Psalm 100 A psalm. For giving thanks.
Let us begin by reading the first verse of Psalm 100 and 66. Wait a minute there is no Psalm 166. If you are looking for it, you have not read your Bible enough to realize there are only 150 Psalms. What I mean is to read the first verse of Psalm 100 and the first verse of Psalm 66. Let’s read 66 first.
Shout with joy to God, all the earth! Psalm 66:1
Now turn to Psalm 100.
1 Shout for joy to the LORD, all the earth.
2 Worship the LORD with gladness; come before him with joyful songs.
3 Know that the LORD is God. It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.
4 Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name.
5 For the LORD is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations.
Psalm 100 is known as a Psalm for thanks giving and sometimes also refer as a Psalm of praise. But I recently found out that of the 150 Psalms, about 70% of it takes the form of lament and only a minority focus on praise and thanksgiving.
When you read the Psalm, it is like a roller coaster ride of emotion and moods fighting against each other. On one end we read about a deep despair and doubts and then on the other end we read about the soaring confidence and praise to God. Doubts. Paranoia, meanness, delight, hatred, joy, praise, vengefulness, betrayal – you find it all. The Psalms give us a comprehensive record of life with God through an individual accounts of the author. It is like a spiritual journal of a personal letter to God. 73 or about half of the Psalms are attributed to David. By reading his Psalm we see that David maintained a very personal relationship with God. By comparing the Psalm he wrote and then compare with the historic record in 1st and 2nd Samuel, we caught David’s spiritual and personal journey with God.
His psalms form a record of his conscious effort to orientate his daily life to God. We on the other hand, fill our day with activities after activities and then try o carved out sometime for spiritual activity such as coming to church and worship. Worship to David and the Psalmists was the central activities in life, not something to get over so that we can get back to our activities. They made God the center of their life so that everything relate to God. It is the other way round.
And so when we read Psalm 100 we can truly appreciate the thanksgiving and the praise because it is as real as the author can experience which he instructed us to do.
1 Shout for joy to the LORD, all the earth.
In praise, the creature happily acknowledge that everything good and beautiful and true in the universe come from the creator. Here it tells us that praise need not be sober and reflective. We are to shout for joy to the Lord and in Psalm 66 shout with joy to the Lord because the world cannot contain the delight God inspires.
We shout for our team, our child for joy. But not just us, it did not say only the supporter of Jehovah is to shout for joy. All the earth is suppose to shout. We will see why later in verse 3.
2 Worship the LORD with gladness; come before him with joyful songs.
Verse 2 give us the attitude of gladness and the action of come to him with joyful songs.
Worship involves attitudes and actions.
Attitudes of awe, reverence, respect, adoration, gladness
Actions of bowing, singing, praising, jumping, serving, giving, preaching …
Singing (Psalm 30:4)
Shouting (Psalm 35:27)
Making a joyful noise (Psalm 98:4)
Laughter (Psalm 126:1-3)
Thanksgiving (Psalm 100:4)
Standing (Deut 10:8)
Kneeling (Psalm 95:6)
Clapping (Psalm 47:1)
Dancing (Psalm 149:3)
Uplifted hands (Psalm 63:4)
Making music on instruments (2 Sam 6-5)
Matt 5:8 - “This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoureth me with their lips; but their heart is far from me” (Matthew 15:8). Can’t be hypocrite.
Worship is both a subjective experience and an objective activity. Let me share with you what Warren Wersbe had written in his book real worship.
In John 4:4. the Lord Jesus said that his worshippers must worship him in spirit and in truth. In spirit (not capitalized) is the subjective part and in truth is the objective part.
So when worship God, we let our spirit take control. When John says worship in spirit and in truth, he is talking about worship God through our personal experience. Worship should be a result of our response to God. In short, it is our personal relationship with Him. Don’t misunderstand me here, we must not neglect the Holy Spirit to guide us. I believe the Holy Spirit will not violate our personality but use it to express our praise to god. This is why no two believers can have identical worship experience even though they participate in the same service, at the same time, in the same venue. My worship experience this morning is not the same as Eng Hock or Simon or Alvin because we all have different personal experience and relationship with the same God. Eng Hock was jumping and clapping when we sang “Hallelujah to The Lamb” just now, I wasn’t but we both worship with gladness, although the degree may be different. So it is very subjective.
