I preach in a lot of different places now. I used to have the privilege of preaching in one place just about every Sunday, and now I'm sort of everywhere. And as a discipline for myself, because I don't want to preach the same sermon or the same sermons all the time, I've been working through the Psalms as I go to various places. And I preached through all 150 Psalms at First Press Jackson, and then I actually went back and preached 22 sermons on Psalm 119 while I was at First Press Jackson. But I was not at all pleased with how all of those sermons went. So what I've actually been doing is I've been going back through the Psalms and I've been working on sermons that I didn't think I did a very good job of. And I've been using that as a discipline for myself because in my personal devotions I'm working through the Psalms right now and I'm actually using a little book that David Calhoun edited called Prayers on the Psalms. It's a tiny little book. It'll fit in your shirt pocket. And the Banner of Truth Trust published it just a few years ago. It is the little prayers that accompanied the Scottish Psalter of 1595. When the Scottish Psalter of 1595 was produced, that's about 20-something years after John Knox died, a new edition of the Scottish Psalter was published. When it was published, there was a little one-sentence prayer appended to every psalm. That prayer was in the form of a collect. A collect is a kind of a prayer that actually has five parts to it. One sentence, I mean, you could pray these prayers in probably 15 to 20 seconds. I mean, they're really that short. But they are very, very rich and meaty. And David Calhoun, who administered to me as a student, studied these prayers and produced an edition of these prayers, and I've been using them for my devotions. They actually come from a French Protestant martyr. a pastor named Augustin Marlerat who was a Huguenot minister who had served with Calvin in Geneva and then was martyred while he ministered in France. And his prayers in French were translated in English by somebody we really don't know who and then appended to the Scottish Psalter. And so I've been working through those prayers and then using that sort of work back through the Psalms. So Psalm 100, one of the most memorable of the prayers of the Psalter. You know, Psalm 23, even people who don't know the Psalms very well know Psalm 23. But probably right after Psalm 23, Psalm 100 is one of the best-known Psalms. We're going to sing at the end of the service, all people that on earth do dwell. That's got to be one of the still most widely used psalter tunes or lyrics in the English-speaking world today. And of course, it's based on this particular psalm. And I'd like to remind you several things about the psalms. The psalms express for us the whole range of Christian experience. Calvin called them the anatomy of all parts of the Christian soul. Calvin said the Psalms will give you the words to express anything and everything in the Christian life. They really provide for us the expression of Christian experience, both the highs and the lows of Christian experience. I had the privilege just last week of giving a little session on Samuel Rutherford. I was commenting that C.H. Spurgeon said that Samuel Rutherford's letters were the nearest thing to inspiration. outside of the Bible ever written by a mere human. And I was pondering with the pastors who were there, why would Spurgeon have thought that? Well, one, if you read the letters of Rutherford, they are filled with a passion and a love for Christ. If anything, Rutherford shows himself to be completely enwrapped by the very thought of Jesus Christ. He loves Jesus Christ. The other thing is hardship. Those two things just come out in Rutherford's letter, a passion for Christ, but also the hardships of the Christian life and ministry. And I said, if you look at Spurgeon's life, you could kind of sum up Spurgeon's life in ministry in the same way. A bold proclamation of Christ and yet a lot of hardship and struggle and difficulty, not only in his own life, but in the lives of the people that he was ministering to. Well, that's kind of like the Psalms too, isn't it? The praise of God and hardship. Both of those things are wrapped up in the Psalms. This psalm, of course, is the psalm on which all people that on earth do dwell is based. But it's also the psalm that Isaac Watts before Jehovah's awful or awesome throne is based. That's Watts' rendering of this psalm. And Spurgeon himself said, there's nothing like singing all people that on earth do dwell with a large congregation. There's just nothing like getting together and raising our voices to the rafters. The Huguenot refugees that came to Geneva often commented on the singing there at St. Peter's in Geneva, and you can imagine why. The Huguenot refugees often in France were in places where they could not sing out loud for fear of being caught by the authorities. And so when they came to Geneva and they were allowed to sing out loud, or where they heard singing out loud, it was very moving. My friend Mark Dever in Washington DC had a young man who was serving as an intern in his congregation who had come to faith in Christ in a country where Christianity is illegal and is actually under very aggressive persecution. And when he came to Capitol Hill Baptist Church, the first Sunday that he was there and they began singing, the man just dissolved into tears. And finally, one of the elders just came over next to him because he was convulsing in tears during the