The Psalms for June: Language for Our Moment…and Theological Ambiguity
About six weeks after the attacks on the World Trade Towers on September 11, 2001, a colleague commented, “The Psalms gave us the language to name what we were feeling when we saw those towers go down.” This colleague mentioned Psalm 130, assigned for June 7. “Out of the depths I cry to you, O [God].”
The Psalms Help Us Name and Express Loss and Grief
Some Psalms help us name our grief and lift it into the hands of an empathetic and compassionate God. Sensitive ministers often instinctively turn to the Psalms at times of death and other catastrophes because of the expressive power of the Psalms. While our immediate thought is to turn to the Psalms of lament, other kinds of Psalms also help us to express thanksgiving, recognize God’s sovereignty, and ask for God’s leadership in our lives.
Many people in North America find themselves in situations of lament. The sense of shock may not be as immediate as it was following 9/11, but the collapse of the economy has left many people without jobs, facing mounting credit card debt, losing homes, and struggling with shrinking income from stocks.
Congregations and other non-profit organizations that depend upon charitable donations are also feeling the pinch. Three congregations within two miles of my home have cut staff and reduced ministry because their offerings and endowments have shriveled.
Individuals, households, and communities also face many other kinds of losses. Among them: natural disasters, the wars in the Middle East, frustration over the practice of torture and the denial of rights to persons detained at Guantanamo Bay, not to mention divorce, disease and death, and anxiety about declining congregations and denominations.
Possible Preaching Motifs
The Revised Common Lectionary assigns four Psalms to coordinate with the Gospel reading during June. We will focus on these four. However, the RCL also assigns different Psalms to be read with the passages from the Torah, Prophets, and Writings that move semi-continuously through 1 Samuel with texts pertaining to the Davidic covenant. These alternative Psalms are Psalm 138 (June 7), Psalm 20 (June 14), Psalm 9:9-20 (June 21), and Psalm 130 (June 28). This last Psalm 130 is also appointed to go with the Gospel on June 7 and is discussed in this essay.
Only one of these texts is a pure lament (Psalm 130), but all give the preacher an opportunity to help the congregation name the losses and grief that permeate this moment in history.
A preacher might use these Psalms to help the congregation reflect theologically on the economic crisis. I can imagine a four sermon series, each focusing on a different aspect of the loss brought about by economic distress: what we feel as individuals and households, effect on public institutions, diminishment of the congregation (especially the ability to carry out mission), and losses in other parts of the world.
As noted above, financial disruption is only one factor in the sense of loss today. The preacher might also use the four psalms as the basis for a series on something like “Four Faces of Grief in our Moment in History,” for example: in the financial sector, in our nation’s recent international behavior, in the decline of the historic churches, and in personal matters such as divorce and death.
Each of the four Psalms in June not only acknowledges loss, but also points to God as the source of hope. The preacher is called to bring a message of hope to the congregation. However, two qualifications come to mind. First, the preacher should not turn too quickly and facilely to hope. We need to face squarely the depths of the present moment.
Second, the preacher needs to be concrete with respect to how God is at work to bring hope. The preacher should not settle for the generic admonition to “trust God.” For the psalmists, God acted in specific ways. The preacher needs to help the congregation identify how God is acting in the current financial crisis and in other situations.
If I may take personal privilege here, I believe God is working in the present financial distress to call us to create another mode of economy. I am not economist enough to propose such a re-organization. But currently, money too quickly becomes an idol and our economy makes us too susceptible to greed, manipulation, and injustice. Although the press has rightly criticized some corporate leaders for personal financial abuse (for example receiving multi-million dollar bonuses when their stockholders are losing money), the problem is far deeper. We need an economic system that is inherently more just.
Some Psalms Raise Difficult Theological Questions
At the same time, the Psalms contain two theological perspectives that many preachers and congregations today find troubling. The first of these is that some Psalms assert that God either actively caused the distress in which the psalmists found themselves, or permitted that distress to occur without actively causing it. The second troubling perspective is that some Psalms assume that God will save the individual or community by inflicting violence on enemies, perhaps even destroying them.
Convinced that God is a God of unconditional love who wills for all people and elements of nature to live in relationships of love, I cannot believe that God would actively inflict pain on others or permit others to do so. If God has the power to end suffering but does not use it, I regard God as immoral.
Furthermore, I regard God’s power as limited. The innocent suffer not because God causes suffering but because the world in which we live is fractured and violent and sometimes brings about arbitrary suffering. I do think that some individuals and communities bring suffering upon themselves by behaving unjustly and thereby setting in motion values and behaviors that result in suffering and destruction. This is precisely what has happened in the present economic crisis. God is not actively punishing us, but we suffer the fate of our own unjust economic system.
June 7, 2009
Psalm 130
Psalm 130 is often called a penitential psalm — a hymn in which the speakers take responsibility for sin and turn to God for forgiveness. While this Psalm acknowledges that the speaker has sinned (vv. 3, 8), the content of the sin is not named. Sin here refers to attitudes and actions that violate the covenant between God and Israel and that, therefore disrupt the community and limit the possibility of blessing.
The word “depths” in verse 1 refers to the sea as a symbol for chaos. The psalmist’s covenant-breaking behavior has made life such a chaos that the psalmist cannot repair it but can only turn to God for help. (Ps 130:2)
If God should keep a strict account of sinful behavior, everyone would be forever condemned (v. 3). But God forgives (v. 4-7). Note that forgiveness here is not simply overlooking guilt but means overcoming the power of chaos and restoring self and community to life in covenant.
