Category: Praying with the Psalmists

My as-yet-unpublished book, Praying with the Psalmists, is about using patterns from Psalms in your own prayers. I want to make a habit of praying that way, using different types of Psalms.

On Good Friday, before singing in a wonderful cantata in the evening, I walked among the bluebells at Bull Run Regional Park in the afternoon.

So this is a perfect time to write a creation hymn.

Creation Hymns in Psalms use the following key concepts:

• God’s Glory
• God’s Sustaining Care
• God’s Knowledge
• Creation’s Joyful Response

You’ll find them in Psalms 8, 19, 33, 65, 95, 96, 104, 139, and 148.

The key concepts give us an idea of what to talk about. I’m going to write a creation psalm about what a wonderful time I had out in God’s creation.

Lord, I love the bluebells so much,
the first flowers on the forest floor.
Each one has small beauty,
rewarding a zoom lens with a glimpse of perfection.
But the fields together
give sparkles of color as far as the eye can see.

I love the way these flowers are wild,
not cultivated like hothouse plants,
but exuberantly filling every bit of ground
overflowing a space that tree leaves normally shade,
bursting forth before the leaves come back,
proclaiming with their brightness that Spring is on its way.

And you gave me a glorious day to roam the trail,
to stop and stoop to capture one flower’s portrait.
Sunshine streaming through the bare branches,
blue skies shining high above,
air brisk and clear,
a perfect day for a ramble.

And with the cantata choir to come,
songs of your love go through my head.
And can it be that I should gain
an interest in my Savior’s blood?
And can it be?
And can it be?

No humans tend these abundant blossoms,
they fall under your tender care.
And if that is how God clothes the Spring blossoms,
that appear only for a few weeks,
how much more will my Father in heaven
care for my needs?

Lord, it’s hard to worry or fret
when walking the Bluebell Trail.
With the river calmly flowing past,
the small flowers dancing in the breezes,
the brisk air filling my lungs,
the happy children spotting critters,
the sound of birds chirping in the trees high above,
it easy to imagine they’re all singing your praises.
And I can pause my busy life to join in.

That’s the idea. Mind you, I’m partly posting this so you know your own psalms don’t actually have to be very good!

Try it at home! If you’re really brave, post one you’ve written in the comments!

I’ve written a book about Psalms called Praying with the Psalmists: Open Your Heart in Prayer Using Patterns from Psalms.

I’m currently looking for a publisher, and one of the publishers I’m planning to query asks for a list of ways your book challenges assumptions. They want a dozen or more ways. I’ve come up with a disorganized list, and I thought it would be fun to post them while trying to make some kind of order. So enjoy!

Challenging Assumptions in Praying with the Psalmists:

• You might think that Psalms are ancient literature and have no relevance to today, but human emotions are still the same centuries later, and we can learn from Psalms about opening our hearts in prayer.
• If you think the God of the Old Testament is judgmental and angry, it will be good to immerse yourself in studying Psalms, where we see, again and again, that the Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and rich in love.
• If you think poetry has to rhyme, you might be surprised to learn about the Hebrew poetry of Psalms, where the form used is mainly parallelism — a form about the content of the lines rather than the sound of the lines, which has been translated beautifully into thousands of languages over time.
• If you think that only gifted writers can write poetry, you may be surprised at how easy it is to copy the parallelism the psalmists used, and how it can slow down your thinking, make you pause, and help you open your heart.
• You may have heard you should follow a formula when you pray such as ACTS (Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, Supplication), but the 150 Psalms in the Bible fall into ten different types, and each type has a different form or set of key concepts. There are many ways to pray, and studying Psalms can deepen your prayer life.
• If you’ve been told you should pray specific requests so you will notice when God answers, you will find it interesting that the psalmists go into great detail about their problems, but make their requests to the Lord in generalities, trusting the Lord to figure out the specifics.
• If you think you could never memorize a Psalm because you’re bad at memorizing, you need to know that no one is bad at memorizing Scripture. Memorizing a Psalm might take you longer than someone else, but you got to spend more time with the passage, so how is that bad?
• If you think it’s not okay to question God, take a look at the angry and despairing questions in some of the Psalms.
• You might think Psalms are all about joy and praise, but there are more Laments in the Bible than any other type of Psalm.
• On the other hand, you might think Laments are depressing to read or write, so you may be surprised to learn that along with detailing their troubles, the psalmists who wrote Laments also include a section about trusting God and a section about how they’ll praise God when God answers.
• If you’ve heard that Messianic Psalms all point to Jesus, you may think they are not something we could write today.  Yes, they foreshadow Jesus, but the psalmists who wrote them didn’t necessarily know they were prophesying. The Messianic Psalms make a good model of how we can pray about injustices in society or government.
• If you think the book of Psalms is too long to go through them all or that some Psalms simply aren’t interesting, then you’ll enjoy my 12-week Reading Plan to cover all the Psalms and show how they all fit into ten types.

