The joy of God’s presence is experienced when worshippers gather

Whenever someone attempts to paint a picture of joyfulness on a holiday it tends to feature the same things. Usually there’s a lot of food. Doesn’t matter what holiday it is, there's going to be food in that picture. But the other more significant thing is you’re going to see people gathered together. We all intuitively know that we experience more joy when we’re gathered together with other people than when we’re all alone.

That’s why we so naturally want the people we love the most to be with us at significant events like holidays and birthdays and weddings. There’s greater joy to be had when that joy is shared with others around us. The presence of people amplifies the joy.

But for some reason, Christians often buy into the lie that the greatest joy we experience with God is when we’re alone. I’d rather worship God by myself than gather with others. Our psalm today is going to go to war with that line of reasoning and convince us of the opposite.

Main Point – The joy of God’s presence is experienced when worshippers gather

Prayer

You may be skeptical of my argument this morning. So I’ll present my case in stages. Starting with this:

Point #1 – There is joy in God’s presence (vs. 1-2)

     If you’ll remember, last week I mentioned how the psalms were placed in a specific order intentionally. And the reason that was important was because the Songs of Ascents are designed to be sung on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. The very first of the songs we covered last week where the author expressed a desire to be away from the presence of the wicked. He desired to be in the presence of the Lord instead. That kicks off his journey. We have skipped Psalm 121, only because I preached that psalm in September when I came to candidate. But in that psalm you can read how the author is on his journey. He’s walking through the hills and he’s walking under the hot sun. Today, we read that the author has arrived at his desired destination. He’s standing in Jerusalem.

READ VS 1-2

At the very invitation to go to the house of the Lord, the author gives a resounding “Yes!” You can imagine our author from last week who is suffering among wicked people being asked if he would like to join someone on a trip to Jerusalem. “Would I ever?! Nothing would make me happier than to be there!” And now he states, “We’re there. Our feet are standing within the gates of Jerusalem.”

There’s some interesting historical points to make here that will help us understand this psalm. You’ll notice just above verse 1 in your Bible there is a description of this psalm. If you have a pew Bible it’s in all capital letters. That is called the “superscription”. And it is just as much inspired as the verses that follow it. In our psalm we read this in the superscription - “A Song of Ascents. Of David”. This tells us that king David is the author of this psalm. That’s important. Because who is the one who built the temple of the Lord in Jerusalem? It wasn’t David. It was his son, Solomon.

David says in verses 1 and 2 here, I’m so glad to go to the house of the Lord in Jerusalem! But there’s no temple in Jerusalem for him to go to. So what is he going to? You may remember that many years before the temple was built, Moses built the tabernacle which was like a portable temple made out of tents. But the tabernacle is not in Jerusalem either! It’s off in a place called Gibeon during David’s reign. No temple, no tabernacle, what’s in Jerusalem?

In the book of 2 Samuel, we read about how one of the first things David does as king is conquer the city of Jerusalem, make it his capital city, and then bring the ark of the covenant there. He does it with much dancing and sacrifices and he rejoices placing the ark inside a special tent he built for it. The ark of the covenant was a special symbol crafted to represent the presence of the Lord. It had been carried by God’s people for years to demonstrate that God is with them. And the reason in our psalm that David is so excited to go to Jerusalem isn’t because he likes being in a fancy building or because he thinks city life is better than country living. The reason he wants to get to that place is because that’s where the presence of God is.

“I was glad when they said to me, ‘let us go to the presence of the Lord!’ And now our feet are standing near the presence of the Lord.”

The Lord is the one whom David loves and he finds no greater delight than being in the Lord’s presence.

Have you ever met someone who you’ve looked up to for a long time? Kids and even adults will travel long distances and wait in long lines to meet their sports hero. Just standing next to this athlete who you know all about and have watched for so many years is an incredible experience. You get a picture with them. You get them to sign a ball or a photo. And the rest of your life you can tell people, “I met that guy and here’s my photo with him.” There is such joy in the presence of the one you respect.

