Again, that's Psalm 67. Psalm 67, starting in the first verse, reading all the way through. May God be gracious to us and bless us and make his face to shine upon us. Salah. that your way may be known on earth, your saving power among all nations. Let the peoples praise you, O God. Let all the peoples praise you. Let the nations be glad and sing for joy, for you judge the peoples with equity and guide the nations upon earth. Salaam. Let the peoples praise you, O God. Let all the peoples praise you. The earth has yielded its increase. God, our God, shall bless us. God shall bless us. Let all the ends of the earth fear him. I just pray again for illumination from God. Oh Lord, the entrance of your word gives light, as the psalmist said, and so we pray that you would, by your spirit, grant your word entrance into our hearts, enabling us to believe, and in believing, to understand, and in understanding, to obey. And we ask this for Christ's sake, amen. You may be seated. This psalm, Psalm 67, is one of the so-called orphan psalms of the Psalter, which means that it doesn't indicate who the author of this psalm was in the superscript. Often you'll read in the psalms that it was written by David or Korah or even Moses and so forth, but this psalm does not tell us who the author was. Now, I think there's good reason to think that the author was David. In fact, David is the one who is explicitly said to have authored it. in the Septuagint, which is the Jewish translation into Greek of the Old Testament. So this is a very ancient tradition. There were obviously reasons that they had for thinking it was written by David, and I think other reasons can be given. But it's efficient for us to remember that whoever authored it as part of the canon of Scripture, it was given by inspiration of God. Whoever wrote it was born along by God's Holy Spirit, and the words themselves are in fact God-breathed. The structure of this psalm, which begins with, if you hearken back to it, begins with Israel petitioning God to bless her, then it moves from Israel calling on God to bless her to that blessing going out to the nations, and then coming back to bless Israel once again. And all of that is designed to especially draw our attention to verse four. a verse that calls on the nations to be glad and sing for joy, for you shall judge the people righteously and govern the nations on earth. that this is the central focus of the psalm as apparent from several facts. First of all, notice that the first three verses, as well as the last three verses, which flank it on either side, all consist of two-line stanzas, which causes verse four, which has three lines, it alone has three lines, that causes it to stand out. Moreover, if you compare the first three verses to the last three verses, you'll notice that they're all complementary in some way. For example, verse 1 petitions God to bless us, which corresponds to verse 7, which says God shall bless us. Verse 2 speaks of God's way being known on earth, which corresponds to verse 6, which says the earth shall yield her increase. Or in, I think, the English Standard Version, it says the earth has yielded its increase, but the Hebrew here, I think, is better rendered as a future tense. But then, most obvious of all, verses 3 and 5 correspond to each other, obviously, because they're identical. They're exactly the same in both cases. What you can't see from the English translation that again points up this structure is that all of these corresponding verses have the same number of words in Hebrew. So verses 1 and 7 have the same number of words as each other, verses 2 and 6 do as well, and then of course verses 3 and 5 do since they're identical. Which again leaves verse 4 standing out by itself as having no other verse that complements it, and it has more words in it than any other. Now, one way of thinking of this is sort of like a literary pyramid. The first three verses on the one side, the other three verses on the other side, with verse four then serving as the capstone. A better way, perhaps, of thinking of this, and this is a way that Jews will think of this passage even to this day, is to think of the menorah, which used to shine in the temple, which had a central stem and then six branches, three protruding from each side. And what you'll see in some Jewish artwork is this psalm actually organized into the shape of a menorah. And what they do is they make the fourth verse the central stem, which is the longest, and then they make the other verses branch off of it. And it's remarkable how perfectly this works given the length of each of the verses. And so it's obvious that this is how the drawing is structured. It's designed to draw our attention to verse 4. And because of that, because it's a prayer for, an anticipation of, and indeed focuses on God's kingdom reign among the nations, it has been referred to as the Lord's Prayer of the Old Testament. Recall that in the Lord's Prayer, our Lord, among the other petitions, tells