There!  What do you think?  The publisher who asks for this says it helps them determine how your book gives new views on old questions.  I’m not sure my statements are as “provocative” as what they’re looking for, but I do think they give you a feel for what I’m trying to do with it.  I’ll polish up some more before I send the query, but I think I’ll work with this list.

I’ve written a book called Praying with the Psalmists.

My book is a complete study of Psalms, showing you how you can deepen your prayer life by using patterns from the ten types of Psalms in your own prayers. I illustrate the types of Psalms by telling my own story. But why Psalms?

Why Read Psalms?

Psalms is a book of emotions of humans in relationship with God. Did you know that there are more Laments in the biblical book of Psalms than there are Psalms of Praise? God can handle our emotions, both positive and negative, and you’ll find them all in the Book of Psalms. These emotions are timeless and the Psalms still touch our hearts today. I’ve got a Reading Plan for reading all the Psalms in 12 weeks, reading one type of Psalm each week.

Why Memorize Psalms?

I’ve memorized all 150 Psalms (beginning in childhood, when my parents paid me), and I’ve found that the brain exercise of memorizing a Psalm helps bypass your brain and bring it straight to your heart. Have you ever memorized a piece of music and found that once you memorize it, you can focus on musicality and meaning? “Hiding God’s Word in your heart” by memorizing a Psalm will help you feel the meaning of that Psalm all the more powerfully. (If you don’t believe me, try it!) I’ve got a chapter with some tips on memorizing Scripture in my book.

Why Study Psalms?

Looking deeper at Psalms, you can see the patterns the Psalmists used — and use them in your own prayers. This is the ultimate goal of my book: To give you another tool to use in prayer and to help your prayers reach your heart.

The book is a 12-week study of all 150 Psalms. You’ll read the Psalms of each type, hear how those Psalms touched my life, and see patterns in each type so you can try it yourself.

After all, sometimes you need a Lament.

Where am I in my book journey?

My book is written, and I brought my own small group through it in 2023, with the help of a co-leader.

In 2023, besides working full-time, I was on the Morris Award committee, so that was taking most of my free time. I did send the book out to some agents. But the feedback I got was that I need to grow my platform before I would get enough interest for an agent or large publisher.

So, in 2024, I’m going to try to grow my platform, as well as try some small publishers. If all else fails, I may decide to self-publish.

How can you help?

You can help my platform grow by subscribing to this blog. I’m going to try to post something about Psalms at least once a month. And I’ll post updates about my book journey. This is my personal blog, so if I find other pressing topics about faith or my life, this is where I put them. You can find out about everything else in my website on my About page.

Why Psalms?

Because if you give them the chance, Psalms will touch your heart.

Last week, my friend Darlene and I traveled to California for our friend Ruth’s 60th birthday. It was a lovely trip. We had a great time together.

But Ruth has early-onset Alzheimer’s, and I am all torn up inside about it.

Explanation for this post: I have written a book, Praying with the Psalmists: Open Your Heart to God Using Patterns from Psalms in Your Prayers. This book is not yet published. But the premise is that we can use patterns from Psalms in prayer to open our hearts to God when things trouble us.

The book may or may not ever get published, but I’m trying to model praying with the psalmists in my own prayers when things are heavy on my heart. [You can follow along with the blog series “Praying with the Psalmists.”] At this time, Alzheimer’s is so heavy on my heart.

