0623 - Going Home, Going to Church, Going to Worship
Psalm 122: 1-9
There is a surge of happiness at the sight of Jerusalem.
V. 1 I was
glad when they said to me, * "Let us go to the house of the Lord.
Last year I took a week and went back to
Southern California to visit where I was raised. It was nice to see the old places and the High
School along with the memories. I mentioned Thomas Wolf’s novel, “You Can’t Go
Home Again.'' That it is hard to go back home to your family, your childhood -
to your dreams of glory & fame, to the country, to the old forms &
systems of the things which one thought at the time were everlasting but are
actually changing all the time - you can’t go back home to the escapes of time
& memory”.
This
year, December, we’re heading back to Panama, for me it is a missionary journey
to see my old Christian friends and the church that has been built in La Paz de
Chame on Demetrio Gaitan’s original home. So I can say, I was glad when they
said to me, "Let us go to the house of the Lord.
But
our Psalm is speaking of Jerusalem. Of the pilgrimages the people made to
attend the holy feasts they were required to attend.
It
was in David's time that Jerusalem was first chosen to be the city where God
would record his name. The psalm sings of The joy with which they were to go up
to Jerusalem (v. 1, 2). The
great esteem they were to have of Jerusalem; 3-5. The great concern they were
to have for Jerusalem, and the prayers they were to put up for its welfare 6-9.
We
see the pleasure David and the Israelite's took in approaching to and attending
upon God in public ordinances, David was glad, and would have every
Israelite to say that he was glad to go to the house of the Lord.
It’s
God’s will that we all should worship Him in concert. We should worship Him in
our houses, but also in the house of the Lord, the building where we
assemble not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the
manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the
Day approaching Heb 10:25.
We shouldn’t only agree with one
another, but motivate one another to go to worship God in public. Let’s all go.
Like the platoon Sgt. That motivates all 40 men when he says “let’s go”.
We shouldn’t say, "Do you go
and pray for us, and we will stay at home;" but as Zechariah says in 8:20-2, thus says the LORD of hosts: Peoples shall
yet come, even the inhabitants of many cities. 21 The inhabitants of one city
shall go to another, saying, 'Let us go at once to entreat the favor of the LORD
and to seek the LORD of hosts; I myself am going.' 22 Many peoples and strong
nations shall come to seek the LORD of hosts in Jerusalem and to entreat the
favor of the LORD. Not, "Go ahead and I’ll be along a little later;
or, "We will go first, and you shall come after us;" but, Let’s all
go together, for the honour of God and we can all be edified and encouraged.
We’re all slow and backward, and others too, so we should all quicken and
sharpen one another to that which is good, as iron sharpens iron, Proverbs
27:17.
We know that no building can contain God in all His glory and greatness.
Acts 7:48-49, Yet the Most High does not dwell in houses made by
hands, as the prophet says, 49 "'Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my
footstool. What kind of house will you build for me, says the Lord, or what is
the place of my rest? 2 Cor.
5:1-4; As Paul explains to us in 1 Cor. 3:16-17, Do you not know that you
are God's temple and that God's Spirit dwells in you? 17 If anyone destroys
God's temple, God will destroy him. For God's temple is holy, and you are that
temple.
David at the
house of the LORD he could focus his thoughts, prayers, worship, and
receiving of God’s word in the community of God’s people in a special
way,
The believer also, when attending
church, is bringing the temple of God to the building making it also the house
of the Lord.
It is good and important for us to
gather with God’s people for prayers, worship, and receiving of God’s word. The
gathering should be formal and ordered enough so that it is
regarded as a gathering of God’s house – not everyone doing their own
thing, but God’s people coming together for His glory and their benefit in His
house.
Coming to the house of the Lord
should be a glad thing. This isn’t the same as saying it should
be entertaining, especially in an age when entertainment is a
dangerous idol. Not everything that happens at the house of the
LORD must be fun, but it should all be good, both
welcoming to the not-yet-believer and good for those who are believers in
Jesus.
V 3. Jerusalem is built as a city
* that is at unity with itself;
Jerusalem was not
large, but it was not a disordered collection of tents and shacks. It was built,
and built together in an orderly way (compact together). It was a real city.
The expression ‘unity with itself’ some translations have ‘bound firmly
together’ [compact together] uses…the same verb as is found in the
instructions for making the tent of worship: ‘couple the tent together that it
may be one whole’ (Exod. 26:11). Such was the blueprint; such will be the
ultimate reality, And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great,
high mountain, and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven
from God, (Rev. 21:10ff.)
Charles Spurgeon comments,“A church should be
one in creed and one in heart, one in testimony and one in service, one in
aspiration and one in sympathy. They greatly injure our Jerusalem who would
build dividing walls within her; she needs compacting, not dividing.”
“The unity of the city reflected the unity of the
tribes on these special occasions. The Israelite tribes came together for the
purpose of praising ‘the name of the Lord’. It was an act of loyalty, as the
Lord had commanded them to present themselves before him.” (VanGemeren)
Pray
for the peace of Jerusalem: "May they prosper who love you. 7 Peace be within your walls and quietness within your towers. 8 For my brethren and companions' sake, I pray
for your prosperity.
Internal peace is one of the main ingredients of
success in a church: Strife, suspicion, party-spirit, division, – are deadly
things. Spurgeon comments that those who break the peace of the church deserve
to suffer, and those who sustain it win a great blessing.”
There
are, unfortunately, churches in our area that are going through a lot of
disunity. Even among other Christian denominations and the heretical
progressive Emergent Church movement in the world today. Even within the SBC churches not following
the Baptist Faith & Message.
We,
as David prayed for the peace and prosperity of Jerusalem, we must pray for
blessings of the church, for those who love and pray for the church.
9.
Because of the house of the Lord our God, I will seek to do you
good.
Under the New Covenant the church, for us, is
the house of the LORD, with Jesus the Head and Son of the house Moses was faithful in all God's
house as a servant, to testify to the things that were to be spoken later, 6
but Christ is faithful over God's house as a son. And we are his house, if
indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope (Hebrews
3:5-6), since we have a great
priest over the house of God, (Hebrews
10:21); you yourselves like
living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood,
to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. (1 Peter
2:5); For it is time for
judgment to begin at the household of God; and if it begins with us, what will
be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God?(1 Peter
4:17).
What makes the church special is that it is God’s habitation, His house. His presence, which is
you, makes it special.
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