first hymn. And the elder sat down next to him and he said, are you okay? And the young man said, I've never heard singing. He had been a Christian for a number of years, but he had never heard the people of God sing because they couldn't sing where they were for fear of being captured. And to be in a congregation where they were singing just overwhelmed him. It was with everything, with joy, with a sense of wonder and appreciation and thanksgiving. So it wasn't a bad crying. and convulsing and breaking down. It was one of joy that he could be in a place where God could be sung to and praised with the voices. One of the old Puritans said this, the hearty and willing singing of the Psalms was taken by many Christian leaders to be an indication of the Reformation in people's hearts. In other words, at the time of the Reformation, a lot of people, ministers, would look at a congregation and ask the question, how do they sing? You know, does their singing of the Psalms show that the Reformation has reached all the way to their hearts? So I love the Psalms, and I'm so thrilled to be in Psalm 100 with you today. Now before I read the scripture for you, I want you to be on the lookout for six verbs in this psalm. And I'm just going to outline the message today around these six verbs and then one more, which I'm going to, it won't be a verb, it will be an interrogative that I'll throw in, but you'll understand why it fits with the last verse. But I want you to be on the lookout for these six verbs. Shout, serve, come, know, enter, and give, and then in the very final verse, why. Now you're not gonna see a why there, you're gonna see for the Lord our God is good, but that verse is actually answering the question why we ought to worship. So those are the verbs I want you to look. Shout, serve, come, know, enter, give, and then we'll ask the question, why? Why should we do this? This is the last in a little set of psalms that are about worship. And so the substance of this psalm is about how you worship the living God. And all six of those imperative verbs are there to help you know how to worship God. And then my final question, why, which corresponds to the last verse or the last stanza, explains to us why we ought to worship. So the whole psalm is designed to help us to worship the living God, even though the word worship, unless you count the word serve, which is often a synonym for worship in the Old Testament. The word worship doesn't appear in the psalm, but the whole psalm is about worship. And so we'll learn about worship following those six imperatives in that one question. Now, let's pray before we read God's word. Heavenly Father, we do not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. The grass withers and the flowers fade and they fall, but your word stands forever. Sanctify us with truth. Your word is truth. All scripture is given by inspiration and is profitable for teaching. and reproof and correction and training in righteousness that the man of God may be equipped for every good work. You have given pastors and you've given your word to equip the saints for the work of service. And so we pray, O God, that you would equip us by your word that you would teach us by your word, that you would correct us by your word, that you would mature us by your word, and that as you speak to us by your spirit in the word, that you would open our ears and eyes to behold wonderful things in your law. We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. This is the word of God. Hear it. in Psalm 100, a psalm for thanksgiving. Shout joyfully to the Lord, all the earth. Serve the Lord with gladness. Come before him with joyful singing. Know that the Lord himself is God. It is he who has made us and not we ourselves. We are his people and the sheep of his pasture. Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise. Give thanks to him. Bless his name. For the Lord is good. His loving kindness is everlasting. And his faithfulness to all generations. Amen. And thus ends this reading of God's holy, inspired, and inerrant word. May he write its eternal truth upon all our hearts. This great psalm is a psalm meant to teach us what it is to worship God and for us to encourage one another in the worship of the living God. And I'd like to walk through how it does it as we look at these six verbs in this one final question together today. The first thing that I want you to see is the heading of the psalm. Those psalm headings are part of scripture. They're not added by later editors. If you opened up the Hebrew text, the very first words of this psalm would be a psalm of or for Thanksgiving. And so the heading actually tells you what the psalm is designed to do. The psalm is designed to give you the vehicle, the words that you need in order to thank God. By the way, that's a good reminder of how the Psalms can help you in prayer. We know that in the Christian life, we're supposed to give thanks. There are times in the Christian life when we do not feel like giving thanks. There are times in the Christian life where we cannot conjure up the words with which to sincerely give God thanks. The Psalms are waiting for us there. When we don't have the words to give to God, God has given us the words that we can give back to God. And so the Psalms are a wonderful place to prime the pump of your soul. You may be in a place where you're dry. and you don't feel like you can honestly open your mouth and express with your mouth what's in your heart to God for whatever the circumstances in your