"To the choirmaster: according to The Gittith. Of Asaph.
Sing aloud to God our strength;
shout for joy to the God of Jacob!
2 Raise a song; sound the tambourine,
the sweet lyre with the harp.
3 Blow the trumpet at the new moon,
at the full moon, on our feast day.
4 For it is a statute for Israel,
a rule of the God of Jacob.
5 He made it a decree in Joseph
when he went out over the land of Egypt.
I hear a language I had not known:
6 “I relieved your shoulder of the burden;
your hands were freed from the basket.
7 In distress you called, and I delivered you;
I answered you in the secret place of thunder;
I tested you at the waters of Meribah. Selah
8 Hear, O my people, while I admonish you!
O Israel, if you would but listen to me!
9 There shall be no strange god among you;
you shall not bow down to a foreign god.
10 I am the Lord your God,
who brought you up out of the land of Egypt.
Open your mouth wide, and I will fill it.
11 “But my people did not listen to my voice;
Israel would not submit to me.
12 So I gave them over to their stubborn hearts,
to follow their own counsels.
13 Oh, that my people would listen to me,
that Israel would walk in my ways!
14 I would soon subdue their enemies
and turn my hand against their foes.
15 Those who hate the Lord would cringe towards him,
and their fate would last for ever.
16 But he would feed you with the finest of the wheat,
and with honey from the rock I would satisfy you.”
Psalm 81
This is a Psalm for a feast day (either Tabernacles or Passover, probably the latter). It divides into two unequal parts: the summons to the feast (1-5); and the lessons of the feast (6-16). Its intention is to encourage God's people to recall the significance of their deliverance from Egypt and so to lead them into obedience, love and worship. The note of joy in the opening verses is very impressive, and it does not need much imagination to think of the glorious and exuberant sound that voices and instruments would raise. This is what worship is about. It is of course true, and always to be remembered, that reverence is a keynote, in all spiritual worship; but reverence is not to be identified or confused with sadness or solemnness, still less with staidness. There is such a thing as reverent exultation; and it is a false piety that equates worship with a long face and a lugubrious demeanour. The reason for the feast is next stated, in 4, 5: it is appointed by God (4), and the words used to describe this appointment are, significantly, words used of the Word of God - i.e. it is the authority of the appointment that is stressed. 'Statute' means the command of God: worship is therefore a duty, and it is a matter of obedience for us to gather together. 'Law' means ordinance, and this may suggest that worship is a means of grace appointed by God for the blessing of His people. 'Testimony' refers to the purpose of God in our assembling ourselves together: it is a testimony to the world; but also, as Maclaren observes, in the sense of being 'A right commemorative of a historical fact, and therefore an evidence of it for future times.'