This is part 1 of the message from Psalm 96.

Pray: that Jesus be exalted and praised among us and by us before all peoples for He is great and greatly to be praised

[Psalm 96] “Oh sing to the Lord a new song; sing to the Lord all the earth! Sing to the Lord, bless His name; tell of His salvation from day to day. Declare His glory among the nations, His marvelous works among all the peoples!

Let the heavens be glad, and let the earth rejoice; let the sea roar and all that fills it; let the field exult, and everything in it! Then shall all the trees of the forest sing for joy before the Lord, for He comes, for He comes to judge the earth. He will judge the world in righteousness and the peoples in His faithfulness.”

Tonight, we’re starting a three-week series entitled “Sing to the Lord” on Psalm 96, 97, and 98. The reason why we’re focusing on these three Psalms is first of all because I want you to see the God who is praise-worthy and why it is important for us to sing praises of worship to God, and how we should be growing in worship and its expression. Second, I want you to see what the coming of the reign and kingdom of Christ does to a heart and life on this earth, how it will fill you with hope and passion and joy. Third, I pray that the studying of these Psalms would awaken in you deep and serious happiness in the sovereign God. As C.S. Lewis says, “There is a kind of happiness and wonder that makes you serious.” I believe that the whole of Scripture creates this, but even more specifically these three Psalms let us see that statement played out, because in these three Psalms what we will see in 96 and 98 is pure joy, delight and gladness before the coming King and in 97 we will see the seriousness of the King and His coming, and the result I pray will be a kind of happiness and wonder that will make us serious.

But before we just jump into Psalm 96, I know some of you have probably never read the Psalms or you have and you don’t get it or why they are there and how they fit into the Bible so let me give you some info on the Psalms, the author, and then we’ll look at the background of this psalm and then we’ll get to the content.

The Book of Psalms: It is a collection of 150 praises or songs, divided into 5 books (96-98 are in Book 4) written in poetic fashion for the purpose of personal and mostly congregational singing. As you read through the psalms usually you will see the word “song: beside the number or a direction to the “choirmaster.” This being the case the Psalms read differently because of how they are written, and therefore how we study them and apply them should be different from how we study other genres in the Bible such as historical records, or narrative, or eyewitness account, or apocalyptic, or letters. Poetry is meant to be beautiful, creative, and to evoke the imagination and heart of the reader. So what you’ll see in the Psalms is a lot of parallelism (saying the same truth twice in a different way) and you will see the whole range of emotion of life experience. There are highs and there are lows in the book that we are meant to feel with the author. One of the things I personally love about the Psalms is how they inform my feelings and how feelings are not overlooked. I want you to see that as well. Feelings are not the enemy to truth, though you can have feeling and no truth and truth and no feeling. God, however, has both and His desire is that we have both and it is patterned after Himself, as He is both The Truth and Joy: Holy and Happy in beautiful harmony.

The Author: The author of this Psalm is David, King David, Israel’s first true king over a united kingdom, and as king he was to be the ideal Israelite setting an example for the people to follow. As king he was to be a protector and applier of the Law and lead worshipper of the nation to the God of Israel. And the Scriptures say that he was a man after God’s own heart, and with that in mind, as we look to David, take note of his heart that you may share his heart for God, and that it may be said of us that we are men and women after God’s own heart.

The Background: If you would, turn with me to I Chronicles 16 and in “David’s Song of Thanks” look at verses 23-33 and what do you see? They are almost verbatim the words of praise from Psalm 96 and that being the case we assume that these words were composed for this occasion or they were fitting to be sung on this occasion. The reason behind these words of praise is that finally, the ark of God, the place where God would come down in His glory and meet with His people upon the mercy seat, between the cherubim, was coming to Jerusalem, the city of David. Previously the ark had been in the house of Abinadab and now that Israel was established he wanted the ark in Jerusalem, so they took it out of the house and on the first journey Uzzah reached out and touched the ark as it was falling from the cart (they were supposed to carry it) and he fell dead because He presumed to touch that which was holy. So David was frightened and saddened and they kept the ark in the house of Obed-edom for three months. Then God told David the time was right for the ark to return and it was upon this return that David sang and danced before the Lord, and it was for this occasion that the Psalm was written. The Lord, the true King was returning to His Kingdom and to His City and so this Psalm also looks forward to the return of Christ when He will come and establish His rule on the earth. This is the prophetic-side to the Psalms where there is a present fulfillment (the ark returning to Jerusalem) and a future fulfillment (Christ coming to earth) that you’ll see throughout the book and prophetic literature. But what I want us to zero in on here, before we get into the content of the praise, is the heart of David, the worshipper, and we see his heart clearly in the parallel account to 1 Chronicles 16 which is…

[2 Samuel 6:16-23] “As the ark of the Lord came into the city of David, Michal the daughter of Saul look out of the window and saw King David leaping and dancing before the Lord, and she despised him in her heart. And they brought in the ark of the Lord and set it in its place, inside the tent that David had pitched for it. And David offered burnt offerings and peace offerings before the Lord. And when David had finished offering the burnt offerings and the peace offerings, he blessed the people in the name of the Lord of hosts and distributed among all the people, the whole multitude of Israel, both men and women, a cake of bread, a portion of meat, and a cake of raisins to each one. Then all the people departed, each to his house.

