There are days that I wake up in the morning and I don’t feel like the songwriter did when he wrote this Psalm. I don’t know about you but there are days, I feel like shouting, but, not joyful stuff. I would have to think that the writer of this Psalm whether it was David or someone else had good days and bad ones. We could suppose that this songwriter was having a great day when he penned these words and they are nothing more than the gushing sentiment of a psalmist having a great day and simply thanking God for His good fortune. There are others Psalms that are not as pleasant or positive. And you don’t have to go far from Psalm 100. Psalm 102 says, “Lord, hear my prayer! Listen to my plea! Don’t turn away from me in my time of distress. Bend down to listen, and answer me quickly when I call to you. For my days disappear like smoke, and my bones burn like red-hot coals. My heart is sick, withered like grass, and I have lost my appetite. Because of my groaning, I am reduced to skin and bones.”
I can relate to these ancient songwriters. Some days I feel like Psalm 100, and others I feel like Psalm 102. It’s important to note that Scripture helps us to relate to God in our bad and good times. 2 Timothy 3:16 says, “All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful to teach us what is true and to make us realize what is wrong in our lives. It corrects us when we are wrong and teaches us to do what is right”
This means that there is truth in this Psalm to teach us something. You may not be having the kind of day, or month or even year that you feel like shouting to the Lord with a joyful noise. You may feel more like Psalm 102, groaning, sick, tired and depressed. This is the great thing about God’s Word though, you can learn about God and how to respond to Him, no matter what kind of day you’re having. And Psalm 100 teaches us a lot about God and how to worship Him.
The key to worship as this Psalm teaches is found in verse 3.
Know that the Lord is God
Most people in the world do not know this truth. The Joshua Project is an online research initiative seeking to highlight the ethnic people groups of the world with the fewest followers of Christ. According to their research there are 6.9 billion people living in the world today. Consider less than 1 billion people live in North, Central and South America combined and 1.2 billion live in one country alone. One of the most unreached countries on earth, China, almost 83% of the population has no idea about Jesus Christ. If the truth of Scripture teaches us that joy on the earth comes from knowing God, there are a lot of people in one country that will never experience the joy we know.
You may be having a great day, or a bad day, the great thing is that you have the opportunity to hear about the truth of your God. Your neighbors, friends, co-workers and your family all have ample opportunity to hear about the truth of God. But there are places on earth where the joy of knowing God is silent and non-existent. One of the keys to worship is the knowledge that we are doing everything we can to help the message of Jesus Christ get out into the world. Jesus said, “Go and make disciples of all the nations,baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Matthew 28:19-20
I’ve heard it suggested that this was a command of Jesus only given to the audience of the Apostles present when he said this, so this commission doesn’t apply to us. But again, we need to allow the Scripture to teach us. 1 Peter 2:8-9 says, “people stumble because they do not obey God’s word, and so they meet the fate that was planned for them. But you are not like that, for you are a chosen people. You are royal priests, a holy nation, God’s very own possession. As a result, you can show others the goodness of God, for he called you out of the darkness into his wonderful light” Paul says in Ephesians 4:11-12 “Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers. Their responsibility is to equip God’s people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ.”
What is God’s work? Jesus defined it! He told us to share the truth of His resurrection, and His Saving Power, with as many as possible. I’m speaking to a group of folks who know that the Lord is God, but, I wonder how are we doing at reaching the rest of our world with this message? Shouldn’t this truth drive how we budget and spend our money? How we talk and act around others? The Lord IS God. We can’t have some kind of mediocre response to this truth. We are either all in, or we’re not in at all. David Platt in his book Radical says and I quote, “The price is certainly high for people who don’t know Christ and who live in a world where Christians shrink back from self-denying faith and settle into self-indulging faith. While Christians choose to spend their lives fulfilling the American dream instead of giving their lives to proclaiming the kingdom of God, literally billions in need of the Gospel remain in the dark”
The second truth this Psalm teaches us about worship is in verse 5
God is Good
The fact that God is Lord and that He is good is great news for us! Some say there is nothing good about God. In his book Hell Is Real But I Hate To Admit It, Brian Jones writes, “Outspoken atheist Richard Dawkins wrote: The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully...Dawkins is dead wrong, not because he paints God with too cruel a brushstroke but because he’s too flattering. The God of the Bible is far more vengeful than Dawkins could ever dream. The real God, the Deity we only catch a glimpse of in Scripture is infinitely more bloodthirsty, vindictive, genocidal, pestilential, sadomasochistic, and capriciously malevolent than human language could begin to express.”
But what about the good part? This is the human dilemma. It’s impossible to understand the goodness of God without accepting the part about God is Lord. He’s boss. In charge. The ultimate call. No one does anything or even thinks anything without His knowledge. God is good. You’re not. God is pure. You’re not. God is holy. You’re not. God is the definition of all that is Right and Good. You’re not. We suffer on a planet that was doomed once we disobeyed God. God in His GOODNESS gave us a way out. God in His GOODNESS offered His Son Jesus to pay for the penalty of our sinful nature. His GOODNESS is that HE triumphs over our sin to offer us an eternal place with Him instead of being punished as we deserve in hell.
I saw a joke on the internet the other day. The city of Dallas Texas re-named a street in honor of Chuck Norris; but then had to reconsider once people started dying. They soon grimly realized that you can’t cross Chuck Norris and live.
You can’t cross God and live. Jesus Christ is the Goodness of God defined. He is the reason for our worship and our celebration. Why we can “Shout to the Lord!”
Again, I’m speaking to a group of people who know Jesus, but do we worship Him as He deserves? Do we shout His Name, do we offer thanks to Him, do we praise Him all the time, or just when we feel like it? Romans 12:12 says, “Rejoice in our confident hope. Be patient in trouble, and keep on praying.” “But Christ, as the Son, is in charge of God’s entire house. And we are God’s house, if we keep our courage and remain confident in our hope in Christ” Hebrews 3:6
I’ve heard God referred to as a celestial vending machine. In other words, when I want something or need something, I’ll slip in some prayer, or maybe a worship song or two and then demand God provide what it is I’m asking for. It doesn’t work that way. God is good as HE defines goodness, not as you define Him. If I could define God, make some meaning out of why He does what He does, or figure out a way to get in His head, He would in that moment cease to be God. The truth is, I can’t do that because He is God.
Romans 5:2-4 “Because of our faith, Christ has brought us into this place of undeserved privilege where we now stand, and we confidently and joyfully look forward to sharing God’s glory. We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they help us develop endurance. And endurance develops strength of character, and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation.”
This verse sums up all what Psalm 100 is about. We shout to the Lord because of our faith in Christ. It is because of our hope in our eternal life that we sing songs of gladness. We worship Him because we know that the Lord is God, and we understand that our God is good because He produced the gift of Jesus Christ. We are not thankful necessarily because of our stuff, our freedom, or our family, we are thankful because we are saved! Ultimately this is the truth that motivates us to live not for ourselves but for Him.
Romans 7:24-25 “Oh, what a miserable person I am! Who will free me from this life that is dominated by sin and death? 25 Thank God! The answer is in Jesus Christ our Lord.”
