Sunday, June 30, 2024

Psalms – Psalm 7

I love the Psalms.

There are times when I feel things, but I can’t quite put those feelings into words or into prayers. In those moments, the Psalms can give me the vocabulary to say things I otherwise can’t express. It’s comforting to know that people of faith thousands of years ago experienced the same things and had the same thoughts and feelings as I do. This is especially true when my thoughts and feelings are unpleasant.

This week, we are going to continue our summer series on the Psalms by looking at Psalm 7. In some ways, Psalm 7 is unpleasant. David prays that the Lord would sharpen his sword and ready his bow to go to war against his enemies. It feels bad to have those kinds of thoughts or to read a prayer like that on the lips of someone as beloved as David.

But let’s be honest—have you ever had thoughts like that?

Have you ever felt wronged and sensed the desire for retaliation welling up within you?

What do we do with those feelings in light of the cross?

I love what Eugene Peterson says about the Psalms in Answering God:

Psalm language is not careful about offending our sensibilities; its genius is its complete disclosure of the human spirit as it makes response to the revealing God. Given the mess that things are in, it will not be surprising that some unpleasant matters have to be spoken, and spoken in the language of our sin-conditioned humanity, for the language of prayer is, most emphatically, human language. It is not angel talk.

Join us this week as we dive into Psalm 7 in light of the cross. I hope to make sense of a powerful passage that otherwise might seem confusing. Above everything else, I hope we can be challenged to love like Jesus.

See you Sunday!
Service times are at 9:00 & 11:00. If you can’t make it in person, you can watch live at those times.