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Psalm 138
Proper 16A
Years ago I read a wonderful novel by Indian writer Arundhati Roy and one of the things I liked about the book was its great title: The God of Small Things. That title can be an apt summary for something you run across often in the psalms, including in Psalm 138. Israel praised their God…
Psalm 138
Proper 12C
Psalm 138 has features shared by many psalms of praise. There are vows to praise God. There are references to the poet’s motivations for praising God. There is the ardent hope that eventually all the earth and all the kings and peoples of the earth will learn to praise Israel’s God as well. Like most…
Psalm 138
Epiphany 5C
The Lectionary likes Psalm 138 and slates it sometimes in Ordinary Time and sometimes in Epiphany. I have several sermon commentaries on the CEP site on Psalm 138 but for this week I will riff on the last time I wrote about this in the Sundays after Epiphany. I have noted often in my sermon…
Psalm 138
Proper 16A
It’s only 8 verses long and yet Psalm 138 pulls off a pretty nifty feat: it encapsulates most of the major themes of the entire Hebrew Psalter! Let’s make a list of the kinds of prayers and motifs that get mentioned across these very few verses: A vow to praise God continually A vow to…
Psalm 138
Proper 12C
Psalm 138 has features shared by many psalms of praise. There are vows to praise God. There are references to the poet’s motivations for praising God. There is the ardent hope that eventually all the earth and all the kings and peoples of the earth will learn to praise Israel’s God as well. Like most…
Psalm 138
Epiphany 5C
Our prayer life should be our autobiography, C.S. Lewis once observed. But that is also why Lewis thought the Hebrew Psalter was such a fitting prayer book since it contains prayers that fit a wide variety of life’s experiences. Were the 150 Psalms all in one particular emotional register, what help would it be for…
Psalm 138
Proper 5B
While some scholars call this an individual Psalm of thanksgiving, I think there is enough evidence to label it a royal Psalm of praise. For one thing, it is “of David,” the first of 8 Psalms attributed to David. While that doesn’t definitively prove that David wrote it, the central section (verses 4-5) is addressed…
Psalm 138
Proper 12C
At first glance Psalm 138 is simply a royal psalm of thanksgiving offered to God in response to some special experience of personal salvation. It includes an invitation to the royalty of the earth to join in praising the God of this King, whom the superscription identifies as David. Many scholars don’t take the superscriptions…
Psalm 138
Proper 5B
Psalm 138 is a psalm of praise to God for deliverance from some kind of trouble. Its content suggests the psalmist’s enemies have done all they can to silence that praise. However, the psalmist remains utterly determined. Perhaps his foes’ opposition has even made him more determined than ever to praise God with “all of…
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