Weds Night 11/1 All Hallows Night

Communion of saints





COMMUNITY PSALM OF NARRATIVE PRAISE

"...when God broke silence and came to the aid of the people...then this deed awakened the jubilation of the liberated..."

ln the same way that lament was limited by the post-exilic emphasis on penitence, so too praise grew faintin the postexilic experience of an absence of deliverance.The remembrance of divine deliverance is best re-experienced in the Exodus text we have heard already . Miriam's dance and song in Ex 15:1 :

Sing to the Lord , who has triumphed gloriously / Horse and rider has been thrown into the sea.

Westerhoff urges us to observe the Psalm of Praise in its simplest form: 1) a summons to praise
2) an account of God's saving deed.

The CommunityPsalm of Praise is expanded in Ps 124:

Psalm 124
1If it had not been the Lord who was on our side—let Israel now say—
2if it had not been the Lord who was on our side, when our enemies attacked us,
3then they would have swallowed us up alive, when their anger was kindled against us;
4then the flood would have swept us away, the torrent would have gone over us;
5then over us would have gone the raging waters.
6Blessed be the Lord, who has not given us as prey to their teeth.
7We have escaped like a bird from the snare of the fowlers; the snare is broken, and we have escaped.
8Our help is in the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth.
The New Revised Standard Version, copyright 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.






Psalm 124
1If it had not been the Lord who was on our side—let Israel now say—
see Ps 94:17

Note plural references as indicative of a national or communal thanksgiving song


2if it had not been the Lord who was on our side, when our enemies attacked us,
3then they would have swallowed us up alive, when their anger was kindled against us;

see Prov 1:10-12-sinners swallowing the innocent alive like sheol cf Num 16:30-33


4then the flood would have swept us away, the torrent would have gone over us;
5then over us would have gone the raging waters.

Chaotic waters engulfing the believer also in Jonah 2:4 and Ps 69:2-3;15-16

Note the structure: 1-5 : the situation of past danger

6Blessed be the Lord, who has not given us as prey to their teeth.

Note the mood change . Prey to their teeth is common animal imagery as in Amos 3-4; Job 4:10-11; Ps 104:21
7We have escaped like a bird from the snare of the fowlers; the snare is broken, and we have escaped.

Salvation from earthbound predators gives way to rescue that allows flight to the heavens
8Our help is in the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth.

Note inverted order: vs 6- escape on land ; vs 7- escape to the sky; vs 8 maker of heaven and then earth

6-8: Thanksgiving for deliverance


The New Revised Standard Version, copyright 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

A little known psalm ,Westerhoff believes, provides us with a retrospective into " the hour into which lsrael looked back upon a rescue from very grave trouble and summed up this experience in language of relieved praise". Our critic invites us to realize that this experience of "dodging the bullet" is understandable to people of all ages. Praise celebrates the present human experience of rescue; lament remembers the deliverances of the past in order to generate hope for the present time of trouble.