Psalm 8

 To the Chief Musician. On the Instrument of Gath. A Psalm of David.

¹O Lord, our Lord,

How excellent is Your name in all the earth,

Who have set Your glory above the heavens!

²Out of the mouth of babes and nursing infants

You have ordained strength,

Because of Your enemies,

That You may silence the enemy and the avenger.

³When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers,

The moon and the stars, which You have ordained,

⁴What is man that You are mindful of him,

And the son of man that You visit him?

⁵For You have made him a little lower than the angels,

And You have crowned him with glory and honor.

⁶You have made him to have dominion over the works of Your hands;

You have put all things under his feet,

⁷All sheep and oxen— Even the beasts of the field,

⁸The birds of the air,

And the fish of the sea

That pass through the paths of the seas.

⁹O Lord, our Lord,

How excellent is Your name in all the earth!

Commentary

Vs. 1 “O Lord, our Lord,

How excellent is Your name in all the earth,

Who have set Your glory above the heavens!”

How magnificent is the Lord, our Lord in all the earth. For it is He who is the Creator and Sustainer of all things. And He is our Redeemer and Savior for He is Lord of all. His Name then is the Most excellent Name in all the earth. For by His name He rules, and by His Name we find Him and know Him, and by His Name we are saved by Him and brought into an everlasting covenant and relationship with Him through His Most Hallowed Name. How Great then is His Name in all the earth! And yet He has set His glory above the heavens, far above the stars and constellations, far above the earth and all of creation, His glory cannot then be fully seen by us (or creation) in our mortal and fallen state. For He must first bring us into Himself, before we will see His glory fully revealed in His Kingdom forever!

Vs. 2 “Out of the mouth of babes and nursing infants

You have ordained strength,

Because of Your enemies,

That You may silence the enemy and the avenger.”

Now all these things that are so clear and self evident to all of us who believe in Him, who walk by faith with Him, are near impossible for the “wise and prudent”, or the proud and self-sufficient to see. For God Himself has ordained this, to shut the eyes of the one, while opening wide the eyes of the other (Consider Matt 11:25, 1 Cor. 2:1-16) so that His Honor and Glory should not be given to another, therefore:

“Out of the mouth of babes and nursing infants

You have ordained strength,

Because of Your enemies,

That You may silence the enemy and the avenger

Therefore it is by mere babes and nursing infants that God has ordained strength to be revealed and declared, even in the face of the proud and the mighty and powerful, to put to silence then all of His enemies. Now these babes that the Word of God speaks of here are not literal babes and nursing infants per-say, but His born-again children of God, His nursing infants, His chosen people, who in faith feed on His Word, who are the least esteemed in the eyes of those of this world, and so it us through us who believe and obey His Son Jesus Christ that God has ordained strength, so that He may put to silence the enemy and the avenger. For such is the Sovereign Strength and Wisdom and Power of God that He need not consider all the principalities and powers who rise up and unite themselves against Him, for He can easily handle all of them with even the weakest and most vulnerable of us, with mere babes and nursing infants! For it is our Sovereign God, who in His Greatness, chooses to disarm and defeat his enemies, through mere babes, who again are all of His people who believe Him and chose to obey Him, who thus are the least esteemed in the eyes of those of this world, but who are most loved and cherished in His World, in His Kingdom who are all His saints, both now, and down through all the ages.  

Vs. 3-4 ³When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers,

The moon and the stars, which You have ordained,

⁴What is man that You are mindful of him,

And the son of man that You visit him?

David’s heart now marvels at this, that our God who created all the universe, everything in all of creation, (both in the physical and spiritual realms), that He would consider him, (us), a mere mortal man or woman, as someone to be loved and cherished and through His Greatness to be exalted above all of His creation.

Vs. 5-9 ⁵For You have made him a little lower than the angels,

And You have crowned him with glory and honor.

⁶You have made him to have dominion over the works of Your hands;

You have put all things under his feet,

⁷All sheep and oxen— Even the beasts of the field,

⁸The birds of the air,

And the fish of the sea

That pass through the paths of the seas.

⁹O Lord, our Lord,

How excellent is Your name in all the earth!

And so in exalting mankind above all of His creation, God has made us a little lower than the angels, placing us on the earth to bear His Image and giving us dominion over all the works of His hands. Therefore in doing so He has crowned us all with glory and honor placing us far above and before everything on earth. And so, though He has made us a little lower than the angels, by placing us here on earth, we are not lower than them in stature (though we are in power and might, 2 Peter 2:11), for one day we who believe in Him will judge angels, (1 Cor. 6:3). Therefore, as the pinnacle of His creative genius, God has exalted us above all His creation. For He has given us dominion over all the works of His hands, everything on earth He has placed under our feet as to be subordinate to us, whether domesticated or wild, whether found in the air, or found in the waters and the seas, all of creation God has placed under our feet! Nothing than is to be exalted above mankind, other than God Himself! Because of this David closes this Psalm with great praise and thanksgiving saying, 

“O Lord, our Lord,

How excellent is Your name in all the earth!”

Scripture Quotations

New King James (1982):Thomas Nelson.