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Nicene Creed: Article 3, The Holy Spirit

Title slide with photo of Mayberry and Bluemont Churches

Jeff Garrison
Mayberry and Bluemont Churches
John 14:15-31
November 23, 2025

Sermon recorded at Bluemont Church on Thursday, November 20, 2025

At the beginning of worship: 

Just before the battle of Palo Alto in the Mexican-American War, Captain Jack Hayes supposedly prayed:

      O Lord, we are about to join battle with vastly superior numbers of the enemy, and Heavenly Father, we would mightily like you to be on our side and help us.  But if you can’t do it, for Christ’s sake, don’t go over to the Mexicans, just lie low and keep in the dark, and you will see one the of the dangest fights you’ve ever seen on this earth. Amen.[1]

We should remember we’re called to be on God’s side, not to win God over to our side! And God is by our side (maybe not in the way Captain Hayes desired), but God is there as an advocate and friend. And God can remain on both sides.[2] The Almighty is larger than earthly conflicts.

Before reading the Scripture:

Today I’ll finish my series on the Nicene Creed. When the Council of Nicene broke up in 325 AD, the third article of the creed simply said, “We believe in the Holy Spirit.” As I have indicated, the primary conflict 1700 years ago centered around Jesus and if he was God. Future councils felt that just as Jesus Christ is God, so is the Spirit. They expanded the third article to indicate that the Spirit is also God. 

God’s Spirit gives us life. We see this in the garden when Adam was created. The spirit gives us the breath of life. It also provides life to the church. In line with this, the third article of the Creed addresses the church as well as our hope in the future. 

I have made a point through the sermons to highlight how the Creed serves as the unifying document of all Christianity: Protestants and Roman Catholics as well as Orthodox and Coptic Christians. However, there is one slight difference between those of us in the West (Protestant and Roman Catholics) and those in the East. It has to do with one line where we say that the Spirit descends from the Father and the Son. Eastern Churches say he only descends from the Father. 

This change occurred in a Council in Toledo in the 6th Century. Unlike the Council of Nicaea and Constantinople in the 4thCentury, this Council didn’t include all Christendom, which is why it’s not accepted by the Eastern Churches.[3]

Today, we’re following the passage from which I preached on two weeks ago, which if you remember took place around the table on the last night Jesus was with his disciples before the crucifixion. Here, Jesus builds on what he has already covered. Two weeks ago, we learned of Christ’s co-eternal existence with the Father. Last week, we focused on God’s incarnation in Jesus Christ. In this week’s text, we see that Jesus sweetens the deal with the promise that he’ll also be with us, here, on earth 

This week, we’ll learn that the disciples (and this includes all of us) are to be incarnational witnesses to the world as we too are brought into this relationship. God, through the Spirit, comes from the Father at the request of the Son, and resides in believers. This incarnation—God being with us—allows us to be about the work of Christ.  

Finally, this passage that I’m about to read provides the underpinnings for the doctrine of the Trinity, with the teachings of the Spirit which proceeds from the Father and the Son.[4] Within this passage, we’ll also hear the first two of five teachings from Jesus on the coming on the Spirit as told by John in his gospel.[5]This is an important promise, as John emphasizes by quoting Jesus in numerous places speaking about it. Without God’s Spirit, we’d be lost! 

Read John 14:15-31

A true friend is one who sticks with us, regardless of our hair-brained ideas. Most of us, at best, have only a few such friends. But thankfully, when others fail us, Jesus promises us his presence. The promise expands Jesus implies this mystical union in which God is with us, by us, and in us. This presence we’re promised is the kind of friend who will never abandon us. It is also the kind of presence which offers us advice if we are willing to ask and listen, which will hopefully keep us from participating in hair-brained ideas.

“I will not leave you orphaned,” Jesus says. In the ancient world (and in many places today without government safety nets), to be orphaned is to be extremely vulnerable. Orphaned children in places like Southeast Asia often end up in horrific situations such as prostitution. To be orphaned is a scary proposition. This is why the Old Testament repeatedly demands the nation of Israel to care for the orphan, widow, and foreigner in their midst.[6] And when they don’t care for the orphan, they’re condemned.[7] To be orphan leaves you with no advocate. 

God insists his people watch out for those who are vulnerable. It is scary to be alone. Being an orphan isn’t just something experienced by children whose parents have died. Middle aged men who have lost their jobs as factories close and are too old to be retrained in a new field are like orphans. Those abandoned by their spouse or lover and left with young children are like orphans. The elderly, when their spouse dies and their children all live on the other side of the country or globe are like orphans.[8]

We identify with the pain of each situation. Thankfully, Jesus promises his presence. At the same time, we should befriend the orphans around us because we know what God has done for us!

Now let’s go to the beginning of our text today. Jesus starts out with a promise that if we keep his commandments, he will send us a companion. What commandment is he referring to, we might wonder? Is it the commandment to love? Or is it the Ten Commandments. Elsewhere in Scripture, the term translated as “to keep” or “to fulfill the commandments” is used for the Ten Commandments and the word here for commandment is plural, indicating there are more than one of them.[9]  

However, Jesus spent this evening encouraging the disciples to let themselves be loved by God. If you remember, before dinner, Jesus washed the disciples’ feet as a visual example of his devotion and love.[10] Because they are loved by God, they should love one another and to share that love with those who do not yet know the Father.[11] Jesus isn’t saying we must follow a bunch of rules. Instead, he invites us into a community of love.  

If we love Jesus, he promises the Father will send us an Advocate, a companion, a friend, someone to always be with us. The Greek word here, translated as the Advocate, literally means “the One Called Alongside.” Other translations use “the Helper,” the Counselor” or “the Comforter,” all which capture a part of the meaning. This one who comes alongside is like a true friend, who will be there in an emergency, who will help us and vouch for our character.[12]

In verse 17, Jesus identifies this companion as the “Spirit of Truth.” Earlier in this chapter, in verse 6, Jesus referred to himself as the “Truth.” This is an example of how this passage is referring to the interworking of the Trinity. The Father, the Son and the Spirit, works together in a unity beyond our comprehension. 

We see this line of thought continue in verse 18, which we’ve already looked at when I referred to us not being orphaned. Jesus promises to come back, but not in the way the disciples (and we) may desire. This isn’t a passage about the end times, but about the ongoing life of a Christ’s followers. Instead, Jesus continues in verse 19 to hint that the world may not see him, but those who love him and keep his commandments will. This will result in our knowing for sure that he and the Father exist in each other. In addition, and in an incarnational way, they also remain within the faithful. 

This is way too much for the good Judas… I wonder if he changed his name after the bad Judas betrayed Jesus? John distinguished the good Judas from Judas Iscariot. The latter had already left the table to arrange Jesus’ betrayal.[13] Understandably, this Judas doesn’t understand Jesus. Attempting to explain in detail, Jesus speaks of how we, through love, are brought into an intimate working relationship with God. God loves us and we receive such love by obeying Jesus and sharing his love.

We’re to be true to our Savior, to follow him. But let me go off a bit from our text and remind us that although we’re to obey Christ and to do Christ’s work in the world, we need to remember we’re not in charge of the world. If we forget this, we take on too much of a burden and will quickly burn ourselves out. Yes, we love the world, but we’re not here to save it. We’re here to follow Jesus and to show his love and be grateful. Saving the world is God’s business.

In The World is not Ours to Save, the author, who worked for nuclear disarmament, speaks about the time he heard God speak to him. He attended a major disarmament conference at a hotel in San Francisco. There was a lot going on and he stepped into a stairwell to escape, to think, and to catch his breath. There he heard God’s calming voice: “The world is not yours, not to save or to damn. Only serve the one whose it is.”[14] We, too, have such a calling.

Jesus closes our passage anxious about what will happen soon. He’s going to meet the “ruler of this world. And it’ll look like Jesus lost on Friday afternoon, but come resurrection Sunday, we learn of God’s true love for the world. Jesus’ words given on the night of his betrayal continue to provide us hope and encouragement. But more importantly, it’s through the promised Spirit, we experience God’s presence.  Amen. 

[1] This was from a speech by Marjorie Thompson as the Montreat Spirituality Conference, as retold by John Salmon of Portland, OR.  

[2] Abraham Lincoln made this point in his second inaugural address: “The prayers of both could not be answered. That of neither has been answered fully. The Almighty has His own purposes.”

[3] There is more behind this “filioque” clause. See Phillip Cary, The Nicene Creed: An Introduction (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2023), 185f. 

[4] Presbyterian Church (USA) Book of Confessions, “The Nicene Creed” 1.3

[5] See John 15:26, 16:7-11 and 16:12-15.

[6] Examples:  Exodus 22:22; Deuteronomy 10:18,  24:17-21, 27:19; Psalm 10:18, 82:3, 146:9; Isaiah 1:17, 1:23; Jeremiah 5:28, 7:6, 22:3; Ezekiel 22:7; Zechariah 7:10; Malachi 3:5

[7] See Isiaah 1:23, 102 and Jeremiah 7:6. 

[8]The expanded meaning of orphans came from a sermon by Less Griess, “Always With Us”  from Sermons On the Gospel Readings, Series II, Cycle A,  found at http://www.sermonsuite.com/freebk.php?i=788036753&key=shtqt1bmwEFq5zne in October 2014.

[9] Raymond E. Brown, The Gospel According to John XII-XXI (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1970), 638.

[10] John 13:1-11

[11] Frederick Dale Bruner,  The Gospel of John: A Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2012), 836

[12] Bruner, 834.

[13] John 13:30

[14] Tyler Wigg-Stevenson, The World is Not Ours to Save: Finding the Freedom to Do Good (Downers Grove, IL: Intervarsity Press, 2013), 18.

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God Incarnate: Nicene Creed Article 2, Part 2

Title slide with photos of Mayberry and Bluemont Churches

Jeff Garrison
Mayberry and Bluemont Churches
November 16, 2025
Philippians 2:1-11
Nicene Creed, Article 2, Part B

Recorded at Mayberry on Thursday, November 13, 2025

At the beginning of worship:
As a Christian community, our faith is grounded in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Without Christ, little that we do here makes sense. Jesus Christ serves as the glue which holds the church together. 

