CHAPTER 3

The Nations at Heart

Katie Hoogerheide Frost

Katie Hoogerheide Frost (MM—Performance, MA—Education, MA—World Arts) focuses on how we humans can relate to God’s word deeply, especially through internalizing Scripture and connecting it with our lives and cultures. She serves as an associate instructor at Dallas International University, an ethnoarts consultant with SIL International, and a member of the Psalms: Layer by Layer project.

With a flourish of poetic artistry, Psalm 67 reveals to us the heart of God and His covenant people. And what do we find at the heart of this ancient poem? We find the nations. All the nations. All the nations worshiping God. All the nations rejoicing in God as their perfect king. This poem depicts people all over the earth recognizing God’s ways and bowing in awe of Him¹—and it does so with remarkable artistry that highlights its message in profound ways.

Please join me on a tour of this sevenverse gem and experience for yourself the beauty and power of its message. To do so, I invite you to imagine yourself gathered with a crowd of people at the temple in Jerusalem. The people of Israel had been commanded by God to come together in Jerusalem for major festivals three times a year, and for at least two of these festivals, they would have brought the firstfruits of their harvest to Him.²

So, here you are at the temple with your fellow citizens after presenting your firstfruits. You’re shoulder to shoulder with everyone. It’s noisy, and people are excitedly greeting one another, finding out what has happened since they last saw each other several months ago. The sky is clear blue, the sun is shining brightly, and you feel its warmth seeping through you. Suddenly the crowd hushes. The priest comes out and raises his hands. You close your eyes and listen as the familiar priestly blessing washes over you:

The LORD bless you

and keep you;

the LORD make his face shine on you

and be gracious to you;

the LORD turn his face toward you

and give you peace. (Num 6:24–26 NIV)

As the last words fade away, the temple musicians strike up a tune, and the choir starts singing.³ You’ve never heard this particular song before and listen with interest.

May God be gracious to us and bless us.

May he make his face shine toward us. Selah.⁴ (Ps 67:1)

Immediately you recognize that these words sound similar to the priestly blessing. They’re a bit shorter and in a slightly different order, but you know that songwriters often condense and rearrange things. You love the picture of God’s face shining on you with the warmth and the light that the sun does now. The Selah has given you a moment to pause, to think about what you just heard, and to wonder what’s coming next. When the musicians move on, what a surprise you get!

To understand your way on earth,

Your salvation among all the nations. (Ps 67:2)

“Wait a minute!” you think. “You mean we’re asking God to bless us so that other people get to know Him? Don’t we have a tough enough time here in Israel, with the other nations around us hating us and fighting against us? Shouldn’t God just bless us and take care of us so we survive?”

Then you remember what God told our fathers: “All peoples of the earth will be blessed through you.”⁵ Blessed to be a blessing. This song ties together two of the greatest blessings of our heritage, those given to Aaron and to Abraham. As people watch God blessing us and taking care of us, they’ll get to know Him. One of the reasons the nations hate us and are afraid of us is because they don’t know our God. They worship idols. If they got to know Him, they would realize He is much more powerful and much more reliable than any of the gods they trust. Every time they see Him help us—when He rescues us in battle, provides rains so our crops grow, delivers us from sickness, or is with us in other kinds of ways—it’s another chance for them to see how He cares for those who trust in Him.

Let the peoples praise you, God.

Let the peoples praise you, all of them.

Let the nations shout joyfully,

because you rule the peoples fairly,

and the nations you guide on the earth. Selah. (Ps 67:3–4)

People usually praise someone who has impressed them. If the nations get to know God, they will be impressed and praise Him. They won’t just be glad to see how God takes care of us—they’ll be thrilled to discover that He will care for them too as the perfect king. They will want to be part of His kingdom, where He rules with justice and guides His people with perfect wisdom.

Let the peoples praise you, God.

Let the peoples praise you, all of them. (Ps 67:5)

This verse is a repeat of an earlier one. This psalm simply overflows with the sound of the nations, the desire to hear God praised all over the earth!

The earth has yielded its produce.

May God, our God, bless us.

