…No single Psalm …speaks only of creation. It is always the God who has already revealed himself to his people in his word who is said to be known as the Creator of the world. Because God has spoken to us, because God’s name has been revealed to us, we can believe in him as the Creator. Otherwise we could not know him.
The creation is a picture of the power and faithfulness of God, which he has demonstrated to us in his revelation in Jesus Christ. We worship the Creator who has revealed himself as the Redeemer.
..The creation Psalms are not lyrical poems, but instruction for the people of God in which, coming to know the grace of salvation, they are led to know and to honor the Creator of the world.
The creation serves the believer, and everything created by God is good if received with thanksgiving ( 1 Timothy 4:3f.). But we are able to give thanks only for that which stands in harmony with the revelation of God in Jesus Christ. The creation with all its gifts is there for the sake of Jesus Christ. So we thank God for the grandeur of his creation with, in, and through Jesus Christ, to whom we belong.
Quoted from Psalms, The Prayer Book of the Bible by Dietrich Bonhoeffer (Augsburg, 1974), a translation of Das Gebetbuch der Bibel (the 8th ed. published in Germany in 1966). These thoughts are found in the seventh section, “The Creation” (pp.29-30), where the author begins to treat the Psalter according to classification by subject.
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