Psalm 66 is an appropriate focus for Pentecost Sunday because this feast day marks the end of Eastertide. Psalm 66 is associated with the mightiest act of God, resurrection from death. The ancient church entitled Psalm 66, “a psalm of resurrection.” Psalm 66 gives us words to celebrate the mightiest acts of our Triune God: the incarnation, life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus, the coming of the Holy Spirit to empower the Church, and the promised soon return of Jesus and his eternal reign. It also gives us an example of an individual expressing joy to YHWH and sharing it with other faithful people.
Category: Psalms Group
These materials were shared with the Psalms Group, a fellowship group with a special interest in learning about, reading and praying the Psalms daily.
Unless otherwise noted, quotes are from Interpreting the Psalms by Patrick D. Miller, Chapter 5: “Enthroned on the Praises of Israel: Interpreting the Biblical Hymns”
“The most exuberant, extensive, and expansive indicators of who and what God is, and what God is about, are found and elaborated in the hymns and songs of thanksgiving that the people of Israel and individuals in that community uttered again and again in the course of Israel’s history.” (p. 64)
Psalm 35 is a lament psalm of angry complaint. Trouble seems close by, hatred is growing, and trust in God is wavering. Maybe you can relate to a person in a badly deteriorating situation—you or others you have known or heard about, now or in the past.
Psalm 12
From Reflections on the Psalms by C.S. Lewis:
Email preparing for May 10, 2020
Thanks be to God that we don’t have to fake “fine.” Life in Christ includes suffering and pain of all kinds and also includes resources to get through it.
The Book of Psalms begins (1:1) with “Blessed is the man” and ends with five hymns of praise focused on God, equivalent to “Blessed be the LORD.”
There is a step-by-step progression in this praise:
From an email sent on 5/1/2020 to prepare for Sunday’s Psalms Group
Last week we joined the pilgrims as they proceeded to Jerusalem singing their Psalms of Ascent—psalms that helped them stay in reality about the trouble in their lives, about YHWH who acts to keep his faithful, and about their ultimate security and peace in YHWH. Journeying together through the Psalms of Ascent helps us find words to express our distress, to call for God’s help, and to experience his rest and peace. I hope your reading of chapter 4 on “Poetry” in Open and Unafaid enhances your psalm reading and praying.
1. Preparation
Learning to pray a psalm in Christ involves study, meditation, and praying in the Spirit. Studying a psalm includes reading it repeatedly from several different translations, focusing attention on its actual words and images, and doing the research necessary to comprehend what the psalmist is saying. Comprehension usually requires using tools like a study Bible, Bible dictionary, and/or commentary.
If we wish to make the most of the psalms, then, we must not only understand them as prayers, we must also understand how they “do” prayer. The psalms show us the nature of faithful prayer in the following ways: