Embrace the Word for Monday, July 27, 2026
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Psalm 95 is an exhortation to worship the LORD and a admonition against a hard heart. While Psalm 95 does not have a superscription, Hebrews 4:7 attributes the Psalm’s authorship to David. Israel’s exile in Babylon is the setting for the opening Psalms of Book 4 of the Psalter. As Book 4 opens with a Psalm of Moses, the next several Psalms highlight the LORD’s reign and His victory over His enemies. Psalm 95 offers to Israel what their response should and should not now be in anticipation to the new Exodus that awaits them. Just as the LORD rescued His people from Egyptian captivity and preserved them through the wilderness, so now the LORD will preserve them until He returns them back to their Promised Land. Psalm 95 begins with two calls to worship (95:1-2, 6), which are coupled with two reasons that the LORD should be worshipped (95:3-5, 7a), and it concludes with a caution against hardness of heart (95:7b-9), coupled with a reason to heed that warning.
Psalm 95 begins with a charge to worship the LORD: “Oh come, let us sing to the LORD; let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation! Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving; let us make a joyful noise to him with songs of praise!” (95:1-2). This charge is plural in that it goes out to all of God’s people. This charge is emphatic in that it issues calls for God’s people: “Oh come” and “let us come,” which are two different but similar terms that inform how the LORD is to be approached and then how He is to be met with or drawn near to in gratitude. This charge is exuberant in that God’s people are to sing (actually to sing loudly or shout), and twice it is stated that the sound of their singing must flow out of much joy. Finally, this charge is focused in that the object of their worship is to be the covenant LORD, who alone is the source of their salvation.
There is a fitting reason why the charge to worship the LORD should be performed: “For the LORD is a great God, and a great King above all gods. In his hand are the depths of the earth; the heights of the mountains are his also. The sea is his, for he made it, and his hands formed the dry land” (95:3-5). The LORD’s absolute exalted status is reason enough to worship Him, but this greatness is explained further in that the one true great God is the King over all. While there are not really any other gods, people perceive there are, and even demons might overstate whatever power they have been granted and purport to be gods; but there is only one Creator of all and one Ruler over all. All worship is owed to the one and only God. God’s greatness and His worthiness to receive worship is seen in sway over all creation—His control extends from the deepest depths of the earth to the greatest heights; His control ranges from the seas to the land. He made it all and it all belongs to Him. To worship anything or anyone else is to fundamentally be critically resistant to reality.
After charging all His people to worship Him, coupled with a reason that He is to be worshipped, a second charge is issued: “Oh come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the LORD, our Maker!” (95:6). Here, an additional terms is used for “Oh come,” overlapping the two used in verses 1 and 2, connoting the notion of enter. If a progression is being suggested here with the three terms for “come,” the idea is possibly something like: (a) turn to the LORD joyfully; (b) draw near to LORD in gratitude; (c) and approach the LORD in reverence. This second charge to worship emphasizes reverence with the use of three related terms: “worship,” “bow down,” and “kneel before.” The term “worship” literally means to prostrate oneself, face to the ground. The next two terms solicit specific body postures that reflect genuine humility and submission. Whereas the first charge emphasized rejoicing in the presence of the LORD, this second charge emphasizes reverence. Both are needed. Rejoicing without reverence is just emotionalism or sheer sentimentality. Reverence without rejoicing is just duty or mere ritualism. God charges His people to worship Him with a gladness and a gravity. The LORD desires exuberance and humility in His presence.
Just as the first charge to worship the LORD was coupled with a reason He is to be worshipped, so too is this second charge. Whereas the first reason highlighted the exalted status of the LORD, this second reason highlights the special relationship that the LORD has with His people: “For he is our God, and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand” (95:7a). The great King over all the earth is the God who has relationally covenanted Himself to His people: “I will be your God, and you will be my people” (See Exodus 6:7). God is the creator of all peoples, but He has a special relationship with all who live in covenant with Him. The LORD’s special people are always under His care and authority. By the way, special is not meant to be a statement about the exceptional qualities of the people themselves, but a statement about the exceptional unearned love that the LORD bestows on them (See Deuteronomy 9:4-12).
