05 Sharing the Psalms

by Krisan Marotta | Jun 22, 2016 | 01 Podcasts, Psalms

Ed Scully recorded this talk live before an Adult Sunday school class on how to study the psalms. It is the fifth talk in a seres of five.

Setting the Stage with Psalm 81

Ed: Picture this scene. A great congregation of Israel gathers, possibly for a major feast. They wait expectantly in the sanctuary. Worship is about to begin. A priest or musician rises, perhaps the director of music, and summons the people. He calls the music to begin. We read in Psalm 81:

Psa 81:1 Sing aloud to God our strength; shout for joy to the God of Jacob!
Psa 81:2 Raise a song; sound the tambourine, the sweet lyre with the harp.
Psa 81:3 Blow the trumpet at the new moon, at the full moon, on our feast day.
Psa 81:4 For it is a statute for Israel, a rule of the God of Jacob.

The stage is set for something big. God speaks in this psalm. That is our topic today: how to set the stage for God to speak.

As teachers, how do we capture attention and say, “Now focus on what is going to happen”? God does the speaking. Our task is to prepare our message for the people and prepare the people for the message. More accurately, how might we allow God to use us to do both?

Our Goal as Teachers

We have talked about our goal as teachers. What are we trying to do when we teach Scripture? What is the outcome we want?

Change lives.

When we teach the psalms, what specific changes do we hope for? Think in concrete terms. If a psalm has truly changed you, it has done more than inform your mind. It has affected your life.

We have the text. We have life. Teachers connect the two. A theologian may sit with the text and not be changed. A teacher must bridge text to life.

David outlined purposes of the psalms: they evoke emotion, draw us into the story, guide worship, and invite reflection and meditation. Those are life-facing aims. Yet we often drift to information. We need to reorient.

So what do we want people to do with the psalms?

Pray them. Let the psalms shape prayer.
Praise with them.
Read them more.
Study them.
Meditate on them.
Sing them.

These actions change lives.

Connect Text and Life Throughout

It is easy to think the talk is for information and small groups are for application. That is a fallacy.

Do not give a lecture and tack on five minutes of application. That says your purpose is information and you hope others will apply it later. Instead, connect text and life throughout. In every part of your lesson, ask: how does this move into life?

A reliable guide: share how the passage changed you. Then invite them to experience that change. Ask yourself, what do I want them to do? Then practice it together during the lesson.

Engage People Actively: Meditation

If I talk while you listen, you may or may not be engaged. How can we actively engage everyone? One way is to do, in the lesson, what we want them to do at home.

Let’s model meditation with Psalm 81. Close your eyes if you like. Relax. Picture yourself in the great congregation. Feel the crowd hush. Hear the harps and lyres. Hear the tambourine. The music swells. Something significant is coming.

Then God speaks. The crowd falls silent. Suddenly it is just you and God. Ponder each phrase. Picture what it touches in your life. Here are lines from Psalm 81, made personal for meditation:

I removed the burden from your shoulders.
Your hands were set free.
In your distress you called, and I rescued you.
I answered you.
If you would but listen to me.
You shall have no other gods in your life.
I am the Lord your God.
Open wide your mouth, and I will fill it.
But you would not listen to me.
Oh, if you would just listen to me.
Will you follow me now?
If you will, I will break through the obstacles in your life.
Those who hate me will be punished.
But you, I will satisfy with a feast.

What images came? What emotions?

Participant Reflections

Audience: I felt sad at the line about not listening. We have all done that. Then “Open wide your mouth” took me to a cardinal nest outside my parents’ window. One baby bird waited with its mouth wide open, calling before the mother arrived. If it had not opened its mouth, it would have died. At one point the baby looked too big for the nest, and the father pushed it down safely. I thought of that bird.

Audience: I am very active as the chairperson for a Good News to You ministry. We recently had our banquet, which was not where it needed to be financially. When you said, “I will take your burden,” I thought, You are right, Lord. It is your work. I must obey. Then the part about listening made me ask, Do I really understand what you are saying? Am I lazy? Do I not want to do it? Or are you telling me not to do it, at least not now?

