Jeremy L. Berg

David is a fascinating and illuminating character study. He is more than just the shepherd boy who defeated giant Goliath, or the man who committed adultery with Bathsheba. He’s a poet and a musician, a mighty warrior and a mighty sinner, a “man after God’s own heart” one moment and a man after Uriah’s wife, Bathsheba, the next. David is an example to follow one moment and a severe warning to heed the next. He’s real. He’s a paradox. He’s a lot like you and me.

To kick off the New Year, we’re going to read, study, teach and discuss key episodes from David’s life together the next 7 Sunday evenings at our 5pm MainStreet gathering at St. Martin’s By the Lake. Consider joining us for this series.

New Year’s Psalms Challenge

David penned many of the Psalms in Scripture and these provide a special window into the passionate heart and tortured soul of this flawed but faith-filled man of God. This new year I am inviting us to commit to reading the Psalms on our own and together as a church.

CHALLENGE: Is there one particular psalm that resonates with your soul these days? Is there one psalm you read and say, “Yes, I’m feel ya! That’s where I am at as well”? Seek one particular psalm to inhabit this year. See reading guide below.

Here’s a short introduction to the psalms from my book, The Father’s Song: The Divine Symphony of Scripture followed by a guide to David’s psalms.

I have over 2,000 songs in my iTunes library.  I also have a much smaller “Playlist” of all my favorites: songs that make me smile and move me to dancing, songs that evoke significant memories, songs I’ve shared with special friends, songs that comfort me and songs that move me to tears.  Skimming through another person’s music collection can often give you a small window into that person’s soul.

By God’s grace, the ancient “Favorites Playlist” of Israel has been preserved for us in the 150 song collection we call the Psalms.  We have in the middle of our Bibles essentially the iPod of the ancient Israelite people.  This collection of 150 songs includes hymns for holy days, community laments, individual laments, songs of pious persons, thank-offering songs, royal songs and more.  They are the raw, unfiltered poetic scribbles and lyrical expressions of man’s search for God amidst all the struggles common to man.  

The Psalms are 150 attempts to sing our way back into the Dance of the Trinity and to live in tune with The Father’s Song. The psalms capture the full library of human experience and emotion.  Perhaps the closest contemporary style of music closest to the raw, gutsy, authenticity of the Psalmist are today’s Hip-Hop rap artists.  Hip-Hop music is often characterized as a poetic expression of social protest and lyrical accounts of one people’s individual and corporate societal struggles.  In other words, Rap music has been categorized as, “A cultural evolution of the Black oral tradition and contemporary resistance rhetoric.”

In the same way, the Psalms provide a rich tapestry of individual and corporate religious protests, cries for justice, deliverance, safety and rescue.  Israel recounts her own history of oppression and its struggle for liberation.  The lyrics are uncensored and filled with explicit, violent images one moment, and sacred, reverent praise choruses the next.  One should not examine and study the Psalms primarily with their mind, as much as they should let them wash over their soul like a beautiful sunset, an electrifying concert or breathtaking painting. Good music does not explain and define, it expresses and emotes.

These 150 songs provide us with a library of imperfect, individual attempts to echo the foundational groove and harmonious rhythms of The Father’s Song. In the Psalms we glimpse snippets of the beauty and majesty of God, are faced with the naked realities of the brokenness and injustice of the world, witness the universal longing for meaning, the depravity of human nature and come face to face with the Holy and trustworthy character of the Living God.  The psalmist invites us to make these songs our own, and bring us into the courts of the the Living God so we might hear more clearly the beautiful melody of the Song above all songs of which all our songs are only faint echoes.

This is a priceless collection, a prized treasure of the people of God — both past and present.  In the words of Bullock, “To read and pray the Psalms is to join the voices of numberless people who too have read and prayed them, have felt their joy, anguish, and indignation.”  So, let us not only read and pray the psalms; but let our very lives be swept up into their God-centered melodies and bring us more in step with The Father’s Song.

A Guide to David’s Psalms

About half of the 150 psalms are attributed to David. Jen Brooks at Anchored and Assured provides a list of 35 of David’s psalms organized according to topic. As you seek your Psalm for the year, or moment, or season, considering starting with the following psalms (note: the link doesn’t provide the entire psalm; I recommend reading each psalm in its entirety):

• 1. Confessing and Repentance – Psalm 51
• 2. Gratitude for forgiveness of sins – Psalm 32
• 3. The joy of companionship with God – Psalm 16
• 4. Praise, worship, and adoration – Psalm 18
• 5. Plea for justice when facing persecution and false accusations – Psalm 17
• 6. An Appeal for Justice – Psalm 35
• 7. Prayer in assurance God always hears our prayers – Psalm 34
• 8. A prayer when feeling overwhelmed and desperate – Psalm 142
• 9. God’s protection, presence, and provision – Psalm 63
• 10. Prayer of worship – Psalm 24
• 11. God’s comfort – Psalm 23
• 12. God’s guidance – Psalm 25
• 13. Love for God’s Word; worship – Psalm 19
• 14. God hears and will respond – Psalm 5
• 15. Trusting in God in times of trouble – Psalm 86
• 16. God’s strength and assurance – Psalm 27
• 17. Depending on God in times of stress – Psalm 31
• 18. Trusting God for His protection and peace – Psalm 3
• 19. Prayer for refuge – Psalm 61
• 20. Prayer of praise – Psalm 8
• 21. Expression of gratitude – Psalm 30
• 22. Praising God now and forevermore – Psalm 145
• 23. God is omnisient, omnipresent, omnipotent – Psalm 139
• 24. Waiting on the Lord – Psalm 40
• 25. Refusing to panic in chaos and danger – Psalm 11
• 26. Choosing to trust when we’re afraid – Psalm 56 
• 27. Assurance that God is Judge over all – Psalm 58 
• 28. Placing our confidence in God’s sovereignty – Psalm 62
• 29. Prayer against those who conspire against us – Psalm 64
• 30. Prayer in suffering – Psalm 69
• 31. Urgent need of help – Psalm 70
• 32. Striving to walk with integrity – Psalm 101
• 33. Expressing gratitude and praise for all God does for His people – Psalm 103
• 34. Prayer for contentment – Psalm 131
• 35. Harmony in relationships – Psalm 133