme cruelty.
- When we see an “Air Jordan” symbol we immediately think of Michael Jordan, one of the greatest basketball players of all time.
- When we see a cross, we think of Jesus, our Savior.
Sometimes it doesn’t even take a visual symbol. Sometime just hearing a person’s name brings up memories.
- When I hear the name of Tom Hanks, I have good memories of movies like “Forest Gump” or “Castaway.”
- When Martha Stewart’s name comes up I think of the woman who cooks and bakes magnificent dishes but also went to prison for insider trading.
- And then there’s Donald Trump. People either love him or hate him, but everyone knows who he is!
The images that come to our minds when we hear of these people are based on their reputations.
Your reputation is the generally held beliefs and opinions other people have about you. They aren’t necessarily factual, nor do they encompass all of who you are; but they are what people think of when they hear your name or see you enter a room.
I’d like to say I don’t care much about what people think of me, but I’d be lying. The truth is that I want to have a reputation of being a smart, funny, charismatic guy. What people think when they hear the name Ryan Lenerz is important to me. I know it’s just a name, but it carries much more weight than that. My name instantly sparks ideas and images of me in people’s minds when they hear it.
I’m not alone in caring what others think about me.
- Some people are people-pleasers, trying to please others so they’ll be well thought of.
- Others are high achievers – the successful ones. They want their employees or customers or students to love them; they want their bosses to hope they’ll never leave.
- Others have taken on labels they’re trying to live up (or down) to. This type of person may be known as the tough one, the life of the party, or the rebel. They want to make sure everyone knows their reputation.
- Many of you may simply seek to be known as a Christian. You hope people will recognize you as different from the world.
In all of these cases, we essentially create the reputations we want. Whether we care a lot or a little, our actions impact what people think when they hear our names.
In our time, in addition to our reputations in the physical world, we have reputations in the online world. You now can find websites to help you create your reputation – to eliminate information that paints you in a negative light and emphasize your positive aspects. (Note: these websites are not cheap!)
Whether or not your reputation is important to you, you do have one. Everyone does! Today we will see in Psalm 8 that God also has a reputation.
God’s Reputation Through Scripture
Psalm 8, a psalm of David, is the first openly worshipful psalm in the book of Psalms. The structure dictates the emphasis of the words.
Psalm 8:1 begins: “Oh Lord, our Lord. . . .” Notice that the first “Lord” is in all capital letters. This is how most Bibles translate the formal name for God, “Yahweh.”
The second “Lord,” however, is not all capitals. It is a different Hebrew word – “Addon” (from “Addonai ”), which means master or the one who rules. It always refers to the ultimate authority or position of a person. This psalm opens by addressing the triune God of the Israelites and then emphasizing His position of authority over all creation.
The first verse and the last verse of Psalm 8 are exactly alike: “Lord, our Lord, how majestic is Your name in all the earth!” This is important. This is known as an “inclusio,” a literary device that creates a “frame” by placing similar material at the beginning and the end of a passage. Everything between the two identical verses supports the statement “How majestic is Your name.”
“Majestic” may seem like a rather outdated word now – perhaps a bit of “Biblese” held over from long ago. More familiar words might be “excellent” or “impressive.” “Name” is synonymous with “reputation.” A better translation for us might be: “How amazing, how famous, is your reputation!” According to David, God’s reputation made Him the most famous being in all the universe.
At the time of David, people around the region had all heard the stories of the plagues of Egypt and of the Israelites crossing the Red Sea during the Exodus. The Philistines had watched as young David, with strength fromGod, struck down their mighty Goliath. Yahweh, the God of the Israelites, was famous indeed!
David goes in a different direction to further support the reputation of God. He points to the glory of the stars and the moon in the sky. Then he looks at our position as humans and recognizes the glory God has given us, including dominion to rule over the animals, birds and fish in this world.
For David, all of this amazing creation, both “way out there” and here on this rock, points to God’s glory. The creation all around us – the symbol of who God is – beckons us to think immediately of the God who made it all. Therefore, David opens and closes this psalm with the overwhelming praise of “God of Israel, our master, Your reputation on this earth is magnificent.”
God’s Reputation is in Decline
Something has happened between the time of David and today. God’s reputation has faded. All the wonders of God’s creation – the sun, moon and stars in the heavens, the humans who are different from and above all the animals, birds and fish – still exist. While all this was once the primary support for the fame of God’s reputation, this is no longer the case.
Long ago, virtually everybody believed in God, although perhaps not in Israel’s Yahweh. Everyone who examined the night sky and the diversity of creation knew there was something more, something grander, behind this breathtaking earth. Now science has explained away the glories of creation and left the fame of God as an afterthought.
The bright lights of the starry night have been dimmed by the brighter glow of our street lights and neon signs. The miracles of birth, life, and death have been trumped by the advancement of medical science, which can create life in tubes, heal complex injuries, and keep people alive longer than ever before. The amazing intricacies of our bodies and the variations between species are now understood to be based on complex DNA strands. Now that these have been deciphered, they can be used to select the biological material parents want for their children. (Defect-free and blond, please.)
What happened? The majesty, the excellence, and the awe of which David sang have been drowned out by other things competing for fame and glory. David’s appeal to the stars and the moon and all of creation no longer proves the glory of God. In understanding God’s greatness through science, people have altogether dismissed the idea of a divine creator worthy of our allegiance and praise.
What does this mean for God’s reputation? Right now, what are the generally held beliefs and opinions people have about God?
- God may or may not exist. (More people are agnostic than actually atheistic.)
