Ps. 66.4-5 (world judge)

Let the peoples / rejoice and sing for joy
for / you judge the peoples / with equity
and guide / peoples on the earth.
Let the peoples / praise you / O God
let all the peoples / praise you. 

From the recognition of God’s authorial glory in Israel we now move into God’s world-wide judgment and guidance. Here, the psalmist’s sees God as a type of benevolent ruler, both righting wrongs (judging in equity) and guiding his people. How God performs these activities is not the focus. The point, rather, is that his dominion is one that is not merely limited to Israel but one that expresses concern for “all the peoples”. There is, in other words, a perception of God’s constant and abiding concern for “the peoples”. And, this is not played off his concern for Israel. It is, just as much as Israel’s history, to be a source of world-wide liturgy. The refrain is exactly the same: “Let the peoples praise you…”. It is a thing delighted in. Again, however, we must point out that there is an almost willed naiveté in these lines. How else are we to explain this vision of world-wide liturgy to God? Haven’t Cain and Abel been fighting since Eden? I think what we must (or, might) say is that these lines exist in some type of twilight; that the psalmist sees the entire earth within the resurrection power we have detected in so many other psalms—drawn up from the power of Sheol to be put, firmly, in the land of the living.  Maybe, more appropriate to this context, is that the whole world is contained within (or, perceived through) the Aaronic (high priest) blessing-power of God. Is this vision any less astonishing than the psalmist who is sure God can redeem him from Sheol?