The membership requirements to be a part of the Presbyterian family, at least on the surface, are easily met. All you have to do is to realize your need of a Savior. In other words, admit your sinfulness. Then accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior. 

That sounds simple until we dig into what it means and discover our primary allegiance belongs to Jesus alone: not to ourselves, our families, our bosses, a particular political party, our country, or even our favorite sports team. All those allegiances may have value, but they all take a seat behind Jesus. After all, earthly allegiances are fallible. In the end, only Jesus Christ is infallible and eternal. 

Finally, to join the church, we agree to part of a new family. We’re to pray and support one another and the church as we commit yourself to follow Christ and to study God’s word as you strive to apply it to your life.  

As I said, on paper, being a member of the church sounds easy, and I hope some of you who have not yet united with us in our faith journey will do so. But when we commit to join the church, it’s like joining the military. We sign our lives away. It no longer belongs to us, but to Jesus Christ. 

Before reading the Scripture:

Today, as we continue our celebration of the 1700 anniversary of the Nicene Creed, we’re looking at the second part of the second article. Last week, we looked at the first half where we learned that Jesus is co-eternal with the Father. Once that’s established, the Creed shifts and for the first time deals with us. But even here, it’s not about what we’re to do, it’s still about what God is doing on our behalf. Here, the creed explains our salvation. Jesus comes to save a floundering world. 

Martin Luther regarded the Creed “as a summary of the gospel, the saving word of God that gives us Christ—and in him gives us salvation—to be received by faith alone.”[1] Of course, once we receive salvation by faith, we’re to respond out of love. 

Out text this morning comes from Paul’s letter to the Philippians. Much of this reading draws on a hymn which beautifully summarizes what we believe about our Savior, Jesus Christ. 

Read Philippians 2:1-11

This passage is poetic and beautiful. The chapter begins with Paul making a personal plea for those in Philippi to live out their lives in the way of Christ. This would please Paul, who personally invested in establishing the church there. In a way, Paul has a personal stake in their wellbeing. 

Paul calls on his readers to live with agape love, a love which looks out for the wellbeing of others. It’s a life of humility and as Paul suggests, our example is Christ. 

There have been debate among scholars over the deeper meaning of these words beginning in the sixth verse. It’s widely accepted by scholars, at least going back to the 19th Century, this is an ancient Christian hymn on the incarnation.[2] When we speak of Jesus’ incarnation, we refer to how God embodied himself in a human life. In Jesus Christ, God became a person, just like you and me. It’s a mystery, yet an essential tenet of the Christian faith. 

Now, it’s not important whether Paul wrote this hymn or someone else wrote it. Perhaps Paul just incorporated into his letter like I might allude to a hymn or a popular song in one of my sermons. What’s important is the unique relationship of God through Jesus Christ to us. This is what the second article of the Nicene Creed emphasizes.

However, unlike the Creed, Paul’s main emphasis isn’t theology, its ethics. The Creed shows what God has done for us, not what is expected of us. I think Paul would agree with the Creed. After all, our salvation isn’t about what we do, but what God has done for us. Knowing this, Paul wants us to consider how we live as Christ-followers. “Let the same mind be in you as was in Christ Jesus,” Paul writes. Or as the Message translates begins this passage, “Think of yourselves the way Christ Jesus thought of himself.” Paul presents Christ as the ultimate model for moral action.”[3]

Christ, who is equal to God in that mysterious union of the Trinity, did not exploit his position of power, but became a servant, a slave, to reach and lift us up. If we are Christ-like, we, too, will be so humble.

Pride is a dangerous thing, and we see from this ancient hymn, Jesus shuns pride for obedience. He takes on the human condition yet remains without sin. But he doesn’t brag about his accomplishments, instead he’s crucified for them. Because of his obedience, God lifts him up, restores him back to his divine and glorious state so that at the end of history, all will bow before him in worship and in doing so we will be bringing glory to the Father.

Although this passage shows one of the keys tenets of our theology—that God became a man and lived among us—it also illustrates the truth Jesus taught throughout his ministry: the last shall be first[4] and those who want to be great must first become a slave or a servant of all.[5]

We worship an awesome God who encourages us to strive to be “Christ-like” which means we must serve others… And as important as theology is to get right, it is more important that we live by what we believe. Do we believe what Paul emphasizes in this letter to the Philippians? But a more important question is this. Do we live like we believe it? 

The late preacher Fred Craddock, commenting on this passage, summarizes these verses this way: “The hymn stands in the church’s Scripture not only to define lordship and discipleship, but also, as a judgment upon the kind of triumphalism that abandons the path of service and obedience.”[6] Humility should be a result of our faith, for we know what God has done for us.

As we see in this passage from Paul, Jesus Christ chose to come in the flesh. He could have stayed in heaven and avoided a lot of heartache, but then he couldn’t have shown us the way back to the Father.[7] So we worship a sovereign God who freely came to us. God now calls us through a Son to accept his forgiveness of our sins and then, with the help of the Holy Spirit, encourages us to live a godly life which honors the triune God and furthers God’s kingdom in the world. That, in a nutshell, is the core of the Christian life. It’s all about God and what God has done and can do in our lives. 

This passage, as well as the Creed, lays out what God has done for us. We should celebrate this grace. The question now remains in our hand. Will we accept this grace and follow the path set forth by Jesus? Amen.  

[1] Phillip Cary, The Nicene Creed: An Introduction (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2023), 103-104.

[2] Gerald F. Hawthorne, Philippians: Word Biblical Commentary #43 (Waco: Word, 1983), 76.

[3] Hawthorne, 79

[4][4] Matthew 19:30, 20:16; Mark 9:35, 10:31; and Luke 13:30

[5] Matthew 20:26, 23:11; Mark 10:43;  Luke 1:48; and John 12:26

[6] Fred B. Craddock, Philippians: Interpretations: A Commentary for Teaching and Preaching (Atlanta: John Knox, 1985), 43.

[7] John 14:6.

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The Nicene Creed, Part 3

Title slide with photos of Bluemont and Mayberry Churches

Jeff Garrison
Mayberry & Bluemont Church
November 9, 2025
John 14:8-17

Sermon recorded on Thursday, November 6, 2025 at Bluemont Church

Before the beginning of worship:
At the end of the summer, billboards started appearing around our area. They read: “Jesus is not God: Jesus did not preexist in heaven.” One was on Highway 52, just outside of Fancy Gap. 

This set off a firestorm, and many people became upset. Some complained to the county supervisors to have the signs removed. But the free speech amendment in the Constitution tied the \supervisors’ hands. A few became angry and resorted to vandalism. Some of the signs they spray painted out the “NOT,” so that the sign read, “Jesus is God,” with a black space in the middle. 

While I disagree with the sign, I don’t think we should resort to vandalism of those with whom we disagree. Instead, we should consider this as a challenge. Sometimes, being challenged by ideas with which we disagree helps us sharpen our own faith and understanding. This can be a time for us to dig a bit deeper into our own theology, which is what I hope to do as we continue our exploration of the Nicene Creed this morning. 

Before reading the Scriptures:
Today, in our tour through the Nicene Creek, we’ll begin our exploration of what Jesus the Son means. As I stated two weeks ago, the crisis which led to the Nicene Creed came from a movement within the church known as Arianism. Those who followed this path, led by Bishop Arius of Alexander in Egypt, held that Jesus had been created by God the Father before the foundations of the earth. This clearly put a hierarchy within the godhead. 

Those who disagreed with Arius, pointed out that as a creature, Jesus wouldn’t be very different from us.  The Council of Nicaea was called to work out this dispute, which led to this great creed of the church which established two mysteries, the Trinity and the Incarnation of God in Jesus Christ. 

As I pointed out last week, you can divide the creed nto three articles based on the Trinity. The short first article focused on God the Father, a topic which didn’t require much space as there was no controversy around the topic at this point in history. But the second article, which focuses on God the Son is longer because of the conflict over the nature of Christ. The Council insists that Jesus and God are the same. The Arian position was condemned as a heresy. 

For my text today, I am going to the Gospel of John. We already heard the opening of the Gospel in our call to worship. There, in John’s prologue, we learn that the Word, another name for Jesus who is God’s revelation, has been with God all along, from the very beginning. In the 14th Chapter of John’s gospel, Jesus claims to be eternal with the Father. 

It’s the night of the Last Supper. Jesus and his disciples gather for the final time before his crucifixion. Almost a quarter of John’s gospel focuses on this one night. Jesus begins by telling the disciples he’s leaving and will prepare a place for him. Thomas gets the first question concerning where Jesus is going and how can they go there if they don’t know where he’s going. 

Next, Philip picks up the questioning in relation to the Father which we’ll see in our reading. 

Read John 14:8-17
Over a period of several weeks, a minister listened to a parishioner tell the same fish story many times. Each time, the fisherman told the story, the fish took on a different dimension. Somethings he made the fish out to be a whale. Other times, the fish sounds like just a lively bass. Finally, the reverend felt he needed to confront this fisherman about his habitual lying. That next Sunday, after worship, he called the man aside. He told him about hearing the same story told in a variety of ways to different listeners. He encouraged him to be truthful. 

“Well, you see,” the fisherman explained. “I must be realistic. I never tell someone more than I think they’ll believe.”[1]

You know, we can only understand and comprehend so much. In our passage this morning from John’s gospel, we must wonder if Jesus overloaded his disciples. He attempts to teach them about the unique relationship between him and God the Father along with our relationship to the Holy Spirit. This is enough to cause our heads to spin. This morning, I want us to concentrate on Jesus’ relationship to the Father. From this passage we learn our knowledge of God comes from our knowledge of Jesus Christ, which is why it’s important to study and know him. From Jesus’ life, we can understand God. 

Our passage begins with Philp begging to see God the Father. “Jesus, that’s all we need. Then we’ll be satisfied.” “Show me,” Philip demands. Sounds like Philip’s descendants may have ended up as residents of Missouri, the “Show Me” state.