us to pray, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. And as well, the Lord's Prayer concludes by saying, for thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever and ever. And so in light of that, in light of the fact that the focus is on God's kingdom reign, the term kingdom is not used there, but it's obviously focusing on God's reign, we're going to look at what this psalm has to say and we're going to do so particularly in light of its relevance to the kingdom of God. We're going to see first what the psalmist has to say about what kingdom is in view here, maybe that seems obvious to you, but we're going to see that scripture makes certain distinctions that make this question a legitimate one. Then we're going to look at who the subjects and scope of this kingdom are, and then finally we'll look at the salutary benefits of this kingdom. First then, in order to understand verse 4, we need to understand an important distinction as I intimated a moment ago. Scripture teaches us to distinguish on the one hand between God's providential kingdom, what our standards refer to as his providential kingdom, and the mediatorial kingdom. God's providential kingdom refers to His unfettered, unchallenged, absolute reign over all of creation. For example, in Psalm 103.19 we're told, The Lord has established His throne in heaven, and His kingdom rules over all. So the providential kingdom refers to God's absolute reign over absolutely everything. It's unchallenged. There's no sense in which anything is out from under His sovereign dominion. But then scripture also speaks of God's kingdom in some sense needing to be established. Right? In fact, that's what we pray for in the Lord's Prayer, that God's kingdom would be established. And so it's obvious that we have to make some distinction here. Now, the first and that second kingdom, the second sense in which the term kingdom is used refers to that mediatorial kingdom. the kingdom that God was going to establish, in which everything was going to be put right. In other words, even when we speak of God's providential kingdom ruling over all, there's a sense in which everything is not normal, right? It's under God's sovereignty, but ethically, mankind has fallen from Him, there's rebellion, there's evil in the creation, there's thorns and thistles coming up from the ground. Not everything is as it was originally made from God, and not everything is as God has finally intended for everything to be forever. And so there's a sense in which God needs to rectify this, and that's what he's doing by means of this mediatorial kingdom. Now we see both of these kingdoms, by the way, in the prophet Daniel. Recall, for example, Nebuchadnezzar. Remember Nebuchadnezzar boasted about his accomplishments, for example, in Daniel 4. Listen to what King Nebuchadnezzar said. Is not this great Babylon that I have built for a royal dwelling by my mighty power and for the honor of my majesty?" Well, as a consequence of this being lifted up in pride, we're told that God cast down Nebuchadnezzar and drove him mad and sent him out to live in the fields for a period of seven years. After the seven years, we're told that Nebuchadnezzar finally acknowledged God and turned to Him, and these are the words that Nebuchadnezzar spoke. At the end of time, I, Nebuchadnezzar, lifted up my eyes to heaven, and my understanding returned to me. And I blessed the Most High and praised and honored Him who lives forever. For His dominion is an everlasting dominion, and His kingdom is from generation to generation. All the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing. He does according to his will in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth. No one can restrain his hand or say to him, what have you done?" So again, this is Nebuchadnezzar giving some reference to this providential kingdom of God that rules over all. He was driven mad and insane because he refused to acknowledge God's sovereignty and usurped and was lifted up in pride. And then only upon acknowledging this does God then restore his sanity and allow him once again to reclaim the throne. The Mediatorial Kingdom, on the other hand, is also mentioned by the prophet Daniel. And hopefully you'll remember this passage. It's very critical for understanding many New Testament verses. But Daniel, recall, in a series of visions, he sees, in one of these visions, he sees the Ancient of Days seated upon his throne, and then another one coming up to him. In fact, here are Daniel's words. coming with the clouds of heaven. He came to the Ancient of Days, and they brought Him near before Him. Then to Him was given dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away, and His kingdom the one which shall not be destroyed. Now obviously that son of man that Daniel saw is the Lord Jesus. In fact that was Jesus, maybe you haven't noticed it, that was Jesus' favorite way of referring to himself in the Gospels. Very interesting since that's not a very