Psalms Group, Sunday August 2, 2020, 9 AM
We will focus on the theme of “Nations” tomorrow, presented in chapter 13 of Fr. David Taylor’s Open and Unafraid. He starts off by describing his own experience and understanding of “Who is my neighbor?” What experiences have shaped your understanding of that question? How has your reading and praying of the psalms impacted your understanding of who your neighbor is?
Here are the questions this chapter explores:
- How do the nations in the Psalter connect to God’s good purposes for all the earth?
- How do they become participants and antagonists to these divine purposes?
- How do they figure in the work of God’s chosen king?
- How might the psalms relate the role of the nations to a life of faith? (See Open and Unafraid, p. 163)
Here are the psalms identified as “psalms of the nations” in chapter 13 of Open and Unafraid: Psalms 2, 18, 66-68, 72, 87, 96-98, and 148-149.
Here is my list of references to “the nations” in this week’s and next week’s lectionary psalms: Psalm 68:26-35, especially 32-35; Psalm 72:8-11and 17-19, especially 17b and 19b; Psalm 75:3, Psalm 78:55; Psalm 79:1, 6 and 10, Psalm 80:8, Psalm 82:8, Psalm 83:6-8 and 17-18 (enemy nations who might come to know YHWH too), Psalm 86: 8-10, and Psalm 87. Be on the lookout for more references to this important theme!
Tomorrow morning’s opening liturgy will include Psalm 87, a Zion hymn that looks forward to people of all nations—even nations that have been enemies of Israel—becoming citizens of Jerusalem, the “City of God.” John Newton, the converted slave trader who wrote “Amazing Grace” also wrote “Glorious Things of Thee are Spoken,” a hymn based on Psalm 87. We will also read together “The Song of Simeon” from Luke 2:29-32 and “The Song of the Lamb” from Revelation 4:11, 5:9-10 and 5:13-14.
Check out our BCP’s “Occasional Prayers” section on pp. 641-683 and notice prayers that include “the nations.” Examples, by their numbers in the BCP, include prayers 16 and 17, 27 and 28, 39, 42, 118 and 121.
All of our reading and praying draws us to Jesus Christ: “For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world…For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.” (John 6:33 and 40)
May our reading and discussion of “Nations” bring this vision from Revelation 7:9-10 more and more alive in us:
“After this I looked, and behold a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, ‘Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!’”
A lesson sheet on Psalm 87 will follow later today.
Grace and peace in Christ,
Toni