God Made the Sea for Play!! Psalms 102-104

 Psalms 104:24-26 (ESV Strong's)

24 O LORD, how manifold are your works!

In wisdom have you made them all;

the earth is full of your creatures.

25 Here is the sea, great and wide,

which teems with creatures innumerable,

living things both small and great.

26 There go the ships,

and Leviathan, which you formed to play in it.

God Made the Sea for Play!!

Any boater would love to make the above passage their theme verses for life.  We see in the above passage that the waters created under the heavens are all full of God’s creatures.  The seas are for His enjoyment and for His glory.   All the creatures of the sea, manifold different, are but His creation to bring Him glory.   The contrast of this portion of the psalm is in verse twenty-six.   Here we have two contrasting aspects as compared to the previous lines.  In the lines leading up to twenty-six we read about all the creatures God created.   This verse then pivots to “ships.”   One could make the case that God made the ships through the toil and mind of man, but the point might be that in the midst of God’s creation man find a place enjoy that creation.   God provides man with the wisdom of ship-building to enjoy, not just the land creatures, but the sea creatures.    Perhaps the greatest challenge is to read what the author writes about the Leviathan.  We have no idea what the Leviathan was.   It is used, however, throughout Scripture and is described as a sea monster.   It is used four other times in the O.T.

Job 3:8 (ESV Strong's)

8 Let those curse it who curse the day,

who are ready to rouse up Leviathan.

Job 41:1 (ESV Strong's)

1 “Can you draw out Leviathan with a fishhook

or press down his tongue with a cord?

Psalms 74:14 (ESV Strong's)

14 You crushed the heads of Leviathan;

you gave him as food for the creatures of the wilderness.

Isaiah 27:1 (ESV Strong's)

1 In that day the LORD with his hard and great and strong sword will punish Leviathan the fleeing serpent, Leviathan the twisting serpent, and he will slay the dragon that is in the sea.

In this psalm, however, the writer departs for the scary sea monster theme and rather makes it sound like Leviathan is just another fish jumping and frolicking in the sea.  This song moves Leviathan from dragon to dolphin.    The point the author is making is that God designed the sea, controls the sea, provides for the sea creatures and provides to us a place of enjoyment in the sea.   God has designed His creation for His glory and the enjoyment of the creation.