You know, in the first chapter of John’s gospel, Philip easily answers God’s call.[2] Perhaps now, after having been with Jesus for three years, Philip begun to wonder just what he got himself into. He desires a grand demonstration, perhaps an encounter like Moses experienced at the burning but not burning bush. Such presentations are rare and would not be forthcoming. 

But let us think about Philip’s question. “Show us the Father, and we’ll believe.” We all would like a bit more evidence. I mean, wouldn’t it be great to see God and that be all it took. Then everyone would believe, right? But it doesn’t work like that. Earlier in this chapter, in his questions and answers with Thomas, Jesus said “I am the way, the truth, and the life, that no one comes to the Father except through me.”[3] Faith involves trust and mystery, which is what the Creed is about as it teaches us about Jesus’ incarnation and the mystery of the Trinity. 

It sounds strange but after living with the Master for three years, the disciples still don’t understand the unique relationship between Jesus, the man, and God the Father. And we should be honest. It’s hard to grasp the idea that God and a man are one in the same, which is the mystery of the incarnation which is at the heart of the Creed. 

I think Jesus emphasizes this relationship on his last night with the disciples to prepare them for what’s ahead. They’re not to be abandoned, but God’s through the Spirit will be with them, guiding them and helping them to do even greater things that what Jesus did during his earthly ministry.  Jesus stuck with them for three years, and through the Spirit, in that unique relationship known as the Trinity, he’ll still be with them and us.

As we saw last week, the idea of God the Almighty Creator wasn’t in debate at Nicaea. But they did debate the relationship of Jesus to God and to us.  The first half of the 2nd Article of the Creed deals with the relationship between God and Jesus. Next week, we’ll look at the second half of the second article, which deals with Jesus’ relationship with us and our salvation. But before we get there, the Creed establishes Jesus as God. This is my argument against that billboard which appeared on roads around western Virginia back in the late summer. 

We’re told in the Creed that the Lord Jesus Christ is the only Son of God. But the Creed doesn’t end there. The Creed continues by stating Jesus is eternally begotten. The two may seem similar but by insisting on “eternally begotten,” they imply Christ’s eternal nature with God. This was against the Arians who taught that Jesus was created by God, which would then mean that Jesus is a creature. And we’re not to worship creatures or Creation. We can appreciate creation, as it’s the work of God’s hands, but we only worship God, the Creator. 

Next, the Creed provides a list of parallel traits which may make us wonder. Jesus Christ is God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God… each of these emphasize further the eternal nature of Christ. 

Next, we return to the beginning, where we are again reminded that Jesus Christ is begotten not made. Again, this implies Jesus is not a part of God’s creation. This line continues with Christ being of one being with the Father.

This part of the creed used a Greek word, homoousious, which combines the Greek “Homo” meaning “the same” with the word “ousia,” which stems from the word for means “to be.” The Creed emphasizes Jesus as the very essence of God.[4]

It seems those who wrote the Creed went a little overboard in their linking Jesus Christ and God. But this, like the doctrine of the Trinity, is a mystery. While we may not always understand, we accept by faith that Jesus came to show us the way to the Father and by seeing him, the disciples and first witnesses saw the Father. For this reason, Jesus is to be worshipped and adored.  

One of the great hymns of the church, which we’ll sing in a minute, begins, “Crown Him with Many Crowns, the Lamb upon his throne.”[5] This hymn draws upon the vision John has in the fifth chapter of Revelation. There, John glimpses the eternal glory of Christ, a passage I preached on in the summer.[6] But it also reminds us that Christ does more than teach us about how to live. Christ is to be worshipped. And we can do that because we only worship God. And Christ, in some mysterious way we can’t fully grasp, is God. Amen. 

[1] Snappy Steeple Stories, compiled by Oren Arnold, page 43. 

[2] John 1:43.

[3] John 14:6

[4] See Phillip Cary, The Nicene Creed: An Introduction (Bellingham, WA: Lexman Press, 2023 ), 77

[5] Matthew Bridges wrote the hymn in 1851. The music, Diademata, is by George Job Elvery, written in 1868. 

[6] See https://fromarockyhillside.com/2025/08/03/the-slain-yet-victorious-lamb/

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Nicene Creed #2: God the Father

Jeff Garrison
Mayberry & Bluemont Churches
November 2, 2025
Genesis 1:1-5 and Job 38:1-7

At the beginning of worship: 
In her delightful book of essays titled, Things That Are, Amy Leach ponders God.

The people say the word repeatedly, and the more they repeat it, the less I can understand it: listening to words I do not understand is like swallowing stones. With each repetition of the word it is like I am given another stone to swallow… The word refers to someone no one has ever seen. Perhaps this is why people say it over and over, as if repetition of a word can make up for the absence of its referent.[1]

What can we know about God? This question takes us to the doctrine of revelation, which has little to do with the last book of the Bible. Theologically, revelation is how God chooses to be revealed. The ultimate revelation is Jesus Christ, God in the flesh. But you know, God didn’t have to come. God could have stayed hidden. But God loves this world and goes great distances to connect to a fallen humanity. God calls Abraham and Moses. God sends Judges, anointed prophets and kings, and works through ordinary and broken people until finally coming to us as a Son. Jesus Christ reveals God in a way we can know and understand.  

God directs what is revealed and not revealed. There are times God may be silent, especially when we attempt to usurp God’s position. Barbara Brown Taylor, an Episcopal priest and author, provides this explanation: 

Silence becomes God’s final defense against our idolatry. By limiting our speech, God gets some relief from our descriptive assaults. By hiding inside a veil of glory, God eludes our projects. God deflects our attempts at control by withdrawing into silence… When we run out of words, then and perhaps only then, can God be God.[2]

Barbara Brown Taylor and Amy Leach are on a similar page. When we expend a lot of words on God, we find ourselves out over our skis. With skiing, when you get ahead of yourself, just like when you think you know too much about God, you’ll liable to come tumbling down. We need to let God be God, have faith, and trust in God’s love for us. 

In this my second sermon on the Nicene Creed. We’ll explore the first article, on God the Father. 

Before reading the Scriptures: 
The Nicene Creed is divided into articles. There are at least two ways of doing this. One divides the creed up into 12 articles, where the first deals with God the Father, the second through the seventh deal with Jesus Christ the Son, and the remaining articles focus on the Holy Spirit and the work of the church.[3]  A simpler way divides the creed into three articles, which is what I plan to use as we look at the Creed. After all, I don’t have twelve weeks to devote to the Creed. This manner breaks the creed into the three persons of the Trinity: Father, Son, and Spirit.

The first article for both divisions of the creed deal with God the Father. It’s short, just 21 words in the English translation which appears in our Book of Confessions. “We believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all that is, seen and unseen.”

God is the creator. There are things about God we, as mortal creatures, are unable to know as we’ll see in our scripture this morning. I want us to look at two different texts, the first from the very beginning of the Bible, Genesis 1 and the second and main text from chapter 38 of Job. 

Let me say a bit about Job. He was a righteous man who suffers greatly after a behind-the-scenes contest between God and Satan. Early in the book, Job loses everything: his family, his flocks and herds. He’s reduced to a sick and improvised man. At this point some friends visit him. They come with the best of intentions but a severe lack of social awareness. They try to comfort Job while insists he did something bad for all his suffering. Much of the book consist of a dialogue between Job and his so-called friends. They do a lot of God-talk. At the end, God corrects them all when he speaks out of whirlwind. Let’s see what we might learn about God the creator and the God who dresses down Job from the whirlwind:

Read Genesis 1:1-5 and Job 38:1-7

The first article of the Nicene Creed introduces us to God the Creator. It draws on both passages of scripture. God is “Father Almighty,” a term well known in the ancient world. In the epic poem Aeneid, this term referred to Jupiter, the great God within the Roman pantheon of gods. But the pagan gods of Rome were not Almighty, nor were they the creator of all.[4] So, the Creed reminded those in the 4th Century that the God it speaks of is much more powerful than the gods they worshipped. 

Furthermore, this God has created everything. Older English versions say “all things visible and invisible,” which reminds us that God’s creation includes things we can’t see or understand. This doesn’t refer to things only seen through a microscope or telescope, but things in different realms. 

We’re not privy into the world of heavenly beings, or even demons, those beings who have fallen from grace.[5] All things remind us that everything has been created by God.[6]

This opening article of the Creed, while setting up our understanding of God in opposition to the ancient gods, doesn’t spend much time with God the Father. This is because there was no conflict. Jews and Christians, of all different stripes, believed in one God, the Father Almighty. The conflict came in the understanding of the Son and Spirit, which we’ll look at over the next few weeks. 

When the Almighty speaks to Job and his friends out of the whirlwind, it becomes immediately clear that neither Job (who is later vindicated by God), nor his so-called friends know what they’re talking about. This is why I like the essay I quoted a portion of earlier by Amy Leach. The more we talk about God, the less sense we make.  We will never fully comprehend God and when we encounter the Holy One, we should stand in silent awe. “Be still and know that I am God,” the Psalmist tells us.[7]

God response starts at creation, reminding Job he wasn’t present when God laid out the earth’s foundation. Although God tells Job to be ready to answer, Job finds himself speechless at God’s questions. And we would be, too.

One of the beautiful things about this opening speech is the joy of creation. In verse seven, we’re told the morning stars, and the all the heavenly beings sing joyfully. They accept their position in creation and remain quite content. Imagine the stars singing like birds sing on a spring morning. But we humans tend to focus too much on ourselves. Wanting to be like God, we find it easy to break the Commandments. We’re like Adam and Eve in the garden, delighting in the forbidden fruit. 

“God is Great, God is Good,” the prayer many of us said at the table as children goes. But a great God cannot be controlled. A God in which we can fully understand would be a limited God, which is not God. By definition, God is greater than anything we can manage. There must be a mystery which we accept by faith. The creed calls us to accept this mystery, as we worship God who has creates everything, and as we’ll see next week, loves the world enough to send his only begotten Son to save it. 