At first, I thought I’d write a lament, as I did in “Lament for Leukemia.” But despite the situation, Laments generally are more for prayer requests — bad situations where you are asking God to come through. My friend’s Alzheimer’s is a horrible situation out there in the world, and I can’t help wondering how God allows it. Why is this happening to someone who loves God? I just hate it. So this is a situation for a Wisdom Psalm.

Now, the trouble with writing a wisdom psalm myself is that I don’t particularly think I have wisdom. So I think of the ones we laypeople write as Pep Talk Psalms — reminding ourselves what we know about God, reminding ourselves that it’s worth it to follow God, reminding ourselves that we actually do trust God. Some Wisdom Psalms in Scripture that I love are Psalm 1, Psalm 34, Psalm 37, and Psalm 73.

In my book, I cover five key concepts from the biblical Wisdom Psalms: Blessings, Teachings, Consequences, Oversight, and Perspective. But maybe you’ll get the idea from the example and the biblical examples. I’m going to attempt to use parallelism and dive in and write a psalm about this. I’m going to start with the situation, but then remind myself what I know.

A Psalm for Alzheimer’s

Father, I hate Alzheimer’s
with every fiber of my being.

First, my mother had it,
starting in her early sixties.
It started kind of cute:
holding hands with Dad in new situations,
not understanding mirrors,
proud of getting a puzzle piece in,
telling my Dad they should get married.

But every time I saw her,
she was much worse than the time before.
I just got a memory on Facebook about the time
more than a year before her death,
already on hospice,
when she fell out of her wheelchair
broke her nose, cut her forehead,
and had to remain bedridden
for the last year of her life.

When I saw her two months before her death
at my Dad’s funeral,
she couldn’t talk,
couldn’t smile,
couldn’t sit up,
couldn’t feed herself.
People asked if she knew me,
but how would I even know if she did?

I really hate Alzheimer’s.

So now my friend Ruth has it,
about ten years younger than my Mom started.
Yes, she knows me.
Yes, she can still talk,
with a little trouble putting thoughts into words.
Her frequent “Yeah, uh huh…” reminded me so much
of my mother for a while saying constantly “okay… okay…”,
though Ruth is working to engage in conversation
at least in that way.

She’s happy!
She laughs a lot.
Her husband does a wonderful job
of keeping things light,
laughing with her,
making her failings foibles.
She’s got grandbabies nearby,
living in both homes where she spends her time.
She’s not thinking about the future
and what it will hold for her.
She’s enjoying the present.

She did hike with us,
her husband leading her by the hand.
I tried — and failed to get her past the spot
where she needed to put her foot just there —
because she’s not looking at her feet.

We looked at pictures
from junior high and high school.
She knew who people were
(or at least said she did)
when we could get her to look at the TV
where they were showing.

In the old pictures, in every single set
there’d be a picture of Ruth
perched atop a swingset or boulder or castle wall or tree.
She can’t climb any more,
and I hate that.
In fact, she has trouble sitting down
in an ordinary chair.

And I hate it.

I know it’s only going to get worse.
Though Ruth isn’t thinking about that.
She’s enjoying her husband’s care,
her children and grandchildren,
and wherever she finds herself.
She enjoyed our visit,
and I’m so glad we got to be there for her.

But I hate Alzheimer’s.

[Crying break.]
Lord, why did this have to happen
to someone so vibrant, so alive,
so sharp, so kind,
so always full of mischief,
always literally climbing on boundaries?

Now I’m home,
no longer putting on a brave face so Ruth won’t see my distress,
and my 7-year-old niece is getting
a stem cell transplant for leukemia.
A high school friend’s husband, a pastor,
just passed away from a brain tumor.
Thousands of innocents were recently murdered
in terror and war, both Israelis and Palestinians.

And, Lord, it all seems so hard.

But whom have I in heaven but you, Lord?
I’m not going to decide you don’t exist
because terrible things happen in the world.
I’m not God,
and that’s a good thing.
But I don’t understand.
And that’s okay. I’m human.

What do I believe?
I believe you bring good even out of terrible things.
I believe that mankind is fallen,
but that you redeem.

I believe that my mother is in heaven now,
and all her suffering is not even worth comparing to the glory she now faces.