- If He does exist, He probably doesn’t actually care about “little old me.” (This is, of course, completely contrary to the point David made in Psalm 8.)
- God is unfair, unloving, or unable to make this world better than the chaos we see.
This leaves God with you and me – followers of Jesus – as the primary instruments for building up His reputation. We are the representatives and witnesses of His goodness and love. The stars and the animals cannot cry out in audible voices like we can to sing the praise of God and elevate His reputation. They reflect His glory in the way He created them to – through their natural beauty – but present-day people have attributed their splendor to science and evolution. God gave humans an elevated status over the animals, birds and fish; but that also leaves us a great responsibility to sing His praise and build His reputation on the earth.
One disclaimer before I move on: we are co-building God’s reputation with Him. Even if we fail, His reputation will one day be elevated again. Jesus said in Luke 19:40 that if we don’t sing God’s praise, then the rocks would do it. His name, His reputation, will be lifted high.
How can we play a part?
We must believe Jesus Christ died on a cross for our sins, and we must repent of our sins. We must turn our allegiance to Him, making Him the “master” of our lives. Then we have the Spirit of God within us and will be God’s representatives on this earth.
Representatives of God
As God’s representative, do you build up or tear down His reputation? Do you advance His reputation or do you smear it through the mud?
Throughout history, not all people claiming to be Christians have done a good job of advancing the reputation of Jesus. During the Crusades, thousands of people were murdered “for Jesus.” The church has often been filled with greed and a misuse of power. Right now the Southern Baptist Convention is facing a reckoning because the leaders cared more about their power and reputation than the safety and healing of sexual abuse victims. All of this appears on the nightly news; and the watching world says, “See, Christians are a mess like everyone else.”
Things like this are black eyes for God’s reputation; and they make people say, “If that’s what followers of Jesus are like, I don’t want to be one.” Now, more than ever, we followers of Jesus must carefully consider our actions and how they impact God’s reputation.
You can’t be the person who cheats, lies, steals, parties, and fights and then go to church on Sunday and act like you are special. Nor is it helpful to act “holier than thou,” telling people about their sins and telling them they are going to hell. I’m not saying we should hide the truth, but blurting out such challenging words to a world that already doesn’t care about what you say is unhelpful to God’s cause.
Equally unhelpful in boosting God’s reputation is the person who is basically a good person, who isn’t a religious snob, but who also never talks about their faith or points people to the goodness of God. People like this don’t smear God’s reputation in the mud, but they don’t advance it either.
We are called to advance the reputation of God in our personal interactions with others. When people see you, let them see the fruit of the Spirit. Show them someone with a love and concern for others unlike what most people have. If they see you as a representative of Jesus they will think more highly of God. Perhaps you talk about your faith with others and tell them that your relationship with Jesus is a two-way street; you ask God for something and He answers. All of this challenges people’s thoughts about God and expands the glory of His name.
The person who best exemplified this lifestyle was Jesus Christ. As God the Son on earth, He told His disciples that everything He did was to glorify the Father. He taught His disciples to glorify the Father as well – to pray to the Father, to give thanks to the Father, to recognize that all good things come from the Father. Now our role is to live like Jesus, praising God for all He has done and rebuilding His reputation on this earth.
Too often, however, we turn to God only when things are going badly and take all the credit for ourselves when things are going well. When we are healthy, when all the bills are paid, when our jobs are secure and our families are without conflict, we take that opportunity to feel like “we” finally have things together. When people ask, “How are things going?” we tell them, “Great – life is good.” It is at that moment that we can expand our answer: “Life is good and God is great! I am blessed, I am cared for, I am loved, I am forgiven, I am truly satisfied with the life my God has given me.” Do you see the difference? Do you see how easy it is to turn such a simple answer into a praise to the name of God?
Our job isn’t merely to rebuild God’s reputation, but, in some cases, to defend it. What would you do if the reputation of a member of your family were slandered? What would you do to make things right for them? I’m guessing you would be willing to go to great lengths to defend that person’s honor and to fix any damage done. In your younger days you might even have been willing to risk personal danger by getting into a fight to defend that girl you were dating.
If you are willing to go to such great lengths to protect the reputations of the people you care about, are you willing to do that to make right the reputation of God – the maker of the heavens and the earth? Are you willing to risk injury of your own reputation for the sake of defending God’s reputation? People will belittle Him, dismiss Him, or – worse yet – slander Him. They will blame Him for all the sin and evil in the world – the very sin we are responsible for. Defending God’s reputation means putting ourselves in uncomfortable conversations to stand up for the God of the universe.
Conclusion
Psalm 8 emphasizes the majesty of God’s name. Take a moment this week to watch the sun go down. Watch the stars in the night sky. If you are lucky enough, watch a storm roll in, or watch lightning bugs dance across the fields. Soak up the awesomeness of God’s creation and praise Him for it! Make sure to connect the dots in your mind between this awesome world and the God who gave it to us!
Remember: as representatives of Jesus, we play a role in making God’s name – His reputation – either majestic or murky. This means giving God the glory when you achieve success. It means standing up for God when people’s misunderstanding of Him assigns Him undue blame. It means living a life filled with the fruit of the Spirit. As you show, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness and self-control, the watching world sees a glimpse of the majesty of God working in you.
Our goal should be that the people who observe us will see that our reputations align with and build up God’s. I’m sure you’ve been to the funeral of a person whose life has been spent building and defending the majesty of our great God. While we celebrate their legacy, their faith and their character continue to point to Someone greater than themselves – the Master God they submitted their lives to.
When our goal in life is to advance God’s reputation, we can sing out loudly with David: ”O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is Your name in all the earth.”
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