A former professor of mine, Donald McCullough, wrote a powerful book titled The Trivialization of God. McCullough points out how we, as a society, tend to cheapen God. We do this because we want to control God. One of my favorite quotes attributed to Mark Twain is that God created us in his image and we return the favor. When it comes to God, we think we know more than we do which leads us into idolatry. McCullough has this to say about backing away from the trivial gods which we surrounded ourselves:

The most important step that could be taken toward removing trivial gods from the altar of devotion and renewing faith in the one true God, the Holy One, would be for the church to rediscover the Bible, to open itself anew to its creative and redeeming Word.[8]

We need to be like Job, speechless before the Lord in a whirlwind. We acknowledge we don’t know everything about God, but we trust that God is good and will work out all things to his glory and our well-being.  Amen. 

[1] Amy Leach, Things that Are: Essays (Minneapolis, MN: Milkweed, 2013), 99-100. 

[2] Barbara Brown Taylor, When God is Silent 

[3] Kevin DeYong, The Nicene Creed (Wheaton, IL: Crossways, 2025), 25. 

[4] Phillip Cary, The Nicene Creed: An Introduction (Bellingham, WA: Lexham, 2023), 25. 

[5] Isaiah 14:12, Revelation 12:7-9.

[6] Cary, 29-30.

[7] Psalm 46:10

[8] Donald McCullough, The Trivialization of God 

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We Believe: Joshua 24

Title slide with photos of Mayberry and Bluemont Churches in the fall

Jeff Garrison
Mayberry & Bluemont Churches
October 26, 2025
Joshua 24:14-28

Sermon recorded at Bluemont Presbyterian Church on Friday, October 24, 2025

At the beginning of worship: 


Early in the fourth century, Constantine, the Roman emperor, legalized Christianity. Supposedly, going into battle significantly outmanned, he dreamed of a cross. He had crosses painted onto the shields of his soldiers and won the battle. In time, he embraced the faith and joined the church. 

I’m not sure it was like this for Constantine, but a lot of folks join the church and then discover it’s less than peaceful. A friend of mine wrote a novel about a man who lived his whole life alone in the wilds of the north woods. His parents moved to the wilderness and when they died, he stayed. It was all he knew. When a lost hunter comes to his cabin looking for help, he tells him about Jesus. The recluse wants to be a part of a church. He moves back to civilization, only to discover a church full of conflict and fighting between various factions.[1]

In Constantine’s time, two significant factions argued over the nature of Christ. One group believed Jesus was God and the other, the Arians, led by Bishop Arius of Alexander, taught that Jesus had been created by God before the creation of the earth. This debate over Jesus as a creature or as God hurt the mission of the church. Ironically, an Arian bishop brought Constantine into the faith. 

Not being a theologian himself, but a ruler, Constantine realized the problem. He called the bishops of the Church together in Nicaea, a town along the coast of what’s today Turkey. Essentially, he locked them in a room and told them to work it out. From the Council of Nicaea, held in 325 AD, comes the essence the Nicene Creed. That council was held 1700 years ago, this year. 

Between now and Advent, on the 1700th anniversary of Nicaea, I want us to spend some time with this creed. This is the most significant creed of the Church. Protestant, Catholics, Orthodox, and Coptic Christians accept the Creed. Even churches who claim to be non-creedal owe an allegiance to this document if they believe in the Trinity and the Incarnation of God in Jesus Christ. This creed becomes the foundation of Christianity as we know it. 

Before reading the scripture:


Today, I want to link my sermon to the beginning of the Creed. It starts, “I believe” or “We believe.”  You can make a case for both. There is no official translation of the Nicene Creed into English. The Eastern Church mostly uses “We” and the Western Church (Protestants and Roman Catholics) mostly uses “I.”[2] However, the Presbyterian Church in our Confessions uses “We.” 

The “I” seems appropriate when one joins the church. The “We” seems more appropriate when we, as the church, proclaim in unison our faith. When we say the Creed or any of the confessions, we draw on a historical profession of faith by those before us who, like us, followed Jesus. 

Also notice, this creed doesn’t tell us what to do. Instead, it informs us as to the nature of the one we worship.[3] The creed summons us to worship God. Worship is the priority of the church. While everything we do is important—from sharing the gospel to helping those in need—worship always remain at the forefront of the Christian faith. God acts so that we might experience salvation. God acts and then calls us to do likewise, which is why we worship God first, then are sent out to serve God through our lives. The foundation of our discipleship comes from knowing God. 

Our text today will be from the last chapter of Joshua. While I talk about the text, you can be looking for it, as it’s toward the front of your Bibles. Israel now controls the Promise Land. In this chapter, Joshua calls the Hebrew people together at Shechem, a historically important site for the Jacob story in Genesis.[4]

The summons to Shechem brings the story of Joshua to a close. Joshua begins by recalling all that God has done for the Hebrew people, going back to Abraham. Joshua wants the people to know they didn’t conquer the land on their own. God led them to victory.

Next, we get to our text for this morning, which begins in verse 14. This is essentially a renewal covenant. The people in the Promised Land are to once again proclaim their loyalty to God. After this passage, the chapter ends with the death of Joshua. 

Read Joshua 24:14-28


We believe. When we say these words, with Christians throughout the ages, we proclaim the God we worship. We believe in a triune God: Father, Son, and Spirit. As one author writing on the creed says, 

To confess the faith is to make what we believe into something shared, public, and recognizable, not just a fleeting thought in the heart. The baptismal confession makes us members of Christ’s army, and to this day there are places where this confession can get you killed. It is not just saying what is in our heart; it is joining a community and sharing its dangers and tasks as well as its blessings.[5]

In our morning text, the people of Israel are at a point in history that they must decide what they believe. It’s a dangerous decision, because they’re surrounded by people who believe differently. Furthermore, it appears some still hold on to other gods, even those gods beyond the Euphrates and the gods of Egypt. 

It’s hard to let go of what we believe as we see in Jacob’s story in Genesis. Jacob’s wife Rachel stole her father’s gods and brought them with her as they headed toward the land promised to Abraham.[6] In addition, the Hebrews were acquainted with the gods of Egypt. 

Furthermore, in the Wilderness, they built their own golden calf to worship. If these people are going to become the covenant people of God, they must put away that which they’ve trusted before and keep only God at the forefront of their lives. 

A covenant is an agreement between two parties. We make covenants all the time. Marriage is a covenant. In a way, a covenant is a contract where each party pledges to do something for the other. God made a promissory covenant with Abraham. He was promised descendants who would become a great nation and who would out-number the stars.[7]

Now, the rewards of Abraham’s covenant are being realized. His descendants have become many and are establishing a nation. Israel can now live out their covenant with God, so they essentially make a discipleship covenant.[8] God will be their God, and they will do God’s work in the world. 

As one commentator notes:

The call of Joshua to Israel is more than simply a narration of past history. It is a demand for discipleship, a call to hear and obey in faithfulness and loyalty the commands of God.[9]

Joshua expects the people to decide who they will serve. Will it be God of Abraham, Issac, and Jacob? Or will it be some other god? The decision is up to them, but Joshua has made up his mind. He and his family will serve God. He’s not taking a poll. He’s not waiting around to see which way the winds blow. Joshua doesn’t desire to be a part of the “cool crowd.” Such desires leave us open to being misled.[10] Instead, Joshua sticks with the truth, with the God who has delivered the people from bondage in Egypt.  

The people immediately agree to stick with Joshua. “Not so fast,” Joshua said. Joshua doesn’t just want an emotional commitment which might change next week. He wants the people to truly make the right decision. Joshua pushes back. “You can do it,” he challenges. “And if you enter into this covenant and don’t keep your end of the bargain, God will be vengeful.” But the people continue to insist they’ll follow God. They are told that if they make this covenant and they break it, they’ll be on the hook and must answer to God. But the people insist they’re in it for God.

Only at this point, after being assured of the people’s commitment, does Joshua make the covenant between God and his people. He writes it down, so they’ll know what God expects. And he sets a stone under a large oak, designating the place as holy, kind of like a shrine or altar.  

As I said earlier, the book of Joshua ends with his death. But we’re told in verse 31 that they people remained faithful to the covenant for at least two generations—not only during Joshua’s life, but also during the lives of the elders who outlived Joshua. 

To be in a covenant with God has benefits and requirements. Jesus establishes with us a new covenant, one of grace. But we enter this covenant promising to further his ministry and mission. Like Jesus, we’re to be concern for the poor, the sick, the needy, even those who gotten into trouble and find themselves in prison.[11] Like Jesus, we’re to show compassion and empathy and agape love, which is the type of love which works for the best for others. 

We’re living in an unsettled time. The government shutdown means many are going without a paycheck. Some will look to food banks for help. And soon, many of our neighbors who depend on benefits like SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) and WIC (Women, Infant, and Children) may find their budgets impacted.[12] As followers of Christ, of the God who we profess to believe in, we have our marching orders. We need to be generous and gracious and to do what we can to make the lives of others better.  

The Creed reminds us of what the God we proclaim has done for us. And as followers of this God, who strive to be godly, let’s do what we can to support food banks through our giving and volunteering to help the vulnerable among us.  

Let’s now stand and confess our faith with the Nicene Creed, a creed the church has said for 1700 years. 

[1] Robert Marshall,  On Rabbit Trails and Bear Hunts, (2007).

[2] Philip Cary, The Nicene Creed: An Introduction (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2023), 17.

[3] Cary, 12.

[4] See Genesis 33:18-34. There, after Jacob was reunited with his brother Esau, he built an altar to God. Then, tragically, Shechem raped his daughter Dinah, and his sons revenged her abuse. 

[5] Cary, 20. 

[6] See Genesis 31:34.

[7] See Genesis 12:1-2 and 15:5. 

[8] E. John Hamlin, International Theological Commentary: Joshua: Inheriting the Land (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1983), 189-190.

[9]  Trent C. Butler, Word Biblical Commentary: Joshua (Waco, TX: Word Books, 1983) 279.

[10] I’m indebted to Jennifer Erin Valent, a Christian Twitter for this insight. She posted on October 22, 2025: “When you never grow out of the desire to be a part of the “cool” crowd, you’re an easy mark for an unprincipled grifter.”

[11] Drawing upon Matthew 25:35-36 and 43-45. 

