Today's reading is Psalm 100, a psalm for giving grateful praise.
Shout for joy to the Lord all the earth.
Worship the Lord with gladness.
Come before him with joyful songs.
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.
Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise.
Give thanks to him and praise his name.
For the Lord is good and his love endures forever.
His faithfulness continues through all generations.
The word of the Lord.
Well, good morning, Trinity.
It's good to be with you this morning on this summer Sunday.
It is, I know that there are more people than usual perhaps joining online.
Probably enjoying lovely cottages, but it's great that we are here.
And I think today we're going to learn why it's important for us to come together to praise.
Just last weekend, I had a wonderful experience.
My wife and I were at a wedding, actually Sunday last week.
And that was a bit unusual because it was really quite heartwarming.
It was two, a colleague of Yvonne's whose husband died a few years ago.
She ended up marrying another widower from her street.
They had been neighbors for something like 25 years, but after they sort of refound and reconnected in love.
And it was fun.
You know, it was beautiful.
It was at a winery in Niagara on the lake.
And I know a highlight for so many people when they go to a wedding is usually the wedding dance.
And it was the case there.
Now, I will say that I am a watcher of the dancing, not a dancer.
I am about the world's worst dancer.
However, there's something about watching and listening to the music play and see kids of all generations.
You know, older people, younger people coming together and just celebrating, kind of letting loose and enjoying time together.
But chances are, if you've been to a wedding any time in the past in a while, there are kind of a set of party songs, like a party playlist.
That probably some of these songs you'd find listed.
And depending on your generation, but it may even sound familiar.
Songs that are usually upbeat, cheerful.
These are not songs that kind of deep folk songs that kind of express longing and sadness.
No, it's kind of upbeat, cheerful, one note kind of songs.
Like things like, here's the list that I came up with.
I Got a Feeling by the Black Eyed Peas.
I got a feeling.
Or how about Uptown Funk by Bruno Mars?
Trust me, I was playing this in the car yesterday.
I cannot get an Uptown Funk out of my head.
It's been there.
Or Can't Stop the Feeling by Justin Timberlake.
Shake It Off by Taylor Swift.
How about Happy by Pharrell Williams?
These are all probably pretty familiar.
Well, as we think about those songs today, this is kind of connecting into the last.
This is the last installment of our summer sermon series where we have been looking at the Psalms.
Right?
Since July, we have explored how the Psalms are a collection of Psalms and prayers and poems
that express a wide range of human emotions.
Joy, sorrow, anger, gratitude, and of course, praise.
These songs, we go to the Psalms and we read them because in some ways they give us the words to
help us express our feelings to the Lord.
Just looking back, Rob kicked us off at early July on why we should sing in the first place, Psalm 96.
We have looked at songs of protection, Psalm 91.
Songs about lasting truth, 145.
Songs that keep us going in times of sadness, Psalm 42.
Songs of comfort and songs of fire, Psalms 46 and 63.
But today's Psalm, Psalm 100, which we just had read a minute ago, it's a great way to end
because it brings all these pieces together and it's just pure praise.
It's kind of like the party playlist of the Psalms, the party mix of the Psalms.
So let me just say a few words about Psalm 100.
It's definitely one of the most well-known of the Psalms and it's a short song.
It's only five verses, but it's a song that's been written by the great John F. Kennedy.
But it's packed with practical wisdom that can shape our daily lives.
Now it's probably sounded familiar to you because we see it in a bunch of different places in our life as Christians.
So first of all, in liturgy, many churches, no matter what the denomination, will sometimes use Psalm 100 as a call to worship.
It's a short psalm. It kind of sets the tone for the praise for the service.
Now if we were in a more formal version of the Anglican morning prayer service, which is what happens when we don't have communion,
there's usually a stricter liturgy that follows.
And one of the pieces of that is what's called the Jubilate, which is actually this psalm.
So anytime people come together, it's this psalm that's part of that liturgy.
You may also be familiar with it from music.
You might know this tune.
We think of that as the doxology, but it actually was originally written as all people that on earth do dwell.
And the name of that tune is actually called Old Hundredth because it's based on Psalm 100.