May God bless us,

so that all the ends of the earth will fear him. (Ps 67:6–7)

So here we are, all gathered at the temple, having just brought our firstfruits of the harvest. Our hands have literally held the evidence of God’s blessing again this year. Now our vision has expanded and we’ve been reminded—the purpose of being blessed is actually to bless others, to give them the opportunity to know God. The more people know Him, the further the ripple effect will extend, until even the people the farthest away from us—those “at the ends of the earth,” as this song says—will fear Him and be in awe of Him.

The musicians are winding down. That’s the end of the song. I invite you to return from your imaginative journey and turn your thoughts now to your own setting, wherever God has placed you at this point in time. Psalm 67 has shown us God’s goal—that every nation, tribe, people, and language will be represented at God’s throne, praising Him and worshiping Him (Rev 7:9). Representatives from every people group all over the globe will be present—none will be missing. Psalm 67 also gives us a vision of how God is accomplishing this goal—through blessing His people!

Psalm 67 takes this message to another level through its structure. All the references to “us” and “our” are at the edges, three in the first verse and three in the last two verses. Meanwhile, all the references to the “peoples” and “nations” are in the center. The psalms were originally written in Hebrew, the language of ancient Israel. In Hebrew poetry, the middle is often where the most important words are located. In technical terms, this is called a chiasm. Practically, this structure is similar to a sandwich, with the bread on the outside surrounding the meat. In Psalm 67, the people asking for blessing are on the edges, while the people who are going to be blessed—the nations—are at the heart, in the center. In fact, if you count all the words in Hebrew and find the middle word, it’s the word for “peoples”!⁶The people of the world are literally at the heart of Psalm 67.

This central reference to the peoples occurs in the second line of verse 4, which describes God’s perfect rule. This middle line of the psalm paints a picture of the new heaven and new earth (Rev 21:1), when justice will be restored, evil and oppression will be conquered (1 Cor 15:20–28), and people will walk by God’s light (Rev 21:24; 22:5). Psalm 67 asks God to shine His face upon His people so that those from every nation will be brought under His kingship, worshiping Him and basking in His light forever!

Brothers and sisters, this world has a lot of darkness in it, but there is hope. Jesus came as the light of the world (John 8:12). He died and rose again to conquer sin, sickness, evil, and oppression of every kind. The world needs to hear about Him. When Jesus touches our lives, when He blesses us, then we in turn become lights in the darkness. Jesus taught that His people should not put that light under a basket but on a stand, to let our light shine before others (Matt 5:14–16). When we let our light shine, people will praise God for it.

You may not feel like you can reach many people. You may not see right now how you’re being blessed or could possibly be a blessing. Take courage. Psalm 67 shows that God’s work in our lives causes those around us to praise Him, to rejoice as they experience His kingship. God Himself provides the blessing to draw people to Himself. Do you have a testimony of healing from sickness? Have you been delivered from addiction? Can you speak of His faithfulness when you were struggling to take one more step? Has He given you time, energy, material resources, or skills? Pray for blessing. Share whatever He’s given you with others. Go and stay wherever He calls you. And watch Him bring in the harvest, until all have heard and every tribe, nation, people, and tongue is gathered in His light.

RETURN TO LESSON 1: The Living God Is a Missionary God

Notes

1. See also Psalms 22:27 and 86:9.

2. See Exodus 23:14–17 for the three festivals. The Feast of Firstfruits noted in Leviticus 23:9–14 would have fallen during the Feast of Unleavened Bread at the time of Passover, while the Feast of Weeks was designated in Exodus 34:22 as the time to bring the first-fruits of the wheat harvest.

3. Even before the temple was built, David instituted Levitical worship through instruments and song (1 Chr 6:31–47; 15:16–25). See 2 Chronicles 5:12–13; 23:18; and 31:2 for mentions of the musicians in the temple.

4. The translation and story behind this psalm are based on research from the Psalms: Layer by Layer project.

5. Though the wording differs slightly in each case, the promise originally given to Abraham in Genesis 12:3 is reiterated four more times in addresses to each of the patriarchs: Genesis 18:18 (in God’s thoughts); 22:18 (to Abraham); 26:4 (to Isaac); and 28:14 (to Jacob).

6. Pieter van der Lugt, Cantos and Strophes in Biblical Hebrew Poetry II: Psalms 42–89, Oudtestamentische Studiën 57 (Leiden: Brill, 2010), 225. For Labuschagne’s work regarding the concentric, menorah structure of the poem and its connection with light, see van der Lugt, 225, 227.