[12] It is still a question about how much and when the shutdown will impact such programs, but most agree that if it goes on too long, it will hurt. See https://www.npr.org/2025/10/24/nx-s1-5581354/federal-shutdown-snap-wic-food-aid-ebt-hunger and https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/10/14/wic-funding-uncertain-government-shutdown/86691522007/

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Psalm 111: A Call to Contemplate God

Title slide with photos of Mayberry and Bluemont Churches.

Jeff Garrison
Mayberry & Bluemont Churches
October 14, 2025
Psalm 111

Sermon recorded at Mayberry on Friday, October 10, 2025

At the beginning of worship: 

Throughout September, I jotted down sightings from my deck and as I walked the backroads around Laurel Fork. Then, as I was driving back and forth from Wilmington last week, I tried to organize them into a poem which I titled “September from My Back Deck.” I’ll read it to you:

Queen Anne rolls up her lace early
as the chicory and black-eyed susans fade,
replaced by golden rods and the limby yellow wingstem 
growing along the ditch banks with an occasional bunch of purple  ironweed.

The leaves on the walnuts and hickories remain green
but much paler than at midsummer
Occasionally I jump, as if being shot at, when a hickory nut
pings off the barn’s metal roof. 

Only a handful of birds now sing at dawn,
and the sound of insects at night are softer than a month ago.
The lightning bugs disappeared and the last of the yellow finches’ head south
but wooly bear caterpillars show up, some say, forecasting a bad winter.

The bears are less active than in the spring, 
and it’s easier to see groundhogs now the hay has been cut a final time.
The deer move in large herds, as the fawns lose their spots
and the bucks grow antlers.

After dark, which comes earlier as the month progresses,
I watch Cygnus the swan fly higher 
followed by his fellow aviator, Pegasus, the flying horse,
and if I stay up late, I’ll see the fall constellations rise.

The days remain warm, but some mornings feel chilly,
the rain colder and the morning fog denser than just a month ago.
I catch a whiff of smoke from a burning field or brush pile, 
soon to be replaced by woodsmoke.

I posted the poem in my blog this week and didn’t think about this at the time. But Jacqui, a regular reader, quickly responded, “That catches all of God’s blessings.”[1] This was a good insight. Today, as we finish up this tour through the Psalms, I want us to consider how we think about God. Do we spend time contemplating what God has done for us?  

You know, most of us know how to go to God in prayer when we are in need. Many of us also know how to pray and give thanks to God for the blessings we’ve enjoyed. We know how to pray for the needs of others. But probably fewer of us are as competent when it comes to praising God for just being God. But such praised is called for throughout scripture.  And I hope today you’ll consider all of God’s blessings and how they should draw you into praise. 

Before reading the scripture:

We’re concluding out time with the Psalms as we look at Psalm 111. As I’ve done through this series, I used Psalms suggested by the lectionary. If I had already preached on that Psalm, then I went to another lectionary.[2] Though such madness, I find that I’m preaching on Psalm 111 six weeks after preaching on Psalm 112. I now realize this wis unfortunate. The two passages are linked together, which I alluded to when I preached on the latter Psalm.[3]

Psalm 111 is in the wisdom tradition. Parts of the Psalm sounds like Proverbs. Also, like Psalm 112, the poetic structure of this Psalm is acrostic. Each line within the passage begins with the next letter of the Hebrew alphabet.  Finally, the Psalm focuses on God. But the Psalm doesn’t deal with God in the esoteric, such as the wonder of creation.[4] Instead, the Psalmist focuses on what God has done for his people. 

The voice of the Psalm is an individual, but his or her concern is of community interest as the Psalmist announces at the end of the first verse.[5] He will praise the Lord, but he’s going to do it in the company of God’s people. Praising God when we are alone doesn’t provide the glory the Almighty deserves. In our call to worship this morning, I adapted the opening to make the Psalm reflect such community participation.[6] Let’s listen to this Psalm.

Read Psalm 111

As I indicated earlier, back at the end of August I preached on Psalm 112. In that passage, the Psalmist encourages us to strive to live righteous lives with a promise of great blessing. Psalm 111 also focuses on righteousness, but here it’s about the righteousness of God. Maybe I should have reversed the two sermons, but it’s too late for that. In addition, it’s probably good for us to end this tour through some of the Psalms with one that encourages contemplation. This Psalm invites us to ponder the nature of God. 

One of the purposes of the Psalms is to model honest prayer. I hope you have come to an understanding how we might use the Psalms for our own prayers. Or at least, we can use them as a starting point to kick off our prayers. I often do this when writing pastoral prayers.  And because there are so many Psalms, which address all forms of emotions and needs, we shouldn’t be without words to help us convey our thoughts to God. 

Like Psalm 112, this is another Halleluiah psalms. Our version of scripture translates Halleluiah as “Praise the Lord.” As I said with the other Psalm, Halleluiah, is a transliteration of the Hebrew. And it’s an imperative. In other words, the Psalm begins with a command for us to praise God. 

The Psalmist then models such praise. She or he gives thanks to God with his or her whole heart, and with everyone else who believes in God. The Psalmist has spent time studying or pondering the works of the Lord. From his or her study, the works of God are found to be great, honorable, majestic, and righteous. The Lord endures forever. We find this key understanding throughout the Hebrew scriptures, which equate our lives with that of a flower, that blooms beautifully and then fade away. God, however, is eternal.[7]

The Psalmist then recalls God’s wonderful deeds. Providing food for those who fear God would immediately make the Hebrew people recall God nourishing those fleeing Egypt during the Exodus with manna. God being mindful of his covenant reminds the people of Sinai, where God gave the law and formally established a covenant which went back to Abraham. Giving God’s people the heritage of the nation links to Joshua’s conquest and the establishment of a nation. 

The praise continues, moving from deeds completed to God’s integrity: faithfulness, just, trustworthy, and righteous. Then, the Psalmists returns to God’s action, the redemption of his people. Here, those of us on this side of the resurrection, immediately think of the coming of Jesus, who redeems us of our sin. 

Finally, the Psalm ends by repeating a common saying found in wisdom literature, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.”[8] Of course, fear here doesn’t mean being afraid of God. After all, if the Lord is everything the Psalmist confesses—faithful, just, trustworthy, and willing to redeem—then there should be little to fear for those who seek to live righteous lives. Instead, fear here is more like “awe.” We stand in awe before God and all of God’s works. 

As I have indicated, this is a wisdom psalm, but one which is also linked to our redemption as we see in verse 9.  We should understand that wisdom is different that knowledge. As one commentator notes, “Knowledge is book learning.” Wisdom is more like street smarts. You don’t learn it from school. It comes from having been around the block a few times.[9] In the case of our relationship with God, wisdom comes from contemplating what God has done and standing in awe as we say, “Thank You.”  

Psalm 111 invites us to pause for a moment and consider God’s nature. God directs us in Psalm 46 to “be still and know that I am God! I am exalted among the nations. I am exalted in the earth.”[10]   

When we spend time thinking about God’s nature, we build ourselves a solid spiritual foundation from which we can continue to grow in Christ. So, take time as did the Psalmist to contemplate what God has done for you, for us, and for the world. And let such knowledge draw you into praise. Amen. 

[1] https://fromarockyhillside.com/2025/10/09/september-from-my-back-deck/

[2] The one exception was the sermon on September 28, which I adapted a former sermon as I spent much of that week on a mission trip.  Mostly I drew the Psalms from the Revised Common Lectionary. 

[3] https://fromarockyhillside.com/2025/08/31/psalm-112-the-blessing-of-the-righteous/

[4] Psalm 8 is an example of a creation psalm. 

[5] James L. Mays, Psalms: Interpretation, A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching (Louisville, KY: JKP, 1994), 335.  (other individual Psalms include 8,103, 104, 145, 146).

[6] I used the Message translation for the opening line which I adapted: “Hallelujah! We give thanks to God with everything we’ve got.”

[7] See Isaiah 40:7-8.

[8] See Job 28:28 and Proverbs 1:7 and 9:10. For similar ideas, see Proverbs 15:33, Isaiah 11:2 and 33:6. 

[9] Scott Hoezee,  https://cepreaching.org/commentary/2025-10-06/psalm-111-10/

[10] Psalm 46:10.

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Psalm 137: A Difficult Passage

Title slide with photos of the two churches where the sermon will be preached

Jeff Garrison
Mayberry & Bluemont Churches
October 5, 2025
Psalm 137

The sermon was recorded at Bluemont Church on Friday, October 3, 2025

At the beginning of worship:

All of us have probably harbored feelings of revenge. But it’s not healthy. The desire for revenge also makes reconciliation an impossibility. 

Philip Yancey wrote a valuable book, which I highly recommend, titled, What’s So Amazing About Grace? In it he writes: “The strongest argument for grace is the alternative, a permanent state of ungrace. The strongest argument for forgiveness is the alternative, a permanent state of unforgiveness.”[1] We wouldn’t want to live in such a state, would we? But many people do live their lives in such a fashion. 

Yancey went on to quote Lance Morrow who linked unforgiveness to Newtonian physics. “For every atrocity there must be an equal and opposite atrocity.”[2] And then there was Ghandi who said, “An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.”[3]

Today, we’ll look at a passage of scripture which seems void of grace. But before we go there, I want you to not forget that message of grace and love and forgiveness which runs through 95% of the Bible. And to understand the passage, we must place it in context, which I’ll try to do. 

Before reading the scripture:

Many of the Psalms are void of any direct historical connection. We understand the feelings of the Psalmist without a knowledge of what led to such emotions. Some Psalms are joyous, other sad. At times, the Psalmist feels threatened or angry. But we often don’t know what actions led to such feelings. Was it because of an abundant crop or military victory? Or did the feelings come from a war or pestilence in the lands or being double-crossed? 

The Psalms don’t generally provide a clue as to what led the Psalmist to have a particular feeling to bring forth to God. And this okay, for it means we can apply the same Psalm for many situations. 

Today, we’re looking at the 137th Psalm and this one is different. We are given a setting. This Psalm was written after Jerusalem fell to Babylon. Her people, now in exile, attempts to maintain their identity. This becomes a hard task, because the Babylonians taunt them.

