Lesson 39 · Unit 7 · Reading Every Genre
The Psalms: Borrowed Prayers
A hundred and fifty of them, to say the thing you cannot say.
Open
Someone whose heart has just been broken will put one song on repeat all night. He did not write it, but every line of it is his - some things you cannot say in your own words, and only borrowed ones let the tears find a way out. Down deep, people usually need borrowed language.
God knows this. So right in the middle of the Bible he put a songbook: a hundred and fifty of them, joyful, confused, grateful, furious, black all the way down - all of it kept. The church has called the Psalms the school of prayer. You do not learn to pray and then come read them; you read them, and slowly you learn to pray. This lesson is about reading that kind of borrowed prayer - and we are not going to walk around the few psalms that cut your hands.
Scripture
A psalmist far from the temple, aching for God in a foreign place, turns around and speaks to his own soul. Read it aloud, and let the rise and fall come through. (Psalm 42:1-5, 11, WEB)
1For the Chief Musician. A contemplation by the sons of Korah. As the deer pants for the water brooks, so my soul pants after you, God.
2My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God?
3My tears have been my food day and night, while they continually ask me, “Where is your God?”
4These things I remember, and pour out my soul within me, how I used to go with the crowd, and led them to God’s house, with the voice of joy and praise, a multitude keeping a holy day.
5Why are you in despair, my soul? Why are you disturbed within me? Hope in God! For I shall still praise him for the saving help of his presence.
11Why are you in despair, my soul? Why are you disturbed within me? Hope in God! For I shall still praise him, the saving help of my countenance, and my God.
See
A psalm is painted - and sung to yourself
The Psalms speak in images. "As the deer pants for the water brooks" is a picture of thirst, not a note on zoology; tears as food day and night is the salt taste of a whole night, not a recipe. Hebrew poetry does not rhyme in sound but in sense - two lines at a time, echoing, deepening or contrasting each other. That is called parallelism, and it is why you have to read a psalm slowly, letting the two lines light each other up. And watch for one strange move: the psalmist keeps turning around and talking to himself - "Why are you in despair, my soul?" It turns out that faith is not always a feeling. Sometimes it is preaching the truth, once more, to your own heart.
Walk one through: inside Psalm 42
Start with the situation. The writer is far from the temple, and people ask him daily, "Where is your God?" (v. 3). Step one, he complains out loud and without flinching: the tears, the remembering, the old joy of leading the festival crowd - all of it laid out in front of God (vv. 1-4). The Psalms give "pouring out your trouble to God" a legal place; this kind of psalm is called a lament, and laments take up more room in the Psalter than anything else. Step two, he questions himself: "Why are you in despair, my soul?" (v. 5) - not denying the despair, and not letting it have the last word either. Step three, he turns: "Hope in God! For I shall still praise him" (v. 11). Notice that word *still*. The praise has not come back yet, and he has already set a date for it. Complain, question, turn - you can borrow that whole path. One thing more, said plainly: if the heaviness presses too long and too hard, getting medical and professional help is not weak faith - and tell your pastor or the person who walks with you, rather than carrying it alone.
The most common misreading: the imprecatory psalms we skip
You reach "Happy shall he be, who takes and dashes your little ones against the rock" (Ps 137:9), and a lot of people close the book. This is in the Bible? And so the cursing psalms become the few pages we quietly skip. First see what they are: these are the prayers of a conquered people under the blade - people whose homes were burned and whose children were killed, bringing their unhousable rage to God exactly as it is. Then see what they are not: they are not a plan of action. The psalmist does not do a single one of these things. He hands the revenge over, to the God who judges all the earth. That is the very road of Romans 12:19 - "Don't seek revenge yourselves, beloved, but give place to God's wrath... 'Vengeance belongs to me; I will repay, says the Lord.'" So an imprecatory psalm is a waiver, not a permit: it insists that evil will be settled, and insists that the hand doing the settling is not mine. Stand at the cross and look back, and there is a further layer still: every curse landed at last on Jesus himself. Do not skip these pages. One day you, or someone you are walking beside, will be hurt past speech, and will need them.
Deeper
Parallelism
Hebrew poetry "rhymes" in meaning: two lines at a time, echoing, deepening or contrasting.
Imagery
a psalm speaks in pictures - "as the deer pants for the water brooks." Feel the picture first, discuss the doctrine second.
Lament
the largest category in the Psalter; pouring out your trouble to God has a shape to it - complain, question, turn.
Imprecatory psalms
a signed waiver handing revenge back to God (Rom 12:19), which finds its outlet at the cross.
Christ's prayer book
what Jesus cried on the cross was Psalm 22; he prayed the deepest darkness for us first.
Story
Auntie Du ran a loom in a textile mill for thirty years. The second year after she retired, her husband died suddenly of a brain hemorrhage. She had believed for a long time, but in that season she could not get a prayer out - every night she knelt, said "Lord," and choked. A sister from church came to see her, offered no explanations, and left behind a bookmark with "Psalm 42" written on it. "Auntie, when you can't say anything, just read this."
She began reading one psalm out loud every night. At first it was like reading someone else's mail. Then, somewhere in the reading, it became her own words. "My tears have been my food day and night" - is that not exactly me? "Why are you in despair, my soul?" - it was the first time she had ever learned to ask herself that. And when she got to "Hope in God! For I shall still praise him," she said that word *still* was like a hand, pulling her out of today and into tomorrow. One evening about six months later she closed the Psalms and found she could suddenly pray again in her own words. "Those hundred and fifty held me up," she said, "until I could open my own mouth."
Respond
Reflect — alone, or talk it through together
1In Psalm 42, what does the psalmist say to God, to other people, and to himself? What is the near-identical repetition of verses 5 and 11 doing?
2What is the difference between pouring out your trouble to God and grumbling behind his back? How does the handing-over in the imprecatory psalms help you digest an injury?
3What is the one thing right now you most cannot get out? Find a psalm and borrow its words to say it to God.
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Pray together
God who has counted my wanderings and put my tears in your bottle: thank you that right in the middle of the Bible you placed a songbook that keeps the joy and the pitch black alike. I have brought the part I cannot say - and borrowing the psalmist's words, I will ask it too: why are you in despair, my soul? Teach me to hope, for I shall still praise you; and please keep the record for me of the days that have not yet turned into praise. In Jesus' name, amen.
Walk
This week's actionabout 15 min
Copy out Psalm 13 by hand (it is only six verses) and mark the three movements: complaint, request, turn. Then write a prayer of your own in those same three steps, and read it aloud to God.
Mark it when it happens — this week, at your pace.
Spiritual practice
Begin prayer with a psalm every day this week - read it slowly once, then borrow its sentences to tell God your own situation.
Memory verse · Psalms 42:11
Whyareyouindespair,mysoul?Whyareyoudisturbedwithinme?HopeinGod!ForIshallstillpraisehim.
Walk further
David, the shepherd-king who wrote the most psalms; Psalm 22 at the cross; the theme of prayer; lesson 13, Prayer Is Not a Performance; and the Walking Through Grief reading plan.