“A Heart for Sunday Worship”
(Psalm 122)
Series: I Love Sundays
Rev. Todd A. Linn, PhD
Henderson’s First Baptist Church, Henderson
Words in Black: Todd
Words in Blue: Rich
Praise God and be glad! We are in the house of the Lord!
Sometimes being in the house of the Lord can surprise you. Any of you surprised right now by my wardrobe?! I’ll tell you I’m a bit surprised and if you’re hugely freaked out by the pastor not being in a coat and tie, don’t worry. Next week all will be well in the world again!
This Sunday we wanted to do some things that were a bit different. We wanted to alter the routine a bit to demonstrate that Sunday worship is not about always having to do things the same way, having the same order of service, or even dressing the same way. Worship is about much more than that. And we want to talk about having a heart for worship this morning.
We’d like to invite you to open your Bibles and find Psalm 122, which is on page 420 of the church Bible. You can also find the outline on your phones or tablets through the YouVersion Bible app.
While you’re finding that, we are blessed to be using this material written by our missional partner Hal Seed in San Diego California. We are partnering with NewSong Church, founded by Hal and partnering more directly with Wes Coddington at the Seaside campus in San Diego where Wes and his family are sharing the Gospel in Oceanside.
Hal wrote this material we are using in Sunday school and he wrote it for a wider audience than Baptists so keep that in mind as you use it. Any time you use someone else’s material you know it’s never written the way you would write it. And based on what we know about Hal, I am very confident he would say, “Just use the good stuff and forgive me for the bad stuff.”
Brother Ken read Psalm 122 earlier and we want to revisit this psalm and these 9 verses and talk about keys to meaningful Sunday worship, meaningful corporate worship.
There are four of them, four keys to meaningful corporate worship. They each have to do with our disposition, with our heart. What kind of heart are we to have?
**Before we look more closely at Psalm 122, let’s go to God in prayer (Todd prays).
Well, let’s take a look at these four keys to meaningful corporate worship. The first one is our having:
1) A Glad Heart (1-2)
People who love Sundays, who love Sunday worship are those who have glad hearts. Hearts that love the Lord and are filled with joy by the very thought of gathering with other believers to bring God glory. Read it again there in verse one, what the psalmist himself says:
1 I was glad (not mad!) when they said to me, “Let us go into the house of the LORD.”
Now of course, the psalmist, David according to the superscription, would be going into the temple on the Sabbath, the Jewish Sabbath being on Saturday. As Christians we gather now at the church building on Sunday for corporate worship.
So someone says to David, “It is time to make our ascent up the hill to Jerusalem. It’s time to go.” A smile breaks across his face. Just the thought of going makes his heart glad. And because we know David was a musician we can imagine him breaking in to song. Maybe he sang something like the wonderful chorus:
I will enter his gates with thanksgiving in my heart
I will enter his courts with praise
I will say this is the day That the lord has made
I will rejoice for he has made me glad
Someone says to you, “It’s time to go to worship.” What is your response? Are you filled with joy? Do you prayerfully anticipate being in the presence of God when you come together for worship? Look at verse 2:
2 Our feet have been standing Within your gates, O Jerusalem!
The idea here is that God’s people have been traveling to Jerusalem, looking forward to worship. They are “glad” to go into the house of the Lord and now, at last, their feet are standing within the gates. They have made it! At last!
Do you come to worship with a sense of anticipation? Do you come expecting God to speak to you? Do you come expecting to be joyful in HIs presence? Are you so looking forward to His being glorifies that you pray He will be glorified by everyone present? Do you pray for the pastor, pray for the musicians, pray for those leading and teaching, pray for the volunteers, pray for your brothers and sisters in Christ, pray for lost people who are present?
One of the keys to meaningful Sunday worship is coming together with a glad heart, expecting God to do great things. But not only do we come with a glad heart. Secondly, we come with:
2) A Grateful Heart (3-4)
A grateful heart. See the gratitude of the psalmist in verses 3-4:
3 Jerusalem is built As a city that is compact together,
4 Where the tribes go up, The tribes of the LORD, To the Testimony of Israel, To give thanks to the name of the LORD.
The worshipers are coming together into the house of God “to give thanks to the name of the Lord.” Many different people—“tribes”—think of all the different kinds of people.
Toward the end of the book of Deuteronomy, Moses is blessing all the tribes of Israel. He speaks a blessing for each tribe and in his blessing he describes the character and nature of each tribe. Each tribe differs somewhat from another. Each tribe is part of the corporate assembly, those who enter into the house of God to give thanks. Each tribe has a grateful heart.
The psalmist says that they entered the house of the Lord to “give thanks.” For what do you suppose they were thanking God? It could be so many things. God’s people must have thanked Him for the blessing of life. They must have thanked God for allowing them to be born and to enjoy the benefits of His common grace. I feel sure they also thanked God for His special grace, or particular grace, that effectual grace that led to their salvation as His chosen people. They must have thanked God for His provision, His giving them food, shelter, protection and a thousand blessings besides.
Maybe they sang a song like:
Bless the Lord oh my soul
Oh my soul
Worship His Holy name
I’ll bet you want to sing that, don’t you.
10,000 reasons for my heart to sing to God with gratefulness.
Sing with me:
Bless the Lord oh my soul
Oh my soul
Worship His Holy name
Sing like never before
Oh my soul
I’ll worship Your Holy name
You’re rich in love
And You’re slow to anger
Your name is great
And Your heart is kind
For all Your goodness
I will keep on singing
Ten thousand reasons
For my heart to find
Bless the Lord oh my soul
Oh my soul
Worship His Holy name
Sing like never before
Oh my soul
I’ll worship Your Holy name
Like the psalmist, Christians can sing with gratitude to God for His choosing us to become partakers of the benefits of God’s chosen people. Christians have become the “Israel of God.” As Paul said in Romans 2:28, he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, but he is a Jew who is one inwardly; it is a matter of the heart, having personally received Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior.
