Psalm 100: 1-5 (links validated 4/23/25a)

In a seminar I co-lead for preachers, we look at how a robust program of general reading feeds the practice of creative preaching. One of the types of literature we suggest that helps to nurture preaching is children’s literature and also middle grade fiction. Wise preachers know they can learn much from writers like Kate DiCamillo or Gary Schmidt or Katherine Paterson or Kwame Alexander who are able simultaneously to write at a simple level and yet a very deep level. It is what my seminar colleague Neal Plantinga calls a “second simplicity.” This is a simplicity that lies just beyond the most basic level of a simple thing. All piano students sooner or later learn how to plink out the simple tune of “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.” But when no less a composer than Mozart wrote a variation on this tune, you get something that is at once simple and complex—you get a second simplicity whose refinement helps you re-appreciate the original. So also with Psalm 100. It plays in one sense a tune as simple as “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.” It is in one sense as simple as a Kindergarten guide to praise. Yet there is a complexity here too that helps us understand afresh the basics of who God is and why we praise God and all that is involved in God’s sticking with us in his immense kindness and grace. It is a second simplicity and it is in this way a deep and profound simplicity as well.

Those of us over a certain age remember a Coca-Cola commercial that ran incessantly in the early 1970s. In it a choir of people from all the world sing a song about global unity, about teaching the world to sing “in perfect harmony.” And somehow buying everyone in the world a Coke was going to be the ticket to make this happen. After all, as the song concludes, Coke “is the real thing.” Well . . . it’s an advertisement after all. But Coke is not “the real thing” to unite the world, to help us sing in global harmony. But the call of Psalm 100 does connect us to the real thing, to the real deal, to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who can and will in the end help us all shout to the Lord in perfect harmony as we enter his gates with thanksgiving. And maybe there will be Coca-Cola in the New Creation but . . . it won’t be the main event. Thanks be to God!

Perhaps I hear Psalm 100 as a counter-cultural protest song because I just finished watching Ken Burn's magnificent (and horrific) documentary on the Vietnam War. I lived through those terrible times, but I had forgotten the ferocity of that war and of the protests against it. Seeing those pictures of Americans protesting the war made me think of the way Christians should be protesting the war against the reign of King Jesus (cf. Psalm 2). But our protest does not have to be violent and bloody, contrary to what some Christian militants might think. Psalm 100 calls us to live with joy and gladness, thanksgiving and praise. That kind of living in this kind of world is eloquent testimony to the truth we celebrate on Christ the King Sunday...

Knowing that Jesus is Lord is not a purely, or mainly, intellectual endeavor. Indeed, the word “know” in the Hebrew is yada, which is first used in the Bible in a very interesting context. “And Adam knew Eve his wife and she conceived and bore a son.” (Genesis 4:1, RSV) Knowing Jesus may begin with learning some facts and giving assent to them. But we don’t really know Jesus as God until we enter a close personal relationship with him, a relationship characterized by trust and intimacy and communion. Think sex and you have it.

Kenneth Samuel went to court to settle a landlord-tenant dispute. The judge referred the case to arbitration. He wanted the two parties to work it out with the help of an arbitrator. So Samuel showed up for the arbitration. He entered the room with details that supported his claim and was pretty much convinced that a mutual settlement was impossible. The two sides just had a completely different view of things. The arbitrator entered the room and said that after reviewing the case, she believed that a mutual settlement could be reached. Samuel thought to himself, “Yeah… right!” But then the arbitrator proceeded to have the two parties talk about what common interests they shared. Both sides kept bringing up points to support their side of the argument, but the arbitrator kept bringing the two back to what interests they had in common. Three hours later, to Kenneth Samuel’s great surprise, they had signed a mutually agreed upon settlement. Samuel wrote, I entered the arbitration room with anger and doubt. The arbitrator entered the room with hopeful expectation. Thankfully, the hope she brought into the room overcame the doubt I brought into the room. What we bring to the issues of life sets the tone for what we will receive...

In August 1987, after fourteen years of ministry at the Cutler Ridge Presbyterian Church, Bob Davis stood in the pulpit to announce that he was concluding his ministry there. He told the congregation that he had discovered that he had Alzheimer's disease. He had reached the point where he could no longer continue his work. In the pews, eyes were wet with tears. Bob went on to say: "A Christian can do nothing greater than surrender completely to the Savior. My life is not mine but Christ's. Today my ministry draws to a close…. I stand at the finish line because God himself has set the distance I must run…. Bob Davis did not ask prayers for himself, but for his family: Pray for Betty, as I turn the guardianship over to her. I will not suffer nearly as much as she will. Pray that I be spared a personality change. Pray that I in no way inadvertently disgrace my Lord, this church, or the people I love." When asked about healing, Bob spoke slowly. He had to concentrate on each word. He continued: "Well, we all want magic, I guess. But the Lord made it clear to me that I'm no different from Paul. You remember he prayed three times for.... (then he lost his thought) whatever it was to be removed, but it wasn't. Yet he was able to say—what was it he said, Betty?" Betty quoted these words from the Apostle Paul, who said: "I have learned in whatever state I am, to be content" (Philippians 4:11). Bob then left the room and returned with a picture that a friend had given him. It was a picture of Jesus clutching a lamb to his cheek. The lamb had one eye open and the other eye closed. The lamb seemed to be saying, "How safe it feels!" The former football star wiped his eyes and said: "The picture gives the only possible answer. It seems as though the lamb is showing me how it should be done. I don't have to know any more about this than the lamb knows. I am just as safe as he, whatever my circumstances."...

Author Dennis Prager writes in "Happiness is a Serious Problem" — "There is a secret to happiness, and it is gratitude. All happy people are grateful, and ungrateful people cannot be happy. We tend to think that it is being unhappy that leads people to complain, but it is truer to say that it is complaining that leads to people becoming unhappy. Become grateful and you will become a much happier person."...

("Not so long ago famous people all over the world were asked by a magazine - 'if you could be granted one wish that will come true right now - what would that be?' There were some very interesting responses - but one response was particularly thought provoking. That response was this -I wish that I could be given an even greater ability to appreciate all that I already have.'...")

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Tom Gordon was a hospice chaplain in Edinburgh, Scotland for decades. He had end-of-life conversations with countless men and women, but one in particular stands out. An elderly man said he served as a sailor in the Second World War on ships in the North Sea. Through his tears, he shared an event that had haunted him throughout his life. He had been on shore-leave before his ship was due to sail. Two days before he was expected to join his ship in the Orkney Islands, he fell ill and was told by the doctor that he was unfit to travel. During his recuperation, word came that his ship had been sunk and only a handful of sailors survived. In between wiping his eyes he asked two questions. First, he asked: Why was I spared when others died? He had wrestled with this question for years and concluded that it was random chance. God had not spared him while condemning others. His second question was the one that still rocked his soul. He asked: Have I been thankful enough for the life I’ve been given? He knew that if not for a timely, microscopic virus, he most likely would have never survived his early twenties. He would have never experienced a million things he encountered over his long life. As the end approached, he wondered if he had sufficiently expressed his gratitude for the many extra years he had been given...