And then also we may be familiar with this because it's often part of a personal devotion.
It's easy to memorize.
In fact, I remember it from my childhood. You know, in my church growing up, scripture memory was a big deal.
Now interestingly, even though we read in church from the NIV, you were only ever allowed to memorize scripture from the King James Version.
I don't know why.
So I have all these kind of King James Versions, verses in my mind that I remember when I was a kid.
The first one I think that I learned was John 3.16, but the second one was actually Psalm 100.
And I realized that in part because my parents gave us an album by a gospel group that actually is still around today, the Gaither Trio.
You know the Bill Gaither Trio?
You sometimes see them if you're an insomniac like me in the middle of the night.
You'll sometimes see their big gatherings on YesTV or something.
But they put out a gospel album in 1975, believe it or not, called I'm a Promise.
And one of the songs starts with the kids reciting this song, Psalm 100.
And so whenever I think about Psalm 100, I actually think about it with little kids with kind of southern accents saying this.
And so as I was thinking about getting ready for this today, I actually found the album and a little snippet of this.
And so I was going to have us all read Psalm 100, but why don't we let the Bill Gaither Trio kids say it out loud.
Let's take a listen.
We can keep going for a while here.
But the Lord is good.
So whenever I read this song, I always think of the Lord is good.
But it is part of personal devotion because it's part of who we are.
But let me give you a little bit more background about Psalm 100.
Sorry, the clicker is jumping ahead here.
There we go.
Well, first of all, we're not actually sure who wrote this song.
Sometimes in the book of Psalms, it says, you know, a Psalm of David or whatever.
This one is not quite sure.
But as we heard when it was read, we are given instructions right off at the top.
And it says this song is for giving thanks or for grateful praise.
So we know actually that this song was also part of the liturgy of the ancient Israelites.
It was to accompany what they called a thank offering.
So you see that in the in Leviticus, Leviticus seven, for example.
It was a specific kind of ritual, an offering, a peace offering that was given to God as an expression of gratitude.
And the way it worked is that worshippers would bring food.
They bring bread, but also an animal to sacrifice.
But compared to some of the other sacrifices they did, they didn't just destroy the animal.
They actually kept part of it, shared it as a meal together.
So as part of that, thank offering.
It helped cultivate a spirit of gratitude, included community of all people and acknowledged God's ongoing provision.
So it was used in liturgy.
But it was also if you look at it where it's collected in the Book of Psalms, it's part of what some people have called the kingship Psalms.
This starts at Psalm 93 and ends at Psalm 100, which we're looking at today.
If you look at these songs, Psalms compared to kind of the tone of some of the others in the book,
they're distinct in their focus on God's rule, God's rule over all.
It offers powerful messages of hope, justice and universal worship.
The idea that we all need to come together in these Psalms, God is portrayed as the ultimate ruler.
It reminds us of God's ultimate control over history.
It provides comfort and assurance that he's in control.
But not only that, but we also learn from these Psalms that God is a king whose reign is characterized by justice and righteousness.
And I tell you, the Israelites were all too familiar with kings who let them down from time to time, even King David, who wrote a bunch of the Psalms.
Right.
So unlike human kings, God could be trusted.
And so that really drives us into what I would say are three big themes in the Psalms.
There's a lot we can explore to learn.
It's about praise, identity and gratitude.
When I sent the sermon notes to Rob this past week, and I encourage you to follow along as we go through that if you got those coming in,
Rob said, hey, you've got three points in your sermon.
You're ready to be ordained.
I thought, oh, is that that's all it takes?
There we go.
But compared to a lot of the other Psalms that we've heard, where sometimes, you know, if you read the narrative through the Psalms,
certainly because they're usually are longer, sometimes it's about praise.
And then they go in and say, but, Lord, I'm having so much trouble or my enemies are against me or smite them, please, will you?
And then at the end, it's kind of come back to praise again.
Psalm 100 is kind of like a one note song.
It's like those party songs you see at the wedding.
Right.
This it's just pure praise.
But even in those five verses, there's a lot for us to consider.
So in those Psalms, themes in the in the Psalm, they encourage us to praise God because of his goodness and love.
