Daily Psalms - Classical Psalms Every Day

Psalm 44: The Strangest ComplaintThis is one of the most theologically daring prayers in the whole Psalter. The sons of Korah begin by rehearsing the old stories — how God's right hand drove out the heathen, how the fathers won no land by their own sword. "In God we boast all the day long." And then, halfway through, the psalm pivots so sharply it almost gives you whiplash: "But thou hast cast off, and put us to shame." What makes this complaint so strange is that it is offered by the faithful. "All this is come upon us; yet have we not forgotten thee, neither have we dealt falsely in thy covenant." They cannot reach for the usual explanation — that suffering is the wages of sin — because the books, in this case, do not balance. The covenant has been kept on their end and the sky is still closed. And so they pray the only honest prayer left to them: "Awake, why sleepest thou, O Lord?" Paul will quote this psalm in Romans 8 to describe the church itself: "For thy sake are we killed all the day long." Apparently faithful suffering is not a glitch in the system. It is sometimes the very shape of belonging to God.00:00 We Have Heard With Our Ears00:25 Not By Their Own Sword00:50 Through Thee We Push Down Our Enemies01:15 But Thou Hast Cast Off01:45 A Byword Among the Heathen02:10 Yet Have We Not Forgotten Thee02:40 Sheep for the Slaughter03:00 Awake, Why Sleepest Thou, O Lord

Psalm 43: Send Out Thy LightMany manuscripts treat this little psalm as the third stanza of Psalm 42, and once you read it that way you cannot un-hear it. The same refrain returns — "Why art thou cast down, O my soul?" — but the prayer that precedes it has narrowed to a single, beautiful petition: "O send out thy light and thy truth: let them lead me; let them bring me unto thy holy hill." The exiled man does not ask first for vindication, or comfort, or even rescue. He asks for two messengers — Light and Truth — to come down and personally walk him home. It is the prayer of someone who no longer trusts his own sense of direction. And the destination he longs for is not just safety; it is the altar, where God himself is named "my exceeding joy." Joy, here, is not a mood the worshipper manufactures. It is a person waiting at the end of the road. Send out thy light, and let it bring me there.00:00 Judge Me, O God00:15 Why Hast Thou Cast Me Off00:30 Send Out Thy Light and Thy Truth00:45 Unto God My Exceeding Joy01:00 Hope In God

Psalm 42: The Hart and the WaterbrooksThere is no thirst quite like the thirst of an animal that has run too long without finding water — sides heaving, tongue out, head turning desperately toward any glimmer of a stream. The sons of Korah reach for that image, and they will not let it go: "As the hart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God." Notice that this is not the prayer of a man enjoying religion. It is the prayer of a man who has lost the meeting place — who remembers leading the festival crowd to the house of God and now hears only mockery, "Where is thy God?" The waves and billows of God himself have passed over him; he is drowning in the very ocean he set out to drink. And yet, three times in this psalm and the next, he turns and addresses his own soul like a friend he must coach back to its feet: "Why art thou cast down? Hope thou in God." Faith here is not the absence of grief. It is the stubborn refusal to let grief have the last word in the conversation.00:00 As the Hart Panteth00:20 My Tears Have Been My Meat00:40 The Multitude That Kept Holy Day01:00 Why Art Thou Cast Down01:20 Deep Calleth Unto Deep01:40 The Lord Will Command His Lovingkindness02:00 Hope Thou In God

Psalm 41: The Friend at the BedDavid begins this psalm with a strange beatitude — "Blessed is he that considereth the poor" — and only by the end do we understand why he opens there. He is, himself, on a sickbed. He is the poor one now. The friends he once trusted are huddling at the foot of the bed asking how soon they can get on with things. "Yea, mine own familiar friend, in whom I trusted, which did eat of my bread, hath lifted up his heel against me." There is a peculiar loneliness reserved for those who fall ill in a crowded room — a loneliness Jesus would later borrow this very line to describe. And yet David's prayer is not for vengeance but for mercy: "Lord, be merciful unto me: heal my soul; for I have sinned against thee." He knows that the truest measure of God's favor is not the absence of enemies but the presence of God himself, holding him upright when even his own body has stopped cooperating. "Thou upholdest me in mine integrity, and settest me before thy face for ever." If you have ever been the one in the bed, you know how much that single sentence is worth.00:00 Blessed Is He That Considereth the Poor00:20 The Bed of Languishing00:35 Heal My Soul, For I Have Sinned00:50 The Whisper of Enemies01:00 The Familiar Friend Who Turned01:20 Raise Me Up01:40 Set Before Thy Face For Ever01:55 Blessed Be the Lord, Amen and Amen

Psalm 40: The Hand That LiftedDavid begins with one of the most physical images of salvation in all of Scripture — a man sunk to the chest in miry clay, unable even to struggle without sinking further, and the hand of God reaching down to pull him up and set his feet on a rock. Notice that David does not say he climbed out. He was lifted. And the first thing that happens after his feet touch solid ground is a song — not a song he composed, but one that is put in his mouth, the way a mother puts a spoonful of something good to her child's lips. But here is the strange and beautiful turn of the psalm: the rescued man does not offer sacrifice, because sacrifice is not what God was after. "Mine ears hast thou opened" — a line so rich that the book of Hebrews would later hear Christ himself speaking it. What God wanted all along was not an animal on an altar but a listening, obedient heart: "Lo, I come: I delight to do thy will, O my God." The miry clay is never the last word. Neither is the rock. The last word is a man who says yes.00:00 He Inclined Unto Me00:20 Out of the Miry Clay00:40 A New Song in My Mouth01:00 More Than Can Be Numbered01:20 Mine Ears Hast Thou Opened01:40 Lo, I Come to Do Thy Will02:10 Iniquities Taken Hold Upon Me02:40 The Lord Thinketh Upon Me