The preacher can use this Psalm (especially the first verse) to help the congregation express its feelings of discouragement and can assure the congregation that God is present with renewing love (vv. 4ff.). However, the preacher needs to handle carefully the notion of sin and penitence. While our culture may be guilty of non-covenantal behavior in many spheres of life (such as the economic exploitation that has created the present financial crisis), individuals are often in chaos through no fault of their own. At the same time, the Psalm gives the community a vehicle through which they can acknowledge sin appropriately.
This Psalm has been set to a number of haunting musical arrangements. An especially meaningful one is Ruth C. Duck, “Out of the Depths, O God, We Call.” Oscar Wilde gives an aching meditation on this notion in his essay De Profundis (Latin for “out of the depths”).
June 14, 2009
Psalm 92:1-4, 12-15
Psalm 92 is an individual’s song of thanksgiving but assumes that others will join the singing. Although God has delivered that individual from enemies, the text does not specify the problematic circumstances.
This Psalm is the only one prescribed for use on the Sabbath. This use is appropriate because one of the purposes of Sabbath worship is for the community to affirm God’s faithfulness even in the midst of a chaotic world.
Psalm 92:1-4 describes a scene from temple worship. In the morning and in the evening, to the sound of stringed instruments, the singer thanks God for deliverance. (Ps 92:1-3) God has made the psalmist glad, that is, God has restored the psalmist to a community that embodies God’s covenantal values and practices (v. 4).
By contrast, the stupid and the wicked do not understand God’s covenantal life. Their unjust and exploitative ways appear to prosper them now, but such behavior will destroy them. (92:5-9, 10-11)
The righteous (those who live in right relationship with God and community) flourish. By speaking of the renewed situation in language reminiscent of Genesis 1 (Ps 92:12-15), the psalmist reminds readers that the promise that they will flourish has behind it the power that created the world and has sustained it ever since.
Psalm 92 calls the congregation to celebrate the promise of the deliverance from chaos and the flourishing of the community. For now, financial and social chaos fulminate. But since God is always present in the world, and is always attempting to lure the world towards generativity, we can live in hope.
June 21, 2009
Psalm 107:1-3, 23-32
Psalm 107 is a community thanksgiving for God delivering the people from several different kinds of trouble: from thirst in the desert (Ps 107:4-9), from imprisonment (Ps 107:10-16), from sickness (Ps 107:17-22), from storms at sea (Ps 107:23-32), from hunger (Ps 107:33-43). Each section manifests the same pattern: the psalmist describes how the community cried out in distress and God then acted to save them. The purpose of the Psalm is not only to offer thanks to God for acts of deliverance but to encourage the community to have confidence that when they are in distress, God can act to save them.
The beginning of the reading, Psalm 107:1-3, is a call to give thanks. The basis of the thanksgiving is God’s “steadfast love,” that is God’s hesed, covenantal loyalty (Ps 107:1). Moreover, giving thanks (and salvation) in this Psalm is a community event: God gathers together people who have been dispersed. (Ps 107:2-3)
In Psalm 107:23-27 a ship was besieged by a storm. In verses 28-32, the sailors cry to God who stills the storm. As in the case of Psalm 92 (above), the storm waters speak metaphorically of chaos.
Some scholars think that Psalm 107 was written during the exile when Israel was in a situation comparable to the sailors on the sea but God redeemed them from exile and returned them to their homeland. Many individuals and communities this summer feel as though they are in exile. A sermon from this perspective might help the congregation to recognize its similarity with Israel in exile and to believe that as God acted to return the community to their own land, so God is at work to restore the present world.
This Psalm fits almost perfectly with the Gospel reading (Mk 4:35-41), the stilling of the storm. Through the resurrected Jesus, the church continues to experience the same storm-stilling power that Israel experienced through God in Psalm 107.
June 28, 2009
Psalm 30
Psalm 30, another hymn of thanksgiving, is especially suitable for preaching in 2009. This song describes someone who felt prosperous and secure. (Ps 30:6) However, serious illness struck and the speaker, near death, was approaching Sheol (or the Pit), the abode of the dead (v. 3). The psalmist’s enemies rejoiced (v. 1a), thus adding public shame and community-disruption to personal suffering.
Reflecting a powerful tendency in Jewish literature, in verses 8-10, the psalmist argued with God. What benefit to the community would accrue from the psalmist’s death? Indeed, since Sheol is a domain in which the residents are gray shades who do not praise God, the psalmist’s death would deprive God of the joy of praise. The preacher could use this aspect of the Psalm to encourage the congregation toward full and open expression of feelings before God.
God restored the psalmist, calling forth the beautiful line: “Weeping may linger for the night, but joy comes with the morning.” (Ps 305b) Sickness and other forms of life disruption may linger, but just as the sun always comes up, so the processes that can lead to health and restoration are already at work.
The middle and upper classes in the United States have been prosperous. Yet many people and groups now have the sense they are going down to Sheol. Life is a pit for increasing numbers. Many weep. The preacher can help the congregation shed tears while also pointing the congregation to ways that God is present and working for restoration.
Two aspects of the Psalm raise theological issues for many preachers. First, the singer assumes that God was angry at the psalmist (v. 5a) and that the illness resulted from God hiding the divine face (v. 7b). The psalmist may have engaged in formal acts of repentance (v. 11). As indicated earlier, in my view such claims are theologically inappropriate. God would not actively cause illness or other misfortune. Second, people and communities who turn to God are not always healed.
Nevertheless, a deeper theological perception is that God is present to lure difficult life situations towards as much restoration and blessing as allowed by particular circumstances. For example, a person may be terminally ill, but God is always with that person in love. The illness may not go away, but God’s presence is a strength and support.
To be candid, the morning does not always dawn with pure, uninterrupted joy. But morning brings to light the presence of God with us. And that is cause for a certain kind of joy, though sometimes muted.
