God is Still on the Throne

Snow Day

As you are on your couch, wrapped in a blanket, holding a cup of coffee, your hair looking like you lost a fight with your pillow. I pray that you are safe and warm.

Just because the snow canceled our service does not mean God took the morning off.

Psalm 29:1-2 David writes:  "Give unto the Lord, O you mighty ones, give unto the Lord glory and strength. Give unto the Lord the glory due to His name; worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness." 

Right out of the gate, David does not start with panic. He does not start with a weather report. He starts with worship. And I want you to notice something — he is calling on the mighty ones, the heavenly beings, to give God glory.

But here is the context you need to know about this Psalm.

Bible scholars believe David wrote Psalm 29 while watching a massive, powerful, terrifying thunderstorm rolling in off the Mediterranean Sea.

This wasn’t a lite rain or a few flurries. It’s like what we see outside. I tried to open my front door this morning and  snow literally fell into my living room. My dog looked at me like, "I am not going out there." And honestly? I agreed with him. 

But David was watching something dramatic. Lightning cracking, thunder booming, the kind of storm that shakes the ground. And instead of hiding under his bed — which, by the way, would have been a completely reasonable response. David looked at that storm and saw God.

He picked up his pen and started writing about the glory of the Lord. 

We are looking at our storm — whether that is the storm outside or the storm in your life right now — and we are choosing to see God in the middle of it.

In verses 3 through 9 David describes the voice of the Lord seven times in this passage. David says the voice of the Lord is over the waters, it is powerful, it is full of majesty.

He says the voice of the Lord breaks the cedars — these are the great cedar trees of Lebanon, the strongest trees in the known world — and God's voice snaps them like toothpicks. The voice of the Lord shakes the wilderness.

It makes the deer give birth. It strips the forests bare. 

In other words — God's voice does not whisper at a storm.

God's voice commands it and I want to be transparent with you this morning. I tried to use my voice on a storm this weekend. But it did not seem to work all that well.

But the same voice that spoke the universe into existence — "Let there be light" — that voice is the voice that thunders over every storm in your life right now. 

Whatever you are facing today — and I know some of you are dealing with things that go way deeper than snow —

God's voice is speaking over that situation. He has not gone quiet. He has not lost His authority. The storm does not silence God. If anything, Psalm 29 tells us the storm is just a backdrop that shows off how powerful He really is.

Now here is the verse that I want to park on for just a moment because this is the turning point of the whole Psalm. Verse 10:  "The Lord sat enthroned at the Flood, and the Lord sits as King forever." 

Did you catch that? "The Lord SAT enthroned." Past tense during the flood — one of the most catastrophic events in the history of the world — while the waters were covering the earth, while Noah and his family were riding out the storm of all storms — God was not pacing the floor of heaven. He was not wringing His hands. He was not frantically checking the weather app every five minutes like the rest of us were doing last night. He was sitting on His throne calm and in control, and fully in charge. 

And then David drops the second half of that verse: "and the Lord sits as King forever." Present tense. He WAS on the throne at the flood. He IS on the throne right now. And I promise you — He will STILL be on the throne when this storm is over. 

Now I do want to point out — God has not once slipped on any ice getting to that throne. He has not called in and said, "You know what, it is a snow day, I am staying home today." His throne is not affected by the weather, the economy, the news cycle, or anything else that has us rattled. He is seated. He is stable. He is sovereign. 

I do not know what storm you walked into this week — or what storm has been raging in your life for months. But I need you to hear this: God did not get up off His throne when it started. He is still sitting right there. And that brings us to the last verse, verse 11, and this is where everything lands: 

"The Lord will give strength to His people; the Lord will bless His people with peace."  That is our word for today. Right there. Out of the whole thundering, shaking, lightning-crashing, cedar-tree-snapping Psalm — it ends with peace and strength for God's people. 

But make no mistake, David does not say. "The Lord will remove all storms from His people." He does not say, "The Lord will make sure nothing inconvenient ever happens to you." What He says is — God will give you strength in the storm, and God will bless you with peace in the middle of it.  That peace is not the absence of the storm. That peace is the presence of the One who is still on the throne while the storm is raging. And that makes all the difference.

Snow canceled our service today, but snow did not cancel God's reign. God is still on the throne. He was enthroned at the flood. He is enthroned today.

And nothing — not a snowstorm, not a health crisis, not a financial situation, not a broken relationship — nothing has knocked Him off that seat.  He has strength for you today. He has peace for you today. And He is ready to give both of them freely if you will just look up and trust Him.

We will be back together in person soon. Probably once somebody shovels that ramp — Until we are together again, I want you to carry this with you: 

Whatever this week threw at you, whatever this storm stirred up in you — He is seated, He is sovereign, and He has not forgotten about you.