Psalm 95 Summary - 5 Minute Bible Study
Psalm 95 Short Summary:
Psalm 95 is an invitation to worship God. The writer wanted his people, the people of Israel and Judah, to worship the Lord for His greatness and kindness. He invited them to worship rather than to participate in the faithlessness of their ancestors, the ancestors who murmured against God and Moses when they couldn’t find water in the wilderness at Massah and Meribah (Exo 17).
Psalm 95 Summary
AUTHOR:
The author of Psalm 95 is unknown.
NEW TESTAMENT REFERENCES:
Hebrews 3:7-11, 15; 4:3, 5, 7
THEMES:
An invitation to worship the Lord.
A warning against hardening your heart towards God.
DEFINITIONS:
Massah and Meribah (95:8) – When the Israelites were in the wilderness they grumbled against God and Moses because they didn’t have any water. The place became known as Massah and Meribah (see Exodus 17:1-7).
OUTLINE:
AN INVITATION TO WORSHIP (95:1-7a):
This psalm is an invitation for God’s people, the people of Israel and Judah, to worship the Lord.
The psalmist gives several reasons why God should be worshiped.
(1) God is a great king and the God above all gods.
(2) The whole earth was created by Him and is in His control.
(3) God is a good shepherd who care for His sheep (His people).
DO NOT HARDEN YOUR HEARTS (95:7b-11):
After inviting people to worship, the psalmist warned God’s people not to harden their hearts, like their forefathers had done in the wilderness.
Many years previous to this, when the Israelites were travelling from Egypt to Canaan through the wilderness, they camped at a place that had no water. Rather than expressing faith that God would take care of them, they complained against Moses and grumbled about God’s leadership (Exodus 17:1-6).
God miraculously provided the Israelites with water by having Moses strike a rock with his staff, but the place became known as Massah and Meribah because of the people’s complaining (Exodus 17:7).
God spoke of that generation of Israelites very harshly, He said, “For forty years I loathed that generation” (95:10).
The psalmist didn’t want the people of his generation to repeat the disobedience of their ancestors, which is why he called on them to meditate on God’s greatness and invited them to worship.
APPLICATION:
If you only focus on your immediate circumstances, you’re likely to miss God’s work in your life.
God didn’t bring the Israelites out of Egyptian slavery with 10 miraculous plagues just to let them die in the wilderness for lack of water.
It was rather foolish for the Israelites to think that, but their sole focus on their immediate unpleasant circumstances led them to that irrational conclusion.
They needed to zoom out, take a wider view, and realize God had a plan for them.
They also needed to realize that God was testing them and maturing them in that moment. It’s easy to serve God when things are comfortable, but will a person abandon their trust in God when things get hard?
If we can’t take that wider perspective when the circumstances of our lives aren’t easy, we are going to fall into the same sin as the Israelites.
We are going to start grumbling and questioning whether God really knows what He’s doing.
When your life gets hard, step back, remind yourself of God’s promises, widen your perspective to what He might be doing through this period of difficulty, remind yourself that you don’t want to be faithful just when things are easy, ask God for wisdom, and then resolve in yourself to pass the test in front of you with unwavering faith.