life. The Psalms can provide you the words that you need when you don't feel like you can say those words to God yourself. The Puritans used to say, pray until you pray. That's really wise. And I think any Christians who have ever lived much of the Christian life know that that's a reality that sometimes when you start praying, you're not all there. And the Psalms can give you the words to do that. And I think the very heading, this is the Psalm of Thanksgiving, it's so wonderful. I know that gratitude is an important part of the Christian life. But I also know that I am often a craven ingrate, right? I'm not adequately grateful to God. And the psalms are there to help me be less ungrateful, to prime my pump so that I can actually express the kind of gratitude to God that I ought to in the Christian life. So this is a psalm for giving thanks. But of course, it's a psalm of worship. If you look back, go all the way back to Psalm 95, O come, let us sing for joy, unto the Lord. Let us shout joyfully to the rock of our salvation. Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving. Let us shout joyfully to him with psalms. How many times have you heard that used as a call to worship? It's one of my favorite calls to worship. And of course, you also get in Psalm 95 verses 6 and 7. 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 flock under his care. So Psalm 95 is a major psalm used for calls to worship, but so is Psalm 96. Look at Psalm 96. Sing to the Lord a new song. Sing to the Lord all the earth. Then Psalm 97, the Lord reigns, let the earth rejoice. Psalm 98, sing to the Lord a new song for he has done wonderful things. Psalm 99, the Lord reigns, let the peoples tremble. So what you have is a series of Psalms, all of which are about worship, but notice this, they are all directed not directly to God, but to one another. In other words, the psalmist opens up these Psalms speaking to you, the congregation, calling on you to worship the living God, you to shout for joy to the Lord. You to sing to the Lord a new song. You to come before him with praises. You've ever noticed that about the Psalms? So many of the Psalms are not addressed directly to God. Now you do get some of that. Psalm 145, 146, 147, 148, 149, 150. There's this direct address to God and about God. But many of the Psalms are, it's us speaking to one another to exhort one another to give to God the glory that is due his name. And of course, that's very important. For those of us, we now live under the glories of the new covenant. And that means it's always been true that God's people is a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. That's always, ever since there was a covenant of grace, that's been true. But that's even more true now. under Jesus Christ, and that's one reason why under the new covenant we don't have human priests. Partly that's because we have a great high priest, and partly that is because we are a kingdom of priests. So one of our priestly responsibilities when we gather is to exhort one another to praise. What do priests do in the temple? They praise God. What does the kingdom of priests do? They praise God. And so the Psalms will actually give you the words that you need to exhort one another to do these things. We need one another to worship. An ember will go out on its own, but put it together with other logs in the fire and it will retain and continue to burn. So also we need one another. worship. So notice the very first exhortation here. Shout for joy to the Lord or make a joyful noise to the Lord or shout joyfully to the Lord, however you want to translate it. What is being said here is to give an homage shout to our King. In other words, the exhortation is to make a joyful acknowledgement that our God is King. Now, I want to note a couple of things about that. One, the kingship of God is really good news for God's people. The kingship of God is really good news for God's people. We'll pray during the pastoral prayer about the state of our country and our world. And it is, I mean, frankly, it's bewildering. I would say the last four to six years for me have been one of the most bewildering stretches of my life, just as I look at my country and my culture, and I ask myself, how in the world did we get to where we are today? And I know my father-in-law, who just died five years ago, 95 years old, veteran of the Second World War. I know the last 10 years of his life. He thought, is this why I fought the Nazis in the Second World War, so that we could be like this? It's a bewildering time. But you know what? Jesus is king. Jesus is King. That is really good news for God's people, no matter what sort of unsettling experiences we may be in. By the way, one of the really striking things about those prayers on the Psalms that I've been telling you about, that I've been reading, is that in almost every prayer, Augustine Marlerat mentions our enemies. And I realized that for him, I mean, persecution was what he experienced constantly. And he was finally martyred. We've always had enemies. The world, and the flesh, and the devil have never been our friends. But I think we probably feel that more now. And that's actually pretty good. That's very important for us to feel. the enmity of the world and the flesh and the devil, and to realize that we've got real enemies, but God is our king. We're coming up on that season of the year where people will often replay S. M. Lockridge's little sort of sermonic poem, He's My King. Have any of you ever heard Go Google that and listen to it