Let the Nations Be Glad
Why God's blessing on you was never meant to stop with you
Series: They Speak of Him Preacher: Demetrius Williamson Date: October 25, 2026 Passage: Psalm 67 Listen: Audio & video on SermonAudio
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Where do your prayers stop?
When we pray, Pastor Demetrius observed, our tendency is to stop at “Lord, bless me” or “Lord, bless us.” We terminate our prayers on ourselves, on our church, or on our circle of friends.
But that is not what we find in Psalm 67. This psalmist reaches beyond himself and beyond his own people to the ends of the earth. He realizes that the blessing he receives, and that his nation receives, was never intended to stop at them. It has always been intended for God’s blessing to reach all peoples. Psalm 67, as Pastor Demetrius put it, gives us God’s global vision for the world.
A Psalm That Speaks of Him
Our series, They Speak of Him, is centered on Jesus Christ in the Old Testament. He is the theme, the focus, the point of the Hebrew Scriptures. In Luke 24:44, Jesus told His disciples that “everything written about me in the law of Moses and the prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.” Each part spoke of Him. Each part was fulfilled in Him. So the task this morning was to see exactly how Psalm 67 speaks of Jesus and is fulfilled in Him.
Some context first. The 150 Psalms have historically been divided into five books, mirroring the five books of Moses. That division is a reminder that the Psalms are not only for singing but also to be read and studied as Scripture. Psalm 67 sits in a cluster, Psalms 65 through 68, that many believe were harvest and nations songs, possibly sung at the Harvest Festival. Read them together and you will see both themes: God giving the increase of the land, and God’s concern for the nations.
Pastor Demetrius argued that Psalm 67 belongs in a category of its own. It is not exactly a psalm of praise, of lament, or of ascent. Here the psalmist is not so much calling people to worship God as he is calling on God to lead people to worship Himself. What we find is a writer with a deep desire for God to be enjoyed by the nations.
And in that, he continues the biblical thread of God’s concern for the nations: the table of nations in Genesis 10, the dispersing at Babel in Genesis 11, and then Genesis 12, where God takes a man, Abram, so that through him the families of the earth would be blessed. In Psalm 67, the psalmist is praying for the Abrahamic promise to be fulfilled.
The psalm is built as a chiasm. Verses 1-2 (God bless us, so the earth will know) are mirrored by verses 6-7 (God bless us, let the ends of the earth fear Him). In the middle, verses 3 and 5 repeat the same refrain, and at the very center stands verse 4: “Let the nations be glad and sing for joy.”
"May God Be Gracious to Us"
“May God be gracious to us and bless us and make his face to shine upon us, that your way may be known on earth, your saving power among all nations.”
Notice that the psalm begins with mercy. “Gracious” can also be translated “merciful,” and the language echoes the Aaronic blessing of Numbers 6: “The Lord bless you and keep you.” But there is a difference. The psalmist includes himself. It is not “may the Lord bless me” but “may the Lord be merciful to us.” It is a corporate request.
He starts with mercy because he recognizes that every blessing comes after the mercy God has lavished on His people. None of their blessings are blessings they deserve. Pastor Demetrius described the word visually as someone stooping down in kindness to help someone inferior. Even the chosen nation had to say, “Lord, we are inferior. We need You to stoop down in Your kindness to lift us up.”
The shining face, again from Numbers 6, expresses living in the light of God’s favor and presence. When God shone His face on Israel, He was saying, “I will guide you with favor by my presence.”
Rivers, Not Reservoirs
Then something changes. In verse 2 the psalmist turns and speaks directly to God, and the hinge is one small word: that. Pastor Demetrius urged us to circle it. The psalmist does not just say, “Lord, bless us. Amen.” He explains why: that Your way may be known on earth, Your saving power among all nations.
A reservoir simply contains and holds water. A river flows. “Lord, make us like a river, that Your way of salvation might be experienced, tasted by all the earth. Lord, don’t keep Your salvation only to us.”
So the question for us is: what noticeable blessings do we have, as a church and as Christians, that the nations ought to see and crave? Pastor Demetrius gave three examples:
- Liberation from sin. The way we turn from unrighteousness to serve the Lord should make people ask, “What is it that causes you to live the way that you live?”
- Peace in hardship. Brothers and sisters in our congregation are suffering painful ailments and failing health, yet “as we watch them suffer, we can clearly see God’s grace in their lives.” That is a testimony intended to point the nations to His saving power.
- Love for each other. Jesus did not say they will know you are His disciples by your pinpoint, perfect theology, but by your love for one another.
The Anti-Jonah
Reading this psalm, Pastor Demetrius thought of Jonah. In his mind, this psalmist is “the anti-Jonah.”
Ironically, Jonah had perhaps the greatest ministry in the Bible outside of Jesus. He went to a pagan land, preached a message of maybe ten words, and saw a national revival. And he was angry. Why? He was a tribalist. He wanted God’s blessings to stay on his nation and not spread to the ends of the earth. He forgot that before Israel was even formed, God promised Abraham that through him He would bless the earth. Israel was supposed to be a conduit of that blessing. The psalmist does not forget, and that is how God’s people ought to be.
Where is Christ in verses 1-2? The nations need salvation, and in Luke 2 an old man named Simeon takes the baby Jesus into his arms in the temple and says, “My eyes have seen your salvation that you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and for glory to your people Israel.” The psalmist prays, “God, may your salvation reach the nations.” Then Jesus shows up, and Simeon says, this is God’s salvation to the nations.
