The Leading of The Psalms
Placing the reading of Psalms as a priority
When it comes to Bible reading for 2025, what role do the Psalms have for you? I’m sure that if you have a plan or a guide to read through the Bible this year, the Psalms are included. But can I make a suggestion to allow the Psalms to take a more prominent role than perhaps the allotted time frame normally given in your reading plan? In other words, would you allow them to play a daily or at the very least, a weekly role?
Why would I suggest such a thing? Here’s just a few thoughts. First of all, I have been challenged by the daily routine of Psalm reading by N.T. Wright. For him, the Psalms are what he continually breaths in as he practices a 5 Psalms a day reading habit. Now he doesn’t read these Psalms all in one sitting per se, but immerses himself in them throughout the day. Wright has come to believe that “the Psalms represent the Bible’s own spiritual root system for the great tree we call Christianity.” Thus, to weave Psalms into our day is an act by which transformation slowly occurs as the roots of our lives of walking with God are watered.
Second, Psalms lead us into a life of worship. I recently read Kathleen Norris’s book The Cloister Walk and in it found a quote by Gail Ramshaw. “If faith is about fact,” writes Ramshaw, “then we line up children and make them memorize questions and answers…But if we are dealing with poetry instead of prose…then we do not teach answers to questions. We memorize not answers but the chants of the ordinary; we explain liturgical action…we immerse people in worship so that they, too, become part of the metaphoric exchange.”
When she writes of “poetry” and “chants of the ordinary,” the Psalms come to my mind. The writer of the Psalms were those living life in both the ups and downs of life. As will be mentioned below, the Psalmists are quite open with their language regarding how they feel about the chaos of the world and whether God is going to do anything about it. And we also must not forget that they are poetry. Eugene Peterson writes that “Poetry is language used with personal intensity. Poets tell us what our eyes, blurred with too much gawking, and our ears, dulled with too much chatter, miss around and within us. Poets use words to drag us into the depth of reality itself.”
So the poetry of the Psalms pull us in to the worship of God and to the depths of our own souls. They are theology in song to be sung or spoken beyond Sunday worship. They meet us on a Monday morning. They speak to us on a glorious weekend. And they give us words to say on a gloomy Wednesday.
Third, Psalms teach us to pray. Dietrich Bonhoeffer writes that “the richness of the word of God ought to determine our prayer, not the poverty of our hearts.” I’m sure you have encountered times where words fail you. You have so many thoughts running through your mind. So many emotions. Yet a sentence cannot be formed. And if you could form one, would it be appropriate to speak before God? The Psalms give us words when we have no words. They give us permission to show up bare before God with all our joys and pain. Bottom line: the Psalms allow for depth in our prayer life. And when we remember they are the words Jesus prayed as well, then we do well to soak ourselves in such richness.
Finally, the Psalms greet us in all our emotional havoc. To read the Psalms feels like reading one who is manic depressive. One Psalm may praise God for being a hiding place while the other painfully seeks to know why God is hiding. One Psalm thanks God for his generosity while another voices a prayer for all enemies to be destroyed. But this is life is it not? So much up and down. We are happy and sad and joyful and gloomy and thankful and doubtful people.
I’m so thankful that the Psalms meet us in the midst of the craziness of life. And I’m grateful as well that they give us permission to be open and unafraid—as the book title by W. David O. Taylor on Psalms is so aptly titled. Ellen Davis writes that the Psalms “enable us to bring into our conversation with God feelings and thoughts most of us think we need to get rid of before God will be interested in hearing from us.” To learn to be vulnerable before God is a glorious thing. And it is a life—which we learn from the Psalms—that is invited by God.
There’s much more that could be written today (there’s always more than can be written), but for now, I ask you to think about how the Psalms—those ancient songs of the people of God—can become the poetic words by which life becomes a fragrant offering both to God and to the world around you? How can your immersion into the Psalms guide you to prayerfully know God and yourself more intimately?
So will you read the Psalms? Perhaps you can’t read five each day like N.T. Wright, but maybe you can awaken each day by quickly reading just one. Maybe you are able to pause at lunch to read. Possibly the end of the day works best. Regardless, I encourage you to allow the Psalms to help give voice to your worship and prayers. To allow you to be honest with who you are as you walk in the presence of God. Blessings as you proceed.
I want to leave a thought by Eugene Peterson as final encouragement for you to embrace the Psalms. Peterson writes:
If we wish to develop in the life of faith, to mature in our humanity, and to glorify God with our entire heart, mind, soul, and strength, the Psalms are necessary. We cannot bypass the Psalms.
Thank you so much for encouraging us to read the Psalms. I love the part where they will help direct our prayers and not just take us into the emotions. Yes, they touch on all the emotions - even sometimes at all at once, seemingly. But digging deeper and letting the Holy Spirit speak to me about using scripture in prayer is a wonderful reminder. Before reading this excerpt, we had begun reading from the Psalms at night. This blog post has been such an encouragement and an affirmation to continue that practice. Thank you and God bless you.