Psalms 29

Psalms 1:41

Gordon Churchyard

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The Storm

Psalms 29

Gordon Churchyard

There was a great storm. The wind blew the sea into the ship. It was filling with water. Jesus was asleep on a seat in the back of the ship. They woke him up and said to him, "Teacher, do you not care that we are in danger?"

Jesus got up and told the wind to stop. He said to the sea, "Peace, be still". And the wind stopped and the sea was quiet. And Jesus said to them, "Why are you afraid? Do you not believe in me?" But they were afraid. They said to each other, "What sort of man is this? Even the wind and the sea obey him". (Mark 4:37-41)

Psalms 29

(This is a psalm) of David.

v1 Sons of God, say that the LORD is *glorious.
Say that the LORD is powerful.

v2 Say that the LORD has a *glorious name.
Say all this to the LORD that is beautiful and holy.

v3 The voice of the LORD is on the waters.
The *glorious God is *thundering.
The LORD is on the great waters.

v4 The voice of the LORD is powerful.
The voice of the LORD is beautiful.

v5 The voice of the LORD breaks the cedar trees.
The LORD breaks the cedars of Lebanon.

v6 He makes *Lebanon jump like a young cow
and *Sirion like a young wild animal.

v7 The voice of the LORD makes fire in the sky.

v8 The voice of the LORD makes the *desert move,
the LORD makes the *desert of *Kadesh move.

v9 The voice of the LORD blows strongly on the trees
and he blows everything from the forest.
But in his temple, everyone says that he is *glorious.

v10 The LORD was king at the time of the *Flood.
The LORD will always be king.

v11 The LORD will make his people strong.
The LORD will give his people peace.

The Story of Psalms 29

David saw a great storm. Perhaps he was hiding from it. He saw the rain and heard the wind. He saw the lightning (fire in the sky) and heard the thunder (noise in the sky). The storm came from the Mediterranean Sea to the mountains of Lebanon. It went from there to Sirion, then down the river Jordan to Kadesh.

The great storm made David think about God. He wrote Psalms 29 in 3 parts:

• Psalms 29:1-2: David tells everyone in heaven to say that God is very great 73

• Psalms 29:3-9:David describes the storm with the thunder as the voice of God

• Psalms 29:10-11:David says that the people of the LORD will be safe even in a great storm.

What Psalms 29 means

Verse 1: The sons of God are probably the angels. Angels live in heaven with God.

Verse 2: Our translation says that the LORD is beautiful and holy. It is possible that the Hebrew means that the angels in heaven are wearing beautiful clothes.

Verse 3: The waters is another word for the sea, probably the Mediterranean Sea.

Verse 5: Lebanon was famous for cedar trees. They were very big trees. Solomon (a son of David) used cedar wood from Lebanon when he built the temple in Jerusalem.

Verse 6: Lebanon and Sirion mean the mountains in these places. In the storm, David thought that they were moving around. Perhaps there was an earthquake. In an earthquake the ground moves.

Verse 9: We are not sure how to translate "blows strongly on the trees". Some people say it is better to translate it "makes the animals have their babies". The storm was so bad that the animals were afraid. The ones that were going to have baby animals had them early. The temple here means heaven. Everyone means the sons of God that are in verse 1

Verse 10: We have spelled Flood with a capital f. This is because it means one special flood. It happened in the time of Noah. Water covered the whole earth. Everybody died except Noah and his family. We know that David meant this Flood because he used the special word that describes the Flood in Genesis. Nobody else uses it in the whole Bible.

Verse 11: After the storm, there was peace. Peace is a gift that God gives to his people. Peace means no loud noises or fighting round us. The peace of God means that there is nothing bad inside us. We are happy deep inside us.

Something to do

1. Follow the path of the storm on a map if you have one.

2. Look for the key words in Psalms 29. A key word is a special word that gives us help in understanding things. Count how many times David uses the words: glorious, LORD, the voice of the LORD, say (or says)

3. Ask God to give you peace. He will if you:

• say that you are sorry for doing bad things

• ask him for help not to do them in the future

• ask him to be your Lord

glorious ~ wonderful, and shining very much
thundering ~ making a loud noise in the sky in a storm'Lebanon, Sirion, Kadesh are places'Lebanon, Sirion, Kadesh are places
desert ~ wild country where there is much sand'Lebanon, Sirion, Kadesh are places
flood ~ when water covers the land