Enter His Gates with Thanksgiving: Psalm 100

Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth.

Five verses. A hundred voices. A thousand choirs. Shout—the Hebrew suggests a war cry, a triumphal roar. Not whispered devotion but thunderous celebration. And all the earth—not just Israel but every nation.

Worship the Lord with gladness; come before him with joyful songs.

Worship characterized. Not duty but gladness. Not obligation but joy. Come before him—approach the King. With joyful songs—music as offering.

Know that the Lord is God.

The foundation. Knowledge. The Lord—Yahweh, the covenant name—is God. Not one god among many. The God.

It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.

Three truths. He made us—creation. We are his—ownership. We are sheep—relationship. The Shepherd-sheep imagery returns. We belong to him by making and by choosing.

Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name.

The temple approach. Gates first, then courts. Both entered properly: with thanksgiving, with praise. Not empty-handed, not empty-hearted. Gratitude and worship as entrance fee.

For the Lord is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations.

The reason for praise. Three attributes. Good—his character. Love endures forever—his commitment. Faithfulness through generations—his consistency.

Five verses. The simplest theology. The purest worship. No lament, no petition, no complexity. Just joyful acknowledgment of who God is and whose we are.

The psalm has been sung at coronations and funerals, at harvests and battles. It requires nothing but a voice and the truth.