I believe that my father shone so brightly while he cared for her,
as Ruth’s husband is beginning to shine now.
[I still don’t think it even comes close to outweighing the evil of Alzheimer’s,
but, yes, good comes out of it.]

I believe that because Alzheimer’s and leukemia exist,
humans are exercising their ingenuity and brilliance
and discovering cures.
The stem cell transplant is a much simpler process
than the old bone marrow transplant.
Immunotherapy shows great promise
for many kinds of cancer,
and research for Alzheimer’s treatments
is making great strides.
We have come so far in medical science!
May it continue, may lives continue to be saved and prolonged.

And Lord, above all,
I believe you are with us.
You became a human,
Emmanuel, God with us.
You took up our infirmities
and carried our diseases.
I believe you know our suffering
and carry us.

Sometimes you calm the storm
and sometimes you guide us through the storm.
You love Ruth, your precious child.

Thank you for her life,
thank you for her friendship,
thank you for her laughter,
thank you for her love.
Thank you that you are always with her.
Thank you that she’s been my friend
for almost 50 years.

Thank you that despite awful things,
there is still joy in this world.

Thank you that we were able to bring some of that joy
to our friend Ruth.

Grant her husband and children
grace and perseverance.
Be with them all on the journey that follows.
But thank you that Ruth herself is living in the moment,
still trusting you.

And you are faithful.

Okay. That’s my psalm. I think it helped. The fact is, I still believe that God is good. I don’t claim to know higher meaning for Alzheimer’s. But I choose to believe that God is good and God is loving. And God brings good out of even this.

Hey, anyone reading this — I’d love it if you tried writing your own psalms, too. You can tell by my example that they don’t have to be very good! But use the comments if you want to share.

Last week, I wrote a Lament for a Leak. This week I got much worse news, so it’s time to write a Lament for Leukemia. Except wait — I already wrote a Lament for Leukemia.

Yes, this is about my same niece, Meredith. Now she’s seven years old, and she’s still dealing with leukemia.

I remember the Lament form using the ACCESS acronym:

Address to God
Complaint
Confession of Trust
Entreaty
Sureness of Help
Subsequent Praise

[If you’re interested in reading a book about writing your own psalms, subscribe to this blog or to my Sondermusings substack, and I will definitely let you know if/when I find a publisher. You’ll also find out some things along the way. Let me encourage you to try the lament form and post your own examples in the comments.]

For now, another lament for leukemia:

[Address to God]
Lord, we don’t know where to turn
and so we turn to You.
You love us and care for us,
you hear prayer,
but we don’t understand
how children can suffer so much
in this world you’ve made.

[Complaint]
Meredith was in remission!
She did so well with immunotherapy!
No side effects!
Out of the hospital on the first possible day!

Our hopes were high.
Our hearts lifted to see her
dancing ballet,
learning Parkour.
(Parkour seems to be navigating obstacles with strength and grace —
may she navigate these new obstacles with strength and grace.)

But only a couple weeks later,
her b-cells are back.
The reengineered t-cells are no longer
protecting her from leukemia.

We don’t want to be ungrateful.
Her big sister is a match!
But the stem cell transplant process
is hard,
is risky,
is scary.
And we’d gotten to hoping she could do without it.

Lord, she’s just a kid!
Seven years old, with years of painful and uncomfortable treatments
behind her.
She was doing activities,
going back to school,
learning new things,
even growing her hair back.
Now it’s time for six more weeks in the hospital (at least).

[Confession of Trust]
Lord, we know that you do see trouble and grief.
You consider it to take it in hand.
You will be with your children
every step of the way.

[Entreaty]
Lord, have mercy!
Grant Meredith health and healing.
Uphold her family.
Grant them all grace and peace.

Give her sister peace and rest
as she donates her stem cells,
and transform her blood into
healing and salvation for Meredith.

Lord, we don’t even understand fully how it works,
but turn her sister’s blood into good medicine
that gives Meredith new health and new life
and many years of thriving.

[Sureness of Help]
Thank you, Lord, that you do hear our prayers.
Thank you for the amazing developments in medicine
that have produced this cure for leukemia.
Thank you that you have been with this family for years already
and you’re not abandoning them now.

