Psalm 95

Image by InspiredImages from Pixabay
Image by InspiredImages from Pixabay

O come, let us sing unto the Lord: let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation. Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving, and make a joyful noise unto him with psalms. For the Lord is a great God, and a great King above all gods. In his hand are the deep places of the earth: the strength of the hills is his also.The sea is his, and he made it: and his hands formed the dry land. O come, let us worship and bow down: let us kneel before the Lord our maker.

For he is our God; and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand. To day if ye will hear his voice, Harden not your heart, as in the provocation, and as in the day of temptation in the wilderness: When your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my work. Forty years long was I grieved with this generation, and said, It is a people that do err in their heart, and they have not known my ways: Unto whom I sware in my wrath that they should not enter into my rest. Psalm 95

There are two main exhortations in this Psalm: the first is an exhortation to praise the Lord and to make a joyful noise unto him. The second is an exhortation to not harden our hearts against him. These represent the two extremes between which we often find ourselves: joy in God and hardness toward him, and we are to be straining every spiritual nerve to move our hearts to joy in God and laboring with all our might to move away from hardness to God.

Then there are two reasons which undergird these exhortations. The first reason (which is highlighted in verses 1-6) is that God is the God of creation and that all that we see around us, the beauty and the majesty of the natural world, is a reflection of the glory and greatness of God. The second reason (which is highlighted in verses 7-11) is that God is the God of salvation and the shepherd of his people. If creation points us to God's might and power, surely salvation points us to God's mercy and grace in Christ Jesus. Together, they give us tremendous reasons to give to God the praise and joy of our hearts.

By: Jeremiah Bass