The Church Attendance Pandemic (Psalm 100)

This morning, we will take a look at Psalm 100 and how it applies to gathered worship:

Shout joyfully to the Lord, all the earth.

Serve the Lord with gladness;
Come before Him with joyful singing.

Know that the Lord Himself is God;
It is He who has made us, and not we ourselves;
We are His people and the sheep of His pasture.

Enter His gates with thanksgiving
And His courts with praise.
Give thanks to Him, bless His name.

For the Lord is good;
His lovingkindness is everlasting
And His faithfulness to all generations.

It is a beautiful Psalm, isn’t it? 

It is rightly titled “A Psalm of Praise” or “A Psalm of Thanksgiving.” As a matter of fact, it is the only Psalm bearing that particular title that is noteworthy. It's not that other Psalms aren’t meant to express praise or thanksgiving. It is just that this one stands apart from the rest.

One commentator wrote, “Among the Psalms of triumph and thanksgiving this stand preeminent, as rising to the highest point of joy and grandeur.” 

Spurgeon said, “It is all ablaze with grateful adoration, and has for this reason been a great favorite with the people of God ever since it was written…Nothing can be more sublime this side heaven than the singing of this noble psalm by a vast congregation.”

The Psalter version of this Psalm (a psalter is a book that arranges the psalms in a way that is easily sung) was commonly referred to as the Old Hundredth. It is the inspiration for the hymn “All People That on Earth do Dwell.” I look forward to our musicians adapting the Psalm for us in the future.

This morning we’ll have to just simply enjoy it by studying it. 

Psalm 100 is the final Psalm in a grouping that began in Palm 93. These Psalms all focus on God as the King reigning over the entire Earth. 

For example:

• 93:1 The Lord reigns, He is clothed with majesty…

• 94:2 Rise up, O Judge of the earth, Render recompense to the proud.

• 95:3-4 For the Lord is a great God And a great King above all gods, In whose hand are the depths of the earth

• 96:1 Sing to the Lord a new song; Sing to the Lord, all the earth.

And so on in 97, 98, and all the way to our passage. Psalm 100 begins with: “Shout joyfully to the Lord, all the earth.”

This Psalm is gasoline for a waning fire. If your heart is growing cold and your worship is becoming a dead religion, dose yourself with Psalm 100. Let's do that now, but first a prayer: 

"King of Earth, our Lord and Redeemer, set us free from being formalism and coldness in our worship of You. Give us a glad heart that explodes with thanksgiving and praise! You are good. We bless your name. Amen.”

The structure of Psalm 100 is simple. There is a pattern that repeats twice in these five verses. 

A set of imperatives or commands are given, followed by the grounds or reason for those commands. 

For example, in verses 1-2, we are told to shout, serve, and come. In verse 3, we are told why: We are His people. 

This pattern repeats in 4 & 5. In v. 4, we are told to enter, give, and bless. In v. 5, we are told why: The Lord is good.

Let's look at the first set of verses: 

v. 1 “Shout joyfully to the Lord…”

Often, when a victorious king would return from battle, his subjects would greet him with loud shouts of acclamation. 

“Caesar! Caesar! Caesar!”

This is the shout of people of made victorious by a glorious warrior-king. That should be us. We should be praising Christ, the eternal King of kings, as the pagans praised their temporary kings. PRAISE JESUS! HALLELUJAH! 

And it is not enough to shout. That’s not the command. The command is to shout joyfully. God is not after mere action. The attitude of your heart is of utmost importance. In Psalm 51, David says:

Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God, the God of my salvation;

Then my tongue will joyfully sing of Your righteousness.

O Lord, open my lips,

That my mouth may declare Your praise.

For You do not delight in sacrifice, otherwise I would give it;

You are not pleased with burnt offering.

The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit;

A broken and a contrite heart, O God, You will not despise.

So, God commands you to worship Him from your heart. You must shout joyfully. 

Spurgeon rightly says, “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.”

Is our society depraved? Yes. The wickedness of the day is exceptional. 

Are our churches struggling?

Yes. I get several emails a week from people all over the nation to a good church. I know of 3-4 or four families seriously considering moving 100s and 1000s of miles to be part of East River. It is hard to find a church that has both good doctrine and practice.

Are our lives difficult? Yes. Are our sins many? Yes. Do people fail us? Yes. Are there thousands of reasons to be morose and depressed? Yes.

That is unless Christ is your King. 

Listen to Colossians 2:

When you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions, having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. When He had disarmed the rulers and authorities, He made a public display of them, having triumphed over them through Him.

If your shout lacks joy, it is because you think much of yourself and little of your God. 

Christ is a victor. 

“…all the earth.” 

This Psalm is prophetic. It looks forward to the day when the gospel of the kingdom will go out and make converts of every tribe and tongue. Our God is no local deity. He is king of the earth. He will destroy the idols of the nations and toss down every false religion. He will call out His elect, and those who once were lost will declare the praises of their King. 