[Subsequent Praise]
Lord, help us dare to celebrate again
when the stem cells do their work.
Let us look forward to the day
when her blood has been renewed
and she is cured.
We look forward to singing for joy
at the healing you bring.

I’m upset over something that happened yesterday. And I feel stupid for being so upset. The something is that in a rainstorm, I discovered my bedroom window is leaking badly. My office window is also leaking.

I feel like that shouldn’t upset me so much — and then my mind keeps spinning over reasons why it does.

And that gets me thinking about Psalms.

You see, I recently finished writing a book about Psalms, Praying with the Psalmists. I don’t yet have a publisher, but my premise is that you can use the patterns from Psalms to write your own prayers.

And I want to try a Lament for this Leak. I think it will help me calm down my catastrophic thinking.

I learned when studying Psalms that God wants our honesty. The psalmists seem somewhat extreme in their complaints. So if I’m extreme in what I worry about regarding this stupid leak — well, that’s okay. God can handle it.

I’ll use parallelism, and I’ll use the ACCESS form of a Lament:

Address to God
Complaint
Confession of Trust
Entreaty
Sureness of Help
Subsequent Praise

Here goes! I’m going to sit down and write this now and try not to edit it too much. This is my prayer.

[Address to God]
Lord, I’m coming to you about this leak,
I’m telling you my worries and fears
because I want to trust that you care about me;
I want to believe that you listen to my concerns.

This one seems too petty for you, God.
I’m a grown-up, shouldn’t I deal with it?
But let me come to you like a child
because as a father has compassion on his children
so you have compassion on those who follow you.

A situation like this makes me miss my father,
miss someone to turn to,
miss not having to be the most responsible one.
So it’s time to turn to You, Father.

[Complaint]
It’s just a window!
But I’ve been afraid of this.

When my air conditioner went out and pulled me back into debt,
my friend said, “What’s *really* expensive are windows.”
Just a couple years ago, our condo association sent out a notice:
Replacing windows is now the responsibility of the homeowner.
Because they’re all getting old,
and the association can’t afford to replace them all.
They had us vote on it,
but what could I do?
We don’t want our fees to go up,
but neither do I want the expense.
Had a feeling it would be relevant,
but hoped I was just superstitious.

Many months ago, I noticed a leak
in the window in my office.
But it didn’t happen again
until yesterday.
I’d hoped it was a fluke.

For the same months, I’ve been noticing a wet, rotting wood smell
near the window in my bedroom
every time it rains.
But never saw any water.
Maybe I’m imagining it?
After all, if I don’t actually see a leak,
how could it actually be there?

Then yesterday it was spitting out.
My head got sprinkled when I ducked in to see where it was coming from.

The rug was wet next to my bed.
Then I saw splashes on the things under the window.
I moved those things next to the piles
removed from my closet months ago.
I got a step ladder and found the water was coming
from the wooden casing above the window.
The paint is cracked, and water was coming out
randomly all in a line,
all along the top of the window,
falling all the way down
not in a stream I could catch in a bowl,
but spreading out and spraying.

I put down plastic,
wiped it down.
The office window was leaking too.
(Usually wind drives rain the other direction
— that’s the one good side.)

Four months ago, a bathroom leak from the condo above me
destroyed my master bathroom and closet.
I still haven’t returned everything to the closet,
trying to sort through the boxes of books.
I’ve only just recently finished cleaning the dust
from the reconstruction.
I still haven’t gotten back
the $500 deductible,
because the problem didn’t originate within my unit.

So I don’t want another project.
I haven’t put my house back together after the last one!
Problems are supposed to wait their turn!
Aren’t they?

And money!
Ten years ago, my Dad gave me the down payment to buy this place.
A few years later, a home equity loan allowed me to pay off
heavy debt from my divorce.

Then the water heater broke…
then the air conditioner…
and always, God provided.

In a few months, I’ll have my car paid off,
and I was already daydreaming about saving little by little
to buy one more car – without payments –
before I retire.

I’d got it in my head that at last I’d go back to visit Germany
where I lived for ten years,
but haven’t seen for eighteen years.
I’d go next June for my sixtieth birthday.
What better way to celebrate?

