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Worship God and obey him[a]

95 Come now! Let us sing together to worship the Lord!
We will shout aloud
    to praise God, the strong Rock who makes us safe!
Let us come near to God
    and thank him![b]
Let us sing songs to praise him,
    because we are so happy!
Yes, the Lord is the great God.
    He is the great king who rules over all gods.
The deepest places of the earth are in his hand.
    The highest mountains belong to him.
The seas are his,
    because he made them.
He also made the dry land,
    with his own hands.
Come now! Let us bend down to worship him!
Let us bend our knees in front of the Lord.
    He is the one who made us.
He is our God.
He takes care of us,
    like a shepherd takes care of his sheep.[c]
As his sheep, he gives us what we need.

Today, you must listen to him
    and obey him.
He says, ‘Do not refuse to obey me,
    like my people did at Meribah.
They also did that one day at Massah,
    in the desert.
Your ancestors tested me there,
    to see if I would punish them.
But they had already seen the great things
    that I had done for them!
10 So I was angry with those people
    all the time for 40 years.
I said, “These people love to go the wrong way.
    They refuse to follow my ways.”
11 I was very angry and I promised,
    “They will never come into my place of rest.” ’[d]

Footnotes

  1. 95:1 This psalm says that it is not enough just to sing to God. We must also listen to him and obey him. Then we will not make the same mistake as God's people at Massah and Meribah. This is the second ‘Royal Psalm.’ See Psalms 93:1.
  2. 95:2 The writer asks people to come with him to the Temple in Jerusalem to praise the Lord.
  3. 95:7 As God's people, we are like his sheep and he is our shepherd who takes care of us. See Psalms 23:1 and John 10:14.
  4. 95:11 See Exodus 17:1-7; Numbers 20:1-13 and Psalms 81:7; 106:32. The Israelites travelled for 40 years in the desert before they went into Canaan, the special land that God had promised to give to them. God gave them food and water in the desert, but they continued to complain. As a result, God let them die in the desert, and only their children went into Canaan.

Psalm 95

Come,(A) let us sing for joy(B) to the Lord;
    let us shout aloud(C) to the Rock(D) of our salvation.
Let us come before him(E) with thanksgiving(F)
    and extol him with music(G) and song.

For the Lord is the great God,(H)
    the great King(I) above all gods.(J)
In his hand are the depths of the earth,(K)
    and the mountain peaks belong to him.
The sea is his, for he made it,
    and his hands formed the dry land.(L)

Come, let us bow down(M) in worship,(N)
    let us kneel(O) before the Lord our Maker;(P)
for he is our God
    and we are the people of his pasture,(Q)
    the flock under his care.

Today, if only you would hear his voice,
“Do not harden your hearts(R) as you did at Meribah,[a](S)
    as you did that day at Massah[b] in the wilderness,(T)
where your ancestors tested(U) me;
    they tried me, though they had seen what I did.
10 For forty years(V) I was angry with that generation;
    I said, ‘They are a people whose hearts go astray,(W)
    and they have not known my ways.’(X)
11 So I declared on oath(Y) in my anger,
    ‘They shall never enter my rest.’”(Z)

Footnotes

  1. Psalm 95:8 Meribah means quarreling.
  2. Psalm 95:8 Massah means testing.