Bible Commentaries

Psalms 95:1-2. O come, let us sing unto the LORD: let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation. Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving, and make a joyful noise unto him with psalms.

There must be, there should be, joy in our worship, it is the very juice, the wine that floweth from the trodden grape. It is the cream of the soul when the heart takes delight in God and joys in him. To worship as if it were mere duty would be but the reverence of slaves before one who is dreaded, but to worship with delight, this is the adoration of children who come to whom they love. God grant us that joy while we adore the Lord. Let us, however, mingle great reverence with joy.

Psalms 95:3. For the LORD is a great God, and a great king above all gods.

“For the Lord is a great God.” Jehovah is a great God, “and a great King above all gods,” above all that are ever called gods, whether they be kings or magistrates, or whatever they may be.

Psalms 95:4. In his hand are the deep place of the earth: the strength of the hills is his also.

Low and high, mysterious, sublime, the dominion of God encompasseth all nature.

Psalms 95:5. The sea is his, and he made it: and his hands formed the dry land.

Creation is the best ground for possession: what he made is his own, the great freeholder, the sovereign lord of all.

Psalms 95:6-7. O come, let us worship and bow down: let us kneel before the LORD our maker. For he is our God;

“For he is our God.” Oh, that is the sweetest of it all, — “he is our God.” Let lords and lands have what masters they will, let us obey and worship our own God still.

Psalms 95:7. And we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand.

He is the shepherd, leading, feeding, protecting, guarding us every day.

Psalms 95:7-10. To day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your heart, as in the provocation, and as in the day of temptation in the wilderness: when your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my work. Forty years long was I grieved with this generation.

Was not that enough? Is there any need to grieve him again. Think with sympathy of what God endured from one generation, and let not another generation follow in their evil footsteps.

Psalms 95:10. And said, It is a people that do err in their heart,

Not merely through ignorance, but “in their heart.” They were not alone with their feet and their tongue, but in their hearts.

Psalms 95:10. And they have not known my ways:

They have seen them but not understood them. He says, “They saw my work,” but you may see and yet not know, for what is merely seen with the eye but not understood by the heart is not known; they were a willful, erring people, and an ignorant people.

Psalms 95:11. Unto whom I sware in my wrath that they should not enter into my rest.

Ah me!