Psalm 31:1-5, 15-16 Commentary

A scant month ago as one of the Psalm readings for Palm Sunday, the RCL assigned portions of Psalm 31.  And now here it is again.  They have chopped it up a bit differently but it’s the same psalm and the whole poem hangs together and needs to be read together (no matter how much the RCL folks take their Lectionary scissors to snip through this like a little girl making paper dolls).

Of course, Psalm 31 still remains relevant in this time where most of us are still in COVID-19 quarantine and isolation and when most churches are still not able to gather.  The idea of trusting in God and of placing the times of our lives into God’s hands speaks to us now but so does the stuff the Lectionary sometimes would have you turn your eyes away from; viz., talk of enemies and being surrounded by things that seem designed to hurt you.  Our enemy now may be a virus—and here and there perhaps insensitive neighbors who place the value of their freedom to do whatever they want over your right not to get infected by them—but the talk in The Psalms about enemies may resonate with us a bit more now than even 3 months ago.

In any event, since I am not quite clever enough to have a whole slew of new insights on Psalm 31 compared to 4 weeks ago, I will refer you to the link of my recent full sermon commentary on this poem.  Probably not too many preachers turned to this Psalm on a high holy day like Palm Sunday but maybe this moment in Eastertide is a good moment to embrace the hope of the resurrection that lurks near the heart of even this ancient song.