# 40 2020 Dev. Psalm 96:1. A New Song! Read all of Psalm 96. The purpose of these devotionals is to draw closer to God and grow spiritually by applying His Word to our daily living. All passages are taken from the NIV.
Psalm 96:1 “Sing to the Lord a new song; sing to the Lord, all the earth.”
Psalms 90 through 100 are a series of 11 Psalms that open and close with “Lord” (Adonai) or “the Lord” (Yahweh). After Psalm 95, a call to God’s people to worship God Almighty the Psalmist calls the world to worship and praise God.
Psalm 96 is divided into 2 themes, vs. 1-6 is a call to move into a different direction: “sing to the Lord a new song”. How difficult it is for followers of Jesus to move into a different direction. The Psalmist calls the whole earth into a different direction, “proclaim His salvation day after day” proclaim it “among the nations… among all peoples.” This call comes in view in 1Pe. 1 “Peter is writing to followers of Jesus scattered among the nations “who have been chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through the sanctifying work of the Spirit, to be obedient to Jesus Christ and sprinkled with his blood:” The Psalmist continues to validate God as the only God of the nations: “for great is the Lord and most worthy of praise.”
The second view, vs. 7-13, calls “all you families of the nations” to acknowledge “the Lord, bring an offering… Worship the Lord in the splendor of his holiness; Say among the nations, ‘The Lord reigns.’” Looking forward to 1Pe. vs. 10-12, it is obvious that God previewed salvation from the beginning of time (Gen 3:15), highlighted in the Old Testament particularly in the Psalms and comes to full view in Jesus. By faith, salvation is from the time of the fall and still is extended to the whole human race and will be available until the last day. Praise the Lord!
Further, the psalmist calls nature to rejoice; The Lord rules all peoples and the Lord rules His creation. “Let the heavens rejoice, let the earth, let the sea, let the fields, let all the trees, let all creation rejoice before the Lord…” Why must every person and everything rejoice? “Because, “The Lord comes to judge the earth.”
Followers of Jesus are reluctant to speak about Judgment, no person is qualified to judge, not Christians, not non Christians, nor anyone from the many religions of the world. But all followers of Jesus know there will be a judgment of the actions and thoughts of all the people of the earth that ever lived, live now and those who will live in the future. Impossible you say? Don’t bank on it, our consolation is that God “will judge the world in righteousness and the peoples in his faithfulness.” Praise the Lord!
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