The juxtaposition between Psalm 21 and Psalm 22 could not be more striking. Look at the end of Ps. 21:

Be exalted, O Lord, in your strength! We will sing and praise your power.

Now read the beginning of Ps. 22:

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from helping me, from the words of my groaning? In many ways the bookends of these two psalms frame the Christian life.

Psalm 22 tests the integrity of the promises of Ps 21. It’s one thing to declare in the sanctuary that “your hand will find out all your enemies; your right hand will find out those who hate you” and another to be tortured mercilessly at the hands of those very same enemies. And the question the two psalms ask together, “Do these promises hold up in the darkest nights of the soul?” Psalm 22 moves us from the comfort of the congregation to the bloodthirsty chaos of a lynch mob. You can hear the thuggish mocking of the strong bulls ^[1]Psalm 22v12 and the ravenous lions ^[2]Psalm 22v13 surround our psalmist.

As the people who follow the crucified Jesus, we walk the line of trust and hope, resting in the promises of God and being literally God-abandoned, stretched to our breaking and pierced by this life.  If the promises of God are true, promises for life from barrenness, life from exile, life from death, then they have to be true in our moments of God-forsakenness.

This psalm contains such stunning poetry that finds its fullest manifestation in Jesus. As he is poured out like water, as his bones are jolted from their joints, and his heart melts like a candle that has been forgotten about, ultimately to be laid in the dust of death.^[3]Ps. 22vv14-18 is so hauntingly beautiful and bears witness to so much of the pain of life; Jesus holds on to the promise. He holds on to the promises of God that God will hear and save^[4]Ps. 22vv19-21, that the poor shall have their share ^[5]Ps. 22vv26, that the knowledge of the Lord shall cover the Lord like waters cover the seas ^[6]Ps. 22vv27-28, and that his arm is long enough to reach even to the grave ^[7]Ps. 22vv29-30.

The line between victory and utter defeat is  tear-soaked, blood-stained, anguish-ridden faith. Are the promises of God true? Ps. 21 says they are true in the congregation in the songs of the people of God. Ps. 22 says, yes, they are even true in the blackest night, in the curses of the enemies of God. The cross is simultaneously the place where all hope is lost and the only place that hope is possible. Jesus, holds onto the promises of God with nail-pierced hands, this is faith that proves God’s word true.

When you think about it, the claims of the covenant people of the Old Testament are not even slightly absurd. At no time in its history was Israel the dominant power in its region.  Rarely did the nation enjoy peace and autonomy.  Mostly, the nation was being squeezed like a vice by forces from Egypt (the south) and forces from Assyria, Babylon, or Persia (the north). And yet there is insistence that the children of Abraham lie at the center of the story of the world and that Zion, the City of David, is the geographic center of the world. The promise to Abraham was always a universal one, weaving the disparate strands of the tribes and nations of the world into one unified cord. If the God of Israel, YHWH, was trying distinguish the nation of Israel among the nations of the world he certainly had an interesting way of doing it. Surely, Israel, constantly fighting for its life, might suggest an alternative plan.

And yet the Lord will not short-circuit the process. He has called a people, a people to be a nation of priests, a people to be witnesses to his salvation and loving kindness, a people to be formed and shaped by his passion and words, a people which would form the very tabernacle of his presence. He knows this people will only be able to fulfill these tasks in fits and starts. He knows that there will be pain, confusion, betrayal, and injustice. If he wanted to accomplish a certain task, he should be fired for his severe lapse in judgment and inefficiency to execute his vision but the way the Lord goes about things suggest he may have something entirely different in mind.

Psalm 20 is a corporate psalm offered on behalf of the king of Israel. As we hinted at above, the king of Israel often entered battle with a smaller military budget, technological disadvantages, and troop shortages. And still the psalmist insists, “May we shout for joy over your victory, and in the name of our God set up our banners.” Is this just glib optimism from a self-deluded startup—on the modern geopolitical spectrum, this would be like Uzbekistan saying, “Hey Russia, hey China, let’s do this.” Or perhaps this confidence, this triumphalism is not vain nationalism but pointing us towards something larger.

