"To the choirmaster: according to The Gittith. A Psalm of David.
1 O Lord, our Lord,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!
You have set your glory above the heavens.
2 Out of the mouth of babies and infants,
you have established strength because of your foes,
to still the enemy and the avenger.
3 When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars, which you have set in place,
4 what is man that you are mindful of him,
and the son of man that you care for him?
5 Yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings
and crowned him with glory and honour.
6 You have given him dominion over the works of your hands;
you have put all things under his feet,
7 all sheep and oxen,
and also the beasts of the field,
8 the birds of the heavens, and the fish of the sea,
whatever passes along the paths of the seas.
9 O Lord, our Lord,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!"
Psalm 8
Three things are said about man in this Psalm - that he is a little lower than the an- gels (a little less than divine), that he is crowned with glory and honour, and that he is lord of the creatures on earth. The implications of these statements are considerable: that he is made in the divine image, that he is thus invested with some reflection of God's glory, and that he is the crown of God's creation, and as such has delegated authority. This is a wonderful statement on the biblical doctrine of man; but it is man as God meant him to be, not man as he is now. It is man's position, nature and destiny in the original purposes of God. And man is very different today, because of the Fall, which brought tragedy and misery into the original grandeur of man's nature. The Psalm is therefore no longer a statement of fact; but it does stand as a prophecy of what God's ultimate purposes for man are through the gospel. This is taken up in the New Testament, in 1 Corinthians 15, and particularly in Hebrews 2:8: 'We see not yet all things put under him'. This is the gospel hope. The 'not yet' will give way to full realisation when Jesus comes again; for in Christ this Old Testament ideal is realised and fulfilled. Of Him the Psalmist's words are true, and always were true, and because this is so, it will ultimately be true of us. Because He lives, we shall live also. And the presence of the glorified Jesus, the God-man, in heaven is the pledge and guarantee that all who trust in Him will also attain to that blessed ideal portrayed prophetically in the Psalm. We see Jesus (Hebrews 2:9) - this is the all-important reality, for although we see mankind - ourselves included - fallen from God's high destiny through sin, we see also, in Him, that destiny restored and secured. How excellent is that Name, that wonderful Name, in all the earth!