After two charges to worship the LORD, there is an abrupt warning that begins with an important reminder concerning God’s Word: “Today, if you hear his voice” (95:7b). David is attributed as the author of Psalm 95, but what David is indicating is that those who are hearing the words of his Psalm should expect to hear from the LORD. David grasps that God is speaking through his words, not that David is thinking he is a god, but that David realizes that he is speaking Scripture. Where Scripture speaks, God speaks. The writer of Hebrews adds this important reminder about God’s Word when it states, before quoting David: “Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says” (See Hebrews 3:7). The author of Hebrews moves back and forth in his quote from Psalm 95:7b-11, attributing the words of Psalm 95 to the Holy Spirit, to God, and to David. The words of David, guided by the Holy Spirit (See 2 Peter 1:21) are nevertheless, a warning “from the living God” (See Hebrew 3:12). The moment that David wrote Psalm 95 it was Holy Scripture. This is an important reminder as it is sometimes confusing to sort out when the Bible came together as Holy Scripture and how. There was no council in the early church that determined the contents of the Bible; God did. When God’s Spirit moved on men to write the Books of the Bible, they were Holy Scripture at that moment. God preserved His Word and through His providential rule over the events of history, He guided His people to discover the Books that were already Holy Scripture, and leading His people to compile the Books into one Book, while guarding them against receiving books that were not Holy Scripture.
The actual warning that was issued to the LORD’s people, who were in Babylonian captivity, awaiting a new Exodus, was to not respond to the LORD the way the wilderness generation did: “do not harden your hearts, as at Meribah, as on the day at Massah in the wilderness, when your fathers put me to the test and put me to the proof, though they had seen my work” (95:8-9). The exact warning is “do not harden your hearts.” The references to “Meribah” and “Massah” establish a historical context to the incident in which this warning refers. Exodus 17 provides the setting and place known as “Meribah” and “Massah” in light of the fact that Israel quarreled against the LORD and tested Him, which is the meaning of those names. Israel quarreled against and tested the LORD because their hearts were hard towards Him. Though they had seen what the LORD had done for them—rescuing them from the hands of Pharaoh, granting them exclusive safe access through the Red Sea, giving them manna from heaven to eat—they only focused on what the LORD had yet to do: supply them with ample water. Rather than operating from a believing heart that would have assumed that the LORD would take care of them with water as well, they operated with a hard heart. In their hard-hearted state they did not reflect on what the LORD had done so far, which would have given rise to a worshipful response; instead they grumbled against the LORD and demanded that He take care of them immediately.
The point of this brief history lesson was to warn the present generation of Israelites to not act that way in their day. How the LORD dealt with the wilderness generation is sobering: “For forty years I loathed that generation and said, “They are a people who go astray in their heart, and they have not known my ways.” Therefore I swore in my wrath, “They shall not enter my rest” (95:10-11). Their hardness of heart persisted for forty years against the LORD. For forty years—the normal span of a generation at that time—Israel did not turn to the LORD, refusing to trust Him and lovingly obey His ways. They went their own way. Thus the LORD swore that they would not experience the rest that He had for them. In that context, the rest that would have awaited them would have been tied to their entrance into the Promised Land (See Deuteronomy 12:9). The wilderness generation, except Joshua and Caleb, all died off before the nation made it to the Land. Ironically, the term “enter” in verse 10 is the same as the term “come” in verse 6. Ultimately, to come into the LORD’s presence is to enter into His rest. But hardened hearts never qualify for worshipping God with rejoicing and in reverence. Hardened hearts are not worshipping hearts, and vice versa. There is no third option.
As we reflect on Psalm 95 we can consider how the Lord Jesus Christ qualifies us to enter God’s presence and experience His rest. The Book of Hebrews emphatically points to Jesus as the sinless, obedient, faithful High Priest who offered Himself as the sacrifice, which would take away the sins of His people. Through faith in Jesus, “there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God” (See Hebrews 4:9). Such faith in Christ shapes an earnest pursuit of the Lord: “Let us therefore strive to enter that rest” (4:11). Such faith also battles against a hard heart: “Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin” (See Hebrews 3:12-13).
That’s all for Embrace the Word for Monday, July 27, 2026. I look forward to being back with you for the Wednesday, July 29, 2026 episode of Embrace the Word as we take a look at Psalm 96.