Now I feel like who am I
to dare to plan for something special like that?
Who am I to think
I can be out of debt for more than a few months at a time?

And, Lord, I know it’s so childish!
It’s expensive to own a home.
My condo already saved my financial situation.
At worst, surely I can get a home equity loan.
But I’m still complaining!
This is the part about all the thoughts going through my head:

How dare I think I can have nice things?
I’m on the Morris committee!
How can I possibly find time to have people come through my home
open up a wall
rip things apart
and put in a new window?
And how will I ever find time to clean up after?
Why can’t I just ignore the problem
and hope the wind won’t blow that direction with rain ever again?

And where do I start?
Who do I call?
(The condo association.
Maybe they can tell me where to get windows that match.)

Okay, that’s the start of my complaint, Lord!
It’s a big mess of money and time that I for sure
do not want to spend right now.

It childishly doesn’t seem fair
when I haven’t even put things back together after the other leak.

It all seemed like more when I was stewing.
But those are my complaints, Lord.
I’m not looking forward to dealing with it.
I’m not looking forward to paying for it.
I’m not looking forward to having people fix it.
I’m not looking forward to moving my furniture to make it happen.
I’m not looking forward to the disruption of folks working on it.
I’m not looking forward to cleaning up after it.

And I keep hoping the problem is just a fluke,
but yesterday was enough water
that I think the time for ignoring the problem
is long past.

[Confession of Trust]
Lord, thank you that writing all that out
isn’t nearly as bad as what was spinning in my head.
Thank you for this home
and how it solved my credit card debt.
Thank you that you provided
after all the other repairs and after dental crises and other unexpected expenses.
Thank you for that $3000 award that came
exactly when I was $3000 in debt.

Father, by now I should have learned that you can meet my needs.
And you help me deal with things I don’t want to deal with.
And you help me find professionals who know what they’re doing.
And I can really do this Grown-up stuff!

And yes, I can trust you, Lord.
And no, this isn’t a disaster.
And yes, I have so many resources
and should probably be ashamed for how upset this got me.
Because you will be with me, Lord,
as you have been with me before.

[Entreaty]
Lord, be with me
as you have promised!
Grant me wisdom
to figure out who to call,
to find trustworthy professionals,
who quote me a good price.
If I need a home equity loan to pay for it,
help me through that process, too.
Make me thankful for my cozy and beautiful home
as I invest in it something in return
for the shelter it has provided to me.

Be with me in this process, Lord.
May it not cost as much money and time
as I fear.
And provide for my needs,
as you always do.
Help me not to fret;
eliminate my disaster thinking,
and grant me grace as I carry on.

[Sureness of Help]
Lord, already I feel more calm.
I know that you see me
and you will help me
and you keep me from disaster.

[Subsequent Praise]
When it’s all done,
when I have brand-new windows
with a lovely new window treatment
(because why not?)
and my house put back together —

It’s time for me to have a party
and tell my friends:
I was so worried about this;
I felt sorry for myself dealing with it on my own,
but the Lord helped me through.

Okay, that’s my psalm of lament.

It’s childish, it’s silly. I’m making a fuss over something people deal with all the time.

But you know what? I feel better after writing that. More equipped to figure out what needs to be done, and not panic about what it will take to do it.

For you, reader, it’s not that I want to make you listen to all my petty worries. It’s that I want to share that we all have petty worries. And yes, we can pray about them! And for me, the Lament form really helps.

May the Lord bless you and keep you.

This week, we’re covering Messianic Psalms – Psalms about how the Anointed One will come and make all things right. Since I don’t claim to be able to prophesy, but I do know that God wins in the end, when I write a psalm in this pattern, I like to call it a Happy Ending psalm. It’s a good pattern to use when praying about injustices out in society.

Here’s one I wrote this week:

From Psalm 72:4

May he defend the afflicted among the people
and save the children of the needy;
may he crush the oppressor.

O Lord,
May our governments do this —
defend the afflicted among the people,
save the children of the needy,
crush the oppressor.

Thank you that, in the end, your kingdom will bring
righteousness and justice for the oppressed.

Help me to learn what my part is
in relieving the oppressed
in defending the afflicted
in helping the needy.

