Today- A Time to Come or a Time to Provoke? (Psalm 95)

This is an exposition of Psalm 95. We will be looking at the contrasted heart condition of the sheep who hear the Call to come and glorify God and the sheep who harden their hearts and provoke the LORD through their faithlessness.
The story is told in the times of Moses and then told to us by the Apostles that such was “our example” as Christians, we are likewise given a staunch warning to not be ignorant of the danger of provoking the LORD, a warning endorsed by God’s wrath and promise of damnation unto restlessness. 

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An Exposition of 2 Corinthians 7

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Delivered on 9-22-2023 / grego. 1-13-2023

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Compiled by JS LOWTHER
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Notes for

Today- A Time to Come or a Time to Provoke? (Psalm 95)

Psa_95:1-11 KJV

1 O come, let us sing unto the LORD: let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation.
2 Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving, and make a joyful noise unto him with psalms.
3 For the LORD is a great God, and a great King above all gods.
4 In his hand are the deep places of the earth: the strength of the hills is his also.
5 The sea is his, and he made it: and his hands formed the dry land.
6 O come, let us worship and bow down: let us kneel before the LORD our maker.
7 For he is our God; and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand. To day if ye will hear his voice,
8 Harden not your heart, as in the provocation, and as in the day of temptation in the wilderness:
9 When your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my work.
10 Forty years long was I grieved with this generation, and said, It is a people that do err in their heart, and they have not known my ways:
11 Unto whom I sware in my wrath that they should not enter into my rest.

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This Psalm is accredited to David in the LXX, and what a Psalm of praise it is. The whole of the psalm contrasts the glory of God with our provoking of God and tempting of God as it was done by our Israelite race in the wilderness a time called the provocation or in Hebrew this is called Meribah
in Greek par-a- p-ik- Ras-mos’
From G3893; irritation: or as some translations have it embitterment – provocation.
As we should know the story referred to as Meribah in Ex 17, we find it…

Exo 17:7  And he called the name of the place Massah, and Meribah, because of the chiding of the children of Israel, and because they tempted the LORD, saying, Is the LORD among us, or not?
LXX Test G3986 pi-ras-mos’ and G2532 Reviling; G3058 loy-dor-eh’-sis

Not just this situation, but hereafter many situations are referred to as Provocation, as a matter of fact even at the end of Moses life he brings up this way Israel is prone to and will be prone to that is the way of provocation.

Look at
Deu_31:27  For I know thy provocation, and thy stiff neck; for yet during my life with you at this day, ye have been provoking in your conduct toward God: how shall ye not also be so after my death?

This way of being, this imbittering way, this provoking way this irritating way is called for what it is by Moses, and it is a way of faithlessness: “they tempted the LORD, saying, Is the LORD among us, or not?”

And this is what the apostle says of the way of Provocation:
Heb_4:1-2
1 Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it.
2 For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto them: but the word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it.

And Paul further adds:

1Co_10:1  Moreover, brethren, I would not that ye should be ignorant, how that all our fathers were under the cloud, and all passed through the sea;
1Co 10:2  And were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea;
1Co 10:3  And did all eat the same spiritual meat;
1Co 10:4  And did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Christ.
1Co 10:5  But with many of them God was not well pleased: for they were overthrown in the wilderness.
1Co 10:6  Now these things were our examples, to the intent we should not lust after evil things, as they also lusted.

The Psalm ends with the proclamation from God to the vast multitude of Israelites who had no joy in Him and who were faithless according to the apostle Paul, it is unto a provocative and faithless people, a people who as a race have God’s covenant given to their fathers and mothers, a race who God calls “the sheep of His pasture”… and “hand”, that he also says that they who  truly are his sheep must ‘hear His voice and not harden their heart’ at the hearing thereof, Yet to those who provoke God He says

“I sware in my wrath that they should not enter into my rest.”

Here is our example, let us take heed as the Apostle hath said:
Psa_95:1
1 O come, let us sing unto the LORD: let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation.
2 Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving, and make a joyful noise unto him with psalms.
3 For the LORD is a great God, and a great King above all gods.
4 In his hand are the deep places of the earth: the strength of the hills is his also.
5 The sea is his, and he made it: and his hands formed the dry land.
6 O come, let us worship and bow down: let us kneel before the LORD our maker.
7 For he is our God; and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand. To day if ye will hear his voice,
8 Harden not your heart, as in the provocation…

Notice: The Psalm has 3 calls to worship in it, all of them say “Come” and it is the words and content of this Word of God that the Sheep hear and react to as those who will have rest; and it is the Word ‘Come’ and the content of it that Word the hard hearted sheep will not come to.

