The Great Convergence: God Over All Text: Psalm 86:8-10
Introduction: The Cosmic Lineup
We live in an age of frantic religious pluralism. The spirit of our time insists that all gods are more or less the same, that all paths lead up the same mountain, and that the most grievous sin imaginable is the sin of exclusion. To claim that your God is the only God is considered the height of arrogance, the seed of intolerance, and the justification for all sorts of oppression. The modern world has set up a pantheon of its own, a spiritual marketplace where every deity gets a booth, and the customer is always right. You can have a god of your own therapeutic devising, a god who affirms your every impulse, a god who would never dare to make demands. But this is not piety; it is blasphemy with a smiling face.
Into this confused and cowardly marketplace, the Word of God speaks with the force of a thunderclap. The Scriptures do not present the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob as one option among many. He is not the best in His category; He is the category. He is not one of the gods; He is the only God, and all others are nothing but pathetic, man-made idols, demons, or figments of a rebellious imagination. The first commandment is not "thou shalt have no other gods before me, unless you find one that works better for you." It is "Thou shalt have no other gods before me." Period.
This psalm, a prayer of David, rises to a crescendo of praise that functions as a direct polemic against every other claimant to the throne of the universe. It is a declaration of cosmic allegiance. David is not engaging in comparative religion here. He is not weighing Yahweh against Baal or Marduk on a scale. He is stating a self-evident fact, a foundational axiom of all reality. This is not just David's personal testimony; it is a prophecy of the final state of the world, when the truth of God's exclusive majesty will be acknowledged by every tribe and tongue. This is a postmillennial psalm. It is a vision of the victory of the Great Commission, when the knowledge of the glory of the Lord covers the earth as the waters cover the sea.
These three verses are a compact statement of God's absolute uniqueness, His ultimate triumph, and the ground of all true worship. They teach us who God is, what God does, and what the nations will do in response.
The Text
There is no one like You among the gods, O Lord,
Nor are there any works like Yours.
All nations whom You have made shall come and worship before You, O Lord,
And they shall glorify Your name.
For You are great and do wondrous deeds;
You alone are God.
(Psalm 86:8-10 LSB)
In a Class By Himself (v. 8)
We begin with the declaration of God's absolute incomparability.
"There is no one like You among the gods, O Lord, Nor are there any works like Yours." (Psalm 86:8)
This is not flattery. This is theology. David says, "among the gods." He is not granting that these other "gods" have any real existence as deities. He is speaking from the human perspective. He is looking at all the things men worship, all the things they give their ultimate allegiance to, whether it is a carved idol in a pagan temple or the modern idols of money, sex, and power. He lines them all up in a cosmic police lineup, and he says that Yahweh does not even belong in the same room. There is no comparison. To compare God to an idol is like comparing the sun to a sputtering matchstick.
The gods of the pagans were finite, flawed, and foul. They were born, they fought, they schemed, they bled, and they died. They were simply super-sized, super-sinful men. But the Lord, Adonai, is the sovereign Master. He is eternal, unchanging, omnipotent, and holy. He is utterly transcendent. To say there is "no one like You" is to confess the Creator/creature distinction. There is God, and there is everything else. And the two are not on a continuum.
And the proof of His unique being is found in His unique works. "Nor are there any works like Yours." What are the works of the other gods? They are the works of men's hands, wood and stone, which cannot see or hear or save. Or they are the works of demons, which are works of deception, accusation, and destruction. But what are the works of Yahweh? He spoke the universe into existence out of nothing. He parted the Red Sea. He made the sun stand still. He raised the dead. These are not just impressive feats of power; they are works that reveal His character. His work of creation reveals His wisdom and order. His work of redemption in the Exodus reveals His faithfulness and justice. And His ultimate work, the incarnation, death, and resurrection of His Son, reveals His unfathomable love and grace. No other "god" has a resume like this. No other god has done anything at all, because no other god is there.
The Global Congregation (v. 9)
From the uniqueness of God, David moves to the universal scope of His worship. This is not wishful thinking; it is a Spirit-inspired prophecy.
