1 Chronicles 16:23-27 meaning

1 Chronicles 16:23-27 continues David's psalm with a call for all the earth to sing to the LORD, proclaim good tidings of His salvation daily, tell His glory among the nations, and recognize that the LORD is great, greatly to be praised, and to be feared above all gods, because the gods of the peoples are idols while the LORD made the heavens, and splendor, majesty, strength, and joy are before Him in His place.

1 Chronicles 16:23-27 widens the song from Israel to the world, taking up the words of Psalm 96: Sing to the LORD, all the earth; Proclaim good tidings of His salvation from day to day (v 23). The address has changed. 1 Chronicles 16:8-22 spoke to "the seed of Israel"; now all the earth is told to sing. Psalm 96 opens with "Sing to the LORD a new song; Sing to the LORD, all the earth" (Psalm 96:1), and the chronicler begins with the second line, so that the universal summons stands first.

The phrase, "Proclaim good tidings" is translated from the Hebrew "basar," the verb Isaiah uses for the messenger who brings "good news" to Zion that "your God reigns" (Isaiah 52:7). Israel is to be that messenger to the nations, from day to day, as a daily habit. The apostles took up this very charge to spread the good news (the Gospel) after Jesus' sacrifice: "we preach to you the good news" (Acts 13:32). The command to Israel in the Old Testament remains in place in the New Testament, yet with the full Trinity in view, as Jesus gives the Great Commission to His disciples after His resurrection:

"Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age"
(Matthew 28:19-20).

The content of the good news follows in the next verse: Tell of His glory among the nations, His wonderful deeds among all the peoples (v 24). The wonderful deeds Israel was told to remember in 1 Chronicles 16:12 are the same deeds it is now told to tell the nations. Their memory feeds their mission.

The reason comes next in verse 25: For great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised; He also is to be feared above all gods (v 25). To fear the LORD is to order one's life around the fact that He is real, powerful, and the final authority—"The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge" (Proverbs 1:7). The nations feared many gods; the psalm says there is only One worth the fear.

The comparison with the gods is then pressed to its conclusion: For all the gods of the peoples are idols, But the LORD made the heavens (v 26). The Hebrew word for idols, "elilim," sounds like a diminutive of "el," meaning "god," and means something like "worthless things" or "nothings." The gods of the nations are named and then dismissed in one word, while the LORD is identified by the single act no idol could claim: the LORD made the heavens (v 26). Isaiah would build whole chapters on this contrast—the idol that must be carried, and the God who carries His people (Isaiah 46:1-4). Paul would stand in Athens and say the same: God "made the world and all things in it," and so He "does not dwell in temples made with hands" (Acts 17:24).

The section closes by describing God's presence: Splendor and majesty are before Him, Strength and joy are in His place (v 27). Psalm 96:6 reads "Strength and beauty are in His sanctuary." The joy in His place fits the moment. Earlier in the ark narrative the people brought the ark up "with joy" (1 Chronicles 15:25), and His place is the tent on Zion, the place David had prepared (1 Chronicles 15:1, 3). Where God is present, there is strength, which the psalm has already linked to the ark (1 Chronicles 16:11), and there is joy. The post-exilic readers, worshiping in a second temple that could not match the first, were being told that God's splendor and majesty came with Him, whatever the building looked like.