By the word of Jehovah were the heavens made, and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth.
Psalm 33 rests everything on the word of the Lord, and verse 6 takes that word back to the beginning of everything. How were the heavens made, what is "all their host," and why does the psalm credit a word and a breath?
Why does a song about God's character turn to the making of the heavens? One writer ties the two together:
Now all this hangs on the word of the Lord. "For the word of the LORD is upright, and all his work is done in faithfulness." His own character must be made good in it. "He loves righteousness and justice." And it is the same word that made the heavens — the word of the Lord. By it the earth stood firm... He does not give up His purpose about the world which He has made. His creation, and His counsel about it, depend upon His word.
The verse names no labour and no materials — only a word and a breath.
Even the heavens — space itself — are a creation of God, made simply by His word. The billions of stars were made by the breath of His mouth. We may feel that it must have taken God ages of work to create so many heavenly bodies. But He speaks of it as nothing more than breathing out!
The word behind "host" is the same one used in the title "the Lord of hosts," and its range is wide:
I may add that the same word translated "hosts" — for example, Jehovah Tzebaoth, the Lord of hosts, Psalm 24:10 — also describes the hosts of the heavens in Psalm 33:6... It covers armies, angels, and created things such as sun, moon, and stars.
Here the term points to what fills the sky, and Scripture gives those lights a further sense:
This term stands for the sun, moon, and stars. One of the Psalms shows it: "By the word of the LORD the heavens were made, and by the breath of his mouth all their host" (Psalm 33:6). And it is just as plain from the Scriptures that the sun, moon, and stars are symbols of ruling authorities — the sun the supreme authority, the moon a derived one, and the stars authorities under them.
after
"Breath of His mouth" — a picture of power going out from God Himself. One writer shows the same figure at work in two very different ways:
"The breath of his mouth" expresses the inner energy of divine power. That power may be creative, as in Psalm 33:6, or judicial, as in 2 Samuel 22:16, Job 4:9, Psalm 18:15, Isaiah 11:4 and Isaiah 30:33. It is the power with which the Lord will destroy the lawless one.
One writer reads "the word of the LORD" here alongside the New Testament's teaching about the Son:
He is the Word, who was with God, and was God, through whom all things came forth... "By the word of the LORD the heavens were made, and by the breath of his mouth all their host. He gathers the waters of the sea as a heap... Let all the earth fear the LORD" (Psalm 33:6, 8)... And God has spoken to us fully and finally in the Son, "through whom also He created the world."
So where does knowledge of that beginning come from?
We know nothing about the origin of creation, and we can know nothing, except what God's revelation tells us... God spoke, and brought things into existence. At the command of the Almighty created things appeared; they did not evolve out of things that already existed. Matter is not eternal.
The same word that started everything also holds it up:
Everything that God does He does by His Word: to this fact all Scripture bears united testimony. He wills the thing to be; He commands, and it exists... "upholding the universe by the word of his power" (Hebrews 1:3). By His Word He created all things, and by His Word they subsist.
- Word — The heavens exist because God spoke; He needed no materials and no long process.
- Breath — The same "breath of His mouth" that filled space with stars is the power that will one day destroy the lawless one.
- Host — The word covers armies, angels and stars. Here it means the sun, moon and stars — which Scripture also uses as pictures of ruling authority.
- Counsel — Since His word made and still upholds creation, His purpose for this world cannot fail either.
- Trust — Faith here rests on revelation, not research. God said it, and the psalm's whole confidence stands on that word.
He gathereth the waters of the sea together as a heap; he layeth up the deeps in storehouses.
Psalm 33 praises God for what He made. Verse 7 turns to the sea: piled up like a heap, stored away in storerooms, and wholly under His hand.
The first line of the verse describes something anyone can still check.
The way God has designed the earth — our present home — is amazing too. Over 70% of the earth's surface is water, yet it does not overflow the land. God gathers the waters together, for all the seas connect with one another. It is as though God designed the earth in such a way that it formed storehouses to hold the waters (v. 7).
The word behind "the deeps" carries more weight than a calm surface suggests. One writer traces it back to the opening of Genesis.
Beneath the heavens stretches their earthly reflection, the great sea. Its waters, massed as a heap under the Lord's hand, reduce man to nothing before Him (Psalm 107:23-30). … The word for "depths" is the plural of the word in Genesis 1:2, tehom, which means the "raging deep." He lays these depths up beneath the quiet and smiling surface, in treasuries. He brings them out whenever He has use for them, and the effect is decisive. This is how the pagan sailors who carried Jonah, and Jonah himself, learned how foolish it is to try to escape the Lord's power.
