Hey Bible readers, I'm Tara Lee Cobble and I'm your host for the Bible recap.

We don't know who wrote any of the Psalms we read today, but they're all really descriptive,

picturesque Psalms, so it makes me wonder if they were written by the same person.

Psalm 95 opens with praise and reminds the listener that God isn't just supreme over the

earthly realm, he's supreme over the spiritual realm as well. He's worthy of worship and

especially the worship of his people. It's not entirely evident in the English version

of verse 6, but in this short verse which says, Oh come, let us worship and bow down, let

us kneel before the Lord our Maker. He's describing three different postures for worshiping

God, bowing and down are two separate acts and kneeling is another act. These are humble

postures of honor and submission, which is how we should relate to the one who made us.

But then he goes on to describe another aspect of our relationship with God. It's not contradictory

to the humble bowing toward our Maker, it's complimentary. People praise God as our shepherd,

the one who is attentive to us and feeds us and watches over us. He calls us the sheep

of his hand. It's a much more intimate relational picture and both things are true of our relationship

with God. He's our Maker and he's our shepherd. He doesn't just make us and then leave us

on our own. He's with us all the time watching over us.

The psalmist begs the listener not to harden their hearts to such great truths and he

references the Israelites who did have hardened hearts. They didn't know God's ways and they

missed out on the beautiful complexity of this kind of relationship with him. The kind

that brings rest and restoration. Psalm 97 reiterates God's supremacy over everything.

He depicts God as a thunderstorm with lightning that strikes and consumes his enemies. He

also says God melts the mountains like wax, which is a direct affront to all the ancient

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