#treeofpsalms

Here's John Hardie, Anglican pastor and attendee of a recent "Unmasking the Psalms" writing workshop, performing his piece from Psalm 116.  The text is below...

Let's Drink to God's Salvation - Psalm 116, John Hardie

I love the Lord. He heard my cry! His servant's desperate cry.

The cords of death entangled me, the grave - it tried to swallow me! In anguish, distress, and sorrow I called on the Lord.

The Lord is holy and just, compassion and true. He protects the unwary, I fell and He grasped my hand.

I love the Lord. He heard my cry! His servant's desperate cry.

Breathe easy, O my soul. 
Dry your eyes. Up on your feet! The Lord has delivered His servant from death.

Let's drink to God's salvation! Revere the name of the Lord. In the presence of His people, I'll fulfill all my vows.

I love the Lord. He heard my cry! His servant's desperate cry.

When a faithful servant dies, Oh, how precious in His eyes is the one, who, like his mother, has served the Most High.

I need your help to make the Tree of Psalms' first CD a reality.

£3000 is what we're short to finish recording, mixing and printing this collaboration between myself and a bunch of UK artists (+ some musicians from the USA and Thailand!).

Graham Kendrick, Philippa Hanna, Chloe Reynolds, Andy Baker, Gaz Simmonds and Andrew Swarbrick are just a few of the musicians involved.

Go to My Rocketfuel Crowdfunding Site to find out more and support...

You can give a one-time gift and receive Exposing the Psalms, the new CD, or a combination of other things (like me writing you your own poem or cooking you dinner).

Or you can give long-term to support the tours, video projects and future artwork the Tree of Psalms plans to grow.

Imagine yourself locked in a small, dirty room. Rope shackles your hands and feet to a chair. One light flickers, dangling just above your head. Beads of sweat tickle your forehead from the heat of the bulb. You can’t scratch the itch. Heavy breathing and threats pummel your ears. Every voice is foreign and full of hate. Each word threatens your life. “You’re about to wish you’d never been born.” Blows begin punishing your face and body, splitting your skin. One of your ribs splinters. Each breath stabs pain. No escape. You’re dead with a heartbeat. And you have no clue what you did wrong.

What name do you call to rescue you in that moment? What if He doesn’t answer?

Psalm 88 never gives a solution to its questions. If anything it stirs them up, pointing a finger at God, questioning His faithfulness and love. It seems like blasphemy. Yet it stands in the Bible. God didn’t snuff out Heman the Ezrahite before he finished writing it. Israel sang it with a flute accompaniment as part of their worship. Put yourself in their shoes. Join with them. Ask God and expect Him to respond . . .

Oh, Yahweh, God of my rescue, I cry day and night to You. Let my prayer reach Your face. Stretch Your ear to my cry. For my soul is weary of problems. My life touches the underworld. I’m counted with those who descend to the grave. I’ve become a warrior with no strength. Mixed with the dead, like a victim lying in a tomb, severed from Your power and memory. You’ve plunged me to the deepest dark pit of the netherworld, in shadows. You’ve spent Your rage on me and held me under the crashing waves.

A cascade of flute pours complaints over you. Your own problems tower higher. It feels like God Himself has His hand on your head, forcing you under the water where the monsters of the deep tear and rip your flesh. Why do you have to suffer? Where’s God? It’s His character to save, to rescue. Where is He? When will He finally answer? Will He send anyone to help? Now it gets more desperate . . .

You’ve taken my friends away and made me disgusting to them in a prison I can’t escape. I waste away in humiliation even though I’ve called You, Yahweh, and humbled myself before You. Will you do miracles for the dead? Will ghosts stand and speak their praise of You?!

The flutes play frenetically. Strings mix their anger with yours. Your emotions ache. You feel the isolation, the shame. It doesn’t seem to matter how much you pray. You can’t perform enough religious rituals to make things better. Analyzing your situation with logic only makes you angrier and more desperate for justice. You long for the intensity to ratchet down just a bit. Maybe resolution will show up. But then it kicks into a higher gear . . .

Will Your mercy matter in my tomb . . . Your kindness and faithfulness when I’m destroyed? Will You show Your miracles in darkness, or your justice in the land where all is forgotten? I’ve shouted to You for help, Yahweh, and at the break of day my prayer confronts You. Yahweh, why do You reject my soul? Why do you hide Your face from me? I don’t understand why I’ve been poor and ready to die since childhood, carrying a dread of You. Your anger floods me. Your terrors annihilate me. They swirl around me like water every day. They surround me completely. You’ve removed lover, friends, and anyone who knows me. Darkness.

