Psalm 95 - When The Music Screeched To A Halt

Psalm 95 is a joyful song with a stern warning.

Psalm 95 (NASB95)

¹ O come, let us sing for joy to the LORD,

Let us shout joyfully to the rock of our salvation.

² Let us come before His presence with thanksgiving,

Let us shout joyfully to Him with psalms.

³ For the LORD is a great God

And a great King above all gods,

⁴ In whose hand are the depths of the earth,

The peaks of the mountains are His also.

⁵ The sea is His, for it was He who made it,

And His hands formed the dry land.

⁶ Come, let us worship and bow down,

Let us kneel before the LORD our Maker.

⁷ For He is our God,

And we are the people of His pasture

and the sheep of His hand.

Today, if you would hear His voice,

⁸ Do not harden your hearts, as at Meribah,

As in the day of Massah in the wilderness,

⁹ “When your fathers tested Me,

They tried Me, though they had seen My work.

¹⁰ “For forty years I loathed that generation,

And said they are a people who err in their heart,

And they do not know My ways.

¹¹ “Therefore I swore in My anger,

Truly they shall not enter into My rest.”

Canons of Dordt

Point II, Article 6: Unbelief Man’s Responsibility

The fact that many who have been called through the gospel do not repent or believe in Christ but perish in unbelief is not because the sacrifice of Christ offered on the cross is deficient or insufficient, but because they themselves are at fault.

Summary

Psalm 95 is most decidedly a psalm of thanksgiving, a purpose which it makes clear in its opening strophe: that God's people must come before His presence with thanksgiving. Most of us are pretty good at saying 'thank you', mostly because society mandates that we say it so often - to the store clerk, to the person who served you cookies at church or held the door open for you, even to the cop who just wrote you up for speeding. But Psalm 95 shows us how to express genuine and heartfelt thanksgiving - not just to other people who may truly deserve it, but to the LORD.

First of all, the psalm tells us that to truly express thanksgiving to the LORD, you must know who you're thanking - that is, you must know both who and what God is. The rock of our salvation - the LORD - is a great God. Not just that, He's a great King above all gods (the psalmist here isn't saying there are really other gods - just the 'gods' our idol-factory minds cook up). The LORD God holds all things in His hand: both the depths of the earth and the peaks of the mountains. Both the sea and the dry land are His, because He made it, forming it all in His hands.

But this transcendent God (a word we use in theology to describe how God is above all things) isn't just a powerful, yet detached force. The LORD is our maker, and even more than that, He's our God, and we are the people of His pasture and the sheep of His hand.

Psalm 95 doesn't just explain who we ought to give thanksgiving to, it tells us how. The opening words command us to come to the LORD, repeating and expanding the command a few lines later: let us come before His presence with thanksgiving. There's something to chew on today: what does it mean to come before God's presence? But the psalmist isn't finished yet; once again he repeats the command to come, this time worshipping and bowing down, kneeling before the LORD our maker.

Fulfilling this command to come with thanksgiving is a noisy endeavor. You must sing for joy to the LORD, shouting joyfully! Singing isn't optional for God's people! So important the command is repeated: shout joyfully to Him. Not just by making a loud noise, though. Shout with psalms. In other words, when you gather with the LORD's people to give thanksgiving each Sunday, sing loudly. Like me, compensate for your lack of talent with volume.

  Dig Deeper  

Remember those old western movie scenes showing a crowded saloon with the piano playing and people noisily having a good time, when all of the sudden the doors swing open, the hero strolls in looking for the bad guy, and the music and fun come to a screeching halt? That's what happens half way through Psalm 95. God suddenly stops the music and interrupts this joyful psalm.

Anybody can sing for joy and shout joyfully to the LORD, even if they don't really know whose presence they've come into. But true thanksgiving requires more than just music and song. It requires full submission: not hardening your heart or testing the LORD.

Our God doesn't look lightly up such sins, for they caused Him to loath the generation of Israelites crossing the desert who erred in their heart and did not know His ways. God was so angry with these people that He swore in His anger that they shall not enter His rest. Their unfaithfulness resulted in them wandering in the wilderness till they died.

For nearly a millennia, this dark cloud of God's interrupting anger hung over the joyful thanksgiving of the first half of Psalm 95. But the music starts again in the third chapter of Hebrews, telling us that unlike that unfaithful generation of old, Christ is faithful as the Son over God's house! And we are His house , if indeed we hold firmly to our confidence and the hope in which we glory.

AAA Prayer (About)

• ACKNOWLEDGE WHO GOD IS: Our Father, our great God and the rock of our salvation;

• ALIGN YOUR LIFE WITH GOD'S WILL: Pray that you will demonstrate the true and genuine thanksgiving that Psalm 95 calls you to in Christ;

• ASK GOD FOR WHAT YOU NEED:

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