The Noise of Global Conquest Text: Psalm 47:1-4
Introduction: A Joyful Noise Complaint
We live in an age that has filed a noise complaint against the Church of God. Our secular overlords, and many of their court evangelicals, would prefer it if our faith were kept private, quiet, and respectable. It can be a personal hobby, a therapeutic comfort, but it must never be loud. It must never make claims on the public square. It must never, in short, act like it is true for everyone.
Into this timid and muted religious atmosphere, Psalm 47 lands like a crate of dynamite. This is not a psalm for the quiet time corner. This is a coronation anthem for a global King, and it is meant to be sung at the top of the lungs, with hands clapping like thunder, by every nation on the planet. This is a psalm that announces the central political reality of the cosmos: Yahweh, the God of Israel, revealed in Jesus Christ, is the great King over all the earth. Not just over Israel, not just over the church, not just over the "spiritual" parts of your life, but over everything. Every parliament, every army, every school, every court, every molecule.
This psalm is a declaration of war against every petty tyrant who sets himself up against the Lord and His Christ. It is a summons to worship, and we must understand that for the Christian, worship is warfare. It is the primary means by which the Kingdom of God advances. When we gather to sing praises to God, we are not retreating from the world; we are assaulting the gates of hell with the praises of the rightful King. This psalm, therefore, is not a suggestion. It is a battle plan.
What we have in these first four verses is a summons to global worship, the reason for that worship, the result of that worship, and the foundation of that worship. And if we understand it rightly, it will cure us of our evangelical squeamishness and replace it with a robust and joyful confidence in the victory of our Lord Jesus Christ.
The Text
O clap your hands, all peoples;
Make a loud shout to God with the sound of a shout of joy.
For Yahweh Most High is fearsome,
A great King over all the earth.
He subdues peoples under us
And nations under our feet.
He chooses our inheritance for us,
The pride of Jacob whom He loves. Selah.
(Psalm 47:1-4 LSB)
The Universal Summons to Victorious Worship (v. 1)
The psalm opens with a command that is both universal and disruptive.
"O clap your hands, all peoples; Make a loud shout to God with the sound of a shout of joy." (Psalm 47:1)
The first thing to notice is who is being addressed. It is "all peoples." In the Hebrew, it is kol-ha'ammim, all the nations, every tribe. This is not a private memo for the members of the Jerusalem church. This is an open summons to the entire human race. From the very beginning, God's plan was global. The Great Commission did not start in Matthew 28; it is woven into the fabric of the Old Testament. God's intention was always to bring the nations into His family, under the rule of His Son.
And what are they commanded to do? Two things: clap and shout. This is not the polite, restrained applause of a golf tournament. This is exuberant, explosive joy. The clapping of hands is an ancient sign of acclamation for a king. The shout is the sound of triumph, a battle cry. This is the noise a victorious army makes when the enemy's citadel has fallen. This is not the sentimental overflow of a purely emotional experience. It is the intelligent and fitting response to a historical reality: our King has won.
Our worship, therefore, must be robust. It must be corporate. And it must be loud. A silent Christian is a contradiction in terms, and a quiet church is a defeated church. We are commanded to make a joyful noise because we have something to be joyful about. The victory is not in doubt. The King is on His throne. The only question is whether we will obey the summons and join the celebration.
The Reason for the Ruckus (v. 2)
Verse two provides the theological foundation for the commanded celebration. Why should all the nations clap and shout?
"For Yahweh Most High is fearsome, A great King over all the earth." (Psalm 47:2 LSB)
The reason is the character and the authority of God Himself. He is "Yahweh Most High." He is transcendent, elevated far above all the pretend gods and tin-pot dictators of this world. And He is "fearsome." The Hebrew word is nora, which means terrible or awe-inspiring. This is not the kind of fear that makes you run away; it is the kind of awe that makes you fall on your face in adoration. For the enemies of God, this fearsomeness is a holy terror. For the people of God, it is a profound comfort. Our King is not a tame lion. He is the sovereign ruler who can, and will, deal with all His enemies, and ours.