Now, just before we dive into those three themes, I will say that over the years, I've had the experience of being able to give advice to people who are making presentations,
whether it's the boards or speeches or whatever.
And I've done lots myself.
I always say that we want to make sure that as you present, you ask yourself about your audience, what do you want them to know?
What do you want them to do?
And how do you want them to feel?
And the best presentations tick all those boxes.
And what I would say is that whoever wrote the Psalm, Psalm 100, captured all of those things for us.
So even as you hear me talk about these themes, think about what is the knowledge that we want to have?
What is this song telling us that we should do?
But also, what's the expectation around how we should feel?
So it's not just pure feeling.
So in other words, that we're kind of up and down depending on our mood.
And it's not just about pure head knowledge.
It's about bringing those things together.
So keep that in mind as we go through it.
Well, let's examine the main themes.
First of all, as we look at Psalm 100, Psalm 100 right from the beginning prescribes praise.
Make a joyful noise unto the Lord or sing songs of joy.
It doesn't ask for permission.
It says, hey, if you're up to it, if you're feeling it, how about praising?
No, it says coming right out.
Your goal, your job as a follower of God, follower of the maker of the universe is to praise.
In the face of this king, we have to praise.
And by the way, it doesn't say you need to praise only when it's beautiful or quiet or, you know, subdued.
In fact, if you look at verse one, the top one is in the New International Version, which we read today.
Shout for joy to the Lord all the earth.
I actually love the one from that I remember as a kid from King James Version.
Make a joyful noise unto the Lord all ye lands.
It's good because I also know that not everyone is a beautiful singer.
And if you feel constrained as you come to church or even in your own time of worship that God is going to be
listening to whether your tone or whatever, that's not the case.
It's the enthusiasm that God is looking for.
As I was thinking about this, I came across, I couldn't resist including this quote from the actor Colin Firth.
He said, my singing voice is somewhere between a drunken apology and a plumbing problem.
Even Colin Firth, if he was led this way, could express shouts of joy to make a joyful noise unto the Lord.
And the Psalm tells us as part of these kingship songs that we want to join all of creation,
all the earth in doing so.
That's what we see again and again, this theme that it's not just us.
We are part of creation expressing its love for God.
And here's another example from Psalm 96, another one of these Psalms.
Let the heavens rejoice.
Let the earth be glad.
The sea resound and all that is in it.
Let the fields be jubilant and everything in them.
Let all the trees of the forest sing for joy.
All creation rejoice before the Lord.
We learn from these songs that worship is meant to be a universal act.
But what does it mean to worship with gladness, come before the Lord with joyful songs?
Well, the Psalm does encourage us to come before the Lord with singing.
But more importantly, it's coming before the Lord with joy.
Not begrudgingly, but because we are responding to God's goodness.
Praise lifts our spirits.
Praise helps us to enter into God's presence.
And praise helps us remember God's blessing.
A firm truth, we look forward together.
And we remember what that one true God, that amazing King did yesterday,
what he's doing today, what he will do going forward.
So how should we praise?
Well, first here, I want to encourage us is let's let loose.
Like those wedding party songs, this Psalm wants us to praise our King with abandon and without hesitation.
I had to drive across town yesterday on 407.
And so I thought, you know, I'm just going to listen to those songs on my little wedding party playlist that I had as I was thinking about this.
No matter what I could do, I couldn't kind of make myself not kind of bop along, right?
Because it didn't really matter.
There was nobody there.
I could let loose.
This Psalm encouraged us to kind of let go, to get out of our heads and into our body and just praise.
Nothing should hinder us from entering into God's presence.
And what's interesting is compare this to what the situation was for those Israelites at that time who wanted to praise,
if they wanted to enter into, as the song says, as the Psalm says, into God's courts, into through his gates.
You know, back in the time, the only person who really could enter into God's presence was the chief priest.
Once a year, the chief priest was allowed to go into what they called the Holy of Holies behind this curtain where the Ark of the Covenant was.
And it was so seen as only that person with that rank and that role could do that.
