Narrative Lectionary Program Year Four– John – June 27, 2021 : Psalm 30
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Furthering the Power of God’s Story – Narrative Lectionary Commentary
by Daniel D. Maurer
As an exegete of the Bible, and one for whom both theological training and parish experience are a part of my past, I sometimes tire of many Psalms and the talk of “enemies” or “foes.”
Yet, at the same time, with biblical history being an interest, I realize that the modern world I’m living in, although it might seem to be very different, shares both homogeneous and metaphorical similarities to the themes found in sacred literature. In the case of the Psalms, I cannot emphasize enough that the Psalmist writers actually were referring more to physical than to metaphorical “foes”. Often modern readers (especially from the West) associate those foes or enemies not literally as an enemy at the gates of one’s city, ready to break it down. Rather, people link the foes as something more metaphorical. The list is long; human beings have lots of enemies banging at the gates, even when those city walls fit the bill more as figurative threats.
Illness. Struggles with money. A collapsing marriage. Confronting an addiction. Finding peace in losing your parents or your children. Struggling with a mental illness. Seeking to reinvest yourself in a faith community.
The list is endless. Often, the struggles themselves are, as well. The enemies never really go away, do they?
Please hear. It’s not my intention in this commentary installment for the 2021 summer readings for the Narrative Lectionary to somehow criticize or devalue an approach to the Psalms that stresses more the metaphorical understanding of enemies or foes.
What I’m saying is that, as an exegete of this text, it’s important to understand the very literal understanding the original Psalmist(s) intended to portray. But, more than simply “understanding” this was the case isn’t enough for an interpreter of biblical texts.
I’m encouraging you to actively refresh yourself in the background of the Hebrew people and the real military threats they were living under. (And, yes, I know. It’s a Wikipedia article, which I hope you understand I’m not being lazy by sharing with you. It’s just that it’s very concise in surveying Jewish military history.) Perhaps it’s also relevant today that Palestinians and Jews today are themselves living under the threat of attacks—literal ones.
Maybe in taking the time to look at and ponder these more literal foes, the understanding how metaphorical enemies can apply might become richer. Or at the very least deeper.
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Exegetical Links
Psalm 30, (Pentecost 6C), The Old Testament Readings: Weekly Comments on the Revised Common Lectionary, Theological Hall of the Uniting Church, Melbourne, Australia.
Singing Just Because, Melissa Bane Sevier, Contemplative Viewfinder, 2010.
Commentary, Psalm 30 (Easter 3C), Wendell Frerichs, Preaching This Week, WorkingPreacher.org.
Psalm 30, Easter 3C, The Old Testament Readings: Weekly Comments on the Revised Common Lectionary, Theological Hall of the Uniting Church, Melbourne, Australia.
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Psalm 30
Readers: Reader 1, Reader 2
Reader 1: I will extol you, O Lord, for you have drawn me up, and did not let my foes rejoice over me.
Reader 2: O Lord my God, I cried to you for help, and you have healed me.
Reader 1: O Lord, you brought up my soul from Sheol, restored me to life from among those gone down to the Pit.
Reader 2: Sing praises to the Lord, O you his faithful ones, and give thanks to his holy name.
Reader 1: For his anger is but for a moment; his favor is for a lifetime. Weeping may linger for the night, but joy comes with the morning.
Reader 2: As for me, I said in my prosperity, “I shall never be moved.”
Reader 1: By your favor, O Lord, you had established me as a strong mountain; you hid your face; I was dismayed.
Reader 2: To you, O Lord, I cried, and to the Lord I made supplication:
Reader 1: “What profit is there in my death, if I go down to the Pit? Will the dust praise you? Will it tell of your faithfulness?
Reader 2: Hear, O Lord, and be gracious to me! O Lord, be my helper!”
Reader 1: You have turned my mourning into dancing; you have taken off my sackcloth and clothed me with joy, so that my soul may praise you and not be silent. O Lord my God, I will give thanks to you forever.