In the past week I read a number of Psalms that were written during times of war. And top in the news this week was a young man gunned down by Toronto police on a street car. Since I am now attending a church that preaches peace over violence, I thought I would dig a little deeper what King David has to say (or sing) during times of war.
I found another helpful site called EasyEnglish Bible that not only translates the bible into easy to read English, but also provides helpful commentaries. This is particularly helpful for Old Testament passages. In today's reading on Psalm 60, this is what Gordon Churchyard has to say:
The Story of Psalm 60
Psalm 60 is a *miktam. A *miktam is either something made of gold, or special teaching or something hidden. Bible students think that there is a story hidden in Psalm 60.
David was at *war. He was a long way from home, near the River Euphrates. That means that he was in Babylon. The old name was Mesopotamia and the modern name is Iraq. 2 Samuel 8:3 tells us where he was. On the way home he fought the Syrians. While this was happening an old enemy of Israel called Edom attacked Jerusalem. David sent one of his soldiers with part of the army to fight the Edomites. They beat them and killed 12 000 of them. This happened in the Valley of Salt, near the Dead Sea.
David wrote the psalm because he thought that God had left him and his people. That is what David thought that the attack by Edom meant. The Edomites must have broken the walls of some of the towns in Israel. But something else must have happened as well. Verse 2 sounds *like an earthquake. This is when the ground moves, and trees and buildings fall over. There are holes in the ground, and animals and people fall into them. All this was hard for David and his people to understand. Why did God let it happen? They felt as if they were drunk after drinking wine! Wine is a drink with alcohol in it. We still have earthquakes today.
We still do not know why this happened. The psalm does not tell us. But it does tell us that God did answer David and his people and he did give them help.
And what was "the *Lily of the Covenant"? A lily is a very pretty flower. A *covenant is what people have when they agree together. Bible students explain "the *Lily of the Covenant" in two ways. Either it is the name of a piece of music that they could sing the words to. Or it is the name of a *musical instrument that they could use to make music while they sang.
The word *SELAH is another problem. It probably means a place for thinking about the words, or praying, or listening to music. When we say or sing the psalms today we do not stop at *SELAH: maybe we ought to! But when we study the psalms, we must think about the words, and pray about them. Even when we do not understand them well, God can and does still speak to us through them. If he does, then the psalm will be as gold to us, because God’s words are still of very great value.
Now that's a lot of good stuff in there. But what does that say to me about my attitude towards my enemies or when I am in the midst of conflict? I think deep down I still subscribe to the "just war" teaching. But I am willing to learn. I have not been in situation where I had to "strike back". I am not sure how I would react then. The Mennonites, who are considered Anabaptists, helped me to worship with the Psalms in Time of War. This is an extract (I put emphasis on the take home points):
We offer the following psalm groupings and their order as a guide for constructing worship services in time of war.
We begin with empathy for the suffering, those who have lost friends and property at the hands of their enemies. These psalms of imprecation allow us to hear the cries of those who are powerless and who suffer in the face of war and unjust suffering. These psalms ground our worship in reality, in the harsh realities our times. They are the voices of those we bomb.
We follow the cries of the victims of war with psalms of lament, psalms that cry out to God in the face of enemies, in the reality of their success and prosperity. They remind us that people make war, it is people that kill. Laments give voice to our feelings of helplessness and to our hope in God, the judge of the universe. We pray that God will thwart their power and bring justice and righteousness to this earth.
Having explored the feelings and expressions of those who are suffering and those who feel powerless in the face of war making, we need to express our confidence in God. The hymns, the psalms of God's sovereignty claim that God is in control, the foundations have been established, and the waters of disorder and injustice will not prevail against our God. We need to be an affirming and confessing community. We need to believe that God is not with the forces of invasion, but is opposed to them.
Finally, we end with psalms of praise, psalms of hope and celebration. Surely, God is to be praised even in our times. Surely, God's praise can be voiced even in a time of war when the current stage seems so bleak and mindless. Praise is an act of hope and of faith. Hope for the future and faith in our God who has the interests of the suffering at heart.
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