PSALM 19
This is a fairly standard and basic psalm. It’s singing the praises to God. The heart of the psalm is a list of ways the
Lord is worthy of praise – his law is perfect, his decree his trustworthy, his
command is clear and so on. There is
one item that strikes the modern ear rather surprisingly, “The fear of the LORD
is pure, enduring forever.” Huh. Something forever fearful – and purely
fearful – that’s not something that has as much modern appeal. It’s a sign of how the times have changed
and how our culture doesn’t perfectly mesh with the people way back when.
PSALM 20
This is another short psalm. It’s fairly standard, with the title serving as the most
interesting part: “Prayer for the King in Time of War.” Yeah, that makes sense that you’d want to
pray to God when putting yourself in a position where you might get
killed. And while killing others
doesn’t sound like the most holy of endeavors, it would help to feel that you
were sanctified in what you’re doing.
And this poem reinforces that sense of being morally right
in what you’re doing. The most
memorable line reads: “Some rely on chariots, others on horses, but we on the
name of the LORD our God.” We have a
cause, a cause that’s bigger than ourselves.
That doesn’t hurt in battle.
PSALM 21
This starts off like a typical psalm and then ends up one of
the bloodier ones. There are three
parts, and the first is a typical and pleasant praising of God.
Then in part two we find out why God is being praised this
time – because he lets the psalmist reign death upon his enemies! “Your hand will find all your enemies; your
right hand will find your foes! At the
time of your coming you will make them a fiery furnace. Then the LORD in his anger will consume
them, devour them with fire. Even their descendants you will wipe out from the
earth, their offspring from the human race.”
This is a psalm with Arnold Schwartzeneger playing the role of God.
The last part is a very brief “hurrah for God” sort of
thing. Well, yeah – you better hurrah
for God. Or he’ll kill you. He’s not the Lord here- he’s Kaiser Soze.
PSALM 22
This is one of the most emotionally raw and harrowing psalms
out there. You just want to hug the guy after the first section. This is the psalm of a man who feels
totally, totally alone – completely adrift.
“My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?” it begins (in words Christ
will later say from the cross. What
does that tell us? This poem begins with the mindset of someone who is being
crucified). There’s all this harrowing
language of being abandoned and a sense of being garbage – “But I am a worm,
not a man, scored by men, despised by the people. All who see me mock me.”
There is no upside here. The
psalmist bellows out: “In you our fathers trusted” – a sentiment, said in other
psalms, but here it sounds more like a desperate plea. Hey!
You treated our fathers well!
What about me!
In the second part the psalmist discusses all the enemies
that surround him, and he compares them all to animals. It’s like he’s stuck in the world’s most
forbidding and evil zoo. After that,
though, he says he’ll proclaim the Lord’s name. There’s no sense of why he’s doing it, especially after the opening
lines of destitution. But a clear
inference can be made – he’s turning to the Lord because he’s got nowhere else
to turn to. Never mind that he’s
apparently been turning to the Lord for quite sometime without effect, but
that’s still the only card he has to play.
This is a heckuva psalm, by a man just punched in the gut
and still suffering from it. It’s one
of the best psalms so far.
PSALM 23
Here it is – the most famous psalm that ever psalmed. “The Lord is my shepherd” psalm about how
walking through the valley of the shadow of death without fearing any evil.
Let’s just ask – why is this the toppermost psalm of them
all? What makes this one stand out
among the 150? Thematically, there are
many like it. That makes sense – if
it’s so popular, you’d expect there to be others like it.
And that theme is finding comfort in the Lord. Isn’t that why people turn to God and
religion? Other psalms are more about
rejoicing or retribution (or rejoicing in retribution, like the blood’n’gutsPsalm 18). Others are cries of
desperation, like Psalm 22. Both can be effective, but both are
off-putting. You turn to the Lord in
times of need, but you hope it isn’t a time of desperation. And many aren’t going to talk about seeing
their enemies perish like some psalms do.
This one strikes a nice balance. You have a sense of concern, that things around the psalmist are
bad – he’s walking through the shadow of death, after all. But as bad as it may look around him – it’s
just that, around him. The psalmist is
calm. The Lord is with him, so why
shouldn’t he be calm. He’s fear no evil
because the Lord is with him, knowing that he’ll dwell in the House of the Lord
for endless days. (And hey – nice
heaven reference for Christians reading this).
Lastly, it’s extremely well written with great imagery, the
best of which I already noted above.
This is what a psalm is supposed to be.
No wonder it’s the most popular one of them all.
PSALM 24
After back-to-back great psalms, we get a brief and low key
one. It’s a praising of the
wonderfulness of God. Not too much to
say. Actually, that might be the main
takeaway from this. What I find compelling
about the Bible is that it’s so often a highly human book. It’s about people – real, flawed,
multifaceted people – and their interactions with each other and the
Almighty. But it’s about people very
often. Many psalms are about God, and
that just lays there flat and cold for me.
This is one of those psalms.
Oh, one thing I fount notable, there’s a line: “Life up your
heads, O gates.” Hmmmm…. Methinks that
a psalmist is mixing some metaphors there.
(The footnotes even inform me that the ancient world didn’t have gates
that moved up and down, so it can’t be that).
EDITED to all: Click here for the next batch of psalms.
EDITED to all: Click here for the next batch of psalms.
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