WEEK 13 |
psalms this week |
"How can we turn our knowledge about God into a knowledge of God? The rule for doing this is simple but demanding. It is that we turn each truth we learn about God into matter for meditation before God leading to prayer and praise to God." |
Psalms 37, 38, and 39.
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introduction to the Series
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Most of what we learn how to do, we learn from other people. Sometimes it is the learning that comes from specific and deliberate instruction. At other times it is the learning that comes by way of example and imitation. During 2023, our endeavor is to learn how to pray from the Psalmist.*
The Book of Psalms is the longest book in the Bible, and it is mostly a book of prayers. We will spend the year going through the book, beginning to end, and letting the Psalmist teach us by example how to pray. |
In this endeavor, we cannot benefit from his deliberate instruction, of course. What we can do, however, is take full advantage of his example. We will observe how he prays, and we will learn to imitate him.
Our approach will be week by week. The recommended practices and exercises are not daily, but rather suggestions for an individual to implement throughout the whole week. |
Exercises for this week
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Psalm 37
Read Psalm 37. This Psalm is not a prayer in the classic sense of things that the Psalmist says to God. It does, however, feature a great many things that the Psalmist says to you. As you read, make a bulleted list of the counsel and/or instructions that the Psalmist gives.
When the above list has been completed, reflect on it thoughtfully. Which reminders do you need to hear? Which advice do you need to heed? Talk to the Lord about how this Psalm speaks to you in a meaningful way. While Psalm 37 is not addressed to the Lord, it is unmistakably about Him. Go through the Psalm and list all of the verbs associated with the Lord -- that is, each of the things that the Psalmist says that the Lord does. Reflect now on the list of the Lord's verbs from Psalm 37. What stories from Scripture come to mind that illustrate the truths attested by the Psalmist? Continue to reflect on the list of the Lord's verbs from Psalm 37. Talk through them with Him. Talk to Him about your response to each. Talk to Him about your experience of each. In contemplating Psalm 37, you have focused first on what the Psalmist urges you to do and second on what the Lord does. Now reflect on those two things together. What relationship do you perceive between what the Lord does and what you are counseled to do? Talk to the Lord about the connection between those two themes (a) in the Psalm, and (b) in your life. From the very first verse, the Psalmist is aware of different ways that a person might respond, whether ways of responding to the Lord or ways of responding to other people. Read through the Psalm with an eye toward this issue of response. Talk with the Lord about the ways you feel encouraged to respond to other people. Talk with the Lord about the ways that you feel encouraged to respond to Him. Central to the concern of the Psalmist in this Psalm is the presence and prevalence of the wicked. Read through the Psalm, and seek to identify the following:
Talk to the Lord about the ways in which your heart and experience do and do not resonate with the Psalmist with respect to the wicked. |
Psalm 38
Read Psalm 38. As you read, stop after every few verses and write down what you imagine the Psalmist was feeling as he wrote those words.
Psalm 38 is a complex Psalm inasmuch as it reflects multiple layers of experience. We want to identify those different layers and talk with the Lord about each of them. First, identify each of the statements made by the Psalmist about his own sinfulness, folly, and errors. To what extent do you relate to the Psalmist's words, feelings, and experiences in this area? Talk to the Lord about your sinfulness, folly, and errors. Next, identify each of the statements made by the Psalmist about his relationship to the Lord. To what extent do the Psalmist's experiences resonate with your own? To what extent have you expressed yourself similarly to the Lord? Talk with Him about how you compare your own relationship with Him to the Psalmist's. Next, identify each of the statements made by the Psalmist about his relationships with other people. What characterizes those relationships? What characterizes those other people? To what extent does your experience resonate with that of the Psalmist? To what extent does your heart -- or has your heart -- echoed his? Talk to the Lord about the ways in which you share some sense of the Psalmist's experiences and feelings. Rewrite Psalm 38:9 in your own words. After rewriting verse 9 in your own words, look up that verse in other translations. (Tip: If you enter a given verse address, like Psalm 38:9, in a search engine, and then click on the BibleHub.com option, that website will display a broad variety of English translations.) Talk to the Lord about which translations are especially meaningful to you and why. We are focusing especially on verse 9 because of its reference to "desires," "longings," "yearnings," "sighs," and "groans." These are all significant for us because we are paying close attention to the words of the Psalmist, but things like "desires," "sighs," and "groans" are not necessarily put into words. Sometimes we find it difficult to put our feelings into words, and that becomes an impediment to our praying. Talk to the Lord just now about the significance of Him knowing your desires and hearing your sighs. Tell Him how that makes you feel. In John Wesley's translation of a Paul Gerhardt poem, we read, "God hears thy sighs and counts thy tears." Meanwhile, the Apostle Paul wrote that "the Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know what to pray for as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words" (Romans 8:26 NASB). Talk to the Lord about these lines and what they mean for your prayer life. |
Psalm 39
Read Psalm 39. As you read, stop after every few verses and write down what you imagine the Psalmist was feeling as he wrote those words.
Go back and reflect on your notes from above. Which of those things have you also felt? When have you felt each? Talk to the Lord about your faith, your struggles, and your relationship with Him when you have experienced each of those feelings. In the early verses, the Psalmist indicates a carefulness about his words. He seems to be conscious of the possibility of sinning with his tongue. What sins of the tongue do you sense that he was trying to avoid? What other sins of the tongue are there? Read Proverbs 6:16-19. Which and how many of the things the Lord hates are sins of the tongue? Read Matthew 12:36-37, 15:10-20. Talk to the Lord about your own patterns and the sins of the tongue to which you are prone. While the Psalmist shows carefulness about his words, he does not seem to restrain himself from saying to the Lord all that is on his heart, which includes sincere doubts, questions, worry, a sense of injustice, and a feeling of despair. With whom are you most free to express all that is on your heart? To what extent do you feel that freedom with the Lord? Talk to Him about the ways in which you do feel that free and the ways in which you do not. What is the ugliest, most shameful, most troubling thing that is in your heart today? Say it aloud to the Lord in prayer. One of the Psalmist's laments is his sense that life is fleeting, which makes any unfairness in life all the more agonizing. At some moments in life, perhaps especially when we are young, we feel that we have all the time in the world. At other times, we are painfully aware of life's brevity and fragility. Talk to the Lord candidly just now about your own sense of your mortality -- about the days you have lived and your sense of the days you have left. The Psalmist is looking to the Lord for help. Read through the Psalm and identify the different kinds of help that the Psalmist needs.
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* We will refer to the author as “the Psalmist,” though of course not all of the Psalms were written by the same person. A significant number are attributed to David. Others are associated with Asaph, the sons of Korah, and an assortment of other individuals. Also, several dozen Psalms have no name attached to them. For the sake of ease and uniformity, we will simply refer to “the Psalmist.”