Everything stops. No music. No words. You wait. You hear nothing. Read the psalm again. Feel the anger, the rejection, the despair, the loneliness poke and scratch your insides. This is as real as it gets. It’s anything but comfortable.

Despite the lack of hope, Heman keeps coming back to God, pointing his finger, accusing God with His own covenant. No other god claims to be as just and faithful. No other god even claims to care about humans. But Yahweh has. Heman won’t let Yahweh forget His promises. He’s not going somewhere else to get his needs met. Even if he ends up in total darkness, he’s waiting for God to save him.

“You promised, God!” “Where were you when their laughter shoved and humiliated me in a corner?” “How could you let Him abuse me like that?” “Why did my daughter have to feel their dirty hands grope and probe her again and again?” “I was powerless.” “None of my friends or acquaintances or loved ones could do anything to help.” Heman’s pointing out that in those gut-wrenching moments, it’s God who’s going to rescue, or nothing at all.

You’ve probably never experienced the kind of hardships that physically tortured Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s, Brother Yun’s, or any martyr’s mind and body. Then again, maybe you have. Whatever your situation, you’ve felt the blows of life pummel your heart. You’ve wrestled with doubt. Have you ever felt like giving up? Does God really care when you suffer? When death’s at your door, are you still going to cling to Yahweh? Will He save you? If you die with no relief from the daily terrors, humiliation, and agony, will you still put your trust in Him?

This isn’t a game. He’s listening and real. Ask Him your toughest questions, even if they sound blasphemous. Pour out all your fury. Expose your darkest secrets. Let the injustice you’ve suffered pound on His chest. Tell Him how your father beat you. Whisper the name of the one who stole your innocence. Empty the shame. Vent all your rage. Let the tears flow like rivers. Sob and shake with the pain right in His lap. He wants to know. He’s here. You’ll never break His love. You can’t shock Him with your depravity. Even your cursing won’t scare Him away.

The God who rescues can take it. Are you willing to expose your heart to Him?

Follow-up questions 1. What’s the worst thing you’ve ever said to (or thought about) God? (God already knows, so you’re safe to share it.) 2. How often do you wrestle with doubt about God being real or loving you? 3. Which person in your life would never betray you? How do you know?

It's the first single for the Tree of Psalms album.  Straight out of Psalm 87, you'll understand and feel what it means to be "Born in Zion".  Sporting Daft Punk and Michael Jackson influences, along with Peter Nevland's inimitable style, it's crack-a-lackin' good. 

Just go to http://noisetrade.com/treeofpsalms/tree-of-psalms and follow the instructions.