Israel once walked between those waters. One writer shows where the power actually lay.
God used the "strong east wind" to split the Red Sea. The waters stood as "crystal walls" on either side and made a path for His people to cross. Yet God had invested His power and authority in the staff Moses stretched out. "He divided the sea and let them pass through it, and made the waters stand like a heap" (Psalm 78:13). "He rebuked the Red Sea, and it became dry" (Psalm 106:9).
One writer finds this same power in a Person asleep in the middle of wind and waves.
Then we see this wonderful Person rise from His sleep. With all the power of the infinite Creator He rebukes the winds and the waves, and at once there is calm. No mere man could do such a thing! This was the Person who had gathered the waters under heaven into one place (Genesis 1:9). He is the One who had made the sea stand up as a solid wall to give the Israelites passage.
The psalm does not stop at what God made. One writer follows the step from creation to God's own purpose.
From this view of creation we turn next to the Lord making good His name (the Unchangeable) in His dealings with His creatures. The counsels of the nations cannot stand against His counsel. … On the other hand, His counsel stands forever, and the thoughts of His heart last "from generation to generation." This contrast only brings more lasting comfort to those who anchor their weakness to the rock of His stability.
One writer turns these storehouses into a question for the reader.
Are we content with a shallow knowledge of the things of God? Or do we know, in the power of the Spirit of God, the blessedness of the deep things of God that have been revealed to us? These "deep things of God" are far more important and far more precious than everything else. They are the precious things connected with Christ in glory, for the depths of God are connected to a risen Christ. In Psalm 33:7, God speaks of the storehouses of the depth. This is surely a sign of the abundance available to us as we are found truly desiring these things.
- Gathered. The seas connect as one body, and the water stays off land it could cover. That is design, not accident.
- Stored. "The deeps" is the raging deep of Genesis 1:2, laid up under a calm surface in treasuries God opens when He chooses.
- Opened. Jonah met a storehouse opened against him. At the Red Sea, Israel walked through the same waters heaped up for them.
- Embodied. Commentators identify this Creator with the One who rose from sleep and rebuked the wind and waves.
- Anchored. The God who stores up oceans has counsel that stands forever. That is where weakness finds comfort, and why His depths are worth searching.
Let all the earth fear Jehovah; let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him.
The psalm has just traced the heavens and the seas back to one cause: the spoken word of God. Now it turns outward and calls every nation to fear Him — but why should the whole world tremble, and what sort of fear is meant?
The call does not stop at the borders of Israel. It runs as wide as creation itself.
By His word He brought the creation into being. All the earth, with all its inhabitants, are called to own Him as the mighty Creator.
The summons is not left hanging. The very next verse gives the reason.
These marvellous facts surely call for the deep consideration of all mankind (v. 8). They should make us fear the Lord with reverent awe and admiration. "For he spoke, and it came to be; he commanded, and it stood firm" (v. 9). All the visible creation came into being in a moment, just by the voice of the Lord. It was no process, but immediate creation. Scientists have recently put forward the theory of the "big bang" to explain how suddenly matter appeared. But they have no idea what it was that exploded to cause the big bang.
The Hebrew behind the second half of the verse carries a picture the English loses. It places the creature, whose life is brief, next to the One whose life is not.
"Let all the earth fear the LORD; let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of Him!" To stand in awe is literally to "sojourn" — to live as guests with Him, to whom alone belongs eternity... He who brought them into being clearly still holds them in His control.
Being told to fear God can sound like bad news. It is not.
This fear of the Lord is not the cringing dread that marks the superstitious. No. It is reverent trust joined with a hatred of evil. "The fear of the LORD is hatred of evil" (Prov. 8:13). "The fear of the LORD is clean, enduring forever." Where this fear is kept up, the presence of the Lord is real and a joy.
This fear does not push a person away from God.
But this does not put us at a distance, or make us want distance. It is simply the creature conscious of being a creature — and where else should it be so conscious? — and this is its safeguard. "The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom": for it keeps God in His place, and man in his; and this is the simple key to true understanding.
Writers link the creating word of verse 6 with the Word of John's Gospel — and note that the world's failure to fear is not for lack of evidence.
He is the Word, who was with God, and was God, through whom all things came forth... "By the word of the LORD the heavens were made, and by the breath of His mouth all their host. He gathers the waters of the sea as a heap... Let all the earth fear the LORD" (Ps. 33:6, 8). "This is hidden from men through their own wilfulness" (2 Peter 3:5).
Commentators also read the psalm forward, to a time when God acts and the call of verse 8 is finally answered.