It always encourages me to think on the catholic (which means universal) nature of the church. Unlike nations, the church has no geographic boundaries. Across the entire globe, the church has gathered this Sunday to sing joyfully to our God. 

v. 2 “Serve the Lord with gladness…”

Our worship, that is, our service to God, ought not be begrudging. I’ve been to truly lifeless church services. They were like funerals. 

Worship of the true God is serious, but it isn’t emotionless. Effeminate preachers and worship leaders have ruined the word “passion.” It is a shame because our worship should be passionate.

Worship can be an emotional rollercoaster. Have you ever been made sick with conviction by a prayer of confession? You know, I'm just sickened by the sin that you still struggle against. And then someone reads to you a Scripture Assurance (that’s the verse David reads every week after our public confession). It’s a Word of Hope for the repentant. God forgives. Then your heart bubbles over with gladness. 

This gets us to the why or the grounds for these commands…

v. 3 “Know that the Lord Himself is God..”

The word “LORD” refers to God’s covenantal name, “Yahweh,” sometimes translated as “Jehovah.” Why do we worship with joy and gladness? Because our eyes have been opened by the Holy Spirit and the blood of Christ. We have been brought into a relationship with God. Yahweh is our God. We are in covenant with Him. A covenant is a special promise between two or more parties. The King of Creation is our King. We once were His enemies, but now we are His subjects. Even better… we now are heirs to His kingdom—sons of the King. 

 “It is He who has made us, and not we ourselves;”

This doesn’t merely refer to God creating man; it refers to the regenerating work He does in His elect. 

As an old commentator says, “Believers are the persons whom the prophet here declares to be God’s workmanship, not that they were made men in their mother’s womb, but in that sense in which Paul, in Eph 2:10, calls them, Τὸ ποιημα, the workmanship of God, because they are created unto good works which God hath before ordained that they should walk in them.”

Titus 2 says:

11 For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men, 12 instructing us to deny ungodliness and worldly desires and to live sensibly, righteously and godly in the present age, 13 looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus, 14 who gave Himself for us to redeem us from every lawless deed, and to purify for Himself a people for His own possession, zealous for good deeds.

It is interesting that a few manuscripts translate the first line of Psalm 100:3 as, “It is He who has made us, and we are His.” We belong to Christ. We are his possession. 

1 Peter 2:10 “…for you once were NOT A PEOPLE, but now you are THE PEOPLE OF GOD; you had NOT RECEIVED MERCY, but now you have RECEIVED MERCY., 

As God says in Isaiah 43, "I have redeemed thee: you are mine…”

Even if the variant translation isn’t correct, the idea is found in the second line of 4. 

“We are His people and the sheep of His pasture.”

Christ is our good shepherd. He said, “I am the good shepherd; the good shepherd lays down His life for the sheep.” 

This is the grounds of our joyful singing or our glad service. 

You been have saved. You have been born again. Christ is your Lord and Savior. How can that be true, and you be joyless in the worship of your God?

It can’t. But we are quick to forget. That is why we must constantly be reminded of our desperate need for the grace of God. 

David is praying for a drummer to show up at East River. He wants some percussion. 

Metaphorically speaking, we pound the bongos every week. We pound both man's sin and God's grace. That is the drum we beat here. We do it so you will praise God with thanksgiving. 

v. 4 Enter His gates with thanksgiving

And His courts with praise.

Give thanks to Him, bless His name.

This begins the second set of verses. 

This is talking about the gates which lead to God’s temple, or to the place of public worship. The “courts” were literally the open spaces which surrounded the tabernacle or temple. Even before the temple or Tabernacle, we see that there was a place where people would publicly offer sacrifices to God. You see this with Cain Abel in Genesis 4. And also with Job in chapters 1-2. There has always been a public element to worship, and there still is…

Hebrews 10:24-26 says,“and let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another; and all the more as you see the day drawing near.”

And so verse 4 of our Psalm is a call to passionate participation in the public worship of God. David Clarkson, successor to John Owen, preached a great sermon entitled, “Public worship to be preferred before private.” In it he gives 12 reasons why public worship is better than private worship. It’s worth looking up.

Nonetheless, this sentiment runs against the grain of American individualism. 

Christians have come to believe that their personal devotional times with God are more important and superior to the weekly worship gathering. They, of course, forget that it was only a few hundred years ago that we had our Bibles. If you want to hear God’s Word. You had to assemble with the brethren. That’s why Paul tells Timothy in 1 Timothy 4:13, “Until I come, give attention to the public reading of Scripture…” He wanted to people to know the Scripture. 

You can’t replace public worship with private worship. They work together, not against each other. There is no contradiction between all-of-life worship (Mon thru Sat) and Sunday worship. 