“Now I know that the Lord will help his anointed; he will answer from his holy heaven with mighty victories by his right hand. Some take pride in chariots, and some in horses, but our pride is i the name of the Lord our God. They will collapse and fall, but we shall rise and stand upright.”^[1]Ps. 20vv6-8

The people of Israel were a people who never washed the sand from the shore of the Red Sea off their feet. Everywhere they went that story followed them, defined them. On that day, outside of Egypt, the question of victory had nothing to do with the inventory of their weaponry or their strategic acumen. In fact, on that day they stood helplessly with their backs against the sea, waiting to be slaughtered by the Egyptians. But the Lord, “answered in the day of trouble.^[2]Ps. 20v1” He split the seas, he made a way. The people, in Psalm 20, sing the past into the present and the future because they know that the question of victory is not what’s in their hands but whose hands they are in. Over the long arc of the history of Israel, we are not simply receiving information about what happened to a certain people long ago. Rather, we are being formed as a people of promise witnessing what happens when we recognize that the story was never about us to begin with. The story is about God, God dwelling near, God promising, God saving, God sustaining. God is not undertaking a project, he is forming a people.

“If the foundations are destroyed what can the righteous do?” (v. 3).

David’s world is tearing at the seams.  The fabric of polite society, the ethos that upholds a peaceful and civil society has eroded. People are cruel and bombastic, without regard for human decency. Everywhere he looks there is more violence.  Snipers load their weapons and shoot indiscriminately into crowds of the innocent (v. 2).  David’s world sounds like hell.  What’s worse, David’s world sounds a lot like our own world a lot of the time.  And the temptation for David is no different than so many of us undoubtedly feel:  with all the darkness in the world should we just run and hide (v. 1)

Its unclear to me whether our own world is more saturated with fear, violence, and evil than ages prior but what I do know is that those of us in the western world who have smart phones in our pockets or computers in our house are more inundated with these images than ever before.  So how are we to respond when our eyes are constantly confronted with suffering and wickedness?  Surely we would rather just ignore it altogether.  Often we try to numb ourselves to the pain of our world by inundating ourselves with entertainment or mindless scrolling.  This is a form of flight.  But look again at what David says in v. 1:

1 In the LORD I take refuge; how can you say to me, “Flee like a bird to the mountains;

David is asking, “How can I run and hide when the Lord is my refuge?”  David is saying that his only recourse in this world of wickedness is to take refuge in the Lord.  He goes on to describe the certainty that the Lord will make it right, he will enact justice.  He chooses to stand and fight but not with his hands, but to entrust himself to God.  He implores God to act with urgency.  He prays.  Prayer is the battleground, the theater of the battle between good and evil and the Lord is inviting us into the fight.

For meditation:
What are your responses to injustice?
What would it look like to pray for God to act in these spaces?
How does this psalm instruct us to engage the news in our world?

“All their thoughts are, ‘There is no God.'”  This is the psalmist’s diagnosis of the most successful people in his world—a powerful group collectively called “the wicked”.  Hidden within this observation is a question:  “God, are you watching this?”  The psalmist continues, “Their ways prosper at all times; your judgments are on high, out of their sight; as for their foes…”  In other words, the psalmist is suggesting that something is getting lost in translation between the heavenly judgments of God and the facts on the ground.  It seems that the one’s who are getting ahead in our world those who are willing to climb on the backs of others.  The rich get richer at the expense of the poor and they think to themselves, “God has forgotten, he has hidden his face, he will never see it” (v. 11).

It is always tempting to take things at face value.  In our world, no different than the psalmists, it just seems like the good girls and guys can’t win.  But the psalmist counters the observations of his eyes with his expectant hope that God does in fact see the things that take place on the earth.  He sees and he cares deeply (v. 14).   And beyond that, he is able to judge rightly and bring about true justice.  The psalmist implores him to do so:

Break the arm of the wicked and evildoers; seek out their wickedness until you find none.

David asks the Lord to act and to disable those who oppressing their neighbors.  But at the close of this psalm, this is his only request.  Surrounding this imploring of God to act is theology.  Look at what he says in v. 14:

But you do see! Indeed you note trouble and grief, that you may take it into your hands; the helpless commit themselves to you; you have been the helper of the orphan.

And again in vv. 16-18:

The LORD is king forever and ever; the nations shall perish from his land.   Psa. 10:17    O LORD, you will hear the desire of the meek; you will strengthen their heart, you will incline your ear 18 to do justice for the orphan and the oppressed, so that those from earth may strike terror no more.

Even though everything David sees would tell him, echoing Longfellow, “that hate is strong and mocks the song of peace on earth, good will to men,” his faith tells him otherwise.  In order to combat injustice, we not only need righteous indignation we need deep theological reflection and prayer.  The psalms invite us to the intersection of this sort of rich theology and bold, unflinching prayer.  Jesus, in announcing the “Kingdom has come near” declares that through his power and life, that the justice of God is no longer a pipe dream but that the judgments of heaven have come to earth at last.