sometime. S.M. Lockridge was a Bible-believing black pastor, and he's got this Good Friday sermon that he preaches where he talks about King Jesus that is just unbelievable. And that's where the psalm starts. It starts with saying, shout joyfully to your king. If you ever wondered why Isaac Watts begins his version of this psalm with before Jehovah's awesome throne, even though there's no throne mentioned in the psalm. His courts are mentioned, but his throne is not mentioned. But where's he getting that from? From this verb, shout joyfully to your king. So Watts is exactly right. This is an homage shout to a king, and that's where worship begins, acknowledging that God is king. But notice also this, shout joyfully to the Lord all the earth. Did you catch that? In other words, the psalmist is not just saying, okay, believers, acknowledge your king. He's saying, I want the whole earth. to acknowledge that God is king. And you, by the way, if you just look back, for instance, just take a look at Psalm 96 verse one, sing to the Lord a new song, sing to the Lord all the earth. This happens in the Psalms all the time. In other words, the psalmist is not just calling on God's people to praise God. The psalmist is calling on the whole world to praise God. So the believer, as we praise God as king, we also long for the whole world to acknowledge God as king. Now, we all know that there is a day when every knee will bow and every tongue will confess. There's a day coming when every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. But we want the world to want to. In other words, we want them to be converted. We want them to want to get down on their knees before King Jesus. Not long after 9-11 happened, John Piper was at RTS in Jackson to preach the missions conference. It was maybe two weeks after the events of 9-11. I think he probably was one of the first people to be able to fly after air traffic resumed a couple of weeks after the events in New York and Pennsylvania and Washington. And one of the things he was preaching on was Muslim evangelism. And he said, I am praying that these events would lead to a billion Muslims professing faith in Jesus. Now at that point, I've got to tell you, I had not been thinking about Muslim conversions at that point. I'd been thinking about some other things, but I had not been thinking about conversions. And he went on to say, and let's pray that our people will send their sons and daughters their best to go and if necessary to die in order to share the gospel with Muslims so that there will be a billion Muslims who will bow their knees and acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord. It was very convicting because my thoughts and prayers had been prayers primarily of retribution. and vengeance and justice being done on the perpetrators. And I had not thought about the spiritual ramifications and opportunities that would come out of the horrific events of 9-11. By the way, one year ago in January, I was in Dubai teaching covenant theology to a room of 70 people, all of whom who are from closed Muslim countries and who are taking the Reformed faith back into closed Muslim countries. And why did that happen in God's providence? Part of it was the events of 9-11. That's why there's a thriving Reformed congregation in the United Arab Emirates in Dubai. It's quite remarkable. But the psalmist is saying here, not just us, Believers acknowledge God as king, shout for joy to God as king, but I want all the earth to acknowledge him as king. So there's a missionary impulse to this particular imperative. Shout for joy to the Lord all the earth. We want all the earth to acknowledge that he is king. Second, look at verse two. Serve the Lord with gladness. serve the Lord with gladness. Now you know that there's a play on words here. To serve the Lord with gladness can either refer to the gathered worship services of the people of God in the Old Testament, that would have been at the tabernacle or at the temple, or it can refer to serving God in all of life. You know, just as we're called to gather on the Lord's day and to give to the Lord the glory of He's name, but we're also called to worship God in all of life. So that in everything that we do, as Paul put it, whether we eat or drink, we do all to the glory of God. We worship God in both of those ways, when we gather to worship him and also in the way that we serve him in all of life. And the same idea is here in verse two, serve the Lord with gladness. Now, notice the emphasis here. Whether we are gathering to worship him or whether we are serving him in the rest of our lives 24-7, as a mother, sometimes thanklessly caring for her children and husband, as a man serving in whatever vocation the Lord has called you to, sometimes having to endure thorns and thistles and difficulties, and sometimes fighting with people that aren't helping you do what you do very well, or serving in a situation in which you're not appreciated, or serving in a situation that challenges your Christian testimony. Whatever it is, whether we're gathered here to worship God, whether we're serving Him in our vocations, we're to do this with gladness. Did you notice this? Serve with gladness. I love what William Plummer says about this. Reluctance in the Lord's service can sometimes be as bad as rejection of the Lord's service. In other words, he's saying, if you're reluctant about serving the Lord, it may say something about your heart. You know, we ought to serve the Lord with gladness. I mean, I can remember as