O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is Your name in all the earth. (Psalm 8:1, NASB)
We think of Christmas as a time of celebration, with expressions of love for family, delicious food, laughter, and sharing a year’s worth of memories. We usually pray that these occasions will be inked indelibly in our memories. I can remember details of past Christmases, while other “memorable” events have been lost forever.
Psalm 8 declares that worship of our Creator and Savior should be a significant part of these celebrations: “O Lord, our Lord, how incomparably majestic is Your name in all of the universe!” (Psalm 8:1). King David sang these words one night as he contemplated the vastness of the starry sky and considered how the Creator “had crowned His seemingly insignificant people with glory and honor” (8:5). As described in Genesis 1:26–28, Adam and Eve were a royal couple with responsibility of ordering creation under God. However, according to Hebrews 2:8–9, because of sin, we do not see everything subject to Him . . . but we see Jesus! Incarnate from His birth in Bethlehem, the Son of Man lived to suffer death to save us and to reaffirm our creational purpose by the grace of God. The Son of Man, one of Jesus’s favorite titles for Himself, was the author of our salvation who was made perfect through suffering . . . and is now crowned with glory and honor (Hebrews 2:9–10). God majestically stooped down to reach the height of mankind’s glory.
Too frequently we focus our attention on ourselves rather than the Lord. Even as biblical praise and prayer are removed from our public squares, Christians should freely celebrate the advent of Messiah, our Maker and Savior, at Christmas. A great truth—both awesome and intimate! “O Lord, our Lord, how incomparably glorious is Your name in all the earth” (Psalm 8:9). When Messiah returns, we will be blessed by universal praise of God in every home and public place, ruling with Him over “all the works of His hands.”