And the extent of His rule is absolute: He is a "great King over all the earth." This is the central claim of the psalm and the central claim of the Christian faith. Jesus Christ has been given all authority in heaven and on earth (Matt. 28:18). This is not a future hope; it is a present reality. He is King right now. He is not campaigning for the position; He has already been enthroned at the right hand of the Father. Our task is not to make Him King, but to announce to the nations that He already is King, and to summon them to bow the knee.
This is a direct assault on the modern heresy of two-kingdom theology, which wants to grant Christ a little spiritual kingdom in the hearts of men while ceding the public square, the schools, and the government to the devil. This psalm will have none of it. He is King over all the earth.
The Result of His Reign (v. 3)
Verse three describes the practical outworking of God's kingship in the world. Because He is King, things happen.
"He subdues peoples under us And nations under our feet." (Psalm 47:3 LSB)
Now, this is the kind of verse that makes modern, effeminate Christians very nervous. It sounds triumphalistic, imperialistic, and frankly, a bit rude. But we must not read our own cultural anxieties back into the text. This is not talking about ethnic Israel establishing a military empire. This psalm, like all the psalms, must be read Christologically.
The "us" here refers to the people of God, the Church, which is the body of Christ. The victory described is Christ's victory, in which we participate. And how does He subdue the nations? Not with swords and spears, but with the gospel. The weapons of our warfare are not carnal; they are spiritual. They are Word and Sacrament. We conquer the nations by preaching the gospel, baptizing them into the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that Christ has commanded. The nations are brought under our feet when they are brought under His feet, when they joyfully submit to His lordship.
This is a verse filled with postmillennial confidence. It is a promise that the Great Commission will be successful. The gospel will go forth and conquer. The nations of the earth will be discipled. This is not a pipe dream; it is the declared purpose of the fearsome King who reigns over all the earth.
The Foundation of Our Confidence (v. 4)
The final verse in our text gives us the ultimate ground of our security and our joy. Why can we be so confident in this global victory?
"He chooses our inheritance for us, The pride of Jacob whom He loves. Selah." (Psalm 47:4 LSB)
Our confidence is not in ourselves, our evangelistic techniques, or our political strategies. Our confidence is in the sovereign, electing love of God. "He chooses our inheritance for us." Our salvation, our place in His kingdom, is not a result of our wise choice, but of His gracious choice. He chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world.
And what is this inheritance? It is nothing less than the world. Paul tells us that the promise to Abraham was that he would be the heir of the world (Rom. 4:13). Christ is the ultimate heir, and we are co-heirs with Him. This is "the pride of Jacob whom He loves." The church is the true Israel, the new Jacob, and our glory, our boast, is not in ourselves but in the fact that He has set His covenant love upon us. We are loved by God. That is the bedrock of all reality.
And then the psalmist inserts a musical or liturgical instruction: "Selah." The best way to understand this is as a command to pause. Stop. Think about what was just said. God, the fearsome King of all the earth, loves you. He has chosen you. He has secured a global inheritance for you. Let that sink in. Meditate on it. Let the weight and the glory of that truth settle into your bones. Because when it does, you will be ready for the next stanza, which is another explosion of praise.
Conclusion: Join the Invasion
This psalm is a summons to join a joyful invasion. The kingdom of God has come, and is coming, and Jesus Christ is King. Our worship is the sound of that kingdom advancing. Every time we clap our hands, every time we shout for joy, every time we sing His praises, we are announcing His lordship to a rebellious world. We are declaring that every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
So let us have done with timid, quiet, private religion. Let us embrace the noisy, public, global, and victorious faith of the Scriptures. Our King is fearsome. He is great. He reigns over all the earth. He is subduing the nations through the gospel. And He has chosen us as His own beloved people. That is a reality worth shouting about.