common way for Christians to go around speaking of the Lord Jesus. We call him Lord, we call him Christ, we name him many things, but son of man is not typically the way that we refer to him. But that is the way that Jesus referred to himself. And very intentionally, I think, he's drawing people's attention to this passage of Daniel. He's showing them that he is not simply a son of man, but that son of man. The one that Daniel said would come up to the Ancient of Days, riding the clouds of heaven. Now, Daniel, if you read the rest of the chapter, the context of this is very puzzled by all of this. And, well, he should have been, in light of Old Testament Language. What's very interesting about this figure is he comes riding, in the language of the Old Testament, the divine chariot. In other words, when God is spoken of as moving and acting or coming and going, often scripture speaks of him coming riding on the clouds. Riding on the clouds in judgment or riding... For example, remember he leads the children of Israel in the cloud by day. This is all a description, essentially, of the angelic host surrounding God as He is on the move, and it takes on this glorious cloud-type imagery. And so it's often used elsewhere in the prophets to speak of God acting. And so what's remarkable about this is here's this human-like figure who's riding the divine chariot. Who could this man be who is moving in the same way that God is often described as moving throughout the Old Testament? Well, in any case, we'll come back to some of that, but we have this distinction then in scripture presented to us, and so in terms of that, we can ask, which kingdom is the psalmist talking about? Well, it's obviously, I think, the mediatorial kingdom. The psalmist is looking forward to a day, he's casting his eyes on the future, when the nations will sing for joy, because God is now governing and leading the nations. All nations are looking to Him as their lawgiver and king, and to be guided by Him. Which obviously is not speaking of his providential kingdom because that's not a time that has to be looked forward to. God reigns right now. There's nothing that's not subdued to him in that sense. Well, when the psalmist says that God shall judge the peoples with equity and govern the nations upon earth then, what he has in view is not God, he's not here looking at God in the sense of condemning evil and wicked people. He's looking to God as the one who will establish justice and righteousness in the earth so that the people can be glad and have cause for rejoicing. For example, listen to what Isaiah 58 says about this coming time. It says, The Lord will guide you continually and satisfy your soul in drought and strengthen your bones. You will be like a well-watered garden and like a spring of water whose waters do not fail. The term, the operative term there is the Lord will guide you continually. The same word used in our psalm. And those are obviously comforting words. These are not words of judgment. In fact, the term used here for govern in Psalm 67, 4 is the very word that's used elsewhere to speak of God leading and guiding his people like a shepherd. For example, it's the one that's used in the well-known Psalm, Psalm 23, where David, speaking of the Lord as his shepherd, says, he leads me in the paths of righteousness for his namesake. As well, this is the term that God uses to speak of himself as the redeemer and shepherd of his people when he brought them out of Egypt. In Exodus 15, 13, Moses in that great song after God delivers them through the Red Sea says, you and your mercy have led forth the people whom you have redeemed. You have guided them in your strength to your holy habitation. Well, insofar as this psalm has the mediatorial kingdom in view then, when it speaks of God governing and leading the nations, it's talking about the King Messiah, the God-man, the Lord Jesus. In fact, and you can do this later, I won't make you look there now, even though it's just a chapter over in your Bible, Psalm 68. You'll notice that it speaks there of God riding the clouds, right in the proximity of this psalm. And since we've already seen that that person who rides the clouds is the Son of Man, then I think it's a no-brainer that this is talking about the Lord Jesus as the one who will lead and guide the nations. And this is, you know, not just something that we can infer from various scripture passages, but we can see it in the Psalms. We can see it elsewhere. For example, in Psalm 45, the following words were spoken by God the Father to the Son. Remember the author of Hebrews. And Hebrews 1 cites this psalm, Psalm 45, to say that these are the words that the father spoke of the son. Your throne, O God, is forever and ever. A scepter of righteousness is the scepter of your kingdom. You love righteousness and hate wickedness. Therefore, your God has anointed you with the oil of gladness more than your companions. So this kingdom and the king of it is obviously the