Why Meditate in Class

Ed: That took only a minute or two. Everyone can participate. If you want people to meditate on the psalms, do it with them during your lesson.

When you look at Psalm 81, I changed pronouns to make it personal. I want people to experience the psalm as if they are there. The psalm is not only a mountaintop of praise. It can be a mirror. Psalm 81 unfolds the relationship between God and his people and how they have not listened. It is a feast day psalm that ends with, “I will satisfy you” with bread and honey. It circles back to the feast.

Meditation is one way to engage.

Fresh Language and Multiple Readings

Another way is to read the psalm in different translations. Eugene Peterson’s The Message includes a volume called Psalms. He paraphrased the psalms in modern-day language to help people pray them.

Here is Psalm 81 in The Message:

A song to our strong God, a shout to the God of Jacob.
Anthems from the choir, music from the band,
sweet sounds from lute and harp.
Trumpets and trombones and horns.
It’s festival day, a feast to God,
a day decreed by God, solemnly ordered by the God of Jacob.
He commanded Joseph to keep this day
so we’d never forget what he did in Egypt.

I hear this most gentle whisper from One I never guessed would speak to me:
“I took the world off your shoulders,
freed you from a life of hard labor.
You called to me in your pain;
I got you out of a bad place.
I answered you from where the thunder hides,
I proved you at Meribah Fountain.

“Listen, dear ones, get this straight.
O Israel, do not take this lightly.
Do not take up with strange gods,
do not worship the latest in gods.
I am Yahweh your God, the very God
who rescued you from doom in Egypt,
then fed you all you could eat, filled your stomachs.

“But my people did not listen,
Israel paid no attention.
So I let go of the reins and told them, ‘Run.
Do it your own way.’
O dear people, will you listen to me now?
Israel, will you follow my map?
I will make short work of your enemies,
give your foes the back of my hand.
I’ll send Yahweh-haters cringing like dogs,
never to be heard from again.
You’ll feast on my fresh-baked bread,
spread with butter and pure honey.”

Hearing a fresh rendering can open ears.

Readers’ Theater and Singing

Readers’ theater engages people with rhythm and structure. For example, take Psalm 19:7–9. Divide the room into two groups. One reads the first part of each line, the other reads the second. Alternate. It works best when everyone uses the same translation.

Psalm 136 also fits this pattern with the refrain “his love endures forever.” One voice reads the first line of each verse, the group answers with the refrain.

We also sing the psalms. Bring in a setting and let people hear or sing it. Michael W. Smith and others have put many psalms to music.

Praying the Psalms

Let’s consider Psalm 13 as a prayer.

Audience: [Reading] How long, Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and day after day have sorrow in my heart? How long will my enemy triumph over me? Look on me and answer, Lord my God. Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep in death. And my enemy will say, “I have overcome him,” and my foes will rejoice when I fall. But I trust in your unfailing love; my heart rejoices in your salvation. I will sing the Lord’s praise, for he has been good to me.

Ed: Invite people to personalize a lament. Ask them to write in a concrete line from their own life. For example, after, “How long, Lord?” one might write, “I have had this disease for months now and received no help.” Then continue with the psalm.

Audience: I go back to “Give light to my eyes.” That is a big prayer for me.

Ed: Take a minute. Choose a verse or two. Substitute words to make it yours. Later, share in small groups. If you want people to pray the psalms, pray them in class.

From Class to Life

Do in class what you want them to do at home.
Read the psalms.
Pray them.
Meditate on them.
Sing them.
Personalize them.
Journal them.
Simple exercises engage everyone and move text into life.

Understand the Learner: Stages of Life

Know who is in your group. Singles, married, divorced, single parents, parents of young children, empty nesters. When you prompt personal application, suggest scenarios that fit the people actually in the room.

Stages of Faith

James Fowler outlined six stages of faith development.

Stages 1 and 2 are early childhood when parents are primary.

Stage 3 is identification with a particular church or denomination. The church now defines belief. “Pastor, tell me what to believe” lives here.