In Psalm 9, the tone has changed but the circumstances really have not.  David opens with the lines:  I will give thanks to the LORD with my whole heart; I will tell of all your wonderful deeds.  I will be glad and exult in you; I will sing praise to your name, O Most High.  But even though, David expresses a heart that is eager to praise the Lord, it is clear from the rest of the psalm that all in his life is not well:

Be gracious to me, O LORD. See what I suffer from those who hate me…

There is no shortage of danger in Psalm 9 but the lens through which David looks at everything is a lens of gratitude, hope, and faith.  He does not simply will himself to this place of expectant fidelity but recounts the past when God had rescued him.  David in the midst of anxious present can look to both the past and the future with clear eyes.  He sees that God has indeed rescued him in times of trouble and he is thus confident that he will do it again.

He declares in the assembly:  The LORD is a stronghold for the oppressed, a stronghold in times of trouble. 10 And those who know your name put their trust in you, for you, O LORD, have not forsaken those who seek you.

This is the confidence that comes from a long obedience in the same direction.  David can speak as one who has put their trust in the Lord, sought him, and he has found himself not forsaken.  We see this cycle in Scripture, often its when the most dire, hopeless of circumstances strike that the people turn again to the Lord.  The pendulum swings from a sleepy complacency which usually results in idolatry and judgment to a desperate plea for God’s intervention.  But Psalm 9 shows us a different rhythm.

What would it look like to seek God so fervently that your circumstances would almost become ancillary?  Or another way we could ask the question, what would it look like to be so alive to God in our daily lives that even in the face of certain death, we would still find faith and hope in his life?  I want to be alive to God in the daily moments of the ordinary days because I know that the trouble finds us all.  David, here in the bleakest of circumstances, can express such unwavering trust in the Lord because he has expressed that same trust on the bright, sunny days.  I don’t know where you find yourself today but perhaps God is inviting you to just acknowledge that he exists, to have your day interrupted and shaped by the beauty of his presence.  When we seek him in the sunlight, we can stand confidently against the black of night, knowing the dawn is coming.  He is faithful.

Out of the mouths of babes and infants you have founded a bulwark because of your foes, to silence the enemy and the avenger (v.2)

Psalm 8 is all about power.  The word translated “bulwark” simply means strength or might.  But notice where the Lord’s strength is on display, not in deeds of mighty kings, or by the wealth of the rich, but in the cries of infants.  These cries testify to the power of the Lord so greatly that the enemy is silenced.  The psalmist goes on, “When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars that you have established; 4 what are human beings that you are mindful of them, mortals that you care for them?”  David is in awe of the Lord’s mighty strength, the world “charged with the glory of God” in the stars that light the night.  He asks the question that so many agnostics have understandably asked for centuries:  “If there’s a god that made the entire universe with all its vastness, why would he concern himself with humanity?”  Again, David displays this imbalance of power:  the Creator God, maker of Heaven and Earth, and women and men, each one who’s days on the earth are “but a breath” (Ps. 103).

This whole psalm is subverting our own expectations of power dynamics.  God’s praise in the mouths of babies is strong enough to vanquish armies, the maker of the whole cosmos has numbered both the stars in the sky and the hairs on the heads of his children.  And its here that David appeals to the origin stories of his people.  You see, the people of Israel are not only daring enough to assert that there is one God who made heaven and earth, but also that this God has shared his rule and reign with humanity.  The psalmist declares:

Yet you have made them a little lower than God, and crowned them with glory and honor. 6 You have given them dominion over the works of your hands; you have put all things under their feet,  all sheep and oxen, and also the beasts of the field, the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea, whatever passes along the paths of the seas (vv. 6-8).  

David asserts the royalty of women and men made in God’s image and then lists the creatures whom they reign over in the opposite order we find in Genesis 1:24-26 (land animals>birds>fish).  To be made in the image of God is to share in the rule of God.  We should look at the world in awestruck wonder and in the same way marvel at the tasks that God invites us to know him in.  Whereas many of the previous psalms have been about rest, this psalm is about work.  This is not a celebration of power for power’s sake but a recognition that we are called to wield our power in a way that brings life to the world.  The work of God informs our own work and makes it a way that we can know him. The work that we engage in every day is done recognizing that everything has been put under our feet.  Our work is a way that we can know God and thus it is holy ground.  We both remove our shoes in awe and wonder at the works of the Lord and put on our boots marveling that we get to participate with him in the redemption of all things.

For meditation:
What would it look like for your everyday work to declare:  O LORD, our Sovereign, how majestic is your name in all the earth!

