Clap your hands, all peoples. Shout to God with loud songs of joy. For the Lord the most high is to be feared, a great king over all the earth.
– Psalm 47:1–2
Oh, I love this verse and especially the way it follows on the end of the chapter before it.
Psalm 47:1–2 Is a Call to Celebrate the Majesty of God
So Psalm 46:10 says, “Be still and know that I am God. I will be exalted among all the nations. I will be exalted in all the earth. God sang. Be still. My purpose in the world is going to be accomplished. My exaltation among all the nations.” That is God’s purpose in the world. God is orchestrating all of history for His exaltation in all the earth which means if that’s God’s purpose in the world and we are worshipers of God and followers of God, children of God, then what’s our purpose in the world? Our purpose in the world is the exaltation of our God among all the nations.
So we get to the next chapter, verse one. From the start out of the shoot, we read, “Clap your hands, all peoples. Shout to God with loud songs of joy.” It’s an exclamation to all the peoples, all the nations of the world. “Clap your hands. Shout to God. For the Lord the most high is to be feared, a great king over all the earth.” Don’t miss the picture here. We live today to see all the peoples clapping their hands and shouting to God with loud songs of joy. This is why we pray for unreached people groups.
This is why we pray for all the peoples, the people groups of the world, especially those who have not been reached with the gospel because they’re not clapping and they’re not shouting to God. They don’t know the one who is king over all the earth. His name is Jesus and they need to know Him. This is why we pray like this. It’s why we must in our lives give for the spread of His kingdom among all the nations.
Psalm 47:1–2 Reminds Us God Wants the Praise of All People
This is why we go right where we live. We want more and more people in our neighborhoods and among the nations in the neighborhoods where we live to clap their hands and shout to God with loud songs of joy. We want people not just near us but far from us to clap their hands and shout to God. So we say to Him with our life, with our futures, with our plans, with our dreams, with our families, with our careers, “However you want to use us, God, to lead all the peoples to clap their hands and shout to you in loud songs of joy.”
O God, I pray this over all of us listening to this right now. I pray Psalm 67 over us. Be gracious to us and bless us and cause your face to shine upon us so that through us, your ways may be known on the earth, your saving power known among all the nations so that, Psalm 47, all the peoples might clap their hands and shout to you with loud songs of joy.
Praying for the Adibasi Janajati People
God, we pray this over the Adibasi Janajati people of Nepal, this remote people group in Western Nepal with just a small number, 1000, 1300 people among them, but no known followers of Jesus. They’re one of these peoples that you describe in your word, O God. So we pray that the Adibasi Janajati people of Nepal would clap their hands and shout to you because they have come to know you as the great king over all the earth.
God, please cause your gospel, your grace, the good news of your kingdom to spread to this people group and to every people group in the world. God, we pray that you would help us all to play whatever part you’re calling us to play until all the peoples are clapping their hands and all of them are shouting to you with songs of joy just like we read in Revelation 5 and 7. O God, use our lives to bring about Psalm 47:1–2. We pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.
David Platt serves as a Lead Pastor for McLean Bible Church. He is also the Founder of Radical, an organization that helps people follow Jesus and make him known in their neighborhood and all nations.
David received his B.A. from the University of Georgia and M.Div., Th.M., and Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. Some of his published works include Radical, Radical Together, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, and Don’t Hold Back.
He lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area with his wife and children.
