¹Shout joyfully to the Lord, all the earth. ²Serve the Lord with gladness; come before Him with joyful singing.

The common theme of Psalms 95 through 100 is the invitation to worship and sing praise to the Lord. He is extolled in lofty, poetic form, with the last in this series, Psalm 100, being the most direct and concise. Whether we call the seven imperatives of this psalm commands or invitations, they are undoubtedly hortatory in their emphasis—an appeal for action. We who are genuine believers are called to recognize the Lord’s desire for us and the innate spiritual response of our souls. In worship, His command proves the sincerity and desire of our hearts.

While poetry generally challenges logical analysis, the imperatives stand out as an unmistakable outline, describing worship in seven ways. (Note: even though the word worship does not appear in this psalm, we use it here as an umbrella concept of our ultimate relationship with and response to the Lord, encompassing all the lofty expressions and attitudes displayed herein).

Admittedly, there is a level of overlap in these statements, but each adds a delightful expansion of our understanding of worship.

“Shout joyfully to the Lord, all the earth” (vs. 1).
Worship is to be robust and joyful, bursting out of a full heart toward the Lord. Pictured here is not a solemn dirge-funeral atmosphere. Joyful singing is a common theme in the Psalms of worship. The stated audience (“all the earth”) conveys that all of creation is to join in responding to the Lord, for “all the earth is full of His glory” (Isaiah 6:3). The psalms frequently refer to non-human objects with human-like characteristics; God sees all of creation with joy (the phrase “it was good” is repeatedly seen in the creation account of Genesis). The glory of creation is a reflection back to the Lord of His glory—in the sense it reflects the joy of the Lord. Thus, the poet of Psalm 100, in the flourish of creative expression, calls on creation to do what it was created to do.

“Serve the Lord with gladness” (vs. 2a).
The call becomes more clearly directed to us humans; we are called to serve the Lord in worship as an expression of obedience. While creation serves the Lord’s purposes by virtue of its existence, we serve the Lord voluntarily by virtue of our free will. The Levites served the Lord by preparing the Tabernacle, providing singers and music, and various other duties supporting Israel’s worship and sacrificial efforts. The priests served the Lord by providing the hands-on work of bringing the sacrifices of the people before God. Christians today are believer-priests who willfully serve the Lord with the sacrifices of praise, and we do it out of the “gladness” of our hearts.

“You also, as living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house for a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ … But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood … so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light…” (1 Peter 2:5, 9)

“Come before Him with joyful singing” (vs. 2b).
God doesn’t come down to our level for us to worship Him. To be sure, He descended to our earthly experience to sacrifice for us, but we go to the lofty heights where He dwells to worship Him. Of course, the idea is not referring to spatial or geographical location but conceptually to spiritual location. The Lord is omnipresent, and He is Spirit, so he is not subject to concepts like “here” or “there.” The idea is for us to perceive in our spirits the reality of God’s presence as we worship. Notice that in the Lord’s Prayer, we are instructed to begin by recognizing “Our Father who is in heaven.” So, too, in worship, we “Come before Him” in heaven. Again, our heart’s attitude is joyfulness, as expressed in singing.

“Know that the Lord Himself is God” (vs. 3a).
Worship involves “knowing” God. The Hebrew word occurs 944 times in the Old Testament (TWOT, yāda‘). A similar sounding word in popular culture today is used in the phrase, “yada yada yada,” which has no linguistic relationship to the Hebrew word. That phrase is used for knowledge that is boring and not worth repeating. By contrast, the Hebrew word yāda‘ brings a deepening knowledge of who God is into our worship. Infinite in His being, we can never exhaust our knowledge of God. While many Christian books address the practical aspects of following Christ, others focus on helping believers know God better. (Two standout as classics: “The Knowledge of the Holy” by A.W. Tozer and “Knowing God” by J.I. Packer. In fact, the essence of the word “theology” is the study of God (Greek: “theos” for God and “logos” meaning the “Word or knowledge about God.”)

The knowledge in the case of this psalm (vs. 3b) is that the Lord (Yahweh) is God (elohim). This is the One who revealed Himself specifically to Moses and the people of Israel. He is the God who is there very personally and acts on behalf of those who trust in Him. He keeps His covenant with them and with all who believe. He is identified as the creator God of the universe, and we who believe are His people. There is no other god than Yahweh, and there is much to learn about Him.

“Enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise” (vs. 4a).
The imagery of God’s presence takes further shape in the form of entering through the gates into God’s temple. The distinctive feature added to joy, gladness, and singing is the attitude of thanksgiving and praise.

“Give thanks to Him” (vs. 4b). Thanksgiving moves from being a heart attitude into the physical realm of outwardly expressing our thanks to God. Our bodies are not separate from our inner person, but we find more complete worship when we engage our whole selves in thanking and praising Him.

“Bless His name” (vs. 4c).
This may, on the surface, seem odd that we should bless God. He is already blessed, apart from anything we could give Him. Indeed, the psalm ends with extolling God, “For the Lord is good; His lovingkindness is everlasting and His faithfulness to all generations” (vs. 5). Blessing God cannot add anything to Him. Instead, it is our expression of turning from our benefit in our relationship as “His people” (vs. 3c) to desiring that our praise and worship benefit God. But how do you give any benefit to the One who created everything and who owns everything? If, for the sake of argument, God needed anything, He could create it, even to the point of drawing out blessing and praise from rocks (Luke 19:37-40). When small children give their parents gifts at Christmas time, the blessing is not in the value of the gift but in the joy of giving and receiving. So also, God accepts our thanks, not because He needs our blessing, but because of the joy we share with Him, and He shares with us in giving and receiving.

So, when we bless His name, we focus on the name Yahweh; this is a poetic way of saying we want God to be more fully known, not only in our own lives as we study about Him and grow in our knowing Him, but that the whole world would come to know Him as Yahweh, as we have. So, we bless His name in our worship.

LORD, the more I learn about You, the more I am drawn to you in worshiping You with my whole being.