He determines the number of the stars; He calls them each by name.He counts the number of the stars. He calls them all by their names.He telleth the number of the stars; he calleth them all by their names.He counteth the number of the stars; He calleth them all by their names.
3 sermons cite this verse
It's a theological word that simply means God is all knowing. God knows everything. He knows everything about you and me and all of us. In fact, the Bible even tells us in Psalm 147, verse four, he determines the number of stars and calls them each by name. Can you imagine that? God knows all the stars. So in 2021, the James Webb Telescope was launched. The results are blowing the minds of astronomers and scientists. This space-going infrared telescope captures previously unobservable planets, stars and galaxies right out to the edge of space and beyond. This is the creation of God that we've never seen before. And astronomers now estimate that there are 100,000 million stars in the Milky Way and outside of that millions and millions of other galaxies. And what did we just read? We read that God knows every star each with its own name. Boy, I'd run out of names fast if it was up to me. Rover, Bob, Larry, Mary. I don't know. …
He is not sent to tell you how your heart got broken and to scold you about it, l ike the schoolmaster who saw the boy drowning and lectured him upon his imprudence in getting out of his depth. There are many who act like that. If a man is very poor, they say, "Ah, you always were extravagant." Or, "You should not have gone into that speculation. You should not have put your hand to that bill to oblige your friend—you must now pay for your folly." There are many who are quite able to tell you that you ought not to have fallen into the ditch, but I think that their homilies had better be saved up till we have helped you to get out of the ditch! The Apostle James tells us that God "gives to all men liberally, and upbraids not," and it is a blessing for the brokenhearted that Jesus heals them freely and does not upbraid them for their sin and folly! Notice, also, that Christ is not sent to bring to broken hearts remedies that we are to apply. If a man has a bad wound and there is an ointment that will heal his wound, he has to put it on. But suppose the wound is in some part that he cannot reach? He says, "Here is the ointment, but what is the good of it? How can I put it on?" He has broken his arm and it is to be strapped up. "Here is the strapping," says he, "but how am I to strap my arm up? I need somebody to do it for me." I remember once being with an old sea captain who was in trouble of mind. I was telling him of the promises of God and he said, "Yes, those promises are something like the great posts by the side of the river to which you can moor your vessel. You have got a rope with a loop to it, but the job is to get it over the post. It will hold your vessel if you can, but," he said, "I cannot get the loop over the post There are the promises, but I cannot get a hold of them." We are so weak and feeble that the Lord Jesus has not merely come to bring the ointment, but He has come "to bind up the brokenhearted." I think that one of the grandest passages in the whole Word of God is Psalm 147:3, 4—"He heals the broken in heart, and binds up their wounds. He counts the number of the stars; He calls them all by their names." Does it not seem to be a great stoop from marshalling the stars to bending down over poor broken hearts and closing up their wounds? Yet God delights as much in displaying His Grace as in displaying His power! So you see, dear brokenhearted ones, that Jesus Christ has come to bind up the broken in heart—that is, to bring to you the consolations of His Grace, and to apply them to you. And for this purpose we read in the verse in which our text is found, that the Spirit of the Lord God is upon Him because it is the Spirit of God who applies the Word to the heart and, therefore, the Spirit is put upon the Lord Jesus Christ so that when He speaks, the Word may be with power. So, dear Friends, we have a Savior sent, upon whom the Spirit of God has been poured out and Who, therefore, speaks effectually—not to ears that are closed, …
See then, Sinner, what the Lord does when "He raises up the poor out of the dust, and lifts up the beggar from the dunghill, to set them among princes, and to make them inherit the Throne of Glory." He gives them the full heritage of the saints on earth and then crowns it with the glorious inheritance of the saints in Heaven! There is nothing good that the Lord keeps back from them. All the promises of this blessed Book, all the blessing guaranteed by the Everlasting Covenant are theirs most richly to enjoy. Oh, that the Lord would come this very night and lift up some of you who are like the beggar upon the dunghill, and set you among princes and make you inherit the Throne of Glory! Thus have I hurriedly set before you what is done for the beggar upon the dunghill, and I can only hint at the answer to the next question, Who does it. "He raises up the poor out of the dust and lifts up the beggar from the dunghill." If any of you saw a beggar lying on a dunghill and wanted to help him, I expect you would send your servants to lift him up from his unsavory resting place. I do not suppose you would go and do it yourselves. It would be very kind for a man to arrange for a beggar in such a position to be taken care of and so to do it by proxy. But listen to this. "HE raises up the poor out of the dust, and (HE) lifts up the beggar from the dunghill." The great Lord of Heaven and earth does this work Himself! He does not do it by proxy. There are two verses in the 147th Psalm at which I have wondered thousands of times—"He heals the broken in heart, and binds up their wounds. He counts the number of the stars. He calls them all by their names." He who looses the bands of Orion, and brings forth Mazzaroth in his season, and guides Arcturus with his sons is the same Lord who bends down in tender pity over the broken in heart and binds up their wounds with a skill and success that no earthly surgeon can even equal! Oh, the matchless condescension of the great Lord of Love that He should thus pity a sinner, love a sinner, embrace a sinner and even lift up a sinner from a dunghill! No one else can do it. The minister here frankly confesses his inability to do it. Not all the holy angels together can do it! Only the Spirit of the living God, who first opens our eyes to see our state as beggars can lead us to look to Jesus Christ and find in Him everlasting riches and eternal salvation! …