And yet every time I tell people Sunday isn’t “Second Saturday,” but it’s a day for the spiritual feeding and fellowship of the body of Christ, there is someone that says,” Well, every day is a day we should worship God.” 

Well, yes, but consider this:

What if I said, “Because my wife and I love each other, we’ve set aside a date night to love each other especially.” How crazy would it be for someone to say, “Well, every night should be date night. You should love your spouse equally every day?” 

We do. Setting aside special times to enjoy the work of a marriage done in the day-to-day only spurs that marriage on to greater love. It is time to look back, reflect, and celebrate. A date night doesn’t mean you don’t love each other on the other days.

Think of the pattern we find in Genesis 1-2. God makes the world in 6 days and then sets aside the 7th day for rest. Not because he is tired but because 1) he is enjoying his work and 2) he is giving us an example. Life is to be lived in rhythm. Six days of labor and a day special was given to rest in the Lord. It’s the day we celebrate the work of God that we get to participate in.

Weekly public worship is essential. 

If you start skipping, it’ll become a habit for you—but much worse, a habit for your children. Spotty attendance among dad and mom usually leads to no attendance among son and daughter when they are older.

I know a lot of ministries try to guilt people into church attendance. It’s a bad approach. 

I once participated in a year-long weekly men’s discipleship program. It met every Wednesday after an evening prayer meeting at 8 p.m. and often went to 10 p.m. Attendance started out well, but over time, it declined from 20 or so men to 5 or 6. Part of the leadership team decided to blame the men for not coming. Attendance immediately went up… for two weeks, then went back down, and never recovered. 

Guilt often only produces short-term results. Inspiration creates consistency. Guilt is like a pilot light; inspiration is the gas that feeds it. Now… 

You should prioritize public worship. We are purposely keeping our ministry simple at East River. By year’s end, we will have a morning Sunday school hour, a worship service, and three monthly meetings (one for men, one for women, and one for youth). Those will be the primary public ministry outlets for the church. 

Church is essential and central to the believer's life, but that doesn’t mean it should dominate every day of the week. It’s our job to equip you for the ministry's work and then to go out and be salt and light in the community. We want to leave space for you to do that, and we intend to make sure you are equipped for that work. 

Now, let’s talk about the pandemic… once upon a time, pastors guilted people into church attendance, but in 2020, even still this very Sunday, pastors are guilting people into not attending in-person church gatherings. Up is down. West is East. We live in insane times.

There was a time when we were all uncertain what we were dealing with in COVID-19, but it became clear within months, if not weeks, that this wasn’t the bubonic plague. It was a very strange flu-like sickness that was dangerous for a very small part of the population. 

So it was mind-blowing to watch American pastors rebel against God and command their churches to “[forsake] the public assembly” for almost an entire year. Video streaming is not church. 

And, yes, some re-opened and allowed public worship, but on the condition that healthy people pretend that they are sick and/or a potential danger to their neighbors. Mask up. Don’t get too close. Make sure to register for your seats. Some churches even went along with not singing because it might potentially pose a greater risk. 

If you opposed these measures, you were guilted and shamed as a rebel against God’s authority who hates his neighbor. That’s hogwash. It’s very opposite. God demands that He be worshipped publicly. And nothing builds up your neighbor like hearing you “Shout joyfully to the Lord, all the earth” in assembly of the saints.

This isn't rocket surgery:

• Healthy Christians should worship together in person every week.

• Sick Christians should abstain until they are no longer sick.

• Sickly Christians must make a judgment based on risks and priorities.

What do I mean by sick? 

If you merely have a cold, don’t shake hands and keep your distance. But still, come to worship.

If you're leaking fluids from your body that you don't normally leak or have a fever, stay at home until you stop leaking. Use a little discernment.

People should leave churches that train them not to gather publicly. There can be no doubt that God-haters in our culture will use this pandemic as a way to little public worship. Pastor James Coates has been arrested in Canada for holding publicly worship services. They will only release him on the condition he won’t preach publicly. He refuses to compile. 

So must we. The greatest pandemic in America isn’t the coronavirus. It’s the lack of church attendance.

Now, why should we give thanks to Him and bless His name publicly?

v. 5 For the Lord is good;

His lovingkindness is everlasting

And His faithfulness to all generations.

Where else can you be with a room full of people who know how awesome our God is? We come together to reflect on the beautiful attributes of God. 

He is loving, merciful, faithful, holy…

He is good, and we will be recipients of that goodness forever and ever!

He is a Being of unchangeable benevolence, mercy, and truth. Such a God is worthy to be held in universal reverence; such a God is worthy of universal praise.

A day is coming when we will all praise Him together. The persecuted Christians from the Roman era, the persecuted Christians from China, the persecuted Christians from Canada, and the faithful believers of every age will be united in one voice. Shout joyfully to the Lord, all the earth!

So, Christian, you have no excuse for cold worship. Repent. Enjoy God. Taste the heavenly goodness now.