I’ve been in the Psalms for quite a while now in my daily readings/devotional times with Jesus.

It’s my favorite of all 66 books in the Bible. Why? Author, Philip Yancey, puts it best:

“More than any other book in the Bible, the Psalms reveal what a heartfelt, soul-starved, single-minded relationship with God looks like.”

Further, life has not always been kind to me and my family. I grew up in a horrifically violent home. I buried my dad in 2000, my son in 2013, and my sister in 2016. I suffer from mental health issues. In short, like most people on planet earth, life for me is messy, sometimes very hard. Frankly, when I read the Psalms I often feel like I’m reading about myself.

Yancey continues,

“In the Psalms I found disorientation, confusion, rage, despair, and anguish such that I had never heard discussed in church… Astonishingly, I learned that the ‘problematic’ psalms were the ones the New Testament – and especially Jesus – quoted most often!”

A “psalm” is best described as “our natural response to God’s activity in our life.” And the responses we find in these 150 prayers/songs run the gamut of human emotion.

The Bible is un-sanitized, raw, chronicling the life of mankind cursed with a fallen nature on a fallen planet.

And, in the context of our self-imposed curse under which we suffer, Paul wrote to the Galatians,

“Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us,…” (Galatians 3:13)

If you’ve never explored the depths of the Psalms, consider joining me. Take your time. Dive deep. Then keep diving.

Find a Bible translation that is easy to read such as the New Living Translation (NLT) or the Christian Standard Bible (CSB), both of which are solid, responsible English translations.

Selah, Nick

***Quotes are from Yancey’s “The Bible Jesus Read.”