And in fact, it was so they considered it so dangerous that before the priest went in there, they tied a ribbon around his ankle.
So that in case he was overcome somehow, they could drag him back out.
That's a hindrance to getting into God's presence.
But Psalm 100 says, no, it's stripping all of that away.
Come as you are, no matter who you are, no matter what your background is, what your rank is.
Now, I mentioned that we don't really know who wrote this song.
It's possible that David did.
And it's clear that he actually was no stranger for letting loose in praise.
So this is a picture of King David in Second Samuel.
He makes this amazing opportunity of bringing the Ark of the Covenant back to Jerusalem.
And he is so overcome with praise and emotion that the scripture, and if you read the King James, he stripped naked and danced before the Lord.
Now, chances are he wasn't actually naked.
He was wearing kind of this priestly garment.
This is a photo of it, a picture of it.
But it reminds me of the quote, you know, sing like no one is listening.
Love like you've never been hurt.
Dance like no one's watching and live like it's heaven on earth.
So as we think about this, you don't have to be naked.
You don't have to strip off in front of this.
But are you constrained by this?
Where do you feel constrained in your praise and in your prayer?
Maybe you were too concerned about what others might see or hear.
So first, let's let loose as we loosen our inhibitions in the face of God.
Second, we should sing loud.
We should sing loud.
It's not about keeping our praise to ourselves, but actually about joining with the praise of others.
Now, if you're like me and our family, when the Olympics are on, it just becomes this big event, right?
We just have the television on nonstop and usually on multiple screens because we just love the competition so much.
But there are moments when you can feel like the whole country of Canada is kind of glued to your seat and watching what's going on.
You know, an example for me was watching the Canadian 4x100 relay team, right?
André Degrasse, he'd had a couple of tough other races.
And then out of the blue, the underdog country came out to win the gold medal.
We were sort of cheering from our seats.
It's that experience, those moments of being loud that we want to let people know.
We want to join together and praise together.
I had a very different experience of this just this past week.
On Monday, I had a wedding on Sunday, but we went to a wedding of a family friend in Pennsylvania on Monday.
She was a singer, a musician, an artist.
And so just as the beginning of the service filled the church, her husband, now a widower, stood up and said,
What Susan really wants, would have wanted, is for you as we sing these hymns, to sing them loud, sing together.
And so when that first song, that first hymn came surrounded by people, the volume in that church was unbelievable.
And it was a sense of praise that transcended anything nice we could have said about Susan, who was a wonderful person.
But it was a chance for coming together and singing out loud.
But third, as we praise, we also want to celebrate love that lasts.
The Psalms last verse actually says that God's love endures forever.
It endures, continues through generations.
And so when we praise, we praise God for this fantastic, steadfast love.
Now, in lots of weddings, including the one I was at last week, you'll hear 1 Corinthians 13 read, you know, often, you know, love is patient, love is kind.
It's interesting because it's actually, we actually had it read at our wedding as well.
It's actually not about romantic love. It's actually an exhortation.
But one of the key pieces that I love is talks about this love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never ends.
As we praise, the Psalm tells us that God's love in a sense is inexhaustible.
And it compares actually to the transient nature of human love.
Society's view of love is that it's temporary.
It's like a flame of a matchstick that gets blown out, eventually burns out.
But as we think about this, Psalm 100, as it prescribes praise, it's part of our response to God's majesty and his steadfast love.
OK, so the second theme, it prescribes praise.
It also, we are inspired by identity.
What identity are we talking about?
Well, first of all, we have to ask who God says he is and then who God says we are.
And then we also have to reflect on whose we are.
The Psalm first tells us that the Lord is God, that is, that emphasis on being a king, the God that we serve is both creator and king.
And again, we see this imperative.
It says, know that the Lord is God.
Doesn't say feel that the Lord is God.
Know that the Lord is God.
It's that head and heart balance.
But this is not just a ruler that we worship or praise because he's in charge.
We also learn about the nature of God in the short Psalm.
We hear that our God is what?
Good.
We hear that phrase, it's so simple, but we explore in the Bible.
What does it mean?
We learn that God actually sets the standard for goodness.
Goodness is actually compassion, love, it's care.
