Today’s Passage: Psalm 67
This little psalm opens with a prayer for God’s own people: may He be gracious to us and bless us. But listen for the reason that comes close behind it, because the blessing is never asked for its own sake. It is asked so that God’s ways may be known on earth, so that the nations who have never yet heard His name might come to fear and love the same God who has been so good to us. The blessing is poured into one people so that it can run out to all the others.
As you read, hold this: God blesses us, that the ends of the earth shall fear Him.
Context The blessing spoken outward
Verse 1 takes up the priestly blessing Aaron was told to speak over Israel.
"May the LORD bless you and keep you; may the LORD cause His face to shine upon you and be gracious to you; may the LORD lift up His countenance toward you and give you peace." Numbers 6:24-26 (BSB)
What the priest once spoke over one people, this psalm now takes up and turns outward toward the whole earth. The face of God shining, His ways made known, His salvation reaching among all the nations: the old blessing has been given wings.
Psalm 67:1-2 (BSB)
For the choirmaster. With stringed instruments. A Psalm. A song. ¹ May God be gracious to us and bless us, and cause His face to shine upon us, Selah ² that Your ways may be known on earth, Your salvation among all nations.
Gracious, bless, ʾôr, pronounced ohr. Strong's H215, light. It is the very first thing God ever spoke over the darkness back in Genesis. Here that light is the shining of God’s own face, His favor resting warm upon His people. But the next line will not let the light stay shut up inside one house. It reaches out across the earth, out among all the nations. : three good gifts asked for. And then comes the small word that turns them all outward, the word that. Everything in the prayer hangs on it, for the blessing is asked for so that it can travel.
Psalm 67:3-5 (BSB)
³ Let the peoples praise You, O God; let all the peoples praise You. ⁴ Let the nations be glad and sing for joy, for You judge the peoples justly and lead the nations of the earth. Selah ⁵ Let the peoples praise You, O God; let all the peoples praise You.
The same refrain comes twice, once at the top of these verses and once again at the bottom, and both times it is all the peoples who are called to praise. The nations are glad because God judges them justly and leads them with a steady hand. This is not Israel standing off to the side and singing about itself. It is the whole earth being invited into a gladness of its own.
Psalm 67:6-7 (BSB)
⁶ The earth has yielded its harvest; God, our God, blesses us. ⁷ God blesses us, that all the ends of the earth shall fear Him.
Study notes The blessing that was always meant to travel
The harvest comes safely in, and once more the song says God blesses us, and once more that small word follows close behind: that. The aim has not changed at all since verse 2. This reaching out toward the nations was never some new thought dropped late into Israel’s story.
"The Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, and foretold the gospel to Abraham: “All nations will be blessed through you.”" Galatians 3:8 (BSB)
All nations, blessed through you. Paul calls that promise the gospel itself, preached in advance to Abraham long before Christ ever came. It is the same good news the psalm has been singing all along. God blesses us, that the ends of the earth shall fear Him.
God blesses us, that the ends of the earth shall fear Him.