Or for those of us who are married, do you remember how much joy there was to be found in being in the presence of your significant other? You would work extra hard at your responsibilities just so that you could get away sooner to be with them. You would spend lots of money on gas or plane tickets to spend just a little more time visiting them. Some of you might have some good stories about sneaking out of your parents house to go see them or about lingering together for long hours not able to say goodbye because you just had such incredible joy being in each other’s presence.

I remember that joy when Silvi and I were married. The joy of knowing, I don’t have to leave you anymore. We get to stay together.

David experiences that exact joy but it’s the presence of the Lord he can’t wait to be in. Christian, can you imagine the joy there will be the day that you stand in the presence of Jesus Christ. Jesus has such great love for you that he endures years of pain and suffering and rejection, he endures the cross, he endures the grave, and he battles with sin, death, and Satan so that he can bring you to himself. And when he gives us faith and plants his love in our hearts we have such a love for him that we endure years of pain and suffering and rejection. We take up our own cross. We will follow him to the grave. We battle with sin, death, and Satan. We do all of this while maintaining our gaze on him as the only prize we aim for. And the day comes when we will be reunited with him.

And there will be no more late night flights required to be in the presence of the one we love. There will be no more long hours in a car to reach him. There will no longer be long walks to Jerusalem to get to his presence. There will no longer be battles with sin and temptation. There will be no enduring trials and tribulations. We will be with him, experiencing the joy of his presence forever. We won’t have to go home. He will be our home.

Can you imagine that? Do you long for that? That’s the joy that there is to be experienced in the presence of the Lord.

But for David we see that he didn’t have to wait until death to experience this incredible joy. It seems that there is a place for him to experience a taste of it on this earth.

Point #2 – God has chosen a place for his presence to be experienced (vs. 3-5)

READ VS 3-4

We hear the name of Jerusalem again in these verses. It was established as a city that is bound firmly together. Now that word for bound firmly together carries the idea of it being united perfectly. There are not some loose stones here and some orphaned wood beams over there. The city is tightly bound together. And that’s not just talking about the physical structures of the city that are nice and compact. He’s talking about the people that visit and make up the city. You see he says the tribes of the Lord go up to this city. I think David uses the term tribes here intentionally. If you remember, prior to Israel having a king, there were 12 tribes: Judah, Benjamin, Ephraim, Manasseh, Reuben, all of those guys. They were each united within their own tribes, but they were sometimes at odds with the other tribes. But here David says in Jerusalem those tribes are bound firmly together. There are no loose or orphan tribes. They are all tightly bound together.

Then David adds this line “as was decreed for Israel”. He’s suggesting that God made an official decree that Jerusalem would be the place where his presence would be and where he would unite his people. But is that true? Did God make a decree about Jerusalem?

I want to show you a verse in Deuteronomy in a moment. Deuteronomy is a book that is reviewing all of God’s laws. Some of those laws are about the festivals that Israel is supposed to keep and they were supposed to keep them in a specific place. Remember we said that these Songs of Ascents were to be sung by the Jews as they journeyed to keep their festivals. Three festivals to be exact. Here’s what it says in Deuteronomy 16:16:

“Three times a year all your males shall appear before the Lord your God at the place that he will choose: at the Feast of Unleavened Bread, at the Feast of Weeks, and at the Feast of Booths.”

So God has specifically said, one day you are going to journey to “the place that I will choose”. Again we see it in Deuteronomy 12.

“the place that the Lord your God will choose, to make his name dwell there, there you shall bring all that I command you” - Deuteronomy 12:11

That’s going to be the place you worship me at. There are nearly 20 instances in Deuteronomy where he uses this phrase. There’s going to be a place that I choose. I’m going to dwell there. And that’s going to be the place that you come to worship me at.