An important step in interpretation of any scripture is to place ourselves in the position of those who first read or heard the passage. This step is especially needed to understand this Psalm, for it seems to go against teachings of much of the Bible. 

The people of Jerusalem exiled to Babylon after the city’s fall in 587 BC had lived through terrible times. Not only had their army been beaten and the city destroyed, but the defeat also involved a long siege in which the people locked behind the city walls experienced starvation. Hungry, they lived through the dread of what might happen when the Babylonians breach the walls. 

And when the unthinkable happened, things got worse. Babylonians and their allied armies raped, pillaged, looted, and killed the Hebrew people. Furthermore, the people felt abandoned by their God. Why were they not saved, they wondered, as the attacking armies tore down and burned Solomon’s temple. Those who survived the attack were hauled away to Babylon as captivities, where they lived with the shame of defeat and a feeling of abandonment. 

But the people for whom the Psalmist’s speaks in today’s text, the pain goes deeper. Think of how the Armenians felt after the Turkish genocide at the fall of the Ottoman Empire. Or how the people of Gaza feel today, after the ongoing assault on the whole society, not just those responsible for attacking Israel in October 2023. And we can see such feelings in Ukraine for how Russia and the Soviets treated them in the 1930s, when up to four million Ukrainians starved. 

We even see this in our own country, with a race of people having been slaves. And after “freedom,” found themselves continuing to live in a society stacked against them, as was the Jim Crow South.  If we want to understand this Psalm, we must place ourselves in such situations. The Psalm, which sounds harsh to our ears, desperately pleas to God for redress.

Read Psalm 137

One of the themes we’ve seen in the Psalms we’ve explored over the past few months is how honest the Psalmists can be toward God. Today, the honesty seems almost obscene. Would we talk with God like this? This is a painfully difficult passage to handle, which is partly why I have avoided preaching it until now. 

The late Old Testament scholar, Walter Brueggemann, wrote, “I am not sure how such a psalm fits with Christian faith.”[4] He’s honest. The Jewish scholar, Robert Alter, wrote “no moral justification can be offered for this notorious concluding line.”[5]There you have it. A Jewish and Christian scholar admitting to the difficulty of this psalm.

So how might we understand these harsh words. One way is to avoid the Psalm, but that is not being truthful to the entirety of scripture. We’re given the 66 books of the Old and New Testament. And if you study these books closely, you’ll find things with which to struggle and Psalm 137 will probably be near the top of your list. But because life can be difficult, we shouldn’t just skip over such passages. 

We can divide this psalm into three parts. The first part deals with Babylon. The second part recalls the people’s the memory of Jerusalem. And the final section addresses God.[6]  

The Psalm begins with an idyllic setting of Babylon, where people gather around the rivers (or maybe the canals running off the river), in the city.[7] We are not told why they gather at the river, but we know that without a synagogue, the Jewish people would often gather by water for worship. 

When the Apostle Paul found himself on the Sabbath in Philippi, with the absence of a synagogue, he headed to the river where he found Lydia and a group of women believers who gathered on the Sabbath.[8] Perhaps this is why the people  gather around the river. 

Although this is a desert city, the water provide growth to trees. Most versions refer to the trees as willows, but the word might be better translated as “poplar.”[9] What’s important is the shade provided on a hot summer day. We can add to this image the cooling breeze coming off the water. 

But the moaning and crying disturbs the idyllic setting. While they have instruments for music, no one wants to sing. Instead, they hang up their harps in the trees. Furthermore, the Babylonians demand they sing a “Song of Zion,” not out of worship or respect but for entertainment. This the people won’t do. They won’t sing the joyous songs of their past for the listening pleasure of their captors. 

The mention of Zion brings to their minds Jerusalem, God’s holy city. In verses 4-6, the Psalm focuses on the Jerusalem, as the people declare their loyalty to it. They are exiled in Babylon. They have seen their city destroyed and their friends and family slaughtered by the Babylonians. But now, in a strange and foreign land, they will remain loyal to their former home. 

Bringing up Jerusalem and the past causes the blood of the Psalmist to boil. Starting in verse 7, the Psalm now addresses God. They recall the taunting of their neighboring enemies from Edom, who supported the Babylonians as their city fell. Their neighbors shouted, “tear it down” and the people of Jerusalem want God to remember these cries and to punish them. 

Those reciting the Psalm save their most heinous hopes for the Babylonians, who devasted the city. Two blessings (or beatitudes) are sought for those who pay Babylonian back including the horrific closing line, those who dash the heads of the infants of the Babylonians against rocks. 


We only understand this last line if we can grasp that it’s cited by those whose grief is so great they’re out of their minds. This cry comes from those who have lost everything including hope. But note this, they cry out such pain, but don’t instigate such action. They leave any action up to God. They don’t rile up the crowds into a frenzy so they might take it upon themselves to carry out such an attack. Perhaps they recall the Old Testament law which restrains revenge by proclaiming “vengeance belongs to the Lord.”[10]

As Christians, who strive to follow the Prince of Peace, we must understand Psalm 137 as an extreme cry of pain. We shouldn’t take the Psalm as an endorsement of how to handle enemies. For that, we must go to the words of our Savior, who calls us to bless and love our enemies. But we should also understand that at times the pain can be so strong that we cry out uncontrollable. This Psalm reminds us of such times and shows it’s okay to bring such cries to God. Hopefully, when the grief subsides, we can then, as another Psalm calls us, sing a new song to the Lord.[11]

As followers of Jesus, this passage not only encourages us to be honest with God, but it also warns us of what happens when we refuse to see the image of God in others. When people, like the Psalmist find themselves in such a situation, they have nothing to lose. Such treatment leaves those we see as enemies with feelings which prevents the possibility of peace. Such situation benefits no one. May we be better. Amen.

[1] Philip Yancey, What’s So Amazing About Grace? (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1997), 114. 

[2] Ibid.

[3] I’m quoting for memory. The first time I heard this quote was in the movie, “Ghandi.”

[4] Walter Brueggemann, The Message of the Psalms (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1984), 75.

[5] Robert Alter, The Book of Psalms:  Translation with Commentary (New York: Norton, 2007), 475.

[6] James L. May, Psalms: Interpretation, A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching (Louisville, KY: JKP, 1994), 422-423.

[7] Alter, 473. 

[8] Acts 16:13.

[9] Most translations use “willow” as a translation. See ESV, KJV, ESV, and NRSV. A few use “trees” as in the CEB and NLB. The CSB and NIV translates it as “poplar.” 

[10] Deuteronomy 32:35. See also Leviticus 26:25, Romans 12:19, and Hebrews 10:30. 

[11] Psalm 96. 

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God’s knowledge of us

Title slide with fall photos of Mayberry and Bluemont Churches

Jeff Garrison
Mayberry & Bluemont Churches
Psalm 139
September 28, 2025

Sermon recorded at Mayberry on Friday, September 26, 2025

At the beginning of the service:

Anyone who has done much commercial traveling has a horror story. Mine came in Tallinn, Estonia. 

Having traveled overland from Singapore, I ran out of time for getting to Scotland and meeting up with Donna and Caroline. In Tallinn, I left the ground and flew to Edinburgh. Maybe I looked suspicious. Maybe it was because I only had a one-way ticket. Or maybe it was because my passport had most recently been stamped in Russia. The Estonians, who were forced into the Soviet Union, don’t look back fondly on those years as shown by their conversion of the old KGB headquarters into the “Museum of Russian Occupation.” 

As I was going through the security line, already without shoes and belt and everything dumped from my pockets into a bucket, a polite but stern woman motioned for me to stand in an x-ray machine, with my hands over my head. But that wasn’t enough. She then directed me to the side and motioned for me to raise my arms as she ran a metal detecting wand over me. Even that wasn’t enough! Then she and another man proceeded to thoroughly pat me down.

Then they went through everything in my carry-on, taking it all out and displaying it on a table as I stood silently watching. The whole time they remained polite but stern. The intimidation was enough to keep me from asking questions. Finally, they put everything back in my bag, smiled, thanked me and sent me on to my waiting plane.

I certainly understand the need for security, but that seemed over the top. I felt exposed. The idea of being so thoroughly explored by those who do not know me is disconcerting. We like our privacy; we like to keep our secrets, especially from strangers. But with God it’s not possible to keep secrets as we’ll see in today’s passage. And that can be comforting, for God wants what’s best for us.

Before reading the Scripture:  

We’re looking at Psalm 139 today. One Biblical scholar refers to this Psalm as a personal expression of radical monotheism. Monotheism means One God. From the Psalmist’s experience, he understands the knowledge, presence and power of God.[1]

The Psalm can be divided into four major parts. Verses 1-6 speak of how we are intimately known by our Creator. This captures God’s omniscience.[2] There is nothing we do that God doesn’t know! 

Verses 7-12 speak of how we cannot run away. God’s omnipresence is demonstrated in these verses. We’re like Jonah. We can’t escape from God. Day or night, up or down, or to the far ends of the earth, wherever we might try to hide from God, we’ll find God already there and waiting. 

Then, in verses 13-18 the Psalm shifts to God’s creative power as he links God’s knowledge with our creation. Having created everything, including us, God knows us better than ourselves. 

In verse 19, the Psalmist takes a completely new tack. In a way, he’d built up God’s ego, bragging about God’s knowledge, presence and power, and then lays out his concerns. He asks the Lord of Creation to handle his enemies. Because of his trust in God, the Psalmist feels comfortable in sharing his concerns which keeps him awake at night. These verses get left out of the lectionary selection for the Psalm because they don’t sound very Christian. But we’ll come back to that. 

Finally, in this last part of the Psalm, the Psalmist concludes his hymn encouraging God to search him and to purge from him any wickedness. He asks to be led into God’s future. Let’s now listen to the Psalm. You might want to pull out your Bible and see if you can identify the parts of this passage. 

Read Psalm 139

The Psalmist begins by reminding us of how thoroughly God knows us. God knows us better than we know ourselves. We’ve seen in other Psalms how God looks down on the earth.[3] Here the Psalmist understands God’s knowledge isn’t just from the distance like scientists studying distant stars looking for exoplanets. God knows us intimately. 