a child, there were times where I thought, oh, Dad, do I have to go to church? I was not serving the Lord with gladness. And certainly there are things that I have to do in the Christian life where I can have that lack of gladness in my duty, like when I'm grading papers. I love to teach. I really love to teach. I would teach for free. But grading papers, that is why the seminary has to pay me. But do I do that with gladness? And we can think of hundreds of things for each of us, which we do not particularly enjoy doing. But we know they're part of our duty to God, and we want to do them with gladness. In fact, one of my friends in Yazoo City, she loves to entertain, but she hates to clean up. And she's got a sign at her kitchen sink that says, divine worship held here three times daily. What's that supposed to do? It's there to remind her that in everything God is to be worshipped. Even cleaning dishes, which he hates to do. That's a great example of what's being said here. We're to serve the Lord with gladness in all that we do, whether we're gathering or whether it's in other areas of life. Then third, come into his presence with singing. Now, clearly, this is especially speaking of gathered worship. You get the language? Come into his presence with singing. And again, in the Old Testament, the tabernacle and the temple were the special place on earth in which God revealed his nearness to his people. Under the new covenant, that's where? Wherever two or more are gathered in his name, there, Jesus says, I am. So when we're under the ordinances and when we're under the means of grace and we're gathered together to meet with him, where two or more are gathered, there he is in a unique and special way, showing his nearness to his people. But notice, when we do this, come into his presence, how? With singing. Now what's being said by that? Partly what is being said is when you come into his presence, you come into his presence with singing so that what? So that the whole of who you are is engaged in giving yourself to God. That's one way that singing works. Singing is designed to keep us from being passive in our worship to God. And it's also designed to unite what we believe with what we desire the most. It provides a vehicle for us to express the deep yearnings and desires of our hearts. And so he says, come into my presence with singing. So he wants the congregation to unite what they believe and what they desire and express it from their heart in singing. That's one reason why singing is so important. in worship. So, so far, we're to shout joyfully that he is king, we're to serve him with gladness, and we're to come before his presence with singing. But fourth, notice the next phrase, look at verse three. Know that the Lord, he is God. It is he who made us, and in the translation it may either be reflexive, and not we ourselves, or it may say we are his. Your English translations may vary there. Either way is a proper translation. You just have to look at the context and make your best guess. It ends up meaning the same thing eventually. We belong to him. He made us. We didn't make ourselves. He made us and we belong to him. We are his people and the sheep of his pasture. hugely important part of worship, knowing that God is God. The very first principle of theology is God is God and I am not. Because what? My big struggle in life is I want to, here's how I want to live, my will, not thy will be done. That's how I want to live. My will, not thy will be done. And the first principle of all of the Christian life is, thy will, not my will be done. God is God, I am not. And so isn't it fascinating that as a part of worshiping God, that's at the very, know that he is God. We belong to Him. We're His sheep. We're His. He made us. We don't belong to ourselves. We are not our own. We belong to God. That's one of Calvin's famous sayings. I am not my own. I am God's. That comes right out of Psalm 100 verse 3. In other words, you can't worship God if you don't know that you belong to him. If you don't realize experientially that he's God and you're not. That he made you, you didn't make him. I think I've told you this story. Bill Sweeney was the senior partner at one of the most powerful law firms in the state of South Carolina. And Glen Connect was getting ready to preach a series of sermons on Genesis 1 to 11 at First Prez in Columbia, South Carolina, and on the first Sunday of that sermon series, Glenn got up and read Genesis 1-1. In the beginning, God made the heavens and the earth. And Bill Sweeney, who had been a member of First Prez and an officer at First Prez for years, was converted on the spot. And he later said, he said this to me, he said, When Glenn started reading that, he said, by the way, he said, what do you mean the sermon? It was Glenn reading the passage. He said, when Glenn read that passage, which I'd heard I don't know how many times, I realized that I was not living as if that passage were true. In other words, I was not living as if God was the maker of the heavens and the earth. I was living for myself. And I suddenly realized, I'm not a believer if I'm living for myself. God made me. I belong to God. God made everything. God alone is worth my worship, and the Lord used it to change his life. He's one of the dearest, you can imagine a powerful law firm senior partner. He took no prisoners, but boy, what a sweet man. That's the only way I've ever known him, as a But it was the word that changed him there. And it was realizing this, that God is God. I am