God has no evil.
His intentions and motivations are pure.
We see this again and again in parts of the scripture.
Psalm 145, the Lord is good to everyone.
He showers compassion.
Psalm 86, oh, Lord, you are so good, so ready to forgive.
And then Jesus himself says, who is good but God alone?
So we serve this God.
He's a king.
We know who he is.
The Lord is God, but he's also good.
But we also need to learn who we are in God's sight.
We are made by God.
Friends, we aren't accidents.
We were created with divine intention and we were made by God in his image.
David expresses this in Psalm 139, one of my favorite Psalms, when he says,
for you form my inmost park, my inmost being.
You, Lord, knit me together in my mother's womb.
We're precious to him.
He knows us.
He created us.
He loves us.
But we also see that when we learn who we are, we also learn whose we are in this Psalm.
The Psalm tells us that we are his people.
God wants us.
He wants to be in a relationship with us.
More than a thousand years after this Psalm was written, God proved this through the powerful
work of Jesus' life, death, and resurrection.
And God ultimately accomplished this work of salvation because his heart beat for his
people.
He couldn't have it any other way.
Psalm 17, we say, God, keep us as the apple of your eye, the center of your being.
Hide me in the shadow of your wings.
And we know that he won't abandon us.
Another image that we see in this Psalm is similar to what we see maybe in Psalm 23,
which is that we are his sheep.
He cares for us.
So it says we are his people and the sheep of his pasture.
This is maybe the one moment in the Psalm where the tone shifts a little bit from this
exuberant praise to just for a moment bringing us back to the calm of the sheep and the
shepherd beside the babbling brook.
Now I was actually interested.
I also thought another song, and this may actually be from the Gators when I thought
about this this morning.
I also learned as a kid the song that said, talked about the sheep of his pasture and
went like this, no matter how bad we are, Jesus loves us.
No matter how far we go, he'll always carry us home.
Well, we know from this picture that God is with us.
He's the shepherd.
He's with us in the field.
He leads.
He protects.
He disciplines.
But if he strays, he comes to get us.
And as we look ahead in 1 Peter 5, we actually see the link to who the Bible calls the chief
shepherd, Jesus.
So as we reflect on the fact that we find our praise anchored in the identity of who
God is and who we are, we remember that we're God's creation, his people, the sheep of his
pasture.
Our world wants to define us differently, right?
By our achievements, by our possessions, maybe by our social status.
But Psalm 100 tells us something different.
And knowing this actually should bring us a deep sense of peace and security.
If we belong to God, we can trust him to care for us, just as a shepherd cares for his sheep.
Doesn't mean that life will be easy, but it does mean that we can trust that we're never
alone, that our worth is found in God, not in the opinions of others.
So we need to remind ourselves about this identity.
God's creation, his beloved.
And it provides a foundation of confidence and peace.
Well our last theme, and by no means the least, is that our praise is to be grounded in gratitude.
Praise and thanks are connected in the Psalm, right from that heading at the beginning for
grateful praise.
And each element supports the other.
And this is a theme we see throughout scripture.
First Thessalonians, for example, Paul says, give thanks in all circumstances, for this
is God's will for you.
Paul was no stranger to difficulty, but he learned to give thanks.
He understood that he was among the people of God.
He was in.
And we realize that when we're counted as one of the people of God, we can respond in
the same way.
It should be that we can't contain our gratitude.
But what does it mean, and how should we give thanks to God?
Well first we should give thanks together.
The Hebrew word that we translate giving thanks, it actually means to praise or give public
acknowledgement.
It's that we are to tell others what God has done.
It's different than like sending somebody a thank you note on a small piece of paper.
It's like one of those big cards that you send to somebody, you know, where everybody
signs.
We're giving gratitude together.
So it's significant when we gather in church like this.
It's not something we can just do on our own.
But we say thanks to God and it's linked to our praise.
Second as we give thanks, we also respond to God's truth.
Giving thanks to God helps believers focus on the truth and promises of God, like those
truths about God's identity and ours.
And focusing on the truth and the promises of God, it emboldens our faith and encourages
us.
