Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - How The Psalms Help | The Writings | Psalm 22

Episode Date: January 30, 2024

Maybe you're super into poetry and think it's beautiful, or maybe you hate poetry and can't understand it. Where does that leave you with the Psalms? In today's episode, Tanya dives into Psalm 22 to share the breadth of knowledge and love to which the Psalms connect you. Read the Bible with us in 2024! This year, we’re tackling a group of Old Testament books traditionally known as “The Writings”— Psalms, Chronicles, Proverbs, Daniel, Ruth and more! Download your reading plan now. Your support makes TMBT possible. Ten Minute Bible Talks is a crowd-funded project. Join the TMBTeam to reach more people with the Bible. Give now. Like this content? Make sure to leave us a rating and share it so that others can find it, too. Use #asktmbt to connect with us, ask questions, and suggest topics. We'd love to hear from you! To learn more, visit our website and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter@TenMinuteBibleTalks. Don't forget to subscribe to the TMBT Newsletter here. Passages: Psalm 22

Welcome to 10-minute Bible Talks, where we connect the Bible to your life. In the time it takes to get to work. I'm Tanya Wilmeth. When Eric and I were dating and still trying to impress each other with our romantic prowess, he gave me a Valentine's gift that still makes me laugh and still makes him roll his eyes. It was a book of Emily Dickinson poetry. I think he picked it out. I think he wrote in it.

He definitely had a nice little card to go with it, and he gave it to me, and he was pretty proud of his thoughtfulness. I opened the gift, and the words I was singing in my brain spilled out of my mouth before my brain could catch up. I said, have you read this? Do you know what these poems are about? I don't remember how he answered, but I could remember the look on his face. Of course he hadn't read the poems. He hated poetry. We often talked about how he thought that people who read and dissected poetry were finding things the author had never even thought about. So I knew he hadn't read Emily Dickinson's poems when he selected her book, because it was a collection of poems

about her obsessive thoughts of death for Valentine's Day. And to be honest, I don't even like Emily Dickinson's poetry. It's a bit dark for me. But he was right. I do love poetry. It's like a puzzle to unlock where the fewest and most poignant words possible are put on the page to convey the largest, most in-depth illustration the mind can grasp. In his 1980s play, The History Boys, Alan Bennett wrote about eight boys who were trying to get into Oxford, and they had to study poetry. In a conversation between Tim's, the instructor, and Hector, the student, Hector groans when Tim's hands him yet another poem to read and analyze. What is this? Sir, I don't always understand poetry, he says.

Hector replies, you don't always understand it? Tim's, I never understand it. But learn it now. Know it now, and you'll understand it whenever. Tim says, I don't see how we can understand it. Most of the stuff poetry is about hasn't happened to us yet. And Hector responds, but it will, Tim's, it will. And then you will have the antidote ready.

Poems are about hearts soaring and hearts breaking, about peaceful nature and natural disasters. They're about relationships that work and the ones that fail. They chronicle the suffering of the body and the suffering of the mind, joy and sorrow, even death. To read a poem is to experience with the author as experienced, and in some shadow way, internalize what it must feel like to be in that moment with them. The Psalms are a collection of poetry that were put to music and sung corporately. Imagine men and women, old people and children, singing together with one chorus.

Imagine how their life experience would have shaped their understanding of the Psalm. and imagine how the psalm would shape their understanding of their life experience. Psalm 22 is one of the most famous, and it could be called a song for when life is hard. If poems in and of themselves are a powerful antidote to the experience of life, then what more is the living word of God set to poetry? What could it do for us to shape and prepare hearts and minds for the life behind us and the life in front of us? In the notes to the choir master, Psalm 22 was from David, and it's supposed to be sung to the tune of a song called The Doe of the Dawn. Now, I imagine the song must begin on a foggy and melancholy note because it begins like this.

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me from the words of my groaning? Oh my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer. and by night, but I find no rest. See, we're not sure what David was experiencing here, but it must have been visceral. He must have felt alone and far from God, even though he believed God's covenant promise

that he would never abandon his people. David's words would find fulfillment hundreds of years later, when Jesus' clothes were torn and divided, when a crown of thistles and thorns was pushed into the skin surrounding his head, when he was flogged and mocked and nailed to the cross in the most agonizing and humiliating form of punishment known to the Roman world. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

Christopher Ash, he's a teacher of Psalms and he wrote this. He says Jesus cries these words on the cross, not because he could not think of any other way of expressing his pain, but because all of his life, this Psalm, the Psalms had shaped his prayers. When Jesus cried out, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? It wasn't because he didn't know the answer, but because he understood his entire purpose. He knew he was experiencing the agonizing separation from the Father, so we would never have to. So what does it mean for us to read this Psalm in these words today? Well, first, it takes us on an emotional journey.

secondly, it prepares us for something we might experience later, and it shows us how to do something unnatural. I'm going to explain. First, reading the Psalms takes us on an emotional journey. Jesus gave himself on the cross, so we would never have to experience the kind of suffering and separation he experienced. Yet if we don't truly appreciate the depths of his suffering, of being separated from his father. We can't truly love him for what he's done for us. I don't think this realization happens all of a sudden or maybe even fully in our lifetime, but I do think the Bible, and especially reading the Psalms in light of the cross, draw us more and more into a loving understanding of what Jesus has done for us that helps us love him more. Second, the Psalms are part of God's word,

and they become a treasure hidden in our heart that will be opened just when we need it. I've seen friends handed devastating news or troubling decisions whose minds were suddenly filled with scripture or truth. They hadn't even consciously processed until that moment. I've had my own moment on the side of a highway when the physical reality of God's goodness overwhelmed any other emotion I was experiencing. And I know it came from his gift of scripture that somewhere he had hidden in my heart. It doesn't have to be that dramatic either. It's words about Jesus being the bread of life

when we're tempted to take something we don't need. It's an assurance that he will always keep us when we feel rejected or alone. The Psalms help us not to be surprised when life is hard. When we feel the pain of rejection, we remember that we are not alone. Finally, Psalm 22 shows us how to do something unnatural to us. It is natural for us to despair, worry, stew, circle the drain with our thoughts.

But we cannot do this prayerfully without the encouragement of the Bible, of Jesus' example, like we experience in Psalm 22. Teacher Gwarnhofer said, We then confuse things like wishing, hoping, sighing, lamenting, rejoicing, all of which the heart can certainly do on its own with praying. But in doing so, we confuse our own. earth and heaven, human beings and God. Praying certainly does not mean pouring out one's heart.

Psalm 22 teaches us to pour out our heart to God and trust God simultaneously. After he cries out to God, David says, Yet you are holy, enthroned on the praises of Israel. In you are fathers trusted. They trusted and you delivered them. To you they cried and were rescued. In you they trusted and were not put to shame. He repeats trust three times in those verses.

He is as full of trust as he is of despair. He holds those two in tandem at the same time. It's the reality of trust that keeps him from falling off the edge. Here's the thing. You and I don't know what's going to happen to us. We don't know when we're going to feel like we might fall off the edge. Maybe you already do. But I can guarantee God will not forsake you in that moment.

He cannot. because he is faithful and he keeps his promises. Let Psalm 22 be an antidote to what troubles you today or what might trouble you in the future. Let the true suffering of Jesus, along with the truth of his resurrection, be the anger that tethers you. I guarantee any one of these Psalms can mend or protect a broken heart.