What mental image comes to your mind when you think of God? I suspect most people have images of God, and those images are almost certainly incorrect or inadequate. We view God as “the big man upstairs.” Or God is a Santa Claus kind of figure, or a white man with gray/white hair and a flowing beard, or wearing a toga. Or maybe God looks like Morgan Freeman in the movie Evan Almighty, with his deep sonorous voice.
As the Psalm 98 continues describing salvation in the rest of verse one, the psalmist uses an interesting image: “[God’s] right hand and his holy arm have worked salvation for him.” Does God have arms and a hand?
We don’t know what God looks like, because God is a spirit. He is neither male nor female. I am using male pronouns for God because the Bible does so, but God has no gender, no body. No arms, no hands. So what could the psalmist mean?
The author is using anthropomorphism, a figure of speech in which a writer gives human characteristics to things that are not human. Anthropomorphism helps us make connections to subjects that are sometimes difficult to understand. Like God.
One way to teach what God is like is to teach his characteristics. God is love, God is merciful, God is gracious, etc. But the first characteristic we should teach about God is his incomprehensibility. God is incomprehensible. That means we cannot fully understand God. His ways are higher than our ways. There is a mysteriousness about God that we humans cannot fully comprehend.
That might sound frustrating, because we like to think of ourselves in relationship with God. And if God is mysterious, then how can we be in relationship with him?
I suggest to you that God’s mysteriousness is a good thing. I want God’s ways to be higher than mine. I want there to be some mystery, even a lot of mystery surrounding God.
As I mentioned in this post, Psalm 98 helps put our lives in proper perspective. God’s mystery is one way Psalm 98 helps put our lives in perspective. When we question how God, a Spirit, could have arms and hands, we are forced to dwell on the incomprehensibility, the mystery of God. And when we dwell on the mystery of God, that mystery reminds us that God is so amazing, and that brings us to a place of proper perspective, of humility and awe and reverence to God.
But know this, God has revealed himself. While we cannot know everything about God, there is plenty we can know about him. We can know enough about God to be in close, meaningful relationship with him. Though God doesn’t have arms and hands or any body that we can see or touch him, God has revealed himself, and one way he has revealed himself, Psalm 98 reminds us, is that he has made his salvation accessible to us.
God wants us to be saved. Saved from what? Saved for what? We talked about that a few weeks ago in the Armor of God sermon series, when we studied the Helmet of Salvation. So hold that thought, because for now the psalmist hasn’t yet described salvation. The psalmist will describe God’s salvation soon, and we’ll talk about that in the coming posts.
For now, the Psalmist has only used human characteristics (arms and hands) to help us understand how God, as spirit, miraculously works salvation in the world. His saving work in the world is kind of like arms and hands that are very strong. Think of a powerful arm wrestler. Or if you are into Marvel movie superheroes, think of Bucky, the Winter Soldier, who has a super-strong prosthetic arm.
The psalmist’s point is that God is the one who is responsible for salvation. Not Israel. Not the people. It is God who did it. God’s arm, God’s hand. That should put us and our abilities in proper perspective. We can do things, many things, for sure. But we cannot save ourselves. Salvation is the work of God alone. In these images, we see strength, capability and power. God’s power. Praise God!
But God doesn’t actually have arms, or a body. Interestingly, though, God will take on a body. That is what is powerfully portrayed in Christmas. God takes on flesh in the form of the baby Jesus, Yeshua, God who saves. That idea of God as a baby might be even more bizarre than God being a bit mysterious.
How does God the baby usher in God’s salvation? A baby is so helpless. So dependent. So frail. A baby does not have a strong arm and hands. There are other words in these first three verses that will help us understand how a baby, God in the flesh, ushers salvation into the world. We’ll learn those words in the next post.
Engaging Scripture 