The Psalmist then insist God’s presence knows no boundaries. God doesn’t just look down on us from beyond the skies. God is with us. God’s presence includes Sheol, the place of the death. This place is where we totally ceased to exist. But thankfully, even there, God’s presence abides, which provides those of us on this side of the resurrection with hope in life everlasting. 

And finally, God created everything, which gives God insights into all that exist. Like a builder, God knows what’s behind every plastered and painted wall. I’ll come back to this in a bit. The first 18 verses of this Psalm praises God. It also reminds us that we’re not God. These traits only apply to the Almighty. 

Then our Psalm takes a shift. David, whom this Psalm is attributed, becomes personal. He calls on God to deal with his enemies. Perhaps this Psalm came from the time when David was hounded by Saul.[4] David tried to be loyal to the king God first placed over the Israelites, but Saul felt threatened by this young up and coming Israelite. Being falsely accused of something is hard. We might lash out, but maybe we should first take the accusation to God and ask the Almighty to vindicate us. 

This David does. Instead of seeking revenge and killing Saul, he takes his concerns to God. Like David, Jesus also didn’t strike back when he was falsely accused. He allowed God to vindicate him when he returned from the tomb. 

Verses 19 to 22 seem hard to reconcile with Jesus’ teachings of loving our enemies and praying for our persecutors. But if we are so close to God, as the Psalmist appears in these verses, we can trust God to hear our concerns, to remain with us in our troubles, and to vindicate us in the end.

We’re not in control; the Psalmist understands this.  Predestination wasn’t something Calvin or Augustine or even the Apostle Paul thought up. They all spoke of it, but the idea goes back into Hebraic thought. This Psalm has predestination written all over it! As verse 16 indicates, God maintains a calendar for each of us. God is in charge. God works things out for his purpose, which means that if we can dovetail our lives into God’s purposes, we’ll be a lot better off. Otherwise, we’ll be swimming upstream.

So instead of working against God’s purposes, the Psalmist shows total trust in God as he asks God to search him for any wickedness and to lead him in the way of life. 

Although he has shown from his experience the knowledge, presence and power of God, the Psalmist realizes as a creature, as a mere mortal, he can’t fully comprehend the nature of God. God’s thoughts are more numerous than grains of sand, yet because God is presence, the Psalmist is going to stick with God! It’s okay that he can’t fully understand the divine mystery; it’s enough that God understands him. And for the same reasons, God understands us. 

What might we learn from the 139th Psalm? Let me suggest two takeaways about God and two about us as human beings. As for God, we’re reminded of God’s awesome nature. God is almighty. God knows all. God’s presence can be found everywhere, even places beyond our ability to go. And God creates all. Furthermore, the second item, God’s concern with creation is such that God remains involved in the world and in our lives. 

Two things we learn about ourselves… First, we can be honest with God. We can appeal to God to care for us and even protect us from our enemies. And we can proclaim our innocence to God but also open ourselves us to be corrected. If so, we ask God to lead us into the way of life. 

As I close, let me go back to the 13th verse. The Psalmist uses the metaphor of knitting to explain how God knows us. God is like a knitter who has invested in every strand within a garment and knows the piece of fabric like no one else, even the person wearing the fabric. 


Likewise, God invests in us. God loves us. God has a purpose for us. And God wants us not only to live for him but to enjoy the relationship. We’re called to be in a relationship with the Creator who knows us and hasn’t abandoned us even when we turn away and attempt to live only for ourselves. God loves us as show through the coming of Jesus. When we live for God, God can do incredible things through us. Believe it. Amen. 

[1] James May, Psalms: Interpretation, A Biblical Commentary for Teaching and Preaching (Louisville; John Knox Press, 1994), 435.

[2] One commentator divides the opening three parts of this Psalm into three attributes of God: omniscience (all knowledge), omnipresence (all presence) and omnificence (all creation). See Athur Weiser, The Psalms: A Commentary (1959, Philadelphia: Westminster, 1962), 802-804. 

[3] We see this in Psalm 113 and 14, which I recently preached on. See https://fromarockyhillside.com/2025/09/21/8250/ and https://fromarockyhillside.com/2025/09/14/is-atheism-really-the-problem-what-does-psalm-14-say/

[4] This link to David comes from Stan Mast’s commentary on this passage. See https://cepresaching.org/commentary/2017-07-17/psalm -1391-12-23-24/

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Praising God

Title. slide with photo of Mayberry and Bluemont Churches

Jeff Garrison
Mayberry & Bluemont Churches
September 21, 2025
Psalm 113

At the beginning of worship:

I’m sure most of you remember the long running TV show, MASH, which lasted three times as long as the Korean War, which it portrayed. One of the more compelling characters in the show was Father Mulcahy, the Catholic priest who served as field hospital’s chaplain. 

In one episode, Father Mulcahy had the blues. Observing the hard work of the surgeons, nurses, and medics to save lives, he complained that all he could do was pray. But then a man on the operating room table took a turn for the worse. Nothing the surgeons did stopped the man’s decline. Mulcahy was brought over. He prayed. Suddenly, the man began to improve. 

“You’re sure you’re not useful,” Hawkeye asked. The shy and humble chaplain said, “It’s not supposed to work that way.”[1]

Of course, it is supposed to work that way. Only it often doesn’t. We pray and someone still dies. But we’re still called to pray and to hope and to do what we can to help. Maybe we should remember to include in our prayers the caveat from Jesus who prayed, “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”[2]

Before reading the Scripture:
As we jump around the Psalms, today we’ll look at Psalm 113. Like Psalm 112[3], which we explored a few weeks ago, Psalm 113 is a positive Psalm which makes two points. First, we’re called to praise God. The second point is the reason why we praise God, and it has to do with the nature of God to help those overlooked by society. Just like Psalm 112, which seems a little unrealistic in its promise of riches descending on the righteous, this Psalm also has an unrealistic theme. It promises blessings to the poor blessings and children to barren women. We’ll need to think about what this means because we know it doesn’t always work that way. 

The language and the poetry of this Psalm is beautiful. It begins and ends with a Hallelujah, often translated as “Praise the Lord!” Faithful Jews who gathered with family and friends at Passover would recite these words. Perhaps even Jesus used this Psalm during the last supper, celebrating Passover with the disciples.

In the Hebrew, the Psalm consist of three stanzas. Verses 1-3 calls us to praise God, verses 4-6 reminds of God’s majesty and why God should be praised. The final three verses illustrate God’s mercy.[4] Let’s look at the Psalm and see what we might learn about God and why all of us should praise God. 

Read Psalm 113


Our Psalm begins with an imperative. The opening “Hallelujah,” translated as “Praise the Lord” in our reading, isn’t a suggestion. It’s a command with two components.  First, we begin now to praise God, and we continue as long as we have breath. And God’s people are always to be praising the Lord. For those of us exploring this Psalm from this side of the Jesus’ resurrection, as we see in the book of Revelation, this task continues into eternity.[5]

Second, we learn God is to be praised continually, throughout our waking hours. From the rising of the sun to its setting, the Psalm commands. In a world without electrical lights, people slept when it was dark. During the daylight hours, people were awake and going about their work, but they were also to praise God. As the lamp in the temple burned continually, reminding the people that their prayers of praise should continually rise to God. Or as the Apostle Paul said, “Pray without ceasing.”[6]  

In other words, our lives are to be a witness, a prayer. This doesn’t mean we are to be on our knees all day. Nor should Hallelujahs come out of our mouths continually. We praise God by how we live and how we relate to others. 

After the command to praise, the Psalm provides the reasons behind such instruction. First, we’re given a theology of praise. We praise God because nothing is greater. God stands above everything. Nations, the earth, even the heavens. The cosmology of the Psalmist places God outside of everything that’s created. This includes the heavens and the earth. We think of God in heaven, but the Psalmist doesn’t pin God down even there. Instead, God the creator stands free from even the heavens. God stands above all, and no one can compare to God. Our minds cannot understand the grandeur and splendor of God. Yet, we are to praise.

The second set of reasons for praise has to do with God not abandoning creation. Our God is not the God envisioned by the Deists, like some of our nation’s founding fathers, who saw God as the watchmaker. God creates, winds up the watch, then stands back and observes the ticking, not intervening. But the Psalmist doesn’t see God in such a manner. The God of the Hebrew people, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, isn’t like this. God continues to be involved in creation. 

We’re given two examples. First, God remains concern for the least of us. The poor and the needy, those often overlooked by others, remain on God’s heart. We also saw this last week when we looked at Psalm 14. In that Psalm, God stands against those who think they control the world and don’t have to answer anyone as they abuse the poor. God provides a refuge for the poor and the righteous. Those who think they can get away with “eating the poor” will experience the terror of a righteous and just deity.

In today’s Psalm, we learn that God looks out for the poor. God raises up the poor from the dust, which should remind us of Genesis, where God created the first man out of the ground and gave him breath.[7] In other words, God gives new life to the poor. 

During the Passover celebration, this Psalm is paired with Psalm 114, which recalls God’s wonders during the Exodus. In this case, the people are reminded that they were once poor, whether slaves in Egypt or the dust of the ground.  

The second half of verse seven recalls the image of the needy being lifted from the ash heap. We can imagine the lepers and others forced to live outside the city walls literally on the dung heap, as the “ash heap” can also be translated.

God not only lifts the poor and needy but seats them on the podium with princes. The poor and the needy will become people of honor. 

The final example of God’s faithfulness is how God looks upon barren women. The translation is that God provides her a home, but the root meaning goes deeper. God seats such women in a happy home, just as God places the poor and needy on the throne with princes.[8] Finally, God makes such women the joyful mother of children.

For the Hebrew faithful reciting this Psalm in the temple or in their homes during Passover, they would be immediately drawn to consider Abraham’s wife Sarah, and Hannah, the mother of Samuel. Both women were without children until late in life. Other women who might be recalled were Rebekah and Rachel.[9]Barren woman in the ancient world were particularly vulnerable, which is why God looks out for them. 

