Jump Start # 628

Psalms 104:14 “He causes the grass to grow for the cattle, and vegetation for the labor of man, so that he may bring forth food from the earth.”

This Psalm emphasizes the activity of God in a way that is often taken for granted and that we sometimes forget about. We spend a lot of time talking about what God does spiritually – forgiveness, prophecy, salvation through Jesus Christ, Heaven, hope and things like this. Great things. Powerful. Impressive. It’s easy to think that the entirety of God’s work is spiritual. It’s not. This chapter shows that. This is not the only place. Remember all the questions at the end of Job? They ask about the activity of God in the natural world. Remember Jesus telling the disciples that God sends the rain upon the just and the unjust? God is busy in the natural world.

Psalms 104 begins with, “Bless the Lord, O my soul! O Lord my God, You are very great!” What follows is like an inventory list of what God does, starting with the heavens. He makes the clouds (3), the wind (4), the earth (5), the oceans (6), the mountains (8), the springs or rivers (10), the grass (14), the trees (16), the moon (19), the night (20), and food for the animals (27).

The young lions, we are told, roar after their prey and seek their food from  God. Our verse says that God causes the grass to grow for the cattle.  God is active in taking care of His creation. God is busy in nature. The grass grows for the cattle. Things are connected and serve a function.

God is busy doing these things – every day. A couple of  thoughts come from all of this.

First, God does many things right around us and before us that we often do not recognize. This time of year folks in my area are cutting their yards once a week. God is causing the grass to grow. We fertilize the yards and we water the yards, but God causes the yards to grow. The fingers of God area all about us. Every life has been touched by God. No one can say that they have not benefitted from God.

Second, the cattle are not aware of God. They do not bow and thank the Lord  before they eat. They do not praise him for green grass. They eat. They give little thought to that. We are different than cattle. Cows can’t help it, they are cows. We can. We ought to thank the Lord. We ought to praise God. We need to realize what He has done. To live without this acknowledgment is to live like the beast of the field. The cow neither fears God nor obeys God. He is not aware of his coming death. The beast lives for today. He lives for self. Filling his belly and being content is about all there is to a beast. Are we living any different than that? Do we realize that we will all stand before God someday. Do we grasp that our lives are but a vapor? Do we realize that God is doing things all around us?

God cares for those that cannot know Him nor acknowledge Him. He also cares for those who can but won’t. Those that could but chose not to. That’s something about God. That’s something about us.

Green grass – that’s God’s gift.

Roger