As a parent and educator I relate to Psalm 81. How often haven’t we thought or said, “if only my child or my student would listen to what I say, this would be so much easier for them.” And yet again and again you feel like your voice is little more than that of an adult in a Charlie Brown episode—noise in the background. In Psalm 81 we hear the heartwrenching cry of God about God’s people, “If only they would listen!”. The unspoken question for those hearing the psalm today is whether we will unstop our ears or treat God’s voice like annoying background noise.
Psalm 81 is an interesting psalm. The first 3–5 verses are in essence a call to worship and could be used as such in your worship service. These verses reference various festivals that were ordained by God to be used as remembrances of how God had brought Israel out of slavery in Egypt. But strangely, verse 5 concludes with the statement, “I hear a voice I had not known.” A closer translation of the Hebrew would be, “I heard a language I did not understand,” which is a perplexing statement. The “I” seems to refer to God, but how could God not understand a language?
There are two ways to make sense of this and both are valid readings. First, God could be referring to the fact that, while in Egypt, the Israelites had lost some of their Jewish ways. Maybe their prayers were lifted up in a language other than Hebrew? In this case, God may simply be acknowledging that they are located in a foreign land. The other way to understand this statement would be that there is a spiritual disconnect between God’s people and God. They are speaking a language God doesn’t understand because their hearts are not attuned to God’s. In which case the worship that they offer in their festivals and the prayers they lift to God are meaningless because they do not originate from the Holy Spirit. Whatever the cause of the communication breakdown, the result is the same—a relational rift. As the remainder of the psalm unfolds, the problem at the heart of this rift becomes clearer.
If we were brought up in the Jewish context and worshiped in Hebrew, the beginning of verse 8 would immediately bring to mind Deuteronomy 6:4–9:
Hear, O Israel: The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart. Recite them to your children and talk about them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you rise. Bind them as a sign on your hand, fix them as an emblem on your forehead, and write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.
This text in Deuteronomy is sometimes referred to as the “Shema” after the first word in the sentence, “שָׁמַע”; the same word used in Psalm 81:8 and repeated in various forms another three times. Not only does Psalm 81 repeat this familiar word, it also has similar content: the law of God. These are the fundamentals of the faith, the summary of the Ten Commandments, the very basis of a relationship with our covenanting God.
In Psalm 81 the various forms of “shema” are usually translated either hear or listen but they could be translated as obey. Listening isn’t enough in itself, it requires action as well. And not just a single action, but a way of life. God doesn’t desire that we listen once and think we have mastered the message. No, God wants us to become a listening people who are actively attuned to God, who share God’s heart.
If we want God to listen to our prayers and respond to our pleas, we need to be in relationship with God. To be in relationship with God means following God’s commands which express the heart of God. It is clear in verse 11 that what is happening isn’t a minor breakdown in our relationship with God; we as God’s people have stopped listening all together. We no longer hear God’s voice. If we did, we would be following the “Shema”.
The commandments are God’s covenantal language, given because God desires for us to flourish. God desires to give us good things, sweet things. To hear God is to know God. To listen is to obey.
In Psalm 81 we hear God’s pain, “if only!” God wants to give us good things, “if only!” God desires to hear us, “if only!” God wants to be in relationship with us but that requires acknowledging who God is, what God has done for us, and living according to God’s will—aligning our lives with God’s demands for justice. If only…I would feed them.
“I would feed you with the finest of the wheat,
and with honey from the rock I would satisfy you.”
If only…
Call to Worship, Confession and Assurance with Psalm 81
[Scripture references below are to the New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition]
Call to Worship Adapted from Psalm 81: 1–5
Sing aloud to God our strength;
shout for joy to the God of Jacob.
Raise a song;
sound the tambourine,
the sweet lyre with the harp.
Blow the trumpet at the new moon,
Blow the trumpet at the full moon,
Blow the trumpet on our festal day.
For it is a statute for Israel,
an ordinance of the God of Jacob.
He made it a decree for Joseph,
when he went out over the land of Egypt.
Sing aloud to God our strength;
shout for joy to the God of Jacob.
Confession and Assurance
Call to Confession: “I hear a voice I had not known”
In Psalm 81 God says, “I hear a voice I had not known”. There is a disconnect between the worshipers and God. Sure, they may be going to worship every Sunday, saying the right things, singing the right songs, following the right order of worship, but it's as if they are speaking an entirely different language. Their worship is not getting through to the throne of God. Why might that be?
What about our worship? What might be getting in the way of our prayers reaching God today? Why might our worship not be acceptable?
God reminds them that he is the same God who brought them out of Egypt, who answered their prayers. God is the God who saved you and saved me. God is the God who met us at the baptismal font and meets us at the table. God is the same…so what has happened to cause this disconnect? Why this break in communication? This break in relationship? Could it be that just like God’s people of long ago we have stopped hearing God? Truly listening?
Let us take a moment to examine our own hearts.
[Pause]
God’s Lament: “If only they would listen” (Psalm 81:8-12)
Listen to God’s lament.
Hear, O my people, while I admonish you;
O Israel, if you would but listen to me!
There shall be no strange god among you;
you shall not bow down to a foreign god.
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.
“But my people did not listen to my voice;
Israel would not submit to me.
So I gave them over to their stubborn hearts,
to follow their own counsels."
Prayer of Confession: Unstop our ears
Having heard God’s lament, let us pray.
Holy merciful God,
unstop our ears so that we may truly listen.
Open our hearts to become one with yours.
Forgive us for putting other gods before you.
Forgive us for worshiping, time, money, success, food,
TV, relationships, drugs, alcohol,
or anything else good or bad, before you.
Conform our will to yours so that we may fully love you
with our heart, soul, and might,
and our neighbors as ourselves.
Amen.
Assurance: “I will feed you” (Psalm 81: 13-16)
Listen to these words of promise spoken by God to each of us,
"O that my people would listen to me,
that Israel would walk in my ways!
Then I would quickly subdue their enemies
and turn my hand against their foes.
Those who hate the Lord would cringe before him,
and their doom would last forever.
I would feed you with the finest of the wheat,
and with honey from the rock I would satisfy you.”
Lord we are listening,
feed us with the finest of the wheat.
Lord we are listening,
satisfy us with honey from the rock.
—Joyce Borger © 2025 Reformed Worship, CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. Used by permission.