And it's one of those moments where we can affirm the truth and the knowledge of who
God is and who we are, even when we may feel different.
Being faithful is to thank even in circumstances.
And then third, as we're grounded in gratitude, we need to turn our thanks into action.
Gratitude is not just a feeling, it's a practice.
It's something that we can cultivate in our lives.
In verse two, in many of the English translations, it says serve the Lord with gladness.
That idea of service, when we focus on God's goodness, his love, his faithfulness, we see
life differently.
Gratitude actually shifts our perspective from what we lack to what we have, from our
problems to God's provision.
And when I talk to donors in the organization that I lead, World Vision, so often I ask
them, why are you giving?
Why are you being so generous?
And they will say, because I am blessed.
I want to give back.
This attitude of gratitude, if you will, compels them to share and to give to others, to give
and to serve.
Well, Psalm 100 packs a lot.
It gives us a lot of encouraging information in just those five verses.
But we see how it prescribes and requires us to praise God.
Our praise is founded on that identity that we have, who he's created us to be and how
he cares for us.
And it connects our praise with thanksgiving.
Putting it all together, one commentator says that we can capture the reason why we praise
with this party mix of a Psalm in this summary, simply to say the Lord is good, the Lord is
God, and God is good.
If you take that away, that's a reminder for us.
That's why we shouldn't hesitate to make a joyful noise.
As I said at the start, this is the last of our series on the Psalms in summer playlist.
God loves our songs.
He loves our praise.
In Psalm 22, it actually says that God inhabits the praise of his people.
The image, if you see it, it's like our praise is a throne that he sits on.
When we praise and when we sing, we connect with God and he shows up in powerful ways.
Did you know there are actually more passages in the Bible around singing than there are
about prayer?
And that's because there's a way of connecting through praise and song different from other
ways.
And, you know, I was thinking about some examples of my own life.
When I travel, particularly on the continent of Africa, there is no meeting or group or
visit that doesn't start with exuberant praise and dancing.
It goes above and beyond any language barrier, situation, cultural barrier.
That brings us together in celebration.
My mother actually told me recently about visiting her sister who is in a long-term
care facility in a memory care unit.
She has challenge with dementia and so on.
But recently, her sisters were together and she was invited.
She used to be a church pianist for many, many years.
I was invited to come to the piano and she was able to play hymns of praise, even beyond
what she was able to communicate.
It connects us in something inside in a different way.
I remember the moment when we were gathering around my father who died a number of years
ago.
And, you know, what we were compelled to do for both the comfort of those family members
who were around him but also for him was to sing hymns around him.
Because there's a way of connecting that songs and praise allows us to do that.
And then finally, probably one of the most significant moments for me was in 2018.
I was in the Central African Republic.
It's probably one of the most challenging places of the world to be a child.
Ongoing conflict, desperation, food insecurity, displacement.
And I was feeling frustrated, I have to admit, at the end of the week, recognizing just what
a gap there was between the resources available to help and the needs of children and families
on the ground.
And we'd sat in meetings and so on and we were getting ready for another day of that.
But before we did it, it was actually Palm Sunday.
And we joined with the local church in one of the remote areas.
And we were invited to take part in their Hosanna procession.
I know I've told this story before, but I think it's worth repeating today as we think
about it.
Unlike what we might do here where we might wave a palm frond, we gathered together as
families, as hundreds of people, and we circled and walked around the entire village.
Worshipping and worshiping in the midst of this.
And what I would say is probably one of the darkest parts of the world.
I was feeling the injustice.
But as we gathered and went back and found our way back into the church to start our
service, I recognized that through that praise, I was actually helping to declare that the
King, the God, the creator cares for his people and breaks through all the difficulties that
we have.
The sin, the injustice, and it was a powerful way as we made a joyful noise together.
So as you leave today, as we leave today, I encourage you to take all of these Psalms
and today especially Psalm 100 with you.
Let's make a joyful noise in our daily lives, remembering who we are in God and giving thanks
for his endless goodness and love.
May the Psalm not only be part of our worship, but a part of your life, a way of life that
draws us closer to God and transforms how we see the world.
Amen.