Psalm 7 is a psalm of judgment. David extols the righteous judgment of the Lord, even inviting the Lord’s judgment upon his own life.  David doesn’t fear the judgment of the Lord because he knows that the Lord’s justice is not retributive but restorative.  For many today, we fear any talk of God as a judge because of the images of an angry, arbitrary God that it conjures up.  But what would it look like for us to recover a proper understanding of the judgment of God?  I want to focus on a couple of this psalm’s important perspectives.

First, the Lord is a judge who is able to actually bring about justice through his wisdom, power, and holiness (v. 11).  The people of Israel actually wanted God to judge the world because they were often oppressed, at the mercy of violent imperial forces.  They were certain, because of God’s promises to their ancestors, that when God enacted his judgment, their righteousness would be vindicated and their oppressors would be condemned.

Second, David gives us an important paradigm as he begins his request for judgment with himself.  He invites the Lord:

3 O LORD my God, if I have done this, if there is wrong in my hands, 4 if I have repaid my ally with harm or plundered my foe without cause, 5 then let the enemy pursue and overtake me, trample my life to the ground, and lay my soul in the dust.

Judgment should always begin with us.  This is the heart of Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 7.  He tells his disciples:

Do not judge, so that you may not be judged. 2 For with the judgment you make you will be judged, and the measure you give will be the measure you get. 3 Why do you see the speck in your neighbor’s eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye? 4 Or how can you say to your neighbor, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ while the log is in your own eye? 5 You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbor’s eye.

The Scriptures do not try to deter us from the notion of judgment altogether.  They simply declare over and over again that judgment belongs to God alone and thus when we judge others, especially their motivations, we are in a sense playing God.  The psalms invite a deep and searching self-examination.  They place us face to face with God and in his presence our souls are laid bare.  The psalms constantly invoke the Lord to judge and they invite us to do the same.  Jesus’ warnings against judgment do not remove the promise that the Lord will judge the earth from the equation, rather they beckon us to recognize our proper place is not in the judgment seat but rather in the place of the one being judged and finding God just and merciful.

For meditation:

-Pray to the Lord asking him to judge your heart and motivations.  Confess.  Know that you are forgiven.  Ask that the Spirit of God would reshape your heart towards his justice and holiness.

I am languishing; O LORD, heal me, for my bones are shaking with terror. My soul also is struck with terror, while you, O LORD—how long?  (Ps. 6vv2-3).

The psalmist, presumably David, in Psalm 6 is not just having a bad day.  He is in the throes of death.  He goes on:  For in death there is no remembrance of you; in Sheol who can give you praise?    I am weary with my moaning; every night I flood my bed with tears; I drench my couch with my weeping.  My eyes waste away because of grief; they grow weak because of all my foes.  (vv. 5-7).  David is in a downward spiral, drowning in his tears every night, losing his vision either because his eyes are red, dry and all cried-out or they are calling it quits because they have just seen too much.  I have certainly felt this way recently.  On every side, we are constantly bombarded with unspeakable suffering in our world.  Whether we are enduring it ourselves or simply empathizing from afar, it’s a wonder our eyes don’t all just up and retire saying, “I’ve seen enough.”

But this psalm and thus the circumstances of the psalmist take an unexpected turn.  The psalmist has been crying out to the Lord, “How long?” (v. 3) and now he speaks with a confidence that seems to come from nowhere:  Depart from me, all you workers of evil, for the LORD has heard the sound of my weeping. The LORD has heard my supplication; the LORD accepts my prayer. All my enemies shall be ashamed and struck with terror; they shall turn back, and in a moment be put to shame.  (vv. 8-10).  Why the sudden bravado when as recently as v. 7 he was drowning in tears?  Simply, the psalmist knows that heaven hears him.  He is assuaged, strengthened, emboldened by this one simple expression of faith that God hears when he cries and is able to work mightily in his circumstances. We are not told if the psalmist receives this word from the Lord.  Presumably he does not and rather is operating from the confidence of his past dealings with God.  He knows that in previous trials, the Lord has heard him when he has cried out and has responded.  But most of all he knows that he does not serve a God who is far off but rather a loving, attentive Father—a God who hears.  Here this is the psalmist’s sole hope, that heaven hears him.  And it changes everything.

For meditation:
-What is causing you anguish, grief, anxiety, or anger?  What would it look like to bring that before the Lord and to trust that he hears you?
-When has God acted in your life in an unforeseen way?
-Notice how the psalms give voice to genuine pain in our lives.  They enable us both to name our suffering and to frame it within the hope that we have in God.

Verse for meditation:   The LORD has heard my supplication; the LORD accepts my prayer.