If my part is to supply books
to help them know they’re not alone,
then help me do my part
and not be silenced.

Father, our world is so far from safe
for so many of your children.
May your kingdom come
on earth as it is in heaven.

This week my church small group is looking at Chapter 8 of my Psalms book — Creation Hymns. So again, I’m going to try to write one. Not a polished one, but just as a prayer, whatever comes out.

Creation Hymns involve key concepts of God’s Glory, God’s Sustaining Care, God’s Knowledge, and Creation’s Joyful Response. And to make it read like a Psalm, I try for parallelism, repeating or emphasizing ideas in a second line.

Usually when I try to pray a creation hymn, I think about the beauty of nature. The irises by my lake have begun to bloom! So I could pray about that.

But this week, I’ve been thinking about Psalm 139, which begins:

You have searched me, Lord,
and you know me.

If you’re not familiar with that Psalm, look it up! So many beautiful ways of expressing how deeply and thoroughly my Creator knows me.

And this is comforting, because I’m still feeling stressed and inadequate.

The leak from the unit above me that poured water into my home last week has been fixed. Water mitigation folks dried everything out with very loud fans.

But my bathroom ceiling and bedroom wall still have big holes in them. The place doesn’t smell good — I hope just like the inside of walls and not mold. And it still hasn’t been settled how it all will be paid for. Surely it’s the responsibility of the owner of the unit above me, but he’s an offsite landlord and his property management company wants me to make a claim on my insurance. Surely my insurance will in turn go after them, because it’s well documented that the leak came from above. They also want their own people to make an estimate before they proceed with reconstruction, and I have a feeling it’s not going to happen before I go out of town in a couple weeks.

But let me put in the psalm why I’m upset with myself. The title is from Psalm 103:

You Know That I Am Dust

You have searched me, Lord,
and you know me.

I know that you’re going to take care of me
and already have taken care of me.
I’m not going to have to pay for the damage,
and it’s relatively little damage
and I’m privileged to be a homeowner
and what’s a little inconvenience?
Especially when my little niece
is suffering with relapsed leukemia.
So how can I get stressed and tired and headachy
simply from a first-world problem like this?

Lord, I keep thinking that trust
means we shouldn’t get upset.
But you know me better than that.
You made me human.
Instead, may I turn to you when troubles happen
when parts of my home literally fall apart.
And maybe I need a little more sleep,
a little more leeway in my plans for getting things done.

Why am I so much harder on myself
than you are?
And how did a problem in only one small part of my home
throw me for such a loop,
make me feel so vulnerable?

But Lord, you know that you made me human,
not a robot.
You know that my life is one-of-a-kind.
You gave me my unique quirks.
And yes, you gave me vulnerabilities,
not making me out of steel.
And they are not flaws,
but facets of your image.
And may I shine that image
more fully with every day that goes by.
And learn about trusting you,
turning to you,
even when my home falls apart,
even when I don’t know what to do.
But may I start by acknowledging that
I don’t know what to do
and I’m feeling stressed
and extra tired
and I want my place of refuge back
and I want all the paperwork done.

Thank you, Lord, for the world you’ve made,
and the ingenuity you’ve given folks
to build homes
and put them back together when they fall apart.
Thank you that it could have been so much worse
and it wasn’t.
But that it’s still okay to feel stressed,
and it reminds me to turn to you.

This week my church small group, which is going through my not-yet-published book Praying with the Psalmists, is covering Thanksgiving Psalms.

My whole point in the book is that we can use the patterns in Psalms to write our own psalms and pray our own prayers. I’ve got examples in the book. But if I’m going to be consistent, I should write another psalm with each chapter we cover. And I like doing that to build a habit.

But honestly? I don’t feel a lot like giving thanks right now.

Yesterday, I wrote a lament in honor of my six-year-old niece who has relapsed with leukemia. That news is weighing on my heart.

And today, I was going to finally tackle the big shelf in my closet that collapsed a week and a half ago and see if I could put it back up. But when I got out of bed, the tile floor in my bathroom was covered with water. Water was dripping steadily from a fire sprinkler head on the ceiling.

