I wrote a song
back in the nineties for a children’s play that I penned for a holiday
presentation that declared:
♪
“He put a new song right into my heart,
It’s a song of praise to Jesus
Just like the shepherds sang when they saw the
King,
It’s a song of praise to Jesus!”
Halelu……jah,
Hallelujah to the King,
Hallelu.…..jah, Oh
we praise the newborn King!” ♫
Over the years
and many Christmases and play presentations later, that song and certain lines
from the play have become a regular part of our family’s Christmas celebration
traditions. There is a line in the play
where the main characters gleefully shout: “Tomorrow’s
Christmas day, and you know what that means… Presents in the morning!” Well, with our family currently spread
between California, Oklahoma and North Carolina over the last few years, I can
always depend on one of the siblings sending out a group family text on
Christmas Eve with that familiar line, which in turn opens up a long thread of
communication of Christmas cheer between all of us!
I thought of
that particular song this morning as I continued with my study of Psalm
100. Verse four in the King James
Version encourages us to “Enter his gates
with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise.” Many of the modern translations tell us to
enter in with ‘songs’ of thanksgiving and praise, which is exactly the way
the original Hebrew implies that the actions ‘thanksgiving’ and ‘praise’
should be presented. That revelation got
me to realize that we are not to just come into His presence with dry or empty
words but with actual ‘songs’ of heartfelt thanksgiving
and praise! Our desire to come into His
presence should be such a joy-filled and exciting event that we can’t help but
sing our way in the door!
In Psalm 69:30
the writer declares that “I want to
praise the name of God with a ‘song’
of praise.” (God’s Word ©) I am sure
that for the musician David, singing unto the Lord was a natural way of
expression for him. I was thinking this
morning that Piper’s and my relationship was filled with music from the very
get-go! We were both raised in musical
families where singing around the piano was not an uncommon activity.
I was in a
secular rock band when we met and played the guitar while Piper was classically
trained on the piano (and continued
lessons into her Junior College years when she also took organ lessons – I have
fond memories of going to meet her after her individual lessons in one of the
practice rooms in the old, musty music building!) Piper also played flute
and piccolo in the high school band and then gave all of our kid’s piano
lessons… which they still play today!
So… to come
into His presence in song is quite natural for us as well. But let
me say… that while a certain familiarity with music is helpful, it should
not be the driving factor for songs of praise.
The heart of a worshipper should be ignited into songs of praise and
thanksgiving by their close, personal and intimate relationship with the Lord! Psalm 100:3 gives us the key premise to the
workings of this Psalm… and most likely
for all the Psalms as well. It states
that we are to: “Know ye that the LORD he
is God…” (KJV) The word “know” is that word in the Greek that
we’ve all come to know and love (if you
are a regular reader of this blog) “ginosko”
which implies a close, personal and intimate relationship with the Lord. It is the “Jewish
idiom for sexual intercourse between a man and a woman.” (Thayer’s)
As I meditated
on this point yesterday I felt the Lord saying down in my spirit that “I should know Him just as I know my wife of
42 years… intimately, closely and with a loving knowledge of her innermost
thoughts, needs and desires… and with ZERO
doubt in my mind concerning the extent of her love for me!”
That natural
kind of love between us is the driving factor for me to do ANYTHING for her. It is also the kind of love that should
automatically drive us to come into the Lord’s presence with heartfelt songs of
thanksgiving and praise. And you know… it doesn’t matter if you
have a beautiful voice or can’t carry a tune in a bucket. David makes that extremely clear when he
began Psalm 100 with the encouragement to “Make
a joyful noise unto the LORD…” (KJV)
My Mom used to
joke about her close friend Norma who knew she couldn’t hold a note but sang to
her heart’s content when singing hymns in church! She always figured that her off-key rendition
would just get lost amongst the other worshippers in the service! I believe that God is more interested in the
heart of the worshipper than the tone!
So what do you
think? Are you going to enter His presence
with ‘songs’
of worship? I think that it
would make Him very happy and bless you as well! Go ahead… give it a try!
Have a
wonderful weekend, and as you do, keep asking yourself… “Am I expecting to enter His gates and His courts with heartfelt ‘songs’ of thanksgiving and praise
today?”
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