Not to us: idols contrasted with the living God

The community refuses to take the credit the nations demand to see

Not unto us, O LORD, not unto us, but unto thy name give glory, for thy mercy, and for thy truth's sake. Wherefore should the heathen say, Where is now their God? But our God is in the heavens: he hath done whatsoever he hath pleased.

The taunt is the old exile question: a God who cannot be pointed at must not exist. The answer is not a statue. It is a God in the heavens who acts. Glory is deflected from the congregation to the name, for steadfast love and truth.

Idols have craft and no life; their makers become like them

Their idols are silver and gold, the work of men's hands. They have mouths, but they speak not; eyes have they, but they see not. They have ears, but they hear not. They that make them are like unto them; so is every one that trusteth in them.

The satire is physical and exact. Then the psalm turns to living trust: Israel, house of Aaron, you that fear the LORD, trust in the LORD: he is their help and their shield. The dead go down into silence; we will bless the LORD from this time forth and for evermore. The poem is not a license to mock every neighbor's art. It is a warning that what you trust you resemble, and that the living bless because they still breathe.