Of course, there is a problem with this. We’ve all known those who are poor and needy, some who have been faithful and have cried out to God. Yet, not many of them ever sat on the podium with highfalutin folk. Even worse, we hear of malnourished children dying in the Gaza and in the Sudan and Congo. And we’re left to question why God didn’t answer their prayers.  And most preachers know of women who avoid church on Mother’s Day, for their prayers haven’t been answered in the manner they’d like. 

None of us should assume we know better than God, but why does God act sometimes and not in others. Had Hannah been the only barren women in Israel when Samuel was born? Probably not. Yet, there are times when God interrupts in history, which gives us hope and the second reason to praise God.

Today’s Psalm demands us to praise of God and gives us reasons to so. At the very least, we should praise God when the sun rises or when we awake. And again, when it sets or as we fall asleep. While it is okay to ask God for what we need, we should never forget to give God thanks with praise. Will we listen?” Amen.

[1] I was reminded of this episode in Scott Hoezee’s commentary on the text. See https://cepreaching.org/commentary/2025-09-15/psalm-113-4/

[2] Matthew 6:10.

[3] See https://fromarockyhillside.com/2025/08/31/psalm-112-the-blessing-of-the-righteous/

[4] Stan Mast, commentary on Psalm 113. See https://cepreaching.org/commentary/2016-09-12/psalm-113/

[5] See Revelation 4, 7:15.

[6] 1 Thessalonians 5:17. 

[7] Genesis 2:7.

[8] Robert Alter, The Book of Psalms: A Translation and Commentary (New York, Norton, 2007), 404, 9.

[9] See Genesis 11:30, 25:21,29:31, and 1 Samuel 1. See Walter Brueggemann, The Message of the Psalms: A Theological Commentary (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1984),162.  See also Athur Weiser, The Psalms: A Commentary (1958, Philadelphia: Westminster, 1962), 707-708,

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Is Atheism really the problem? What does Psalm 14 say?

Title slide with photos of Bluemont and Mayberry Churches

Jeff Garrison
Mayberry and Bluemont Churches
September 14, 2025
Psalm 14

Sermon recorded at Mayberry on Friday, September 12, 2025…

At the beginning of worship: 

There are many times I wonder what to say on a Sunday and this morning is one of them. We gather with the assassination of Charlie Kirk fresh in our minds as well as another school shooting in Colorado. Such events are too common. Just in the past few months we’ve witnessed the assassination of a Democratic legislator and the attempted assassinated of another in Minnesota. And there was the burning of the Governor of Pennsylvania’s home while he and his family slept. And a host of school shootings occurred. Outrage on social media seems to be at an all-time high.  

At times like this, as Christ’s followers, we should concern ourselves with how we reflect the love and the grace of Jesus Christ. How can we not enflame the rhetoric and be the peacemakers we’re called to be? How can we love, even our enemies, as we’re called? 

Psalm 1, which I’ll refer to later in my sermon this morning, speaks of the two paths before us.[1] Do we follow the path of the sinners and scoffers, or the path of the righteous who delight in the law and ways of the Lord? As we’ll see today, carrying and not abusing others for our personal benefit is imperative if we want to be with the godly. 

Before reading the scripture: 

Two weeks ago, in our journey around the Psalms, we looked at Psalm 112. I mentioned my dislike of the Psalm, as it proclaims blessings for righteousness. At times, that seems far-fetched.[2]At least, in the present world. Today, we’ll look at the opposite. 

Psalm 14 curses those who live as if God has no control over their lives. Both Psalms are tricky to peach.

A couple of things about this Psalm. Most Psalms address God. Instead of speaking to God, this Psalm is a prophetic statement by the Psalmist, directed at those whose actions go against God’s Word. While God is mentioned, the Psalm addresses the fools who think God won’t be concerned over their actions. 

Next, this Psalm is repeated almost word-for-word in Psalm 53. However, scholars generally preferred the 14th Psalm as the original seems better preserved here. As much as I would like to ignore this Psalm, when it’s repeated, I should realize God values these words and not disregard them. Repetition biblically emphasizes importance. 

This Psalm can be divided into three parts. It starts with a lament against the wicked who don’t believe in God. But it’s not really about atheism, as I’ll explain. Next, the Psalm serves as a warning against the wicked, followed by a hopeful wish of God intervening and bringing relief to those who suffer at their hands. [3]

Read Psalm 14

I’m going out on a limb and at the risk of oversimplification, suggest there are two kinds of atheists. The philosophical atheist doesn’t believe in God. This doesn’t necessarily make him or her a bad person. You don’t have to believe in God to be a decent human being. And all of us should strive to be decent human beings. 

The second type of atheist may say they believe in God. In fact, they may insist they’re not an atheist. However, their lives don’t act like they believe in God. They live as if they control their own destiny. Such atheists may even be a member of a church. They may proudly proclaim a profession of faith, which makes the second type of atheism more dangerous. And, I suggest, this is the type of atheism referred to in the Psalm. 

Philosophical atheism wasn’t really known in the biblical world. Of course, the Greeks discussed it. Socrates was even condemned to death for atheism. But Socrates denied the charge. He had challenged the leadership of Athens, and the trumped-up charge of atheism allowed the city’s leaders a way to silence him. Plato, from whom we learn much of what we know about Socrates, considered atheism foolish. But that all occurred in Greece, far from Israel.

In the Biblical world, instead of worrying about atheists, Israel’s larger concern were people who went after the gods of their neighbors, especially Baal. A second concern would have been people who lived as if they were God. Such a temptation reaches back to Eden and the Serpent’s promise that eating of the forbidden fruit would make our first parents like God.[4]

So, this opening line isn’t really about atheism as we know it. After all, modern philosophical atheism became popular in the 19thCentury with philosophers like Nietzsche and Marx and brought back into popularity more recently by the likes of Richard Dawkins. But this is not what the Psalmist refers to when he says, “fools say in their hearts there is no God.”  

Notice this Psalm isn’t directed toward those who proclaim out loud that God doesn’t exist. Instead, the Psalm makes such a claim against those who say such things in their hearts. In other words, those who at their very being live as if God doesn’t exist. All of us probably find ourselves tempted in such a manner at some point. And the temptation to want to be our own god is as old as humanity, reaching back to Adam and Eve. 

Let’s face it, those who act as if they are God or above God, or as if for some reason God gives them the right to do what they would like, are all around us. It’s to such people this Psalm speaks. For the Psalmist, these may have been the religious and political elite in Jerusalem, as John Calvin seems to have understood the passage. In his handling of this Psalm, he directs his message toward the clergy during the Reformation who failed to care for their flocks.[5]

Furthermore, this Psalm concerns itself with moral issues more than with theological ones. It’s not that the one doesn’t believe in God, but that one doesn’t act like they don’t have to answer to anyone.[6] The villain in this Psalm doesn’t believe in divine retribution, or that he or she will sooner or later have to atone for his or her sin.[7]

Psalm 14 has a countertheme, this is still God’s world.[8]  And the Psalmist has a message for such villains who think the world belongs to them. God’s watching. The wise aren’t those who act as if they’re almighty, but those who seek after God. The villain, who doesn’t concern him or herself with God, have gone astray or adrift from the truth. In verse four, we learn such individuals think they can use other people for their own enrichment. “They eat up God’s people as if they’re bread,” the Psalmist says. 

This Psalm is attributed to David, who, if you remember, had a righteous streak within him. Do you remember Nathan telling David about a rich man who, instead of taking from his own flock a lamb to feed a traveler, stole the only lamb a poor man owned. David was incensed. He wanted the rich man’s head for his crime, only to hear Nathan’s condemning words, “You are the man.” David had stolen Uriah’s wife and had set up Uriah’s death.[9]

In a way, with this Psalm, David proclaims such a prophecy as he heard from Nathan. But he’s also convicted by it. And in that manner, he’s no different than most humans. We have our good moments and our less than good moments. Our bad moments include trying to use other people for our own benefits without concern for their wellbeing. This Psalm speaks to such situations. That’s abusing and disregarding the needs of others for personal profit, especially the poor who have no means to protect themselves. 

In verses 5 and 6, the Psalm speaks of the terror those who abuse others face. God stands with the poor, with those who are abused by others. God remains a refuge for the righteous. The villains will find themselves, in their quest for ill-gotten gain, in a battle against God. 

Our Psalm ends with a wish and hope.[10] The promised reward, as we learned from Psalm 112 two weeks ago, may be off in the future. The ending of Psalm 14 reminds us that the accounts have not all been settled. Those “fools” who live and act as if God doesn’t exist may seem as if they’re winning in the short run, but judgment awaits. 

What the Psalm encourages the reader to do is to live in a manner which honors all people, especially those who are unable to care for themselves. Then, we won’t have to worry about God seeing what we’re up to and our conscience can be clean. Furthermore, the Psalm wants the readers to know that just because someone seems to live high on the hog while mistreating others, they’ll sooner or later experience the terror of a righteous God.  

Like Psalm 1, this is a wisdom psalm. There are two ways to live, we learn from the first Psalm. We have the path of the sinners, the wicked, and the path of those who delight in God. And as Psalm 14 reminds us, this includes carrying for others. The choice is ours. Amen. 

[1] For a sermon I preached on Psalm 1, see https://fromarockyhillside.com/2023/01/08/psalm-1-two-roads/

[2] See https://fromarockyhillside.com/2025/08/31/psalm-112-the-blessing-of-the-righteous/

[3] Artur Weiser, The Psalms: A Commentary (1959, Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1962), 164. 

[4] Genesis 3:5.

[5] See Stan Mast’s commentary on this passage: https://cepreaching.org/commentary/2018-07-23/psalm-14/

[6] James L. Mays, Psalm: Interpretation, A Biblical Commentary for Teaching and Preaching (Louisville, KY: John Knox Press, 1994), 81.

[7] Robert Alter, The Book of Psalms: A Translation with Commentary (New York: Norton, 2007), 40. 

[8] Walter Brueggermann, The Message of the Psalms: A Theological Commentary (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1984), 44. 

[9] 2 Samuel 12:1-15. 

[10] Brueggemann, 45.