For he is our God; and we are the people of his pasture and the sheep of his hand. To-day if ye hear his voice,
Psalm 95 has just called Israel to kneel before their Maker. This verse names what He is to them — their own God, with them as His flock — and then, in the same breath, turns to a warning about hearing His voice.
The call to praise comes with a time limit.
Psalm 95 summons Israel to come with joyful songs and thanksgiving before Jehovah. But Jehovah is Israel's Maker, and his God also; and now they may look for rest even after so long a time and continued failure. Until power comes in to judgment, while it is still called today, the psalm calls them not to harden their hearts. They hardened them long ago in the wilderness, and God swore that they should not enter into His rest. For in that great tomorrow God will allow no evil and no rebellious person.
The verse gives two pictures of God's care: pasture and a hand.
The godly delight to confess that the One who made the sea and the dry land is "our Maker" and "our God." They also say, We are His: "We are the people of His pasture, and the sheep of His hand." The people of God tend to look to other sources for the supply of their needs and for protection from their enemies. They are in danger of forgetting that God has pasture to meet every need, and a hand to protect from every foe.
That hand is also where the flock is safe.
The picture of safety for the believer is no longer an earthly fold, as in former days, but the hand of the Good Shepherd. There, in the shadow of His hand, He hides them safely from every foe. That hand of unconquerable might will surround the frail and feeble sheep and protect them from every attack of the enemy. It is the hand that redeemed the ancient people from harsh slavery in Egypt, preserved and defended them through the desert, and brought them into the promised land flowing with milk and honey.
Belonging to such a Shepherd is the reason for the homage asked next. It comes with a condition.
Then the psalm urges them again to do Him homage. It sets His loving relationship to them as their Shepherd before them, as something that may well move them to it. But it adds the necessary condition for this to continue: "today, if you hear His voice!" Without such obedient hearing, people who are not agreed could not walk together. Grace only fulfils such conditions — it does not set them aside.
One writer ties the change of tone to a change of subject.
Notice the transition when the psalm speaks of the Shepherd, and of them as the sheep of His hand. It is simple, happy work to praise while we keep our eyes on the Shepherd. But when we turn to the sheep, we need exhortation... So long as God in His love and grace fills the soul, there can only be praise. When the eye turns from God to man, we need the warning: do not harden the heart, do not be careless or forgetful, as Israel was on the day it provoked Him in the wilderness. In other words, if we are to enter into our rest, we must go on. It is not enough for someone to say, "I was converted ten years ago." How is it today?
How long does that "today" last? It lasts as long as God's patience does.
This word "today" is the expression of the patient activity of God's grace towards Israel right to the end. The people were unbelieving; they have hardened their hearts. Sadly they will go on doing so to the end, until judgment comes in the Person of the Messiah-Jehovah, whom they have despised. But until then God loves to repeat, "Today, if you hear My voice."
That word still stands, so it comes to each reader as a personal offer.
But you may soon pass beyond the reach of that love. It offers you forgiveness, life, and heaven now, but tomorrow may be too late. You are here today, and God's Word says, "Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts."... Today is the day of mercy; tomorrow may be the day of doom.
- Maker, then owner. The One who made sea and dry land is "our God." The Maker becomes ours.
- Pasture and hand. Pasture meets every need. The hand keeps off every foe. Forget that, and the flock looks elsewhere.
- Sheep hear. Walking on with the Shepherd has one condition: obedient hearing. Grace fulfils that condition; it does not set it aside.
- Praise, then watch. Look at the Shepherd and you sing. Look at the sheep and you need warning. The test is not a conversion ten years ago, but today.
- Today, not tomorrow. "Today" measures God's patience. It ends when judgment comes. While it lasts, mercy is still calling.
Harden not your heart, as at Meribah, as [in] the day of Massah, in the wilderness;
Psalm 95 opens with an invitation to sing and kneel before the Lord, then turns into a warning from Israel's desert past. Verse 8 names two places where an earlier generation refused God's voice, and asks whether the same refusal is happening now.
Commentators read the psalm as an appeal to Israel. Even after long failure, God's rest is still open to them today.
Psalm 95 summons Israel to come with joyful songs and thanksgiving before Jehovah. But Jehovah is Israel's Maker, and his God as well. Even after so long a time and continued failure, they may still look for rest. While it is still called today, they are called not to harden their hearts as of old in the wilderness, when God swore that they should not enter into His rest. But now, after all, grace says Today, and invites them to come before Him who is the rock of their salvation.
The two place names are not just map references. They are lasting labels for what happened there.
Massah means temptation and Meribah means contention. The Spirit uses these very names, and they describe the moral state of the people. They prove beyond dispute their hardened hearts of unbelief toward God. In arguing with Moses, God's representative, they were contending with God Himself. They were putting Him to the proof by doubting, or in effect denying, His presence among them.
What sounds like a small complaint about water was an insult to everything God had already done for them.
Older versions read "in the provocation, in the day of the temptation in the wilderness." That points back to Meribah and Massah, which the Greek Old Testament translates that way. Tempting Jehovah in the desert meant saying, Is Jehovah among us or not? This may seem to unbelievers a small offence; in the eyes of God and of faith it is a terrible wrong. Had He not broken the pride and power of Egypt on behalf of His poor unworthy people? Had He not brought them out of the house of slavery in triumph? Was He not their Guide and their Rearguard, living among them as their God?
The warning comes right after the psalm calls God's people the sheep of His hand. The change of tone follows a change of subject.
Notice the transition when the psalm speaks of the Shepherd, and of them as the sheep of His hand. Praise is simple and happy work while our eyes are on the Shepherd. But when we turn to the sheep, warning becomes necessary... It is not enough for a man to say, "I was converted ten years ago." How is it today? Are the things of God still of interest, or is the heart absorbed in the things of the world?... There is no sadder sight than a heart hardened by grace neglected or despised.
The warning turns on one word: today. It is a word of patience, and it marks how long the offer stays open.
This word "today" is the expression of the patient activity of God's grace toward Israel right to the end. The people were unbelieving. They have hardened their hearts. They have done so, and sadly will go on doing so to the end, until judgment comes in the Person of the Messiah-Jehovah whom they have despised. But until then God loves to repeat the word, "Today, if you hear His voice."
Hardening is not usually a decision. It is a drift, and it works by small steps.
For which of us does not know, by humbling and bitter experience, how sin lures us and how slippery its paths are? A little evil allowed is the beginning of very great evil. The heart hardens as we look away from Jesus, and self-pleasing takes the place of doing God's will.
There is also a sterner side. When people ignore the warning long enough, commentators say God seals the choice they have already made.
Long before, God had warned them, "do not harden your hearts... in the wilderness" (Ps. 95:8). They gave no answer, and the time came in God's holy government when He sealed this hardness of heart upon them.
The warning is urgent because of what lies on the other side of it.
They are urged not to harden their hearts as their fathers did. Their fathers tempted and tested God, and saw His work. They found Him faithful in His promises and in His threats alike. And now the rest of God is so near. The greater the blessing it holds, the more terrible and beyond repair is the ruin of being cut off from it.
- Voice — Worship comes first in the psalm, warning second. The Shepherd we praise is the One whose voice we must hear.
- Meribah — The two names mean contention and testing. To argue with God's representative was to argue with God. To doubt His presence after Egypt was no small thing.
- Today — The word marks God's patience. It sounds until judgment comes. The question is never what happened years ago, but what is happening now.
- Deceit — Hearts harden by drift, not by decision. A little evil allowed, the eye turned from Jesus, grace neglected — that is the road.
- Rest — What is at stake is God's own rest. The nearer it stands, the more terrible it is to be shut out.