So we praise God thanking Him for salvation, for protection, for food, for things. There are 10,000 reasons for our hearts to find.
True worshipers of God have a glad heart, and a grateful heart. But that’s not all. Not only do we have a glad heart and a grateful heart. Thirdly, we have:
3) A Growing Heart (5)
A growing heart. Here the Psalm shifts. The first part points to the great truth that our coming to worship is about God and the joy of worshiping Him. Now we move to the part where we see that worship is of benefit to us. It we approach is rightly there is something we get out of it. This comes from verse 5 and it may not be very clear at first reading. Look at what is there inside the house of God in Jerusalem, verse 5:
5 For thrones are set there for judgment, The thrones of the house of David.
There are thrones there, thrones set for judgment. When you read the Old Testament you read of people coming to the house of God to hear the Word of truth as carried out by the king of Israel. God’s people traveled up to the house of God on feast days and had the opportunity then to come also with concerns, or questions that would be addressed by the Word of God.
Remember that the king was not to be some political position or a figure-head. He was to be the spiritual leader of Israel. He was to be one who followed God closely and dispensed the wisdom of God’s Word.
So in this sense, the psalmist says, when the people of God gathered together to come into the house of God, they came into the house of God to sit under the judgment of God’s Word.
Do you think of coming to worship in that sense? You gather together to sit under the judgment of the Word of God as it is preached in corporate worship and taught in Sunday school. You are being judged by the Word as it is preached and taught.
Sometimes somebody will say, “You sure stepped on my toes today.” I know what they mean by that. But I will usually respond, “If your toes were being stepped on it was God doing the stepping.” I do not preach “the word of Todd,” but “the word of God.” I proclaim the Word and the word comes forth and judges each of us, including the pastor. If your toes get stepped on at all, it will only be because mine were stepped on first! The Word of God judges every one of us.
So we must come into this sanctuary with a desire to sit under judgment of the Word. Christians have a heart inclined to be judged, a heart that seeks to grow in the things of God. We have a heart that desires growth. We welcome the judgment of the Word of truth and desire to align our lives according to the will of God. As Peter writes in 1 Peter 2:2, “Desire the sincere milk of the word that you may grow thereby.”
I enjoy preaching the Word, but I also love listening to preaching of the Word. I want to grow. I listen to good expository preaching, the kind of preaching where someone takes me through a passage of Scripture. I like to listen to Alistair Begg, Tim Keller, and John Piper. But I also like to listen to Rich Stratton, Matt McCraw, our pastoral interns Buzz Buzzell, John Kloke, and Bryan Bennett. I’m fed by that preaching because it is the teaching of the Word of God. Sermons feed me and satisfy my desire to grow personally. As I listen to preaching or read sermons, I am judged by the Word of God and convicted to conform my life according to His will.
Keys to meaningful Sunday worship include our coming before God with a glad heart, a grateful heart, and a growing heart. Finally, we come to worship with:
4) A Gracious Heart (6-9)
Finally we see the Psalm tells us that in addition coming to worship for God’s glory and our growth, we also come in order to be a blessing to others. Remember Paul’s challenge to the Christians in Philippi (Philippians 2:4): “Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others.”
We have a gracious heart, a heart that is concerned, genuinely concerned, for the spiritual welfare of others. The psalmist says in verses 6 and following:
6 Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: “May they prosper who love you.
7 Peace be within your walls, Prosperity within your palaces.”
8 For the sake of my brethren and companions, I will now say, “Peace be within you.”
9 Because of the house of the LORD our God I will seek your good.
See the concern there for others? There is a real sense of community here. Worshipers come together to pray for one another, to pray for their community, to bless one another. Verse 8, “for the sake of my brethren and companions, I will now say, “Peace be within you.”
The psalmist has a heartfelt concern for his “brethren and companions.” He is concerned for his fellow believers and friends.
You can’t know how your “brethren” are doing unless you are together with them in the Lord’s house.
When we fail to come together in worship and Sunday school we are, in effect, failing to show our care and compassion for our brothers and sisters. When we fail to come together on Sundays we lose touch with the spiritual well-being of our church family.
Remember that Paul writes about our being a body and that each one of us is vitally important to the overall health of the body.
This is one of the points we made a few Sunday evenings ago in our “Discover Your Design Service.” Paul writes in Romans 12:
3 For I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, as God has dealt to each one a measure of faith.
4 For as we have many members in one body, but all the members do not have the same function,
5 so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and individually members of one another.
6 Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, let us use them…
Someone (Paul Tournier) wrote, “There are two things we cannot do alone—one is to be married and the other is to be a Christian.” You see when we come together in worship we are not only saying that God is important, but we are also saying that others are important, too.
The key to loving Sundays, the key to Sunday worship is our coming together with hearts that are prepared to meet God. We come with glad hearts, grateful hearts, growing hearts, and gracious hearts.
If you’ve ever been to hear a symphony perform, then you know what they do before the concert actually begins. They warm up. Each plays a different sound at different times and different keys. It is a perfect example of dissonance, strange, unharmonious sounds serving no rhyme or reason. Then in walks the conductor. They become quiet. He then stands on the platform, raises his wand and motions for them to begin. Then, they play together—in concert—they play harmoniously, they play beautiful music together that they could never play individually.
Each of you is an integral part of this church body. Never, ever stop coming together for worship, gathering together in unity and harmony for the glory of God. Let’s pray.
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