Psalms

The Psalms explore the full range of human emotions from a God-centered perspective. Some Psalms leap off the page as they call worshippers of the one true God to lift their voices up to him with thankfulness and joy. We also see Psalms in which the writer laments the horrible position he finds himself in. The Psalmists speak to God honestly about the pain they are facing. They speak clearly and honestly about their pain. When Christians sing songs that sound like the lament Psalms, we gain a vocabulary for how we talk to God when we are suffering.

Imprecatory psalms affirm our sense that there’s real wrong with the world, that we are right to be angry about it. They speak of the psalmist’s pain in their realness and rawness. They remind us that God is not afraid of our anger. In fact, He, too, is grieved and angry at evil borne of the sin we have committed against one another. These psalms, these imprecatory words, remind us that we can come to God in our anger and ask that He do something about it. The rest of the Psalms, and the rest of the Bible, remind us that He is trustworthy. 

A best-selling book that includes a prayer asking for God to “help me to hate White people” sparked controversy this week after a Virginia pastor posted excerpts from the book on social media and urged Christians to be cautious about such theology.

It is sadly understandable that secular people would despair of hope in times that seem hopeless. Our responsibility as followers of Jesus is to help them follow Jesus as well, sharing God’s word and grace with all those we influence.