"Let the Nations Be Glad"
“Let the nations be glad and sing for joy, for you judge the peoples with equity and guide the nations upon earth.”
Verses 3 and 5 frame verse 4 so that our eyes land on the heart of the song: let the nations be glad and sing for joy. “I don’t know what you’ve been told,” Pastor Demetrius said, “but the gospel we proclaim is one of joy.” The angel announced good news of great joy for all the people.
He confessed that when he evangelizes he often wears a sad look, because he knows he must communicate the bad news: you are a sinner, you deserve God’s wrath, and if you don’t repent you will receive the wages of your sins. “But what I come to share isn’t just bad news. I come to share joy, good news of great joy for sinners.” How often is that element in our gospel presentation?
There are two elements to this joy. Be glad is the inner experience. Sing for joy is the outward expression. The picture is of people and nations so filled with gratitude, thanksgiving, and joy that it just oozes out of them.
And the reason for joy? God judges the peoples with equity. That word literally means level ground, and it is also translated as justice, uprightness, or righteousness. We languish under unrighteous judges and rulers, and under our own unrighteousness. But the One who truly rules the world is just. “The good news of justice is a part of the gospel.” God will vindicate all who trust Him.
Notice, too, that the psalmist is still talking to God. The nations’ joy depends on Him. “God is the lead missionary.” It is His mission to draw the nations to Himself, and the beauty is that we get to be part of it. That means our greatest resource is not our money. It is prayer. And our commitment, or lack of it, shows in our prayerlessness for the nations. If God’s mission is to draw families and peoples from all over the world to Himself, why don’t our prayers align with that mission?
How does this connect to Christ? The Father has appointed the Son to judge all humanity. Jesus is the righteous judge the psalmist sings about. But that raises a question: why would the guilty rejoice over righteous judgment?
Joy and Fear
Wait a minute. I thought you wanted the nations to be glad? Is there a contradiction between delighting in God and fearing God?
Pastor Demetrius argued there is not. Today we often define fear as mere respect or reverence. The biblical picture includes that, but also trembling, standing in awe of who God is, and being afraid. “The one who fears God rightly is also the same individual who delights in God.” He is so concerned with God’s glory, and with continuing to enjoy God, that he does not want to fracture that relationship by sin. There is a joy in fearing God: walking before Him humbly, realizing that false gods incite His fury, and turning to Him to be saved.
The harvest of verse 6 serves as a witness of God’s goodness to the nations, and “the ends of the earth” in verse 7 keeps the focus on worldwide worship. There is not a family, a nation state, or a clan that God has excluded from His plan of saving. “This is how we ought to pray. This is how we ought to feel.”
And this desire flows from the psalmist’s own enjoyment of God. When we find we are not sharing the gospel, Pastor Demetrius said, we must ask: am I delighting myself in the Lord?
The Multitude Before the Throne
“Father God, our prayer is that Your presence and Your favor towards us will be so extravagant that the world takes notice… Would you raise up your people to go and proclaim your goodness so that the nations will be glad and shout for joy in Jesus Christ.”
God’s mission to the nations is like God using His people to set up shop all around the world, so that those nearby can see His blessing on His people, hear about the means of that blessing, the Lord Jesus, and crave to experience it for themselves. The psalmist prayed, “Bless us, Lord, that the nations may praise you.” And God answered in His Son.
At the end of the story we see the answer in full, in Revelation 7:9-10: “a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, ‘Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!'” Listen to the first word out of their mouths: salvation.
God will make the nations glad. He will cause them to rejoice in the salvation and deliverance He has accomplished through Jesus Christ, the Judge who was judged on behalf of His people. And you and I have the privilege of being part of that great work. If you have not yet turned from your sins to Christ, this joy is offered to you too: the good news of great joy for sinners, from a God who stoops down in mercy.
Highlights from the Message
- “Our tendency is to stop at Lord bless me or Lord bless us.”
- “Psalm 67 gives us God’s global vision for the world.”
- “As God’s people, we are to be like rivers. We’re not to be a reservoir.”
- “This psalmist is the anti-Jonah.”
- “Israel was supposed to be a conduit of that blessing.”
- “What the psalmist prays for, God answers in Christ.”
- “The gospel we proclaim is one of joy.”
- “The good news of justice is a part of the gospel.”
- “God is the lead missionary.”
- “The only way that’s possible is because the judge himself was judged on behalf of his people.”
- “If that joy is not in you, it will not come out of you.”
Questions for Discussion
- Where do your prayers usually “terminate”? What would it look like this week to pray beyond yourself, your church, and your friends to the nations?
- Why does the psalmist begin with mercy before blessing? How does remembering that we are “inferior,” needing God to stoop down, shape the way we receive His blessings?
- Are you living more like a river or a reservoir? What noticeable blessings in your life (freedom from sin, peace in hardship, love for others) might God use to draw others to Christ?
- Where might the tribalism of Jonah be hiding in your heart, wanting God’s blessings to stay with “us”?
- Is joy part of the way you share the gospel? How can we communicate the bad news honestly and still proclaim “good news of great joy for sinners”?
- How does it change your view of judgment to know that Jesus, the righteous Judge, was Himself judged on behalf of His people?
- Pastor Demetrius said, “If that joy is not in you, it will not come out of you.” Are you delighting yourself in the Lord right now? What would help you return to that joy?