If you remember, Jesus Said,

Joh_10:26  But ye believe not, because ye are not of my sheep, as I said unto you.
Joh 10:27  My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me:
Joh 10:28  And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.
Joh 10:29  My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand.
Joh 10:30  I and my Father are one.

It is a dangerous and revealing attitude to not ‘Come’ to Praise the LORD within yourself and without with others, to not ‘come’ into his presence your self and with others.
As stated in this Psalm and as the Apostle of Christ teach us from this Psalm there are two sides:
There are the ‘hearers’ and there are the ‘ I will not hear’ ‘sheep’.

The hearing sheep, hear this call of the Psalm and they ‘Come’ in worship, praise, thanksgiving.
The unhearing sheep provokes the Lord to anger and will not come, they are content to stand still and sink their hooves into the wilderness ground and complain about what they do not have- what God has not done for them or given them

The Psalmist, who is the prophet David, is rehearsing a key and pivotal point of Israel’s history to those who will sing this Psalm. The message of this Psalm is simple, the Psalmist wants us to consider the importance of individual and joint worship, as well as the hearing of the Word of God by way of warnings, exhortations and admonitions.

Of course, this is the job of the preacher ministering the Word with a tone repentance and warning, as I am doing this evening with all of you.

Now let us consider the Psalm as a whole and not just dwell on the provoking but on the blessing of those who can hear with faith.
.
v. 1-6 Says “come, let us…” this is the calling of assembly, this is a church call to worship as it were.
The call proclaims 3 main purposes with some minor points falling in under each head:

v.1 I. O come
A. let us sing unto the LORD:
B. let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation.

v.2 II. Let us come
A. before his presence with thanksgiving,
B. and make a joyful noise unto him with psalms.

Such reason given:
1. For the LORD is a great God,
2. and a great King above all gods.
3. In his hand are the deep places of the earth: the strength of the hills is his also. The sea is his, and he made it: and his hands formed the dry land.

v. 6 III. O come,
A. let us worship and bow down:
B. let us kneel before the LORD our maker.

Such reason given:
1. For he is our God; and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand.
2. To day if ye will hear his voice, Harden not your heart….

Hearing the stories of our fathers and of God’s works with a tone of praise and warning is not to be taken lightly, lest we hear those dreadful words of God:
“I sware in My wrath that you shall not enter into my rest.”

A people who have no pleasure in individual and joint worship of the majesty of God are a people who are ever in a state of unrest, being faithless.

Heb 3:1  Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our profession, Christ Jesus;
Heb 3:2  Who was faithful to him that appointed him, as also Moses was faithful in all his house.
Heb 3:3  For this man was counted worthy of more glory than Moses, inasmuch as he who hath builded the house hath more honour than the house.
Heb 3:4  For every house is builded by some man; but he that built all things is God.
Heb 3:5  And Moses verily was faithful in all his house, as a servant, for a testimony of those things which were to be spoken after;
Heb 3:6  But Christ as a son over his own house; whose house are we, if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end.
Heb 3:7  Wherefore (as the Holy Ghost saith, To day if ye will hear his voice,
Heb 3:8  Harden not your hearts, as in the provocation, in the day of temptation in the wilderness:
Heb 3:9  When your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my works forty years.
Heb 3:10  Wherefore I was grieved with that generation, and said, They do alway err in their heart; and they have not known my ways.
Heb 3:11  So I sware in my wrath, They shall not enter into my rest.)
Heb 3:12  Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God.
Heb_3:13  But exhort one another daily, while it is called To day; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.
Heb 3:14  For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence stedfast unto the end;
Heb 3:15  While it is said, To day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts, as in the provocation.
Heb 3:16  For some, when they had heard, did provoke: howbeit not all that came out of Egypt by Moses.
Heb 3:17  But with whom was he grieved forty years? was it not with them that had sinned, whose carcases fell in the wilderness?
Heb 3:18  And to whom sware he that they should not enter into his rest, but to them that believed not?
Heb 3:19  So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief.

Hebrews 4:1-2
1 Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it.
2 For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto them: but the word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it.

Jas_1:12  Blessed is the man that endureth temptation / pi-ras-mos’: for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love him.
Jas 1:13  Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man:
Jas 1:14  But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.
Jas 1:15  Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.
Jas 1:16  Do not err, my beloved brethren.
Jas 1:17  Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.
Jas 1:18  Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures.