Psalm Meditation 499
First Sunday After Epiphany
January 10, 2009

Psalm 95
1 O come, let us sing to the LORD; let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation!
2 Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving; let us make a joyful noise to him with songs of praise!
3 For the LORD is a great God, and a great King above all gods.
4 In his hand are the depths of the earth; the heights of the mountains are his also.
5 The sea is his, for he made it, and the dry land, which his hands have formed.
6 O 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. O that today you would listen to his voice!
8 Do not harden your hearts, as at Meribah, as on the day at Massah in the wilderness,
9 when your ancestors tested me, and put me to the proof, though they had seen my work.
10 For forty years I loathed that generation and said, "They are a people whose hearts go astray, and they do not regard my ways."
11 Therefore in my anger I swore, "They shall not enter my rest."
(NRSV)

This strikes me as a call to worship surrounded by opposing reasons to join the worshipping body. The psalm begins with a call to worship based in praise for all the great things God does around us and among us. On the other side of the call to worship in verse six is the reminder that those who don’t trust in God have the high price to pay of being cut off from God. Whether you worship because God is good or in order to protect yourself from God’s anger let us join together in worship.

While I admit that my fledgling steps into faithfulness were based in the negative I find it is not very helpful in the long term. Most often the negative is stated in terms of a better safe than sorry view. ‘If you believe and there is no God you have not done any damage to yourself or others. If you don’t believe and there is a God you have a pretty high price to pay at the end of your life.’ In this view the only reason to believe in God is to escape punishment. These are the folks who are constantly looking over their shoulder, or in some cases looking over your shoulder, to see all the ways God is actively condemning those who do not go through all the right motions in order to avoid catching hell later.

At some point I found myself responding to God in thanksgiving and praise. I discovered that God was not out to get me nearly as much as God was and is with me in all times and places. At times God is there to be a part of the fun of a given event, to encourage me to join in the good stuff going on around me. At other times God is with me to encourage me to make a different choice or to find a different group of which to be a part. In each situation and all the ones in between I discover that God is calling me to ever deeper and more healthy relationships with God and with those around me.

Whatever our motivation at the moment for our faithfulness the psalmist calls us to worship the God who has laid claim on us. Whether we join in worship to give thanks for the variety and richness around us or to avoid the anger and punishment of God it is good to join together as a body of worship with all our hurts and hopes. “O come, let us worship and bow down, let us kneel before the LORD, our Maker!”

© January 4, 2010