Psalm 8 (NRSV)
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Verse 1O Lord, our Sovereign, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory above the heavens.
Verse 2Out of the mouths of babes and infants you have founded a bulwark because of your foes, to silence the enemy and the avenger.
Verse 3When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars that you have established;
Verse 4what are human beings that you are mindful of them, mortals that you care for them?
Verse 5Yet you have made them a little lower than God, and crowned them with glory and honor.
Verse 6You have given them dominion over the works of your hands; you have put all things under their feet,
Verse 7all sheep and oxen, and also the beasts of the field,
Verse 8the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea, whatever passes along the paths of the seas.
Verse 9O Lord, our Sovereign, how majestic is your name in all the earth!
Devotion
In the midst of foes bent on avenging real or imagined wrong, the psalmist turns his ear to the songs of children and his eye to the stars in the night sky. He ponders the place of mortals within the whole cast of God's creatures. He names sheep grazing on hillsides and oxen hauling burdens, birds of the air and fish of the sea. Would that the psalmist had spoken more urgently of human responsibility!
Prayer
O God, like the psalmist, we are full of awe as we meditate on your works. Inspire us to renew our stewardship of your great gifts of creation! Amen.