not. And we belong to him. We're his people and the sheep of his pasture. Then this, look at verse four. Here's yet another of these imperatives. Enter his gates with how? Thanksgiving and his courts with praise. So how are we to come into his presence? With two things. with thanksgiving and praise. Now I'm going to talk about thanksgiving in the next point, so let me just camp on praise for just a second. Praise in Hebrew and in English is very similar to the English word worship. In the English word worship means placing worth on something, valuing something. For instance, in the old Anglican wedding service, the man and the woman say to one another in the wedding vows, I worship thee with my body. Don't you love that phrase? Is that not awesome? In other words, It's a wife saying to her husband, and a husband saying to his wife, I am going to show how I value you by making sure that you are the only one that ever has this body. This body is yours, and I'm going to show you how I value you by making sure that this body belongs to you. It's a beautiful thing. Praise is the same way. Did you know that the English word appraise comes, its root is connected to the idea of appraise, like you appraise your house? You set a value on something? Well, in praise, we are declaring the value of God, just like in worship, we are declaring the worth of God. And when God says, enter my courts with praise, he's saying this, come into my presence realizing that I am worth more than anything in this world. And look, that's the great battle of our lives. Dabney used to say this about the Bible. He said, the whole Bible is about getting us not to be idolaters. And the only way you can keep from being an idolater is what? Making sure that you appraise God as more valuable than anything else. Otherwise, you'll end up worshiping something else, which is an idol. You have to appraise God as worth more than anything else. And so God is saying, when you enter in my courts, come with praise. Express my value. This is hugely important because the very first temptation, Genesis 3, was all about God getting Eve and Adam to devalue, was all about Satan getting Eve and Adam to devalue God. Satan, you remember, he says to them, the reason that he's told you not to eat this fruit is because he knows that if you do, you will become like him, knowing good and evil. In other words, God is withholding something from you which would enrich you and make your life better and make you more than you are by telling you not to do this. But if you'll disobey, you'll become more than you are. In other words, Satan is saying, God is not good for you. Rejecting God will be better for you than embracing and obeying God. In other words, he was trying to get them to devalue God. So when God says, enter my courts with praise, he's saying, when you come before me, you're coming consciously rejecting the lies of the evil ones. The evil one wants to devalue me, but I am supremely valuable. So come before my presence, come into my courts and praise. Assess me as I am and acknowledge it. Then, look at the next exhortation, give thanks to him and bless his name. So there again is the idea. Remember the psalm we saw in the psalm heading, it's about thanksgiving. Only when you get down to the end of verse 40, you finally get to the thanksgiving. This is where the whole psalm has been going. We're to come into his presence with thanksgiving. Now look, this is huge. Because if you read the psalms very much, you know that the psalmist is constantly in circumstances that do not in and of themselves generate thanksgiving. Lord, my friends have betrayed me. Lord, my flesh is withering. Lord, my enemies are set upon me. Those things do not generate thanks. Those are circumstances that in and of themselves do. Now look, you know, my first grandchild was born. That's easy. Thanksgiving. Lord, you gave me a wonderful wife. That's easy. Thanksgiving. Lord, you've given me a vocation where I can put a roof over my family's head and food in their mouth and clothes on their back and send them to school and give back to your church. That's easy. There are lots of circumstances in our lives that the Lord gives us that prompt thanksgiving, but God wants our thanksgiving to be uncircumstantial. In other words, Though we ought to acknowledge circumstances that prompt Thanksgiving, we always ought to thank God. Usually when people ask me, how are you doing? My standard reply is, better than I ought to be. And I really mean that. If I were doing how I ought to be, I'd be in hell. And I'm very grateful. very genuinely conscious of the fact that I live in unnumbered undeserved blessings. That's just where I live. But no matter how life is going, we're to live in a state of thanksgiving. And notice where he roots this thanksgiving. Look at verse 5, and here's your why. So remember I told you, shout, serve, come, know, enter, give. Why? Why should we do all these things? The answer is in verse 5. And three things. For the Lord is good, his steadfast love endures forever, his faithfulness to all generations. Why should you do this? because God is good, because his saving love never ends, and his faithfulness endures. Three reasons are given. This is so important. God never asks you to worship him without giving you a reason why. I was talking with the elders before the service about the persecution that's going on in China today. Probably some of you have seen it in the news. Both Muslims and Christians are enduring a lot of interference right now. And many have