From Worship to Warning
By Jon Schwiethale
“Come let us sing for joy to the Lord, let us shout aloud to the Rock of our salvation. Let us come before Him, with thanksgiving and extol Him with music and song. For the Lord is a great God, the great King above all gods. In his hand are the depths of the earth, and the mountain peaks belong to him, the sea is his for he made it, and his hands formed the dry land.”
This is a familiar Psalm to many of us. Psalm 95. A Psalm that has been turned into a song for our time and culture, so that we can actually sing it in corporate worship. And I love these words because it reminds me of who God is, that God is the Rock of our salvation, God is Sovereign over all, and that God is our Creator.
However, there is a second part to this Psalm. The part of the Psalm that we don’t sing about. And to be frank with you, a part that we don’t even talk about. And I suppose that is because it is an admonition. It is a warning. And we don’t like to be admonished, we don’t like to be warned. Because warnings are harsh. Warnings are negative. Warnings are meant to remind us.
But warnings are necessary. Because we need to be reminded of our true nature. That in our true nature, we are sinners, that in our true nature, we like the Israelites of the Exodus, struggle with our faith. We struggle with rebellion, we struggle with sin.
See, the Psalmist’s original audience needed to know that the knee bent, the body bowed in worship and praise to God means nothing unless they are living it every day outside of the community of the Lord’s people. And we too, need to be reminded of the same thing. That our worship here means nothing unless we are living it every day when we are out there in the world. God is the Rock of our Salvation. God is Sovereign over All. God is our Creator. And because of all that, He deserves our worship and praise. But our worship and praise is only good when we are living for the God we worship and believe in outside of this church building.