Psalm 19:5, “[The Sun] comes out like a bridegroom leaving his chamber, and , like a strong man, runs its course with joy.”
The created universe is filled with images and shadows of God in Christ. This is not because creative people invent these connections, but because the actual meaning given to the text of the natural world by its Author IS God in Christ.
For instance, God did not create the vine and the branches and then say, “Hey, that is like Christ and His people” (John 15:1ff). Rather, God intended to unite a people to Himself through the incarnate Son and *therefore* He created vines and branches. This is the pattern fro all of the natural world. The created universe is an inference, a “therefore,” that exists based upon the metaphysically necessary premise of who God is as He is revealed in Christ crucified and risen.
Here in Psalm 19, we get an authoritative interpretation of one of the “words” of the “book” of creation. One of the ways it is right to “read” the rising sun is as a Bridegroom, rising up with joy from sleep on the morning of his wedding and going out to meet his Bride. Or again, as a strong man who rejoices in his strength and the meaningful exertion of that strength. These are both true readings of the sun.
And, of course, both of these readings—as is true with the entire “text” of creation—have as their supreme meaning the slain and risen Son of God. Christ is the Bridegroom who rises with joy from the sleep of death, who leaves the chamber of His tomb so that He might gather His Bride to Himself (Rev.7:14, 19:6-8)….And Christ is the Stronger Man who binds Satan through the strength of His death and who—rising again—plunders His enemy’s kingdom, securing the “joy set before Him.” (Luke 11:21-23, Hebrews 12:2).
Every sunrise declares the gospel….every sunrise declares the resurrection of the Bridegroom and promises the final Wedding Day, and ever sunrise proclaims the strength of God in Christ, whose love is stronger than death. And it isn’t just the sun…ALL of created reality is a single, harmonious declaration of one single thing: The beauty—the Name—of God in the crucified and risen Jesus Christ……this—HE—is the meaning of EVERYTHING that He has created.
May we all become more and more fluent interpreters of the language of stars, and sky, and trees, and hills, and forests, and rivers, and birds, and shadows, and light, and all the rest, so that we might hear their declaration of the Name, and that we might speak that Name to others.