Stage 4 is when faith becomes one’s own. That requires questions. We must encourage people to examine and test what they have been taught. They choose it for themselves. This often begins in the late teens but can start later.

Many adults remain at Stage 4, which is good growth, though certain tensions may remain unresolved. Often tensions push us further.

Stage 5 is a maturing faith, often in midlife, with the conviction that all truth is God’s truth. No denomination has everything exactly right. The aim is God’s Word and God’s truth, not defending a label.

Stage 6 is rare. It is deep communion with God. Analysis gives way to union. Ultimate reality is known through Scripture and direct experience with God.

As teachers, we want to move people toward maturity. Sometimes that means taking the risk of offering multiple views, recommending resources, and inviting them to think. If it is not their own, it will not hold.

Moral Development Notes

Research on moral development observed some differences in how women and men describe moral reasoning. Many women articulate morality in the context of relationships, responsibility, and care. Men often speak more abstractly in terms of principles.

Early moral development is self-centered: my needs. With growth it becomes self-sacrificial: caring for others. If that produces resentment or guilt, tension forces growth again toward balance and integrity. Higher levels move from “what I can get away with” to right and wrong even if no one knows.

We need to recognize where people are and invite them higher.

Types of Learners

People learn differently. Four broad styles:

The Answerer. Loves lecture, notes, reading, and structure. They are often our faithful class attendees.
The Dancer. Learns by doing, role-playing, moving. They need to get out of their seats.
The Relater. Learns through discussion. Harmony and connection matter.
The Debater. Highly motivated to know, enjoys analysis, often one-on-one argument and deep dives.

If you only lecture, you may reach about a quarter of your people. Draw in the others. Role-play a lament. Act out a psalm. Let dancers move. Let relaters discuss. Let debaters analyze.

I once led youth through C. S. Lewis’s The Great Divorce. I turned key scenes into skits. Students who never spoke up volunteered to act. They were dancers. Engaging them that way opened the text for them.

Multiple Intelligences

In addition to learning styles, consider multiple intelligences. We often test only linguistic and logical-mathematical ability. There are more: spatial, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and naturalist.

Use varied strategies:

Linguistic: storytelling, reading aloud, journaling.
Logical: categorizing psalms, tracing structure, Socratic questions.
Spatial: visuals, charts, mind maps.
Bodily-kinesthetic: role-play, movement, dance to express a psalm.
Interpersonal: small-group sharing, simulations.
Intrapersonal: silent reflection, personal writing.
Naturalist: outdoor observation with creation psalms, nature imagery.

Do not rely only on your own strengths. Our strengths can become weaknesses if we never vary our approach.

A Flexible Lesson Format

Think of every lesson as connecting life and text, then back to life.

Start with a personal connection. Ask a rhetorical question. Tell a brief story. Prompt people to jot three experiences related to the psalm’s theme. Begin where they live.
Give essential background. In five to ten minutes, set the historical and cultural context, the psalm’s category, and any key structures. If part of a series, briefly review how this psalm fits.
Explore the text. Look at structure and repeated phrases. Ask questions. Relate it to other psalms in the same genre if helpful. Note internal unity. Ask how it fits the broad arc of Scripture, often in terms of gospel and kingdom. What does this psalm reveal about the character of God?
Interweave life throughout. Share your own questions and struggles as you studied. Ask the group questions. Invite illustrations from the room. Alternate modalities: talk, read, write, act, sing, pray. Mix application with instruction. Acknowledge different stages of life and faith in the group. Encourage growth. Do in class what you want them to do at home: read, pray, meditate, sing, personalize, journal.
Close with purpose. Tie back to your opening prompt. “When I asked, ‘Have you ever felt forgotten by God?’ how would you answer now?” Invite reflection and response. Offer a concrete next step. Avoid moralizing. Aim for hearts to purpose something before God.

Closing Prayer

Ed: Lord Jesus, thank you for the privilege of studying your Word and sharing it. Use us as your channels. Speak to us and through us. As we go forward, change our lives. Help us listen and follow you. Amen.