Recently, feeling a weight about Nanci’s fight with cancer, I also felt a great need to sense God’s presence and joy. The Lord led me to Psalm 100. When I read verse 2, which says “come before Him with joyful songs,” I realized I rarely sing to Him in my quiet time.

So to get help for this I called up one of Nanci’s and my favorite songs, In Christ Alone. As I sang along, both the song and the sight of thousands of twenty-somethings at the Passion Conference led me into profound worship. I did in fact sing to Him a joyful song.

This is the song I watched and heard and sang. God used it in my life. Following the song is the very short and very powerful Psalm 100, as well as some more verses about how singing can be a means to praise God. I hope this might encourage you too.

Psalm 100, For giving grateful praise.

1 Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth.
2     Worship the Lord with gladness;
    come before him with joyful songs.
3 Know that the Lord is God.
    It is he who made us, and we are his;
    we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.

4 Enter his gates with thanksgiving
    and his courts with praise;
    give thanks to him and praise his name.
5 For the Lord is good and his love endures forever;
    his faithfulness continues through all generations.

Scripture is full of references to people singing joyfully to the Lord. At every feast and celebration, in public and private worship, singing filled the air:

• Let all who take refuge in you rejoice; let them ever sing for joy, and spread your protection over them, that those who love your name may exult in you. (Psalm 5:11)
• Clap your hands, all peoples! Shout to God with loud songs of joy! (Psalm 47:1)
• My soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food, and my mouth will praise you with joyful lips . . . for you have been my help, and in the shadow of your wings I will sing for joy. (Psalm 63:5, 7)
• Shout, and sing for joy, O inhabitant of Zion, for great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel. (Isaiah 12:6)
• Sing, O heavens, for the Lord has done it; shout, O depths of the earth; break forth into singing, O mountains, O forest, and every tree in it! (Isaiah 44:23)

John Calvin, apparently a student of nature, commented on the last verse, “The little birds that sing, sing of God; the beasts clamor for him; the elements dread him, the mountains echo him, the fountains and flowing waters cast their glances at him, and the grass and flowers laugh before him." [1]

May we do the same!

For more on the subject of happiness, see Randy’s books Happiness and God’s Promise of Happiness, the devotional 60 Days of Happiness, and his DVD series Happiness 101.