mediatorial kingdom. Well, who then are the subjects of this kingdom? Now, this is remarkable, I think, for an Old Testament Jew to be looking upon these words. Because clearly, it's not simply the Jews, but the Gentiles who are in view here. Right? This is already implied, by the way, in the first verse, even though it's sort of tucked away in there and maybe isn't readily noticeable. So bear with me for a moment. But notice that Israel here, corporately, offers the following petition up to God. Listen carefully to these words, God be merciful to us and bless us and cause his face to shine upon us. Now those words should sound familiar to you. They should at least seem similar to something else, something maybe you hear every Lord's Day or at least often on a Lord's Day. Because essentially those are the words cast in the form of a prayer of the Aaronic Benediction. The Aaronic Benediction that often closes the service. In the Aaronic Benediction recorded in Numbers 6, we read, this is how God told Aaron and the Levites, the Aaronic priests, to bless the children of Israel. The Lord spoke to Moses saying, speak to Aaron and his son saying, this is the way you shall bless the children of Israel. Say to them, the Lord bless you and keep you, the Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you, the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace. So shall they put my name upon the children of Israel, and I will bless them. So the petition of Psalm 67 is essentially the Aaronic Benediction cast in the form of a prayer, but there are two noticeable differences if you compare the two. First, notice that the Aaronic Benediction uses the Lord's covenant name, the Lord bless you and keep you. This was that special covenant name that God gave to the children of Israel through Moses. Remember, we saw that this morning, that God revealed himself to Moses as Yahweh, I am that I am. This was the name that they were to take upon their lips in speaking of God, but it was not a name given to the nations, per se. Rather, the term God, which is used in Psalm 67, is that more generic term. For example, if you look back to the first chapter of Genesis throughout, the term that's used for God exclusively when speaking of Him as Creator of all things is the term God, the Hebrew word Elohim. And so you already have the psalmist now taking this essentially Jewish prayer, prayer for blessing, and using a more generic term that would then speak in some sense or suggest in some sense that what's in view is not simply Israel, but the Gentiles. But there's a second indication that this psalm is pointing forward towards the Gentiles, and that's that it changes, again, the Aaronic Benediction not to pray for God's face to shine upon us, but the literal Hebrew says, the prayer says, for God's face to shine with us. If you look, for example, in the English Standard Version, I think it includes there in a footnote that this is actually how the Hebrew is to be read. Both of these changes indicate that the psalmist is praying for Israel to be blessed not simply for her own sake, but so that she, with God's help, might be a blessing to the nations. This is proven by the next verse, in fact, when it says, God be gracious to us and bless us, that your way may be known on earth, your salvation among all nations. The psalmist is praying for God to bless Israel and to shine with her in order that His way, His salvation, might be known throughout all the earth in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the uttermost parts of the earth, you might say. Well, what is implicit, what I've been arguing is implicit in the first verse is also plainly stated throughout the psalm. The psalmist uses, for example, three different Hebrew terms to indicate that this kingdom embraces not only the Jews, but the Gentiles as well. And what's plainly stated is also clearly emphasized because one or another of these three terms that I won't bother mentioning, one or another of these three terms is used eight different times in this psalm. So this is clearly an emphasis on the part of the psalmist. What is more, the psalmist tells us not only that Jews and Gentiles are the proper subjects of this kingdom, and so the kingdom is wider than, I guess I talked too much this afternoon, my voice is going, but It's not only wider than many Jews in the first century were ready to accept, that is, you can recall the many disputes in the first century in the New Testament, where this whole issue of the inclusion of the Gentiles was quite a problematic matter, but the psalmist also modifies all of these expressions several times with the adjective all, which shows that this kingdom is larger than even many Christians have been ready to believe. Notice, for example, that he speaks not only of God being known on earth, in verse 2, and of God being praised by the peoples, verse 3, and of God governing the nations on earth, verse 4, but he speaks of all the nations, or all the ends of the earth