been imprisoned. And a number of them have actually been sent to government re-education camps. And one of the things that's being done in those re-education camps is both Muslims and Christians are being required to blaspheme. Muslims are being required to blaspheme against Allah and Christians are being required to blaspheme against Jesus. And they are being forced to sing songs of praise to the Communist Party instead of songs of praise to God. So they literally have invented secular hymns of praise of the Communist Party that they're trying to get these people to sing. Now, what's interesting is they are being forced to do that against their will. Notice here that the truly sovereign God in the Psalms tells his people why we ought to do. In other words, this is not arbitrary tyranny, worship me. This worship is for a reason. Why? Because God is good. Because his loving kindness never ends and never fails. He has shown his goodness in the giving of his son. His loving kindness never fails. And His faithfulness endures forever. In other words, He supplies reasons why we ought to praise Him. Isn't that glorious? That He says, okay, here are my people. I know that many times you come to worship and you're just not ready to do it. So let me supply from myself The reasons that motivate you to want to worship. I'm good. My loving kindness never ends. My faithfulness endures. Taste and see that the Lord is good. I will sing of the mercies of the Lord forever. Thy faithfulness I will make known. The psalm ends by just pointing us to our God, who he is, what he has done for us in Christ. And what does that do? It moves us to praise him. About 18 months ago, I was in the mountains of Papua, New Guinea. That's what used to be called Irian Jaya. I was about 16,000 feet up on a tree-covered mountain. Now, you say, Ligon, how could you be on a tree-covered mountain at 16,000 feet? because that's above the tree line in most places in the world because it's right on the equator. This is not far from where John Payton went in his ministry. At any rate, I'm with a people that was discovered 18 years ago, the Moi people, and I'm with the missionaries who discovered them, Steve and Carolyn Crockett. And Steve and Carolyn have learned their language from the ground up by pointing to things. What's that? What do you call that? What do you call that? And they've translated a good part of the Old Testament and a good part of the New Testament. And they started translating the Bible into their language. Frankly, they wanted to make sure that these people understood that they were not coming to them to bring them, you know, the white man's religion. The Muslims had been coming into Papua trying to bring Islam to them. They wanted them to know that they were simply missionaries from the one true creator God bringing them a message from him. And so they wanted them to hear it in their own language. So when they finally had gotten enough of the Bible translated in their own language that they could tell them the gospel story, they started reading the story to them. And they read to them from Genesis 1. And at the end of it, one of the men said, this God who made the heavens and the earth, what is his name? And the missionaries were able to say, his name is Yahweh. His name is Jehovah. His name is the Lord. And they read to them from where that divine name was used in the next chapter. But then they read to them the law. Let me tell you, these people that they met, they were doing unspeakable things. When women had twins, the superstition was that one of those children was a demon. And so they would kill the child, the second child that was born would be killed. and hung up in the trees for the birds of the air to eat. Men would very easily kill wives that they were displeased with. These were people living under deep darkness. And as they read through the law and they told the stories of the Bible, the same man who asked, what is his name, said, This God who you've told us about, he must be very angry with us, for we have done bad, bad things. And the missionary said, you're right, you're under his wrath. And the same man said, what can we do? And he said, this God has given his son in your place. And he read to him from the gospel stories of Jesus' death. The man responded, he said, I must trust in this one who has been given in my place. And he wanted to worship God. He was the first of many converts in that village. Many of the people in that little Moi village in Diboto in Papua have been converted under the ministry over the last 18 years that Steve and Carolyn and now a bunch of other missionaries. Once they were converted, they wanted to worship this God because they knew what they deserved and they knew what this God had done for them. They don't question the goodness of the Lord. They don't question the loving kindness of the Lord. They don't question the faithfulness of the Lord. They want to worship God because of that faithfulness. That's how it's supposed to work with us too. That's exactly how it's supposed to work with us too. So may the Lord use Psalm 100 in your life and use it to encourage one another. to come into his presence with thanksgiving and enter his courts with praise. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for this time in your word. We ask that you would work the truth of your word deep into our hearts so that we rest in trust in Jesus alone for salvation as he is offered in the gospel, and then we live to give you praise. We ask these things in Jesus' name.