They tried Me, though they had seen My work.

Psalm 95-96 from the daily reading in the One Year Bible

95 O come, let us sing for joy to the Lord,
Let us shout joyfully to the rock of our salvation.
² Let us come before His presence with thanksgiving,
Let us shout joyfully to Him with psalms.
³ For the Lord is a great God
And a great King above all gods,
⁴ In whose hand are the depths of the earth,
The peaks of the mountains are His also.
⁵ The sea is His, for it was He who made it,
And His hands formed the dry land.

⁶ 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.
Today, if you would hear His voice,
⁸ Do not harden your hearts, as at Meribah,
As in the day of Massah in the wilderness,
⁹ “When your fathers tested Me,
They tried Me, though they had seen My work.
¹⁰ “For forty years I loathed that generation,
And said they are a people who err in their heart,
And they do not know My ways.
¹¹ “Therefore I swore in My anger,
Truly they shall not enter into My rest.”

A Call to Worship the Lord the Righteous Judge.

96 Sing to the Lord a new song;
Sing to the Lord, all the earth.
² Sing to the Lord, bless His name;
Proclaim good tidings of His salvation from day to day.
³ Tell of His glory among the nations,
His wonderful deeds among all the peoples.
⁴ For great is the Lord and greatly to be praised;
He is to be feared above all gods.
⁵ For all the gods of the peoples are idols,
But the Lord made the heavens.
⁶ Splendor and majesty are before Him,
Strength and beauty are in His sanctuary.

¹¹ Let the heavens be glad, and let the earth rejoice;
Let the sea roar, and all it contains;
¹² Let the field exult, and all that is in it.
Then all the trees of the forest will sing for joy
¹³ Before the Lord, for He is coming,
For He is coming to judge the earth.
He will judge the world in righteousness
And the peoples in His faithfulness.

Exodus 17:1-7 says:  Then all the congregation of the sons of Israel journeyed by stages from the wilderness of Sin, according to the command of the Lord, and camped at Rephidim, and there was no water for the people to drink. Therefore the people quarreled with Moses and said, “Give us water that we may drink.” And Moses said to them, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the Lord?” But the people thirsted there for water; and they grumbled against Moses and said, “Why, now, have you brought us up from Egypt, to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?”  So Moses cried out to the Lord, saying, “What shall I do to this people? A little more and they will stone me.” Then the Lord said to Moses, “Pass before the people and take with you some of the elders of Israel; and take in your hand your staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. Behold, I will stand before you there on the rock at Horeb; and you shall strike the rock, and water will come out of it, that the people may drink.” And Moses did so in the sight of the elders of Israel. He named the place Massah and Meribah because of the quarrel of the sons of Israel, and because they tested the Lord, saying, “Is the Lord among us, or not?”     In Psalm 95:6-11 it says:      Come, let us worship and bow down,
Let us kneel before the Lord our Maker. For He is our God, And we are the people of His pasture and the sheep of His hand. Today, if you would hear His voice, Do not harden your hearts, as at Meribah, As in the day of Massah in the wilderness, “When your fathers tested Me,
They tried Me, though they had seen My work. “For forty years I loathed that generation, And said they are a people who err in their heart, And they do not know My ways. “Therefore I swore in My anger, Truly they shall not enter into My rest.”      What was the testing, the hardness of the hearts of the people in the wilderness? They had seen God’s work, yet they still doubted His presence with them and His provision for them. They preferred the familiarity of the bondage of Egypt over the unseen promise of God. The people had seen and experienced God’s deliverance, causing the Egyptians to release them from bondage, through the plagues He brought upon the land. They had seen His provision. The Egyptians sent them out with supplies, with gold and silver. They had seen God’s protection, as He allowed the Israelites to cross the sea on dry land, then destroyed the army of Pharaoh. God had already previously, miraculously provided water, when He made the bitter waters of Marah good to drink. (Exodus 15)    All of these things they had seen with their own eyes, yet they doubted and grumbled against God.

The psalmist says:  the Lord is a great God And a great King above all gods, In whose hand are the depths of the earth, The peaks of the mountains are His also. The sea is His, for it was He who made it, And His hands formed the dry land.    How many today have seen the works of God, His deliverance, His provision, His protection, even His hand in creation, as the psalmist says, yet like the Israelites, they question, they test and grumble against God? Concerning creation, Romans 1:18-23 says:  The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools,  and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures.    Who can truly see and experience the glory, the majesty, the magnitude and the intricacies of creation and doubt that there is a creator, believing instead that it is all by a series of random accidents and coincidences? Who could hold their own child in their arms and not see the works of God? Romans 1:18 speaks of the wrath of God against those who do not believe the evidence of what they have seen. In truth, God’s judgment, the punishment for unbelief, for testing and grumbling against God is, as it says:  “Truly they shall not enter into My rest.”   The Israelites, who doubted God, wondered in the wilderness for forty years, never seeing or possessing the promise of God, peace, protection and provision in their own land. Many today question and doubt God, although they have seen His works. They struggle to find peace. They strive for provision. They seek the protection of man rather than the promise of God. Some wonder their entire lives never seeing or possessing the promise of God, His peace and rest.    

James 1:17 says:  Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow.   God is the giver and sustainer of life and He is the one who blesses us with every good thing.  In Psalm 96 the psalmist says:   Sing to the Lord a new song; Sing to the Lord, all the earth. Sing to the Lord, bless His name; Proclaim good tidings of His salvation from day to day. Tell of His glory among the nations, His wonderful deeds among all the peoples. For great is the Lord and greatly to be praised.     Rather than testing we should be trusting and telling of God’s glory. Instead of grumbling our new song should be of thanksgiving. We should proclaim the good tidings of His salvation, telling others what God has delivered us from.  The psalmist says:  Let the heavens be glad, and let the earth rejoice; Let the sea roar, and all it contains;  Let the field exult, and all that is in it. Then all the trees of the forest will sing for joy.    Creation does indeed rejoice, exult and sing for joy to the God who made it. Not only the living things, with a voice, but the heavens; there are sounds which emanate even from deep space. The earth and the sea respond to the God who created them. The fields exult God, bringing forth both beauty and provision. The trees of the forest bend to the will and the wind of God.

O come, let us sing for joy to the Lord, Let us shout joyfully to the rock of our salvation. Let us come before His presence with thanksgiving, Let us shout joyfully to Him with psalms. For the Lord is a great God.    Enter His rest.    Amen.