What’s the thing in your life that you are just certain, if it were to be different, would change everything?  What’s the circumstance, relationship, life event far off in the future that you are waiting on to make you happier, more fulfilled, or put you in the place where you are finally able to experience joy?  If your job were different, would you be different?  If your spouse, your friends, or your kids were different, would you be different?  David in Psalm 4, takes on two challenges with this sort of counterfactual investment in the future.  First, there is the temptation towards bitterness.  Look at vv. 4-5, “When you are disturbed (possibly or are angry), do not sin; ponder it on your beds, and be silent.”  Here we find David in distress, he is at the mercy of his circumstances.  He is the object of scorn and lies, and from every appearance he is completely in the right, the victim with a righteous complaint.  Yet there is nothing he can do about it and even in that place, the temptation to become embittered and to lash out, however justified it may seem, runs the risk of plunging him into sin.  David determines that his only response to his circumstances is to “offer right sacrifices, and put your trust in the Lord.”  This is far from trying to carve one’s own path in the world.  David here models the trust in the Lord that both heals the sin in our own hearts and judges justly and fights on our behalf.

The second temptation that we see in this psalm is the allure of using your circumstances as an excuse.  David says in v. 6 of those that are constantly waiting on something to change, “Oh that we might see some good!  Let the light of your face shine on us, O Lord!”  If only God would do this, if only he would change this, life would be so much better.  When we find our life becoming so future-oriented that we fail to seize the present moment, we betray that we misunderstand God’s promises.  God’s promise of ultimate joy is not that the weather would always be fair, that people would always treat us well, and that things would go our way.   God’s promise is that in spite of our circumstances, he is always near.   The promise is presence.  David, a master mystic and thus a seasoned diver in the deep places of the Lord, knows this well.  He concludes:  You have put gladness in my heart more that when their grain and wine abound.  I will both lie down and sleep in peace; for you alone, O Lord, make me lie down in safety” (vv. 7-8)—notice again, rest is a defiant act of faith and trust.

Verse for meditation from Eugene Peterson’s version of Psalm 4vv7-8:  

In reflecting on Psalm 2, we were reminded in the absurdity of trying to gain control of our worlds by sacrificing sleep.  In Psalm 3, we see this lived out.  The psalmist states:

5 I lie down and sleep; I wake again, for the LORD sustains me. 6 I am not afraid of ten thousands of people who have set themselves against me all around.

The psalmist, after taking note of all the enemies assembled against him, surrounding him, places himself in the most vulnerable human state. He goes to sleep.  If any situation would call for a stop-at-nothing workaholic approach, it would seem that being the target of the hatred and vitriol of thousands would be such a scenario.  And yet the psalmist doesn’t try to fight his way out, he doesn’t even lose sleep over the furor arrayed outside his door.  He lays down.  From Genesis 1, we can gather a few things that are true of all humanity.

1. We are not God.  Seems like a no-brainer but I am always amazed how often I forget that simple fact.
2. A seemingly subtle fact that the Jewish people still recognize in the way they observe major holidays:  the days do not start or end with us.  There is evening and morning, each day begins when we cease from our work to spend time with family, to eat, to sleep.  Every day is a gift.
3. Every woman and man is made in the image of God, an icon, singularly shaped by God to reflect the beauty of our Creator.
4. We are creatures designed with the task of ruling and stewarding the creation of God.  The image of God is not simply a characteristic of being human it is a vocation to live into.
5. In all of this we are blessed by God.  As the old cliche goes, we are “blessed to be a blessing.”  God has lavished his love and attention upon us in order that we might live rightly in relationship with him in worship.  I think it no small detail that in Genesis 1, the work is the worship.
6. It all culminates in sabbath.  The Creator rests and all of creation joins him.  This is the Shalom, the world at peace joyfully ceding all that we would do to sustain us over to Creator, entrusting ourselves to God.

Returning to Psalm 3, the question for us today is where are our battles raging?  Notice the psalmist never downplays the very real threat that his enemies present.  If anything, he emphasizes just how strong they are to demonstrate that the stakes are nothing short of life and death.  What sorts of stress are you enduring at this moment?   Perhaps your enemies are surrounding you: pressures at work, bosses or coworkers who want to see you fail, financial troubles, marital strife.  This psalm tells us that the strongest thing we can possibly do, in response to these overwhelming forces, is simply to entrust ourselves to God.  Sabbath is not passive.  Sabbath is a form of radical resistance.

Questions for meditation:
Where do you feel the pressure to ignore rest?
What does rest look like to you—just as Sabbath is not passive, resting is not simple inaction, it is time attending to God and trusting that he sustains us.

Verse for meditation today:  Psalm 3v3-But you, O LORD, are a shield around me, my glory, and the one who lifts up my head.