fearing him, in verse 7. and all the peoples praising him, verses 3 and 5, and all nations partaking of his salvation, verse 2. This chord of the universal spread of the gospel, the progress of the gospel, its successful striding throughout the earth, is a chord that's struck throughout the Psalter. This is obviously something that the Psalms are concern to convey. For example, in Psalm 2, the father is quoted saying to the son, you are my son, this day have I begotten you, ask of me and I will give you the nations for your inheritance, the very ends of the earth for your possession. Not only does it speak of the progress of the gospel extending to the other most parts of the earth, but you can even hear the same language being used as we see in Psalm 67. As well, we read in Psalm 22, all the ends of the earth shall remember and return to the Lord, and all the families of the nation shall worship before you. And then again in Psalm 72 we read, They shall fear you as long as the sun and moon endure throughout all generations. In his days, speaking of the future Davidic king, the Messiah, in his days the righteous shall flourish and abundance of peace until the moon is no more. He shall have dominion from sea to sea and from the river to the ends of the earth. Those who dwell in the wilderness will bow before Him, and His enemies will lick the dust. The kings of Tarshish and of the Isles will bring presents. The kings of Sheba and Seba will offer gifts. Yes, all kings shall fall down before Him. All nations shall serve Him. For a final example, we read in the Psalms in Psalm 86, All nations whom you have made shall come and worship before you, O LORD, and shall glorify your name, for you are great and do wondrous things. You alone are God. By the way, I want you to notice a couple of things here. The psalmist is not talking about what will happen after the Lord Jesus comes again from heaven. What the psalmist is talking about is a consequence of the Son having already come and what will happen as His gospel continues to go forth to the nations. As God is with Israel and blesses her, that word goes forth. It's not talking about the Maybe this is not something we often talk about much around here, but it's not talking about what some Christians will talk about, the millennial kingdom that Jesus will establish after he comes again and reigns in Jerusalem. The psalmist doesn't have Israel in view here, he has the entire earth in his purview. He looks forward to the gospel being spread and going out to all nations, and all nations coming to the worship of God. Well, lest you miss it, notice that the psalmist, after speaking of all nations coming to the worship of God, returns to Israel, saying that she too will again receive mercy and blessing. In verse 6 it says, God, our own God, shall bless us. Again, I think the Hebrew there is clear in being future tense. So it begins with Israel being blessed, it moves to that blessing going out to the nations, and then it comes back to Israel once again and says that God, our own God, shall bless us. Well, following the nations being gathered in and coinciding with Israel being blessed again by God, we're told in verse 6, then the earth shall yield her increase. as a consequence of the gospel being embraced by all nations, we're told, the earth shall yield its increase. Well, what does this mean? Well, this is actually a... the phrase comes right out of the book of Leviticus, a passage where God told the people of Israel what would happen if they, as the Lord's redeemed people, would take His yoke upon them and observe His commandments, if they would follow His guidance. We're told in Leviticus 26, now listen for the phrase here. I'm going to read the surrounding context. If you walk in My statutes and keep My commandments and perform them, then I will give you rain in its season, the land shall yield its increase, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit. I will give peace in the land, and you shall lie down, and none will make you afraid. I will rid the land of evil beasts, and the sword will not go through your land. For I will look on you favorably and make you fruitful, multiply you, and confirm My covenant with you. I will walk among you and be your God. and you shall be my people. I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt and so forth. Now, the difference between this passage in Leviticus 26 and what the psalmist is talking about is that the Leviticus 26 passage is talking about what would happen to Israel in her land if she was faithful to God, if she had kept the terms of His covenant. But the psalmist is talking about what God is going to do in the entire earth, and what He's certainly going to do as a result of the Messiah's victory in His death and crucifixion and resurrection and ascension to the right hand of the Father. Well, essentially what we have in this psalm, if you remember the Apostle Paul's treatment in Romans 9-11 of what God has been doing in