Written by Joel Porcher
There are many biblical passages dear to heart, but few are as heart gripping and motivational as Psalm 96. In this Psalm, the psalmist presents God’s program for missions from the Old Testament perspective. He commands every element of God’s creation to proclaim His glory in passionate worship. God’s people must proclaim His glory among the nations, so that all will praise Him. The following excerpt from John Piper’s book Let the Nations be Glad captures precisely the point of the psalmist, as well as two of the foundational constants from this Psalm, a knowledge of God and an understanding of the condition of men, which should press our heats into passionate worship and proclamation of His gospel among the nations. He writes:
“A heart for the glory of God and a heart of mercy for the nations make a Christlike missionary.’ These must be kept together. If we have no zeal for the glory of God, our mercy becomes superficial, man-centered human improvement with no eternal significance. And if our zeal for the glory of God is not a reveling in his mercy, then our so-called zeal, in spite of all its protests, is out of touch with God and hypocritical (cf. Matt. 9:13).”
May we be lovers of God who grow daily in an intimate knowledge of Him which will cause us to strive day by day to proclaim His glories in the gospel among the nations!
Pastor Joel Porcher currently shepherds Anchor Baptist Church in Maryland. Joel and his wife, Deanna, were former ODBM missionaries. They helped plant an indigenous church (Anchor Baptist) in Cape Coast, Ghana.
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