But how does Jerusalem get selected? How does it become the place God will choose? This happens during an incredible conversation God has with David in 2 Samuel 7. You see, David brought the ark of the covenant into Jerusalem, but it was living in a little tent. And David did not like this. He wants to build a temple for the ark or the word he uses is - he wants to build a house for the Lord. And when he tells this to God, here’s how the Lord responds:

“Would you build me a house to dwell in?  I have not lived in a house since the day I brought up the people of Israel from Egypt to this day, but I have been moving about in a tent for my dwelling. In all places where I have moved with all the people of Israel, did I speak a word… saying, “Why have you not built me a house of cedar?” - 2 Samuel 7:5-7

God says, “I’ve been traveling everywhere with my people everywhere they went. I never asked for a house. Having a house has never been my goal.” Why not, God? Don’t you want to have a house? Don’t you want a place where you can settle down and not be bouncing around in a tent all the time? Why has this not been your goal? God tells David.

“I took you from the pasture, from following the sheep, that you should be prince over my people Israel.  And I have been with you…” - 2 Samuel 7:8-9

God says, the reason I’m not interested in having a place to settle down in, the reason I’m not chasing after having a house is because I don’t want to be in a building, I want to be with a person. I want to be with you David. He goes on in the rest of the chapter to highlight how he would establish David’s house. God would be with him and with all of his descendants forever. That’s the place that he wants to be at. You can see it in our psalm too.

READ VS 5.

What’s so special about the city of Jerusalem? Only that it’s the place where the house of David is. The place where God chose to be worshipped would be the place where God’s chosen person was. Where does God consider home? His home is where David is.

This is how we use the word home too, right? I appreciate the definition that the dictionary gives for “home.” It says, “the place in which one's domestic affections are centered.” Or the phrase you might see on a little cross-stitch hanging in your grandmother’s kitchen - “Home is where the heart is”.  That could be a house. It could be a town like Ashdown. It could be in a city like Jerusalem. But those things are only home because of the people you love being there. And the home that God wants is to be with the people that he loves.

This was the place that God chose. That’s why it was Jerusalem. He designated a place where he wanted to be and it was with David.

This is how God is distinct from other “gods”. Because God wants to be in the presence of his people. In all of the pagan religions, they simply had to make the gods happy enough so that the gods would tolerate them. Their greatest hope was that the gods might be kind to them in this world. There wasn’t much of a future life at all. And for those few religions that did promise a future life, it was just filled with worldly pleasures and material blessings. Their hope was not in being together with their god.

But the God of the Bible tells us that our future hope isn’t just the happiness that comes from receiving good food and lots of money. Our future is being in the presence of God. Do you know that’s why heaven is such a glorious future? It isn’t because there are streets of gold. It isn’t because there’s beauty everywhere. It’s not because there is no sin or even because our loved ones may be there. Heaven is glorious because Jesus, our God, is present there.

When we read about heaven in Revelation the description starts with “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God” and the description ends with “his servants will worship him. They will see his face.” God wants to be with his people. He wants to experience the joy of your presence. And he wants you to experience the joy of his presence forever.

And because of his great love for us, God comes to us and brings the joy of his presence whenever the people he loves are gathered together.

Point #3 – Gathered worshippers are the place of God’s presence (vs. 6-9)

Let’s look back at our psalm and see how David’s concern isn’t for the place of Jerusalem, but for the people inside of Jerusalem - or as he says over and over “within” Jerusalem.

READ VS. 6-8

David isn’t concerned with the city walls. He cares about those within the walls. He isn’t concerned about the towers. He cares about those within the towers. Why is he praying for peace within Jerusalem? He’s praying for the sake of his brothers and his companions.

READ VS 9

He seeks the good of the city, but only for the sake of God’s presence. David says, “I want to have peace among the people gathered in this city. I want to have security for the people gathered in this city. And it’s for the sake of the beautiful goodness of God’s presence.” David recognizes that when the people are all able to gather together peacefully in Jerusalem, they are all able to experience the goodness of God’s presence.