"All nations whom You have made shall come and worship before You, O Lord, And they shall glorify Your name." (Psalm 86:9 LSB)
Notice the logic. The nations will come and worship because God made them. His right of creation establishes His right of worship. He is not the tribal deity of Israel alone; He is the God of all mankind. He made the Japanese, the Brazilians, the Nigerians, and the Russians. And because He made them, He owns them, and He will claim them.
This verse is a direct promise of the success of the gospel. This is the Great Commission in the Old Testament. Jesus told His disciples to go and make disciples of all nations. And here, David tells us that this mission will not fail. They "shall come." This is not a maybe. It is a divine certainty. History is not a random, meaningless series of events. History is the story of God gathering His people, from every corner of the globe, to the feet of His Son. Our eschatology must be shaped by this confidence. We are not fighting a losing battle. We are not polishing the brass on a sinking ship. We are on the winning side of history, because history is His story.
And what will they do when they come? Two things: they will "worship before You" and they will "glorify Your name." Worship is the central activity of the covenant people of God. It is our chief end. And true worship is not about getting an emotional experience or being entertained. It is about ascribing worth to God. It is bowing down, submitting our wills, our minds, and our hearts to His sovereign authority. To glorify His name is to declare His character, to tell the truth about who He is. The nations will one day abandon their false gods and their secular idols and will publicly declare that Yahweh, the God of the Bible, is the one true God, and that Jesus Christ is Lord.
The Reason for Everything (v. 10)
The final verse provides the foundation, the bedrock reason, for the previous declarations.
"For You are great and do wondrous deeds; You alone are God." (Psalm 86:10 LSB)
The word "For" connects everything. Why is there no one like Him? Why will all the nations worship Him? Because He is great. His greatness is not a matter of opinion. It is an objective fact. He is infinite in His being and perfections. He is not just a little greater than the angels; He is infinitely great.
And this greatness is demonstrated in His "wondrous deeds." The word for "wondrous" points to things that are supernatural, miraculous, and beyond human explanation. God is not a deist's God who wound up the clock and walked away. He is a God who actively and powerfully intervenes in His creation. The plagues on Egypt, the manna from heaven, the virgin birth, the resurrection of Christ, the conversion of a sinner's heart, these are all wondrous deeds. They are signposts that point to His divine nature and power.
And all of this culminates in the bluntest, most exclusive, most offensive statement in the entire passage: "You alone are God." This is the doctrine of monotheism, and it is the central battleground of all worldviews. It is not that God is the greatest God, but that He is the only God. There are no others. This is the great confession of Israel: "Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one" (Deut. 6:4). This is the great confession of the Church. This is the truth that topples idols, confounds philosophers, and enrages the tolerant. Our God is not a member of a pantheon. He is the sole occupant of the throne of the universe. All other thrones are illegitimate, and they will all be cast down.
Conclusion: From Prophecy to Mission
So what do we do with a passage like this? This is not a piece of religious poetry for us to admire. It is a declaration of war, and it is our marching orders. We are the instruments through which this prophecy is being fulfilled.
First, we must be ruthless in our own hearts, tearing down any idol that competes with the one true God. Is your comfort a god? Is your reputation a god? Is your political party a god? Is your family a god? Anything you look to for ultimate security, meaning, or deliverance, apart from Christ, is a false god. And there is no one like our God.
Second, we must be filled with a robust, optimistic, postmillennial confidence in the victory of the gospel. The nations shall come. This is not a pipe dream. It is a blood-bought promise from the King of kings. Therefore, we should pray, work, give, and evangelize with boldness and long-term vision. We are not trying to rescue a few people out of a doomed world. We are taking the world for Christ.
Finally, our worship must be central. The nations are coming to worship. That is the goal. And our worship on the Lord's Day is the engine of this global conquest. When we gather to sing the psalms, to hear the Word preached, to receive the sacraments, we are not just recharging our spiritual batteries for the week. We are participating in the central drama of human history. We are declaring that God alone is great, that His deeds are wondrous, and that He alone is God. And as we do this faithfully, here in our little corner of the world, we are sending out shockwaves into the cosmos, pulling down strongholds, and hastening the day when every knee will bow, and every tongue confess, from every nation He has made, that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.