I live in a condo. I called and talked with several people. But the people in the condo above me didn’t see any signs of trouble, so the consensus is that I need to call a plumber and get the leak diagnosed. It may be my neighbor’s or the condo association’s responsibility to repair, but it’s leaking in my home and I need to get the work done.

So figuring all that out took most of my day, while the drips keep coming in a bucket in my bathroom at a rate of one every few seconds. I did find a plumber who’s open all weekend and will come tomorrow morning.

Then in the evening, I thought I’d finally take a look at that metal shelf that had fallen down. And when I stepped in the closet to lift it up — my foot got soaked. The carpet is soaking wet. (This closet shares a wall with my bathroom.) I think I can hear more dripping in the walls.

There are lots of good sides to it — I’d taken all my clothes out already. If the shelf hadn’t fallen, I might have never noticed that water. It’s only wet inside the closet, not in the rest of my bedroom. Now if they have to make a hole in the wall, I can have the same people who repair it also put the shelf back up.

But I am not in a happy mood!

All that said, before all this happened, I’d decided to write my thanksgiving psalm about my walk in the bluebells on Good Friday. And when I’m not in a mood to give thanks is probably a good time to remember the many reasons I have to give thanks.

A Thanksgiving Psalm has the basic form:

Call to Praise
“I Was in Trouble.”
“I Called.”
“The Lord Answered.”
Response of Praise

I’ll talk about my experience in the bluebells in the psalm. I’ll put a bluebell picture between each of the parts of the psalm.

Thanks Among the Bluebells

I give you thanks, Lord,
for you have been good to me.
You answered my prayers
and brought me so far.
You healed my heart
and filled me with joy.

The first time I visited the bluebells at Bull Run,
about fifteen years ago,
I’d heard about it in an employee newsletter,
and I went after a trip to my divorce lawyer.

I was so sad about the divorce,
and walking among flowers reminded me of my husband,
of the flowers at Keukenhof,
of hikes throughout Germany.
I told myself that now I was bothering no one
by stopping every few feet to take pictures.
I didn’t have to worry that what brought me joy
was boring anyone else.
I could simply enjoy the amazing beauty
wild and free, filling the woods.

But I still missed my husband
and felt so alone.

And my walk became a prayer walk
asking you, Lord, to help me,
to be with me.

I was still trying to pray my husband back at that time,
but I also wanted your guidance in the life ahead of me.
I had a new job at Fairfax County Public Library
(which was how I heard about the Bluebell Trail),
and I asked your help in paying my bills,
working as a librarian,
making a home for my youngest,
and somehow healing my heart.

I’d been with the lawyer,
asking for her help.
But among the bluebells, I was with you, Lord,
asking for your help.

And when I went back to the Bluebell Trail
this year on Good Friday,
it struck me how thoroughly you’ve answered those prayers
in fifteen years.

My heart is healed.
Now it’s easy to wander with joy
and the woods make me think
of other delightful rambles.
I remembered that first walk,
fresh from the lawyer,
and I thought what a different place
you’ve brought me to.

I’ve got my dream job,
feeling competent and capable as a librarian,
ordering children’s books
for the entire library system.

I’ve got a home I love,
surrounded by its own beauty of nature.
My bills have been paid
and my heavy debts lifted.

And life is so much more joyful
so much more hopeful
than it was on that walk fifteen years ago.

At that time I hoped for a joyful and vibrant life,
but then it was a request of faith
and now it’s acknowledging
where you’ve brought me.

While I was walking through the bluebells
“O Love,” a song from our Good Friday cantata,
was going through my head,
especially these lines:

“O Joy, O Joy, that seeks me through the pain,
I cannot close my heart to thee.
I trace the rainbow through the rain
and see the promise is not vain
that morn shall tearless be.”

So I praise you, Lord,
for your unfailing love,
and your wonderful deeds for humankind.
You brought me out of a place of deep emotional pain
and filled my heart with joy.

“Weeping may remain for a night,
but rejoicing comes in the morning.”

Thank you, Lord my God.
Thank you, Father.

You’re very welcome to post your own thanksgiving psalm in the comments! Tell about a time when you were in trouble, you asked the Lord for help, and the Lord answered. I have to say it really helped my mood.