On the other hand, objective truth cannot be changed, even though our understanding or our experience may change. Verse 3 reads: Know that the LORD is God. It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people, the sheep of his pasture. Two things to take note. Number 1 is that truth is important. It is such a sad affair that million of people are worshiping God without the correct truth. Hence knowledge is important. Here it reminds us that God made us. It reminds us of the relationship of creature and creator. We know that He is the God who made us, hence as the creature, we enjoy the creation and honor the creator. The Holy sovereign God is eternal. Matter is not eternal, hence we don’t worship the creation but the creator. Remember we are his. As sheep of His pasture reminds us again of a God who will take care of us.
We must equip ourselves with knowledge about our God so that we can worship him. Knowing the truth such as Trinity, salvation, holy Spirit and His son, Jesus Christ. Also He is a living God, Christ is sinless , God is love and willing to forgive, the resurrected Lord cannot be changed or compromised. We sang Hallelujah to the lamb. The truth is the Lamb takes away our sin. So when we worship Him this morning, we must not under mind this truth. Here all of us in the church must subscribe to the written truth in the Bible. We must keep the right balance. Bible knowledge must come with personal spiritual experience. While we must not base our theology on experience neither must we debase our theology by divorcing it from experience.
4 Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name.
Worshipper must be active participants. We are to give thanks and to praise His name.
I. Thanksgiving is the Only Appropriate Response for What God Has Done for Us.
1) Thanksgiving requires us to focus on the blessings that God has provided.
2) When we stop focusing on the blessings God has provided, we lose our perspective regarding thanksgiving.
3) When we lose our perspective regarding thanksgiving, our relationship with God will begin to suffer.
4) Thanksgiving is the only appropriate response if we wish to maintain our relationship with God.
II. Thanksgiving Brings About A Change of Attitude In Our Lives.
Thanksgiving leads to humility, dependence on God in prayer and joy.
III. Thanksgiving Spurs us to Action for the Welfare and Benefit of Others.
5 For the LORD is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations.
However, we are called to worship our God is not a one way street command. God himself prove to us that He is worthy of our praise because He is good and He is faithful forever.
Complaining and questioning slander God, and they also reveal pride. We are freed from these bad attitudes when we hold on to one simple truth: God is good. He is always good. He can't be any other way. His nature is good, and He always acts in accordance with His nature. We must hold steadfastly to our knowledge that God is good because appearances will sometimes indicate otherwise.
We don’t have to go far. Psalm 103 sum up nicely why God is good.
Psalm 100 not only called us to worship but also tell us how to worship. The Psalmist, in an especial manner, invites believers to praise God, because he has chosen them to be his people, and has taken them under his care.
Let us begin by reading the first verse of Psalm 100 and 66. Wait a minute there is no Psalm 166. If you are looking for it, you have not read your Bible enough to realize there are only 150 Psalms. What I mean is to read the first verse of Psalm 100 and the first verse of Psalm 66. Let’s read 66 first.
Shout with joy to God, all the earth! Psalm 66:1
Now turn to Psalm 100.
1 Shout for joy to the LORD, all the earth.
2 Worship the LORD with gladness; come before him with joyful songs.
3 Know that the LORD is God. It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.
4 Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name.
5 For the LORD is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations.
Psalm 100 is known as a Psalm for thanks giving and sometimes also refer as a Psalm of praise. But I recently found out that of the 150 Psalms, about 70% of it takes the form of lament and only a minority focus on praise and thanksgiving.
When you read the Psalm, it is like a roller coaster ride of emotion and moods fighting against each other. On one end we read about a deep despair and doubts and then on the other end we read about the soaring confidence and praise to God. Doubts. Paranoia, meanness, delight, hatred, joy, praise, vengefulness, betrayal – you find it all. The Psalms give us a comprehensive record of life with God through an individual accounts of the author. It is like a spiritual journal of a personal letter to God. 73 or about half of the Psalms are attributed to David. By reading his Psalm we see that David maintained a very personal relationship with God. By comparing the Psalm he wrote and then compare with the historic record in 1st and 2nd Samuel, we caught David’s spiritual and personal journey with God.
His psalms form a record of his conscious effort to orientate his daily life to God. We on the other hand, fill our day with activities after activities and then try o carved out sometime for spiritual activity such as coming to church and worship. Worship to David and the Psalmists was the central activities in life, not something to get over so that we can get back to our activities. They made God the center of their life so that everything relate to God. It is the other way round.
And so when we read Psalm 100 we can truly appreciate the thanksgiving and the praise because it is as real as the author can experience which he instructed us to do.
1 Shout for joy to the LORD, all the earth.
In praise, the creature happily acknowledge that everything good and beautiful and true in the universe come from the creator. Here it tells us that praise need not be sober and reflective. We are to shout for joy to the Lord and in Psalm 66 shout with joy to the Lord because the world cannot contain the delight God inspires.
