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Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - Will You Just Shut Up and Listen?
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - Will You Just Shut Up and Listen?
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Will You Just Shut Up and Listen? Psalm 95 One of the most formative experiences of my life was being a chorister in the choir at the cathedral in my home city in England. I learned to sing and to read and write music, and I wouldn’t have become a music freak except for that expe…
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - On Sacred Space, Sacred Acts, and Sacred Sound
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - On Sacred Space, Sacred Acts, and Sacred Sound
by SPCK - John Goldingay
On Sacred Space, Sacred Acts, and Sacred Sound Psalm 99-100 Yesterday I received what initially seemed a puzzling invitation to a weekly, early-morning prayer meeting, described as “sacred space for a variety of prayer traditions.” It seemed puzzling because I always thought of s…
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - I Have Hope for Zion, but Is There Hope for Me?
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - I Have Hope for Zion, but Is There Hope for Me?
by SPCK - John Goldingay
I Have Hope for Zion, but Is There Hope for Me? Psalm 102 Every morning when we wake up, my wife prays our morning prayers, and almost invariably she thanks God for another wonderful day. An hour later, I sit at my desk thinking about that day’s passage for The Old Testament for …
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - One Way to Evade Compassion Fatigue
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - One Way to Evade Compassion Fatigue
by SPCK - John Goldingay
One Way to Evade Compassion Fatigue Psalm 79 The expression “compassion fatigue” has been around for a while. The nature of modern communications media means that we become instantly aware of suffering in different parts of the world, but we cannot deal with all that suffering or…
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - Bring Back! Come Back!
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - Bring Back! Come Back!
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Bring Back! Come Back! Psalm 80 It’s nearly three hundred years since the First Great Awakening, a revival of religious life in Britain and even more in the British colonies in America a few decades before the War of Independence. This First Great Awakening was mostly a movement …
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - God Redeems Now
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - God Redeems Now
by SPCK - John Goldingay
God Redeems Now Psalm 73 Last night we went to a concert by rock-country-bluegrass-folk artist Steve Earle. I first heard him at Nottingham Rock City when he was still fairly fresh out of prison where he had been for drug-related offenses. Twenty years later in a club in Disneyla…
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - Enough Punishment Already!
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - Enough Punishment Already!
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Enough Punishment Already! Psalm 74 This evening, as I write, will be the beginning of the Jewish year 5772; in other words, on this reckoning the New Year will be the 5772nd year since creation. It will be followed by the Day of Atonement and the Festival of Sukkot. Thinking abo…
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - The Promise of a Poisoned Chalice
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - The Promise of a Poisoned Chalice
by SPCK - John Goldingay
The Promise of a Poisoned Chalice Psalm 75 The news today tells of two men called Abu Elias and Robert who were interviewed as they sat at the bottom of the stairs of the Convent of Our Lady of Saydnaya, a city high in the mountains north of Damascus. It is one of the few communi…
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - God’s Faithfulness, Not Mine
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - God’s Faithfulness, Not Mine
by SPCK - John Goldingay
God’s Faithfulness, Not Mine Psalm 143 Contrary to the resolve she had announced a few days ago, first thing this morning my wife sat at her computer checking the news. Eventually I asked her what had happened to her resolve to begin the day with her time of devotion, and in horr…
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - Thine Is the Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - Thine Is the Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Thine Is the Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory Psalm 145 A student once asked me why the Lord’s Prayer is so different from the prayers in the Psalms, which characteristically cry out to God and issue protests to God because of people’s urgent needs. I wasn’t sure, but in due cou…
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - The Praise of God, the Eternal Creator, Is Finished and Completed
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - The Praise of God, the Eternal Creator, Is Finished and Completed
by SPCK - John Goldingay
The Praise of God, the Eternal Creator, Is Finished and Completed Psalm 150 The heading I have given for this final psalm is the rabbis’ footnote to the Hebrew text of the Psalms. We have come a long way from Psalm 1, where we began with an exhortation to pay heed to Yahweh’s Tea…
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - How to Persuade Your Heart
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - How to Persuade Your Heart
by SPCK - John Goldingay
How to Persuade Your Heart Psalm 103 Some years ago I went through one of those periods when God didn’t seem to be real. I don’t mean I was going through some intellectual questioning, though I have done that at other times, but rather that I didn’t feel that God was there. I wou…
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - Fear or Reverence
Psalms for Everyone Part 2 - Fear or Reverence
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Fear or Reverence Psalm 76 Last week I was lecturing on the Psalms at a college in Michigan, and I referred to the extraordinary freedom that the Psalms assume we have in our relationship with God. You can say anything to God. In relation to God, we are like children in relation …
Psalms for Everyone - Death Cathches You When You Don't Expect It To
Psalms for Everyone - Death Cathches You When You Don't Expect It To
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Death Catches You When You Don’t Expect It To Psalm 49 We recently buried the second-oldest member of our congregation, who until she faded away quickly at the end had regularly attended church. We drove quite a way to the cemetery, and I wondered why, until I discovered that her…
Psalms for Everyone - Wake Up, God!
Psalms for Everyone - Wake Up, God!
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Wake Up, God! Psalm 44 In connection with Psalm 20 I’ve mentioned that our church has just had to accept that we could no longer afford to pay the salary of a pastor. I mentioned this to one of my sons in England, who expressed surprise that such a thing could happen, surmising t…
Psalms for Everyone - When Suffering Links to Sin
Psalms for Everyone - When Suffering Links to Sin
by SPCK - John Goldingay
When Suffering Links to Sin Psalm 38 A friend of mine recently gave me a moving description of the Alcoholics Anonymous group to which he belongs. People go to meetings because they are desperate. They know they cannot kick their habit on their own. It’s more like a disease. They…
Psalms for Everyone - I Am Going to Die
Psalms for Everyone - I Am Going to Die
by SPCK - John Goldingay
I Am Going to Die Psalm 39 I didn’t think much about dying until my grandson was born, and then the thought came to me that I could die now; I had done my job for the human race’s future by fathering a son who had himself fathered a son. I thought about it again three or four yea…
Psalms for Everyone - When Life Continues to Be Darkness