And David returned to bless his household. But Michal the daughter of Saul came out to meet David and said, “How the king of Israel honored himself today, uncovering himself today before the eyes of his servants’ female servants, as one of the vulgar fellows shamelessly uncovers himself!” And David said to Michal, “It was before the Lord, who chose me above your father and above all his house, to appoint me as prince over Israel, the people of the Lord—and I will make merry before the Lord. I will make myself yet more contemptible than this, and I will be abased in your eyes. But by the female servants of whom you have spoken, by them I shall be held in honor.” And Michal the daughter of Saul had no child to the day of her death.”

The Heart of a Heart After God
One of the most influential books in my life is a book by Jonathan Edwards entitled: A Treatise Concerning Religious Affections, basically a fancy way of saying, “This Book is About the Place of Feelings in Christianity.” In that book, he says something (well a lot) that is vitally important for us in understanding David and ourselves, he writes: “The things of religion are so great, that there can be no suitableness in the exercises of our hearts, to their nature and importance, unless they be lively and powerful.” In other words, “What we find in Christianity is so great and so important that the only way they can be expressed is by a heart alive and powerful in feeling toward God.” Ultimately, Christians feel the way they do because of who Christ is, and they’re great affections are directed toward Christ because He satisfies us with good.

What we’re seeing from David here is the heart of a heart after God, and the mirror of the Word is revealing our own hearts and showing us either David or Michal. The question is which are you? Are you making yourself merry before the Lord, dancing and leaping and sacrificing and giving in the Presence of the Lord or are you watching out for yourself, concerned with what is respectable and how people view you? Are you God-conscious or self-conscious? In David, this is what we as the worshipper are to look like before the audience of One! Do you see the way he feels and the way he acts, and in this Psalm the way he talks? The way he, in a sense, loses himself in praise and in enjoyment of God?

Take note here brothers and sisters: this should be us! To use John Piper’s phrase from his book Desiring God, David is a Christian Hedonist of the first order: he is seeking and finding all his pleasure and joy in Christ and therefore giving glory to God, for the truth is this as Piper says, “God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him.” You see want to show the world the worth of God, worship Him in a worthy way! As this Psalm says, “God is great, and greatly to be praised!”

All right, go back to Psalm 96 now that we have the background, and we’ve seen the heart of the worshiper, let’s look out how this heart expresses itself in song and we’ll do it by looking at the three sets of three important instructions in this Psalm: Sing, Sing, Sing, Ascribe, Ascribe, Ascribe and Let, Let, Let. Remember, that as we’re looking at these three instructions that we do these things with a view to the coming of Christ: “for He comes, for He comes to judge the earth.”

1) Sing, Sing, Sing! (v.1-6) Oh sing to the Lord a new song; sing to the Lord all the earth! Sing to the Lord, bless His name; tell of His salvation from day to day. Declare His glory among the nations, His marvelous works among all the peoples! For great is the Lord and greatly to be praised; He is to be feared above all gods. For all the gods of the peoples are worthless idols, but the Lord made the heavens. Splendor and majesty are before Him; strength and beauty are in His sanctuary.

The first thing David calls for in his song is singing and it is specifically the singing of a new song. Not that his song was new but new and creative songs should be sung to God for the new and creative things He is doing. He calls all of creation to sing to the Lord and to bless His Name. There is to be no indifference among those who are hearing these words. It’s not like how when we sing a song with the words, “We lift up our hands” or “Dance a dance of joy” and we do nothing, which is really strange, David expects his hearers to join with him and sing, sing, sing!

Singing is the Appropriate Expression For a Glorious God: Have you ever wondered why the people of God sing so much and why singing is so important, and why it is that the Godhead is constantly surrounded by music?

First of all singing is so important because of its power as a medium to communicate truth. There is a saying that has been attributed to Plato, which says, “Let me make the songs of a nation and I care not who makes its laws.” His point was to call attention to the power of the medium over people, which is music and singing. When the people of God sing, that truth is captured in a way that can be remembered and the music to the song has a profound way of moving the emotions to capture the truth of the song. It is powerful!

Second, music is important because of its beauty, and how it calls attention to what is Beautiful. If you want to call attention to the Lord of whom splendor and majesty go before, and strength and beauty are in His sanctuary then you do it by singing. Allen Ross writes, “By singing, the worshippers lift up their voices in beautiful words and memorable sounds appropriate to the beauty of the holiness of God. (Ross, Allen P. Recalling the Hope of Glory, p.259)” And the Godhead is surrounded by such strength and beauty in song because strength and beauty are found in Him! So singing is the appropriate expression of our hearts to God.

And I pray that you will see the worth and the importance of singing in the life of someone alive to God and that you would be more like David than Michal and all your life would be "before the Lord." May the God who is Strong and Beautiful fill your hearts with deep feelings and great and new songs that appropriately reflect His worth.