We shout for our team, our child for joy. But not just us, it did not say only the supporter of Jehovah is to shout for joy. All the earth is suppose to shout. We will see why later in verse 3.
2 Worship the LORD with gladness; come before him with joyful songs.
Verse 2 give us the attitude of gladness and the action of come to him with joyful songs.
Worship involves attitudes and actions.
Attitudes of awe, reverence, respect, adoration, gladness
Actions of bowing, singing, praising, jumping, serving, giving, preaching …
Singing (Psalm 30:4)
Shouting (Psalm 35:27)
Making a joyful noise (Psalm 98:4)
Laughter (Psalm 126:1-3)
Thanksgiving (Psalm 100:4)
Standing (Deut 10:8)
Kneeling (Psalm 95:6)
Clapping (Psalm 47:1)
Dancing (Psalm 149:3)
Uplifted hands (Psalm 63:4)
Making music on instruments (2 Sam 6-5)
Matt 5:8 - “This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoureth me with their lips; but their heart is far from me” (Matthew 15:8). Can’t be hypocrite.
Worship is both a subjective experience and an objective activity. Let me share with you what Warren Wersbe had written in his book real worship.
In John 4:4. the Lord Jesus said that his worshippers must worship him in spirit and in truth. In spirit (not capitalized) is the subjective part and in truth is the objective part.
So when worship God, we let our spirit take control. When John says worship in spirit and in truth, he is talking about worship God through our personal experience. Worship should be a result of our response to God. In short, it is our personal relationship with Him. Don’t misunderstand me here, we must not neglect the Holy Spirit to guide us. I believe the Holy Spirit will not violate our personality but use it to express our praise to god. This is why no two believers can have identical worship experience even though they participate in the same service, at the same time, in the same venue. My worship experience this morning is not the same as Eng Hock or Simon or Alvin because we all have different personal experience and relationship with the same God. Eng Hock was jumping and clapping when we sang “Hallelujah to The Lamb” just now, I wasn’t but we both worship with gladness, although the degree may be different. So it is very subjective.
On the other hand, objective truth cannot be changed, even though our understanding or our experience may change. Verse 3 reads: Know that the LORD is God. It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people, the sheep of his pasture. Two things to take note. Number 1 is that truth is important. It is such a sad affair that million of people are worshiping God without the correct truth. Hence knowledge is important. Here it reminds us that God made us. It reminds us of the relationship of creature and creator. We know that He is the God who made us, hence as the creature, we enjoy the creation and honor the creator. The Holy sovereign God is eternal. Matter is not eternal, hence we don’t worship the creation but the creator. Remember we are his. As sheep of His pasture reminds us again of a God who will take care of us.
We must equip ourselves with knowledge about our God so that we can worship him. Knowing the truth such as Trinity, salvation, holy Spirit and His son, Jesus Christ. Also He is a living God, Christ is sinless , God is love and willing to forgive, the resurrected Lord cannot be changed or compromised. We sang Hallelujah to the lamb. The truth is the Lamb takes away our sin. So when we worship Him this morning, we must not under mind this truth. Here all of us in the church must subscribe to the written truth in the Bible. We must keep the right balance. Bible knowledge must come with personal spiritual experience. While we must not base our theology on experience neither must we debase our theology by divorcing it from experience.
4 Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name.
Worshipper must be active participants. We are to give thanks and to praise His name.
I. Thanksgiving is the Only Appropriate Response for What God Has Done for Us.
1) Thanksgiving requires us to focus on the blessings that God has provided.
2) When we stop focusing on the blessings God has provided, we lose our perspective regarding thanksgiving.
3) When we lose our perspective regarding thanksgiving, our relationship with God will begin to suffer.
4) Thanksgiving is the only appropriate response if we wish to maintain our relationship with God.
II. Thanksgiving Brings About A Change of Attitude In Our Lives.
Thanksgiving leads to humility, dependence on God in prayer and joy.
III. Thanksgiving Spurs us to Action for the Welfare and Benefit of Others.
5 For the LORD is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations.
However, we are called to worship our God is not a one way street command. God himself prove to us that He is worthy of our praise because He is good and He is faithful forever.
Complaining and questioning slander God, and they also reveal pride. We are freed from these bad attitudes when we hold on to one simple truth: God is good. He is always good. He can't be any other way. His nature is good, and He always acts in accordance with His nature. We must hold steadfastly to our knowledge that God is good because appearances will sometimes indicate otherwise.
We don’t have to go far. Psalm 103 sum up nicely why God is good.
Psalm 100 not only called us to worship but also tell us how to worship. The Psalmist, in an especial manner, invites believers to praise God, because he has chosen them to be his people, and has taken them under his care.
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