The Unknown Bible - Pastor Bevans Welder

The Six Commands of Ps 100

Ps 100:1-5

2-1-09

According to verse 5, the Lord is good, his mercy is everlasting and his truth endureth to all generations. Because of these things, we are commanded to:

Make a joyful noise unto the Lord – 1 – this is a noise that is not so much directed to him as it a noise that is joyful to him- like the joy that parents experience when they hear their children’s laughter – the noise we make should bring joy to the Lord’s ears – for instance, a family or a church in good fellowship is a joyful noise to the Lord – by contrast, fussing and bickering is no joy to the Lord’s ears - witnessing is guaranteed to bring joy to the Lord [Lk 15:10]

Serve the Lord with gladness – 2 – we know we are to serve the Lord, but we need to serve him with gladness – the Jews didn’t do this and as a result God plagued them with the many plagues about which he warned them in Deuteronomy 28 [Deut 28:47] – in the south we have an expression when someone thanks us for doing something nice for them – we say, “My pleasure” – soldiers SERVE in the Armed Forces – we are the Lord’s army – that’s the branch of the SERVICE we are in

Come before his presence with singing – 2 – the Lord desires his presence in our fellowship – one of the best ways to come into his fellowship is through singing – you always notice in churches where the congregational singing is really great, the presence of the Lord in the service is more evident – memorize hymns and sing them continuously

Know ye that the Lord he is God – 3 – this is when you get so personally acquainted with God that you know him intimately – when I remember back to meeting my wife for the first time, I could honestly tell someone that I knew her [because I had met her] – but if you ask me now if I know her after 29 years of marriage, I could tell you stuff about her that she doesn’t even know about herself – we need to know God like that – look at the progress of the knowledge in this verse:

a) We know first that he made us – education is destroying this today

b) We know that we are his people – in other words he has power over us

c) We know that we are his sheep – this is what you know after you get saved

Enter into his gates with thanksgiving – 4 – the greatest heart is a thankful heart – we are to “be thankful unto him” – we can thank him for everything because the bad ingredients in life combined with the other ingredients always work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose – Rom 8:28

Enter his courts with praise – 4 – we praise him when we “bless his name” – and we should praise his name because we pray in his name [Jn 14:14] – we are saved by his name [Acts 4:12] – we bow to his name [Phil 2:10] – and his name is wonderful [Is 9:6]