Because You Don’t Deserve It – Psalm 51 David didn’t deserve to write Psalm 51. He should have died for having sex with the wife of one of his most faithful servants, murdering him, and trying to cover it all up. Any one of those things required the death penalty. It’s in the Law that God gave Moses. But God didn’t wipe him off the map; He sent Nathan, the prophet, with a story of a rich man who stole a poor farmer’s only lamb instead of serving one of his own to feed a guest. David swore that the rich man should die for his evil, until Nathan said, “you’re the man.” Gulp. What do you do when you’re caught red-handed? Most of us run away. A few stand still and accept the bitter consequences of our actions. Hardly any of us have the audacity to look in the eyes of the One who’s got power to end our life and ask for forgiveness and complete removal of all consequences. But that’s what David does. I think it happened as he wrote this psalm. Put yourself in his shoes *** Imagine yourself kneeling. You grovel and sob because of how miserable you feel. Regret pierces your heart with images of what you’ve done. Seeing her naked beauty on the roof. Seducing Bathsheba. Looking at Uriah’s face as he refused to sleep with his wife while his fellow soldiers endured the battlefield. The rage that possessed you. The moment you found out she was pregnant. Ordering Uriah’s murder. The satisfaction when you found out he was dead. There’s no escape. You deserve to die. You start by appealing to the part of God’s character that forgives. Give me mercy, because your love, kindness and compassion overflow like no one else’s. Erase my wrongdoing. Make me pure. Scrub me clean. Remember your tenderness most of all. It seems like a long shot, but you keep going . . . I’m to blame. I did it all. Your actions flash through your mind again. It’s always there. I can’t get rid of it. And I did it all to you. Your plea for mercy isn’t looking too good. Now I must confess that I don’t totally understand when he says, “Against you and you only have I sinned.” He clearly sinned against Bathsheba, Uriah, and the whole nation as well. God doesn’t seem to gloss that over either, since he confronts David about it through Nathan the prophet and through consequences afterward. Plus, the phrase is connected to “that You may be found just when You speak and blameless when You judge” (nkjv). I think David’s telling God to judge Him like He did it all intentionally against Him. No matter how severe the sentence he receives, he trusts God’s justice. It’s the only thing I can think of that stays consistent with the rest of the story and God’s character. Let’s go with that. Now the next tricky verse . . . Look, I was born in iniquity and even conceived in sin . . . I’ve heard speculation from people that David may have been his father’s son but of a different mother than the rest of his brothers. Maybe that’s why he got stuck watching sheep. Maybe that’s why Jesse didn’t bring him with the other brothers when Samuel came looking to anoint the next king. Whatever the background, it’s pretty devastating to trace your own sin before your birth. You can’t escape. It grips you everywhere. You begin writing verse 6, repeating the same word as the previous verse for added emphasis (at least that’s how it is in the original Hebrew). It’s like you’re screaming “Behold” or “Look,” in an all-out attempt to win the compassion of God’s heart . . . Look, maybe I was doomed from before birth, But You delight in finding what’s hidden. You know me and make me to know Your wisdom. As you finish the phrase, something happens inside. You realize that God can even go back before the start of sin and plant seeds of goodness. You start getting excited. You write the next two verses not as petitions, starting with a verb, but as declarations . . . You cleanse me on the outside, and I’m clean. You bathe me, and I’m purer than freshly fallen snow. You bring smiles, laughter, shouts of happiness to my ears, And everything that felt crushed starts to come alive. Hope in God’s forgiveness races to your fingers . . . Oh, please, don’t look at all my wrongs. Wipe away even the unintentional mistakes. Don’t just forgive me this time. Go all the way. Make a brand new heart for me, one that has no fault. Give me the right attitude. Whatever You do, don’t throw me out of Your presence. Let Your Spirit stay with me forever. Give me the joy of being rescued by You and keep it fresh in my mind. Can you feel the freshness of a clean conscience? Most of what we’ve heard in churches stops right there. But you don’t. You’re bursting with joy. You want more than just to be right, to be even on the sin scale . . . I’m gonna teach other lawbreakers how merciful you are, God. They’ll come running back to you. Wipe away the guilt of the blood I’ve shed, And no one will be able to shut my singing down. Everyone will hear melodies of Your saving power, Your holiness. My lips will make You famous. Because You don’t want gifts, more punishment, or I’d throw myself on the altar. You care about the hurt of my heart, genuine humility. That’s what You want. Humility and awe sweep you out into God’s heart. Now that your eyes have locked back onto Him, you start seeing the whole situation from His perspective. For the first time since your sin, your heart bursts with His desire for the people who look to you for leadership. Don’t stop with me. Be good to Your people. Build our boundaries back up. Then we won’t be giving offerings out of trying to get right. They’ll ascend from clean consciences, joyful desires to honor You. You’ll get the worship that You deserve. The world will know what a merciful and glorious God You are. Incredible. Even the structure displays it. Verses 1–8 parallel verses 9–17. First David authentically repents and receives cleansing. Then he asks for restoration and becomes an evangelist and worshiper. Finally, he caps it off in verses 18 and 19 with his request for the blessing of Israel and a national heart dedicated to the honor that God deserves. Just thinking through it helps you see the transformation. Writing it changes you even more. David went from selfish leader, deceiver, adulterer, and murderer, to king with a clean heart, willing to lay down his life for his people. That’s what the real God does when you pour out your sin on His lap. If only everyone ran to God when they sinned, instead of away from Him. He loves giving His heart to those who don’t deserve it. He wants to make your rescue His excuse to show the world just how much He loves. How much will you let Him rescue you? Follow-up questions 1. When you mess up where do you usually go, or what do you do that makes you feel better? 2. Is there a person in your life that you can run to for forgiveness, healing, etc.? Who? 3. What do you think would happen if you started telling everyone about how your failures have been forgiven?