history, essentially what we have in this psalm is a poetic description of what Paul is talking about there. Remember in Romans 9-11 in talking about redemptive history, what does Paul do? Paul says, he begins by talking about all those blessings that God has poured out upon Israel, Then he talks about how that blessing has gone out to the Gentiles, and then he speaks once again of that blessing coming back to and sweeping up Israel once again. And what does Paul say will happen once the Gentiles have come in, and then the people of Israel return to the faith of their fathers? He says, then it'll be like life from the dead, or Paul's terms actually are, it'll mean riches for the world. Essentially, this is Paul's way of saying, once all of this happens, the earth shall yield her increase. This is Paul's way, I think, of driving at that. Now, all of this is why it somewhat amazes me we sing these songs. They're in our hymnals. But this message, I think, is lost much on the contemporary church. But we sing this great hope of the gospel success among the nations all the time. And many of the favorite hymns that people often sing, for example, Joy to the World. Everybody knows Joy to the World, right? Listen to this line from Joy to the World. And for example, another song, it came upon the midnight clear. It says, for lo, the days are hastening on, by prophet bards foretold, when with the ever circling years comes round the age of gold, when peace shall over all the earth its ancient splendors fling, and the whole world give back the song which now the angels sing. Now our songs are filled full of this optimism, this confidence in the success of the gospel. And why shouldn't they be? The very songs of the Old Testament, the Psalter, Psalms like Psalm 67, are full of this confidence in God's claiming the nations for Himself and them coming to the worship of God. How does all of this apply to us? I think there are some obvious applications of this to us. One is that we shouldn't grow faint or weary or despondent when we see people not flocking to the kingdom. We shouldn't learn to read God's Word in light of our experience. We should learn to read our experience in light of God's Word. I want you to consider a parallel. I have a friend who often will come to me every time he sees something bad in the headlines, ISIS or whoever it might be. He says, how does this affect your optimism that the gospel is going to triumph through the preaching of it and people are going to come to the faith and so forth? Doesn't this show you that everything is going to hell in a handbasket? And I think back to many of the Old Testament saints who would have been in similar situations. Think, for example, of Abraham. What was Abraham told? Abraham was told, Abraham, you're going to be a blessing to all the families and nations on the earth. And he's told he's going to be given a land. And Abraham says, what is any of that to me? I don't even have a son. How can I be a blessing to the nations? What good is this piece of land that you're talking about since I don't even have a son? And as the years roll on, and if you pay attention as you read through the story, the years roll on. Abraham becomes virtually past, we're told that he was as good as dead. Right? If Abraham was listening to the headlines, what he would have been hearing is, impossible for Abraham to have a son. He's past the age of childbearing. Sarah's too old to have a child, for sure. Sarah's womb has dried up. Sarah can't have a child. And then, what else do we hear? We hear that, well, apparently Abraham experiences some rejuvenation in his body, and he goes to his maidservant Hagar and has a child with her, but what does God tell him? No, Abraham, that's not the child that I was talking about. And Abraham's like, no, no, no, bless Ishmael, bless Ishmael, Lord. What Abraham's doing is he's saying, this was already impossible. Now I have a son and you're telling me that's not it? All the headlines for Abraham are reading very badly, is what I'm driving at. But what are we told that Abraham does? Because of God's Word, Abraham has hope against hope. What that means is Abraham hoped in the face of everything else pointing in the opposite direction. And as a result of that, one of the things we're told about that is because Abraham believed God in spite of everything pointing in the opposite direction. What are we told? that God imputed it to him for righteousness. That's what faith is. It's trusting God's promise, ultimately the promise of a coming seed who will deliver mankind. And as a result of that, God imputed righteousness to Abraham. He was justified by faith. But that's the kind of faith that justifies. It's the faith that trusts God in spite of all apparent opposition. Well, another thing, another application of this text is that if the nations are to embrace this gospel, then obviously it's going to be coming through our witness. Paul said, what does Paul say in Romans 10, that how can they believe