Meanwhile the nations had been shaping proud plans, driven by the cunning and power of the ruler of this world. Their thoughts had been set high against the Lord and against His Christ. But the time had come for God to rise up in power, so that the inhabitants of the world would stand in awe of Him.
Yet the psalm is not on hold until then.
But this is only a suggestion about how the Psalm may apply to prophecy. Meanwhile, let those who love the Lord remember that it is all their own. The practical value of such songs to the believer does not depend on pinning down exactly which period they belong to.
- Cause. God spoke, and creation was there. It was "no process, but immediate creation" — facts that "call for the deep consideration of all mankind."
- Creature. To "stand in awe" is literally to "sojourn". We are short-term guests of the One "to whom alone belongs eternity", who still holds everything He made.
- Character. This fear is not the dread of the superstitious. It is "reverent trust joined with a hatred of evil". It keeps "God in His place, and man in his" — the key to true understanding.
- Compass. The call reaches past Israel to "all the earth, with all its inhabitants". They are called to own their Maker. The world ignores Him by its own wilfulness, not for lack of proof.
- Consummation. Commentators see a day when God rises in power and the world does stand in awe. Until then, the psalm already belongs to everyone who loves the Lord.
For *he* spoke, and it was [done]; *he* commanded, and it stood fast.
One short line tells how everything began: God spoke, and it was there. It also raises a bigger question — does the God who spoke still hold the world He made?
Writers take this line as Scripture's own answer to questions about origins. One writer says God had no existing material to work with:
We know nothing, and can know nothing, about the origin of creation except what divine revelation discloses. "By the word of the LORD the heavens were made, and by the breath of his mouth all their host." "He spoke, and it came to be." So wrote the psalmist (Ps. 33:6, 9). "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth" (Gen. 1:1). So wrote the lawgiver. God spoke, and brought things into existence. By the command of the Almighty created things appeared. They did not evolve out of things that already existed. Matter is not eternal.
Another writer notes what the verse rules out:
All the visible creation was brought into being in a moment, just by the voice of the Lord. It was no process, but immediate creation.
The word "for" ties this verse to the call in the verse before. Making the world cost God nothing but a word:
After this, then, comes the call, "Let all the earth fear the LORD; let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him." "Stand in awe" is literally "sojourn" — be as sojourners with Him, to whom alone eternity belongs. The argument is given in the next verse. These mighty and stable powers came into existence by His mere command. He who brought them into being clearly has them still under His control.
The psalm does not say who spoke. One writer names Him:
"The universe was created by the word of God," as Hebrews 11:3 has told us; or we may take the words of Psalm 33:9. How significant here is the opening of John's Gospel: "In the beginning was the Word." He existed before the first beginnings of creation. Moreover He "was with God, and… was God… All things were made through him." So it was the Word who uttered the words of power that created and made all things — the same Word who later "became flesh and dwelt among us."
The same One who once only commanded came into a place where He learned to obey:
Until then He had commanded; He spoke, and it was done. Now He learns obedience in suffering, as each of the four God-given accounts of His perfect life makes known to us. It was in this school that He learned the rare and precious art of sympathy and of speaking a word to the weary: weariness and weeping, hunger and poverty, contact with every form of human misery and grief. He learned it in this everyday school, not in the untroubled dignities of heaven.
The psalm moves from what God spoke into being to what God plans. One writer links the two:
The earth stood firm by the same word that made the heavens — the word of the LORD. "He spoke, and it came to be; he commanded, and it stood firm." Then verse 11 says, "The counsel of the LORD stands forever, the plans of his heart to all generations." He does not give up His purpose for the world He has made. His creation, and His counsel about it, depend on His word.
Because the first creation cost only a word, the last one will cost no more:
He acted to bring the old creation into existence, according to Genesis 1. He acts again to bring the new into existence. As before, so here, the word of His power is enough. Formerly "He spoke, and it came to be" (Ps. 33:9). Now again He speaks, and His words are, "It is done." Both are accomplished with equal ease.
- Spoke — Creation came by command, not from material God had to work with. Matter is not eternal. Nothing evolved out of what was already there.
- Instantly — The verse leaves no room for a process. It was immediate creation at the sound of His voice.
- Therefore fear — The whole earth has one reason to stand in awe. The One who made these vast powers by a word still holds them under His control.
- The Word Himself — The voice of Genesis 1 is the Word of John 1. He later became flesh and learned obedience through suffering, so He could speak to the weary.
- It stood firm — The word that steadied creation also secures His counsel, which stands forever. That same word will yet speak the new creation into being, with equal ease.