Psalms in Book 5 affirm that God does answer prayer, God’s promises are valid and they include a long love song for God’s laws. The final 5 Psalms are songs of praise believed to have been written to be sung at the dedication of the second temple.

Three of the final five psalms, Psalms 146, 147, and 149, joyfully depict God’s work. Psalm 150 serves as a powerful conclusion to the entire book of Psalms. Interestingly, Psalm 148 stands out as instead of being about God at work it portrays creation’s heartfelt response to God through a beautiful hymn of praise.

The books of Psalms are roughly themed like this:

Book 1: Psalms 1 – 41: God is beside us.
Book 2: Psalms 42 – 72: God goes before us
Book 3: Psalms 73 – 89: God is all around us.
Book 4: Psalms 90 – 106: God is above us.
Book 5: Psalms 107 – 150: God is among us.

148 Praise the Lord!
Praise the Lord from the heavens;
    praise him in the heights!
² Praise him, all his angels;
    praise him, all his hosts!
³ Praise him, sun and moon,
    praise him, all you shining stars!
⁴ Praise him, you highest heavens,
    and you waters above the heavens!
⁵ Let them praise the name of the Lord!
    For he commanded and they were created.
⁶ And he established them for ever and ever;
    he gave a decree, and it shall not pass away.

⁷ Praise the Lord from the earth,
    you great sea creatures and all deeps,
⁸ fire and hail, snow and mist,
    stormy wind fulfilling his word!
⁹ Mountains and all hills,
    fruit trees and all cedars!
¹⁰ Beasts and all livestock,
    creeping things and flying birds!

¹¹ Kings of the earth and all peoples,
    princes and all rulers of the earth!
¹² Young men and maidens together,
    old men and children!
¹³ Let them praise the name of the Lord,
    for his name alone is exalted;
    his majesty is above earth and heaven.
¹⁴ He has raised up a horn for his people,
    praise for all his saints,
    for the people of Israel who are near to him.
Praise the Lord!

All of creation praise the Lord

Psalm 148 is like a party where even inanimate objects are getting down and praising God. It’s a delightful song that takes a quirky turn in the middle, making you wonder if the author hit their head on something just before writing it. But hey, I’ll get to that part eventually!

“Praise to the holiest in the height…” is a beautiful excerpt written by John Henry Newman in his poem The Dream of Gerontius. These inspiring words have been extracted and used as a hymn, possibly taken from Psalm 148 for reasons that will become apparent later.

Praise to the holiest in the height…

Psalm 148 starts like this: “Praise the Lord from the heavens; praise him in the heights!” I love that. Praise starts from heaven, when we join in with praise our voices are mingled with the voices in heaven, with the angels and all the rest of the heavenly host. (verse 2).

That’s brilliant, but this is where it starts to turn intriguing. Inanimate objects are also summoned to praise God — the sun, moon, stars, and even the waters above the heavens. What’s the deal with that? How can they praise God? The straightforward answer is by simply existing. The focus has shifted from heaven, the place where God resides, to the sky. It seems that all of creation was designed to praise God by its mere existence as God’s creation.

Verses 5 to 6 conclude this section. How do I know? Because the same formula is used in verses 13 and 14 to close the psalm. It follows this plan:

• An order –  Let them praise the name of the Lord! (v. 5)
• A reason –  God commanded and they were created. (v. 5)
• A refection – God has established them (v. 6)

That’s the first part of the psalm done, but if you thought inanimate objects praising God were odd, it’s about to get a whole lot weirder.

Use your imagination

What about mythical beasts? What would you think if I wrote this:

Loch Ness Monster and Sasquatch praise the Lord.
Dragons and unicorns praise the Lord.
Fairies and leprechauns praise the Lord.

Am I losing my mind? No. I’m not losing it, I’m using it.

…and in the depth be praise

“And in the depth be praise,” is line two of Newman’s hymn. After the heights of the first six verses, verse 7 is about the depths. “Praise the Lord from the earth, you great sea creatures and all deeps,” says verse 7. In the Authorized Version, the sea creature in that verse is a dragon. In Hebrew, the word translated as sea creature or dragon is tannîn, the same word as the creature Aaron’s staff turned into in Exodus. (It is not the same word as the one translated as serpent in Genesis 3; no one is asking the devil or demons to praise God.)

There’s a whole zoo of mythical creatures in the Bible, from the infamous serpent in the book of Genesis to the wild beasts popping up in Revelation. But let’s face it, who’s taking these literally? I mean, come on, even with all the poetic flair, the Psalms seem more down-to-earth than that, right?

Well no. The book of Psalms is not one of the literal parts of the Bible. It is closer in tone to the Wisdom books of Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Solomon. Wisdom books often anthropomorphize concepts; for example, when the book of Proverbs describes wisdom as a wise woman. The serpent/dragon/sea creature of Psalm 148 is similar to that; in scripture, it is often used as a symbol for chaos.

What frightens you the most? That’s it! That is what Psalm 148:7 is telling you to use as a means of praising God – your fears. The full list from verses 7 and 8 makes it clearer, great sea creatures and all deeps, fire and hail, snow and mist, stormy wind fulfilling his word! In your darkest moments, what scares you is meant to be offered as a form of praise to God. Bring your fears to God in praise. In the depths, be praise!

I recall the trend of praising God for everything that was prevalent in the church, particularly in white evangelical churches, during the 1970s or ’80s. A close friend of mine experienced a storm that caused his garden fence to blow down. When he shared this with another friend, the response was, “Praise God that the fence blew down.” My friend disagreed, expressing that a fence blowing down is not a positive occurrence.

I have learned as a disabled Christian in constant pain that life as a Christian is filled with blessings because Jesus Christ is with me in my pain. In the same way, you can find strength in praising God in your fears because He is with you through your fears. Praising God in the midst of life’s challenges shows that you are focusing on Him and trusting Him to guide you through difficult times.

People too

After imploring the animals to praise God, the Psalmist finally turns to inviting people to offer praise, although the target audience seems inappropriate. During that period, the prophet Ezra was involved in ethnically cleansing the people of Judah; individuals with a non-Judean mother were being excluded from the community of God, and those with foreign wives were also being excluded if they did not divorce these wives. It is intriguing to note that the individuals who were initially called upon to praise God in Psalm 148 were the “Kings of the earth and all peoples, princes, and all rulers of the earth!” These leaders, whom Ezra sought to exclude, were the first to be urged to praise.

Then “Young men and maidens together, old men and children,” the psalmist has still got it backwards as far as organised religion is concerned. In temple worship there was strict segregation, men and women did not share the same space. Asking them to praise God at the same time would have been seen as sacrilegious by some, but here we have it, a psalm written for the dedication of the new Temple in Jerusalem after the exile is saying to praise together, as for old men and children? We still segregate our children off to Sunday schools.

The final two verses follow the formula of verses 5 and 6:

• An order – Let them praise the name of the Lord! (v. 13)
• A reason –  God’s name alone is exalted; his majesty is above earth and heaven. (v. 13)
• A refection – God has raised up a horn for his people (v. 14)

God’s name is the one to be exalted above all. Even the names of the kings of the nations are urged to place God first in praise. It’s not just the youth who are asked to prioritize God, but also the wisdom of old age. As for the people of God, in this song, they only receive a brief mention at the end, almost as an afterthought.

God’s people are passionate about heralding the glory of God to the world. We are entrusted with the powerful message of redemption, proclaiming God’s desire to restore and reclaim His world.

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