unless they've heard? How can they hear unless somebody preaches to them? How can somebody preach unless they're sent and so forth? So the gospel has to be preached. And all of us are a part of that in one way or another. We're either involved in that as those who are preaching it, or even those who are inviting somebody to come hear the preaching, or we're speaking the words of scripture to somebody, or reading with them, or whatever the situation might be, or we're supporting gospel missionaries, we're supporting the church in its worship and work, we're praying for the church. All of these things are ways by which we do that, and a clear implication of the psalm is that we're doing those sorts of things. God uses means. We're Calvinists, we believe that God is sovereign, that he ordains the ends, but we believe that he achieves those ends through means. And so, for example, if God chooses for somebody to hear the gospel and believe it, then he's also chosen for somebody to preach it to them. That's how God has chosen to bring people to himself. So another application of the text is simply that we are involved in doing our part in the body to contribute to the gospel going forth. Well, a third way that I think this applies, I'll make this my concluding application. Actually, I'll put it this way. a commentary that I read on Psalm 67 that I really couldn't believe. I was trying to figure out where this author was coming from. I couldn't have been a believer, but this person actually likened what the psalmist was talking about here to John Lennon's song. You know the song. I wrote the lyrics down here somewhere. It's Imagine. I mean, you remember that song. Imagine, right? Imagine, here it is. Imagine there's no heaven. It's easy if you try. Yeah, that's what the psalmist is talking about, right? Imagine there's no heaven. It's easy if you try. No hell below us. Above us only sky. Imagine all the people living for today. Imagine there's no countries. It isn't hard to do. Nothing to kill or die for. And no religion too. This is what this commentator said that the psalmist is looking for. And here are the words of this commentator. John Lennon scandalized good folks when he wrote, imagine there's no countries and no religion too. Lennon is speaking out against the world where national interests and religious interests favor one group over the rest of the world. He was longing for a world where these things do not cause division and war. The world he wishes for is the very same world reflected in this prayer wish, a world where all are blessed. Christianity seems too often to be about who is right and who is wrong. This psalm is a wish for all of those issues to be put aside so that all can be blessed by God. It challenges us to live a different life and to focus on a world without the artificial things that divide us from each other. Artificial things like who the true God is, how he wishes to be worshipped, and so forth. Well, that's not what the psalmist is talking about. Instead, the psalmist is talking about all false distinctions being put aside, all false worship, all false practices and so forth. And everybody is listening to the voice of God. Everybody is following Him. Imagine that world. In fact, it strikes me as just incredible that anybody would suggest that the kind of world we need is the kind of world where everybody is just living for today. Isn't that what John Lennon said? That's the kind of world he was talking about? Everybody just living for today? Isn't that part of the problem? Everybody just living for today, living as if there is no God above. No God who sees what they're doing. No God who will call them to account for their sin. No God who is opposed to their wars, for example. Lenin's talking out against wars. Well, any war that's worth being disapproved of is of no concern to any unbeliever who doesn't believe in a God who will ultimately call anyone to account for those sorts of things. But instead, imagine that world. Imagine the world spoken of by the psalmist. A world in which Christ is reigning and everybody is worshipping him. A world in which from sea to sea everybody is singing the doxology. A world in which everyone looks to his word and relies upon his spirit and seeks to follow him with all of their heart, mind, soul, and strength. That's the world that the psalmist is talking about. And that's the world, as a final application actually, that we should be praying for, because that after all is what the psalmist is doing in Psalm 67. He's praying for that world, for the world to come to the feet of Jesus and worship Him, and worship Him alone. And with that, let's pray. O God, we thank you. and pray that you would grant your word entrance into our hearts and that you would firmly plant it there and cause us to bring forth much fruit as we seek to see your gospel spread across the earth and Jesus glorified by all men and all nations and all the families of the earth. And it's in his name that we pray. Amen.