But you might ask, “Couldn't they have experienced God’s presence on their own? Can’t they pray to God and feel the warmth of his love in their own homes?” Well, in a sense yes. God is everywhere and he can be encountered anywhere. But God himself would later say that in his temple he has a special presence. David’s son Solomon would build that temple. And he offered a long beautiful prayer to God after it was completed inviting it to be the place where God makes his special presence known. And God responds to Solomon answering his prayers, he says to him,

“Now my eyes will be open and my ears attentive to the prayer that is made in this place. For now I have chosen and consecrated this house, that my name may be there forever. My eyes and my heart will be there for all time.” - 2 Chronicles 7:15-16

Yes, God could allow the Israelites to experience his presence anywhere, but the truth is that God didn’t have to let them experience the blessing of his presence anywhere. But in his mercy, he chose to allow them the beautiful and blessed experience of his presence at the temple. That’s the place he chose. That’s where he wanted them to experience him. They couldn’t sit back and say, “Well, I prefer to experience God’s presence in Samaria” or “I’d rather experience him out in the fields with my sheep.” God says, “You can desire those places all you want, but the place I have chosen for the fullest expression of my presence is here at the temple.”

If it didn’t matter where people met with God at, then David would hardly spend all of his time in our psalm trying to get to Jerusalem and then praying for its peace and praying for its security. This psalm would probably be entirely useless if it didn’t matter where you were to experience the joy of God’s presence. But this is the place God chose and this would be the place they must go. God didn’t want scattered worshippers all over the country. God’s desire was to gather his people together in one place and allow them to experience his presence together.

But if you know your Bible history you know that the temple was destroyed by Babylon later and God’s presence wasn’t there anymore. But then they rebuilt the temple later on! But then it got destroyed later on again! There is no temple today. Where are we supposed to experience God’s presence? What temple can we go to now?

Interestingly Jesus declared, “I will build my church” and “Where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them”. Jesus says, “There’s going to be a new place for my presence to dwell. It’s not going to be secluded in a building. It’s not going to be isolated to a city. It’s going to be where my people are gathered together. That’s where God has chosen now for his presence. Or in the words of Deuteronomy “the place that the Lord your God has chosen, to make his name dwell there”. It’s no longer a temple. It’s the church.

The New Testament is filled with references describing this let me show them to you.

“In him you [all] also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.” - Ephesians 2:22

And

“Do you [all] not know that you [all] are God's temple and that God's Spirit dwells in you [all]? … For God's temple is holy, and you [all] are that temple.”  - 1 Corinthians 3:16-17

And

“For we are the temple of the living God; as God said, “I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.” - 2 Corinthians 6:16

In every instance it’s talking about the church! The local gathering of believers is the place that God has chosen to place his name. And to those who might say, “Well, I prefer to experience God’s presence at home by myself” or “I’d rather experience him out in the forest in a tree stand.” God says, “You can desire those places all you want, but the place I have chosen for the fullest expression of my presence is here in my church with my gathered people.”

Do you remember what the scattered idea of church looked like during Covid? Do you remember everyone attempting to do church away from others by themselves? We tried watching services online. We tried joining with one another virtually. But everyone whether they liked it or not knew that it was not the same. There’s something special and unique about God’s people gathering together that cannot be simulated in any other way.

Now I understand that there are those perhaps watching us online now that for various reasons beyond their control are unable to be gathered here and praise God that we have video cameras that can help them participate with us in this small way. But even those who have no choice but to be away are still filled with a longing to experience the joy of God’s presence among God’s people.

Do you feel that longing in your heart church? Is coming to church a chore for you? Or would you say “I was glad when they said to me ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord’?” Do you love to sit under the teaching of God’s Word? Do you love to join in the saints speaking to our God in prayer? Does it delight your soul to sing praises to him together with other believers? Do you experience the joy of God’s presence when you are gathered with God’s people? Because this gathering is the place he has chosen.

I pray that this would be true of First Baptist. I join with David in saying, “Pray for the peace of our church. May they be blessed who love it.” Would you pray these prayers for our church? Pray that we are a gathering where everyone who attends experiences the incredible joy of God. Pray that God would transform your own heart so that you would experience the incredible joy of God’s presence every time you attend. What our church needs isn’t a fancy beautiful building. We don’t need bigger and better programs. We don’t need more or greater people. What we need is the joy of God’s presence. We need to be people who love being with the Lord. And love that he comes to be with us.

Let’s pray for that now.