Sheltering Mercy
Psalms as prayer book.
I’ve begun a new book of prayers as a means of inspiration while I kneel at the prayer bench next to my study desk here at home. It’s called Sheltering Mercy: Prayers Inspired by the Psalms.
The authors provide a very helpful insight in their introduction. Namely, that “praise” has a broader meaning than I think we are inclined to recognize in most of our church teaching —
Yes, the praise we find in the Psalms is often joyful. Exuberant. A tune fit for dancing. But there is praise of another sort — the praise of the forgotten. The destitute. The fearful. The guilty. For these, praise often looks like utter desperation. Immobilizing panic. Fury. Trembling lips and a stuttering heart. The Psalms pull no punches.
They remind us that worship is not only celebratory, but often mournful — the cry of those so overcome with grief, so lost in darkness, that the world of light and laughter and sun and sky seems like a half-forgotten memory. The God we serve — the One who is relentlessly present with us, even when He seems as distant as the peace we long for — is with us both in triumphant victory and in crushing defeat. In consolation and in desolation. In darkness and in light. In weeping and in rejoicing. In death and in life.
The Psalms cover the wide gamut of human experience and human emotion. They are refreshingly honest. Tactlessly blunt. They move us. Shock us. Invite us to join them in their joy and in their lament. For God is present in it all.
And here’s a taste of their efforts to represent that.
From Psalm 1.
“River Tree”
Lord,
Your presence is life to me:
joy of my heart; strength of my soul.
Grant me the grace to walk in Your ways;
to cherish Your friendship
over the fellowship of the fallen,
soul-shaped as I am by the company I keep—
pressed and formed, for good or for ill.
I refuse to march with those who mock Your mercy;
who revel in the unraveling of sacred things.
They stumble down trackless wastes,
training others in the ways of their wandering.
But You will be my delight, Lord;
Your Word my mirth and meal—
and I like an oak,
drawing strength from fertile soil,
growing in grace,
safe in the circumference of Your mercy.
So I will flourish,
a river tree drinking from the deep—
fruit heavy on my branches;
leaves thrumming with life.
Though seasons shift around me,
I will stand.
The godless are lifeless:
withered stalks,
bent by the wind;
such are those who shun Your mercy.
They forfeit seats at Your table,
refusing Your wedding garments;
choosing nakedness over grace.
I won't be counted among them—
not while Your River rushes for my good.
Lead me, Lord,
strength upon strength,
that at the end of my days I may look back
and wonder at the manifold mercy of God.
