Reading Psalms

 

Reading the Psalms

 

Did you know that Psalms is the most quoted Old Testament book in the New Testament? In Psalms we see the Incarnation, the Crucifixion, and the Resurrection. In Psalms we wrestle with how God’s justice is worked out in the world and in our lives, we confront good and evil, joy and sorrow, grief and joy, friends and enemies, ignorance and understanding.

 

In Psalms we can unashamedly confront raw emotion, from the depths of hell to the heights of heaven – there is no religious pretension in Psalms, there is even the abrupt dead end of Psalm 88.  Have you ever faced a dead end in your life?

 

In Psalms, the Holy Spirit invites us to hear the Father speaking to the Son and the Son responding to the Father. In Psalms we see “the Israel of God” (Gal. 6:16) from the Creation to the Body of Christ, from eternity past to eternity future.

 

The Psalms invite us into the cosmic dance of the Trinity, not as observers but as participants. As Peter writes, we “become partakers of the divine nature” (2 Peter 1:4).

 

In Psalms we hear the Voice of the Son, sometimes this is the Voice of the Head of the Body and sometimes it is the Voice of the Body and sometimes, as Augustine points out, we can’t distinguish between the two.  (If this sounds like a mystery, it is.)

 

What I am trying to say is that there is more to Psalms than we think there is – and saints for ages have known this, which is why Psalms has been the Voice of the Church since Moses and Miriam and Aaron sang of God’s deliverance at the Red Sea. (How have we come to lose our Voice?)

And so I want to encourage us to read a psalm each day, beginning with Psalm One and working through the book, and then beginning again at Psalm One, and so forth and so on for the rest of our lives. What we see and hear will expand and develop and grow and assume texture and nuance and fabric and point and counterpoint – and we will see and hear Jesus Christ coming to us, speaking to us, speaking through us – drawing us onward and upward into koinonia with the Trinity and the Communion of Saints.

 

If this sounds like a mystery…it is.

 

Some observations:

 

As you become familiar with Psalms you will see that there are different themes in different sections – this is part of the discovery process.

 

When I read about “enemies” I tend to think of the enemies of my own soul – my selfishness for example. However, let us not be so foolish as to think that there are not evil people and movements in the world, there most certainly are. There is unspeakable evil in the world working in and through people who have given themselves over to darkness – Psalms gives us an outlet for praying about these things, for giving them into the hands of God and trusting Him to resolve all in His time and in His Way. Psalms teaches us to be God’s Light in darkness, His hope in the midst of despair, agents of His deliverance, in Christ, for those in captivity.

 

I encourage us to read Psalms aloud – reading silently is a relatively recent historical practice, when we read aloud we hear and “see” the words – it can be like looking into a View Master…words assume a depth we didn’t perceive.

 

Why am I so excited about Psalms? Because I am excited about Jesus Christ, and He comes to us again and again and again in the Psalms.

 

Jesus says to us, “Come and you will see.” (John 1:39).

 

And as Philip says to Nathanael, I say to you in all love, “Come and see.” (John 1:46).

 

May you have a blessed 2024 in our Lord Jesus Christ.