God Remembers We Are Dust: What Psalm 103 Reveals About God’s Gentle Rule

Blog by Gem Fadling

Psalm 103 is a beautiful psalm to return to when you want to remember what God is like. It begins, “Praise the Lord, my soul; all my inmost being, praise his holy name.”

We sang a version of this psalm in the 1970s in my small-town Nazarene church:

Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name*

I have a faint memory of my pastor clutching his Bible to his chest, his head thrown back and his eyes closed as he proclaimed, “Bless the Lord, O my soul!” It’s such a sweet remembrance of a heartfelt moment.

When I recently reread Psalm 103 with a small group of friends, I noticed something I hadn’t before. We took some time to read the passage individually and then shared with one another what we gleaned. (Go ahead and read it in your Bible now if you want.)

In my time, I decided to write down all the aspects of God that were so beautifully described. Here’s my list:

Forgiver

Healer

Redeemer

Satisfier

Renewer

Righteous

Compassionate

Gracious

Loving

Merciful

Patient

Ruler

Such a list! My sense of God’s love, character, and abilities was refreshed and renewed.

As we shared around the circle, someone mentioned verse 14: “For he knows how we are formed, he remembers that we are dust.”

A meaningful insight emerged when I layered my list with my friend’s reminder that we are dust. God is all those things I listed, and this is God’s posture toward me in my “dustness.”

Look at the above list again. God is: redeemer, righteous, ruler, forgiver, and healer. God’s way: compassionate, gracious, loving, merciful, and patient.

Something clicked inside of me. God’s kingdom is good, and I live within it. God is my home, and I am treated with grace by a compassionate and capable, healing leader.

My soul expanded as this insight came into focus that night.

Has that ever happened to you? Has something of God’s goodness, beauty, and truth surprisingly merged and caught you off guard in a truly delightful way? Ponder that for a minute and see if you can remember a time when scripture profoundly opened your heart.

Even in the midst of all that goes on in my own life, as well as the culture around me, I abide squarely in God’s kingdom ways.

I hope you can find resonance here with what I’m sharing. Whatever is happening in your life right now and wherever you are, you are living not just in your city, county, and state, but in God’s kingdom. God is compassionate and gracious and so is the way he rules. And it is good.

For Reflection: 

• What aspect of God mentioned in Psalm 103 helps you the most right now?
• Take a moment in your “dustness” to pivot toward God’s compassion.
• How do God’s kingdom ways meet you in your place of need right now?