The appropriate journal entry to record a payment towards an outstanding accounts payable is to debit the Accounts Payable account and credit the Cash account.
To record the payment of $3,000 toward an outstanding accounts payable, the appropriate journal entry would be:
Accounts Payable - $3,000
Cash - $3,000
This entry decreases the accounts payable balance by $3,000 since the payment was made, and decreases the cash balance by the same amount since cash was used for the payment.