The Lord Message:  Worshipping God

The Lord Message:  Worshipping God
Date:  January 25, 2026
Where:  Parsonage at Tilghman
Scripture Reference:  Psalm 100

            One of my most favorite Psalms is Psalm 100.  This is the only psalm that is entitled “A Psalm of Thanksgiving.”  This is an invitation to the whole earth to know and worship God.  I am so thankful for all that God has done for me that I strive everyday to live a life of gratitude, despite what may be happening around me.

            Let us pray.

            The Psalm begins with a command for all the earth to make a joyful noise to the Lord, verse 1.  The Hebrew word here is “rua.”  It means to shout, raise a loud sound, or blast a trumpet as what one would do to welcome a king.  The great evangelist, Charles Spurgeon, says that “Our happy God should be worshipped by a happy people, a cheerful spirit is in keeping with His nature, His acts, and the gratitude which we should cherish for His mercies.” 

            In verse 2, we not only make a joyful noise, but the result of our gratitude flows out in service to God with gladness.  Do you remember the two most important commandments that Jesus said?  In Matthew 22:37-40, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind… Love your neighbor as yourself.” When we love God with all our heart, soul, and mind, this love naturally becomes great joy. 

Do you remember the song that we used to sing in Sunday School, “Down in My Heart”?

The lyrics are:   

Verse 1:   I’ve got the joy, joy, joy, joy, down in my heart.  Where?  Down in my heart!  Where?  Down in my heart!  I’ve got the joy, joy, joy, joy down in my heart.  Down in my heart to stay. 

Chorus:  And I’m so happy, so very happy.  I’ve got the love of Jesus in my heart.  Down in my heart.  And I’m so happy, so very happy.  I’ve got the love of Jesus in my heart. 

Verse 2:  I’ve got the love of Jesus, love of Jesus down in my heart.  Where?  Down in my heart!  Where?  Down in my heart!  I’ve got the love of Jesus, love of Jesus down in my heart.  Where? Down in my heart to stay. 

When you love the Lord with all your heart, soul, and mind, you are naturally filled with joy. 

The outcome of this is that we want to love our neighbor.  You cannot bottle up God’s love, it has to flow out of us.  If we try to bottle God’s love, we will only make ourselves miserable.  When we allow God’s love to flow out of us, then we will show love to our neighbors, our friends, our families, and even strangers. 

We come into fellowship with God by singing songs to Him.  Charles Spurgeon goes on to say, “As for the true believers in Jesus, he serves His God because he loves to serve Him, he assembles with the great congregation because it is his delight to worship the Most High.”  Singing is not the only way to praise God, but it is the chief way to praise Him.” I have the unique perspective when I am in front of the congregation of hearing all of these voices   blending together in song, I tell you the angels are not capable of singing any more beautifully.  The more people that we have in worship that louder and more beautiful the singing is.

            Some may ask why do we have this joy and gratitude and want to sing praises to God?  The Psalmist provides the answer in verse 3.  The reasons start with first recognizing that God is God.  There is no other God like Him.  He is the creator of this world.  He brought order from chaos.  He created the Sun, Moon, stars, planets, and all the celestial bodies and put them in their places.  He chose this planet, Earth, to have waters separated by dry land.  In the waters and the dry land, God created an abundance and diverse life.  From the deepest ocean and caves to top of the mountains and sky, life is found in abundance and diverse.  The last that He created was you and me, Genesis 1:27.  He did all of this for one reason and that is love.  God is crazy in love with us.  One pastor said that if God had a refrigerator our picture would be on it.  He made us and we are His people. 

            Many people in this world are living very lonely lives because they think that no one loves them.  They feel that no one cares about them.  They are looking for a place to fit in; to be connected.  If you are that person, or if you know of a person like that, I want you to know that there is a God who is standing with His arms wide open to welcome you or them.  Jesus once told a parable called the Prodigal Son.  You can read this in Luke 15:11-32.  The parable tells about two sons and a father.  The younger son comes to the father and asks for his share of the inheritance.  Normally, you would only ask for the inheritance when the father is dead.  The younger son is, by all reasoning, telling the father that as far as he is concerned his father is dead.  This must have broken the father’s heart, but he gave his younger son his share of the inheritance.  The younger son took the money and spent it on wild living.  After a while he was broke, he lost all his money.  The only job he could find was feeding pigs.  He was so hungry that the slop that he was feeding the pigs looked like steak to him.  That is when he came to his senses. He decided to return to the father, not as his son, but as hired help.  The story goes that the father was standing at the end of lane waiting for his son to return home.  The father most likely did this day after day hoping and praying for his son to come home.  When the father saw the son, he ran and embraced him.  Before the son could tell him he returned home not to be his son any longer, but if the father would take him on as his hired help.  The father would hear none of that, he ordered his servants to dress his son and give him a ring for his finger to symbolizes that he was one of the family, again.  The father even throws a large party for his son.  In Luke 15:24, the father says this. 

If you do not have a relationship with God, God is searching for you.  Turn to Him in prayer.  Tell Him that you want a relationship with Him.  Confess to God that you are a sinner and in need of a savior.   Asking Jesus to come into your heart and ask Jesus to forgive you of your sins.  He will do this.  Your sins will no longer be remembered by God as far as the East is from the West.  If you do this, you have more love, joy, and peace in your life than you have ever known.  He created you.  He loves you.  You are one of His people, the sheep of His pasture.

Then in verse 4, you get to enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise.  Pastor Rick Warren, from Saddleback Church, said that “what we do here on earth is just in preparation for what we will do in heaven.”  The Psalmist envisioned not just walking into the temple in Jerusalem, but in the temple in heaven where he would be gathered with all the believers worshipping God.  John, on the Island of Patmos, was given this vision in

Revelation 7:9-12.  I am looking forward to that day when if I cannot gather with you in the church on earth, then I will gather with you and the rest of the believers in heaven.  But if you happen to be in the area around Tilghman, I invite you to join with others at Tilghman Methodist Church. Our worship service is at 10am on Sunday mornings.  We would love to have you.  Public worship of God gives us the opportunity to prepare for our worship of God in Heaven. 

            Why do we gather in worship?  In verse 5.  God is good.  His love for us is forever.  He has been faithful in the past and will be faithful now and in the future. 

            God is good.  God is good in His plans.  He is good in His grace.  He is good in His forgiveness.  He is good in every aspect of His being. 

            His love never ends.  In Lamentations 3:22-24, listen to what Jeremiah has to say about God’s love never ending.  This was written by a prophet of God, Jeremiah, who was trying to warn Judah about the destruction that was coming because they refused to follow God.  Jeremiah faced extreme persecution by his own people, neighbors, priests, and kings.  He was beaten, put in stocks, and thrown in a cistern.  He watched the destruction of Jerusalem, including the temple. 

            God is faithful.  The Apostle Paul says in 2 Timothy 2:13.   God remains faithful, even when you and I fail to remain faithful to Him. 

            In closing, we should live a life of thankfulness to God because of what God has done for us.  He made us in His own image.  His DNA is inside of us.  We are His.  When we did not remain faithful and sin entered into our lives, God sent His own Son, Jesus, to die on the cross to pay the penalty that we could not pay for our sin.  God remained faithful, even when we did not.  God has prepared for all the believers in Jesus a place in heaven where we shall all be gathered around the throne of God worshipping Him.  What we do here on earth is in preparation for what we shall do in heaven.  That is showing God’s love to others and by worshipping God with others. 

            God is good!

            All the time God is good!

            So, let us continue to listen to God and do what He says. Amen.