By Bunni Pounds

Psalm 24 proclaims the majesty and grandeur of God, but at the same time describes Him and His attributes in specific ways that we can relate to. Let’s start with the first section of this beautiful Psalm, and I will show you what I mean:

 “The earth is the Lord’s, and all its fullness,
The world and those who dwell therein.
For He has founded it upon the seas,
And established it upon the waters.” (verses 1-2)

God is so big and powerful that He created the whole earth. Genesis 1 lays out the story that the eternal God spoke and created light and everything else in the world as we know it. He molded man into His image from the dust. That is an awesome and powerful God!

Creator God was the beginning of everything. He thought up in His mind’s eye the rolling hills, the mountains that we marvel at, the trees that tower over our homes, the galaxies of stars, and the oceans that we fear. 

Let’s get even more specific: “The earth is the Lord’s” – that includes specific things that you and I love. This list of course is not comprehensive - Mexican food (with Tabasco sauce), Guatemalan coffee, a good steak from Saltgrass Steakhouse, daffodil bulbs that spring up in my yard, majestic paintings at the Dallas Museum of Art, music that stirs my soul, work that empowers me, and everything else that has indescribable beauty.  

Gnostics in the early church saw the natural world as evil, as something to be escaped from or something that they needed to rise above. They thought super spiritual knowledge was their way into eternal life and that the things on the earth were just base affections that needed to be overcome. They didn’t see the beautiful things in the earth as something that God made and redeemed for our enjoyment, but as something that needed to be scorned. 

Gnostics were always trying to rise above the natural earth instead of seeing its beauty and embracing the things that God could teach them through the natural world. It was more than just a battle between flesh and spirit for them; it was a heretical imbalance that made it impossible for them to embrace the connection between themselves and God in a real and natural way.

Even though Gnostic thought is not prevalent in the church today per se, we still have divisions in our minds that keep us from enjoying life and the things that God created for our enjoyment. 

We think we must fast certain foods to please God, to abstain from loving our spouse in the way that God wants us to, we are afraid to dance, or any other random thing with an idea that it will make us holier. These are perversions of the truth and not the plan of God for our lives. 

God wants us to enjoy the things on the earth that He created in the real beauty that He created them, not in the debauched and unnatural ways that we see so prevalent in our world today. Gluttony, sex outside of marriage, immoral theatre, film, or music, an unnatural worship of nature, or legalistic man-made laws concerning what we can and cannot eat are not the plan of God. Those are the devil’s perversions to keep people worshipping the things of the earth and focusing on them unnaturally instead of seeing the beautiful things in the earth that God created and gleaning from the creation to point us to the Creator.  

This is the truth: God is redeeming people, and in the process of that redemption process He shows us His full redemption that He has for the earth and the things that he created. 

Isaiah 66:22 says, “For as the new heavens and the new earth which I will make shall remain before Me,” says the LORD, “So shall your descendants and your name remain.”

2 Peter 3:13, “Nevertheless we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.”

Why doesn’t God just destroy the earth and create something else? Why will He create a new Earth when He comes back? The answer lies in Genesis 1 when it says after each of His creations or artwork -“And God saw that it was good.” God loves the earth and the fullness of the earth; He just wants to redeem it from the false hold that the devil has placed on it. The enemy is not the Creator or the Artist, he is just the usurper of the creation. God wants us to appreciate His earth and not despise it or destroy it.  He is after full redemption of our lives and the things around us.

On to the next section of Psalm 24…

Who may ascend into the hill of the Lord?
Or who may stand in His holy place?
He who has clean hands and a pure heart,
Who has not lifted up his soul to an idol,
Nor sworn deceitfully.
He shall receive blessing from the Lord,
And righteousness from the God of his salvation.
This is Jacob, the generation of those who seek Him,
Who seek Your face. Selah (verses 3-6)

Though God made the whole majestic earth, there is a place in Him and in His presence that goes beyond just enjoying His creation here.  His holy place is a place of revelation and love in His presence. It is a place of glory – a place where true peace, perfection, and extravagant love exists.

We always need to look at Old Testament scripture in the light of New Testament revelation. I have heard this section of scripture preached from the pulpit as a “get your act together, so you can get into the presence of God” message. In the Old Testament during the days of the tabernacle, the people would go through the outer courts, sacrifice their offerings, wash in the lavers and the pools of water, and come into the presence of God. They came in as instructed by God with formulas and patterns, but in the New Testament Christian life – this is only a picture of what Jesus did for us on the cross. 

Through His death on the cross, He became our sacrifice, our ritual lamb, and our cleansing water. When we receive His blood and put our faith in the cross, our hands become clean, our hearts become pure, and we turn our faces from the idols of this world to the only true God. We receive the blessings and the righteousness of God through the sacrifice of the slain Son of God. 

Only through Jesus can we enter into the presence of God. Nothing else can bring us in.

I wrote a song a few years back that says, “I cannot add to Your blood. Nothing I do can compare to You. I cannot add to Your blood. Your perfect life made a sacrifice - by dying upon that tree. There is nothing more that I need.”

For years, I thought I had to DO more to please God, but Jesus says - Just come in. Just seek my face. My blood is enough.

It is not about working ourselves into a cleansing process in our flesh, but walking into His presence and taking on His life by the Spirit.

“…and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler over the kings of the earth. To Him who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and has made us kings and priests to His God and Father, to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.” Revelation 1:5-6

“Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” Hebrews 4:16

Our responsibility in coming into the presence of God is simply this: We have to acknowledge the truth of who we are without Christ, receive the cleansing power of the blood, and walk in boldly into the throne of grace and into His presence.

Continuing on.... to another completely different section….

Lift up your heads, O you gates!
And be lifted up, you everlasting doors!
And the King of glory shall come in.
Who is this King of glory?
The Lord strong and mighty,
The Lord mighty in battle.
Lift up your heads, O you gates!
Lift up, you everlasting doors!
And the King of glory shall come in.
Who is this King of glory?
The Lord of hosts,
He is the King of glory. Selah (verses 7-10)

Can you imagine how heavy old gates are? Or what about giant wooden doors like in medieval times?  Imagine how hard it must be to get those open or lifted up. I am imagining the big fortresses on the movie Lord of the Rings and how many men it took to penetrate those gates or those walls. It might take an army of men to pull them open- twenty on each side.

We are commanded here in this Psalm to open up the gates and the doors of our lives regardless of how heavy they are….. and with that command comes a promise that the “King of glory shall come in.”  They might seem heavy or impossible at times to lift up, but God is mightier. The Lord is mighty in battle. He is the Lord of hosts. As we seek Him by making ourselves available to His presence and receiving the power of His blood, the gates of our hardened and stony hearts spring open and we find freedom. He comes rushing in and overtakes our rejections, our sin patterns, and our numb hearts. 

God is not just the King but the “King of glory” and His glory comes into our lives and changes us forever.

Then we pause like the word “Selah” implies here at the end of this Psalm. 

Selah literally means – Stop and think about it. We take a break in His presence. We stand in His glory that is unmatched. The earth, as it pertains to our lives, is redeemed and the fullness of His glory changes everything. “The earth is the Lord’s, and all its fullness”

Political Corner: In a career or activity that most people, not just Christians, think is dirty and difficult, it is important that people of faith that engage in politics understand that God has a purpose for all institutions. We are called to bring righteousness into the political arena laying down our anger, fears, and pride and walking with a pure heart in a system that is all about who gets the most power and influence and navigating it with humility. Jesus has called us to be salt and light - so that means we bring His redemption even into politics. It is time for some servant leaders in this field. Let’s not be short-changed by doing politics like the world system does it.