Can you recall an experience in your own life where you faced injustice?

Day 4 in our “journey to joy” brings us to Chapter 4, “Injustice,” which is taken from Psalm 123:

¹ To you I lift up my eyes,
O you who are enthroned in the heavens!
² Behold, as the eyes of servants
look to the hand of their master,
as the eyes of a maidservant
to the hand of her mistress,
so our eyes look to the Lord our God,
till he has mercy upon us.

³ Have mercy upon us, O Lord, have mercy upon us,
for we have had more than enough of contempt.
⁴ Our soul has had more than enough
of the scorn of those who are at ease,
of the contempt of the proud.

After reading Chapter 4, here are some questions for personal reflection. Feel free to post a comment for discussion.

1. If you have faced injustice, has it developed in you empathy and compassion for those suffering from perhaps greater injustice or oppression?
2. In what ways does the psalmist model for us how we can be free from repression?
3. As in Psalm 121, we find the psalmist lifting up his eyes. How does lifting his eyes to heaven instead of focusing on the injustice help him?
4. How do the principles of submitting to God and praying for mercy challenge our human level responses to injustice?
5. Can you see how injustice in your life can be an opportunity for God to change you, allowing you “to be the change you wish to see in the world”?
6. Why do we need mercy, and why should we plead for it for others?

For more resources related to Journey to Joy, visit www.thejourneytojoy.org.

What thoughts or feelings come to your mind when you hear the word “church”?

The third chapter of Journey to Joy, “Church,” is taken from Psalm 122:

¹ I was glad when they said to me,
“Let us go to the house of the Lord!”
² Our feet have been standing
within your gates, O Jerusalem!

³ Jerusalem—built as a city
that is bound firmly together,
⁴ to which the tribes go up,
the tribes of the Lord,
as was decreed for Israel,
to give thanks to the name of the Lord.
⁵ There thrones for judgment were set,
the thrones of the house of David.

⁶ Pray for the peace of Jerusalem!
“May they be secure who love you!
⁷ Peace be within your walls
and security within your towers!”
⁸ For my brothers and companions’ sake
I will say, “Peace be within you!”
⁹ For the sake of the house of the Lord our God,
I will seek your good.

After reading Chapter 3, here are some questions for personal reflection. Feel free to post a comment for discussion.

1. Would you say you have a real love for the church, not a self-orientated kind of love, but a love meant for the benefit of the other, even at the loss of yourself?
2. Have you ever acknowledged that you have a deep need for community?
3. How are some Christians in danger of living disconnected from the church, or “decorpulated” from Christ’s body, as DeYoung and Kluck describe it?
4. How can you guard against individualism and cynicism about the church?
5. What is the future hope for the church?

For more resources related to Journey to Joy, visit www.thejourneytojoy.org.

Think about this question: Where do you go when you need help?

Chapter 2, “Help,” is taken from Psalm 121:

1 I lift up my eyes to the hills.
From where does my help come?
2 My help comes from the Lord,
who made heaven and earth.

3 He will not let your foot be moved;
he who keeps you will not slumber.
4 Behold, he who keeps Israel
will neither slumber nor sleep.

5 The Lord is your keeper;
the Lord is your shade on your right hand.
6 The sun shall not strike you by day,
nor the moon by night.

7 The Lord will keep you from all evil;
he will keep your life.
8 The Lord will keep
your going out and your coming in
from this time forth and forevermore.—Psalm 121

After reading Chapter 2, here are some questions for personal reflection. Feel free to post a comment for discussion.

1. If God does not help those who help themselves, as Benjamin Franklin claimed, who does God help?
2. Have you ever found that the determination to fix things on your own has been detrimental?
3. What was the psalmist’s remarkable first step in finding help, and how did he then go beyond it?
4. Could the knowledge that God sees you, watches over you, and protects you change how you face a difficult situation?
5. Do you need a redefinition of “evil” to believe that God can keep you from it?
6. Consider your answer to the question at the top of this blog post. After reading Psalm 121 and Chapter 2, where are you going to go when you need help?

For more resources related to Journey to Joy, visit www.thejourneytojoy.org.

Join us this Sunday, May 19, at 8:00, 9:30 & 11:00 a.m. as we look at Matthew 7:7-11 in our “iTeach: Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount” series with a message entitled “You Only Need Ask.”

Today we are beginning our Discussion Group for the new book Journey to Joy which Crossway released April 30. We will be reading through each of the 15 chapters over the next 15 days and discussing them here. If you don’t yet have a copy of the book, you can find the Kindle edition online.

Chapter 1, “Peace,” is taken from Psalm 120:

1 In my distress I called to the Lord,

and he answered me.

2 Deliver me, O Lord,

from lying lips,

from a deceitful tongue.

3 What shall be given to you,

and what more shall be done to you,

you deceitful tongue?

4 A warrior’s sharp arrows,

with glowing coals of the broom tree!

5 Woe to me, that I sojourn in Meshech,

that I dwell among the tents of Kedar!

6 Too long have I had my dwelling

among those who hate peace.

7 I am for peace,

but when I speak, they are for war!—Psalm 120

After reading Chapter 1, here are some questions for personal reflection. Feel free to post a comment for discussion.

For more resources related to Journey to Joy, visit www.thejourneytojoy.org.

On Monday, May 13, we will begin our online Discussion Group for the book Journey to Joy here at www.godcenteredlife.org. It will continue over 15 days (through May 27) as we take 15 steps on a “journey to joy” by reading through the 15 chapters of the book.

If you’ve been looking for a short Bible study to do or have a group who might like to read through the book, this would be a great opportunity to read and discuss the book together, using the blog as a place to share your thoughts and comments.

If you plan to participate, I invite you to leave a comment to this post and let us know who will be part of the online group as we start on a 15-day “journey to joy.” Everyone is welcome, and you may engage as little or as much as you like.

I’ll look forward to going through Journey to Joy together.

Last week BibleStudyTools.com posted a recent answer I gave to the question “How Does a Modern Jewish Rabbi Interpret the Psalms Differently than a Christian Would?”

The video describes the “journey to joy” that takes place in the Psalms of Ascent, the subject of my new book. You can learn more about Journey to Joy: The Psalms of Ascent at www.thejourneytojoy.org.

On Sunday, May 12, at 8:00, 9:30, and 11:00 a.m. at College Church, William Taylor will preach from 2 Corinthians 11:16-12:10 with a message titled “The Paradox of Divine Power.”

Rev. Taylor is the Rector of St Helen’s Bishopsgate in London, England, and the author of several books, including Partnership: Philippians and John’s Gospel: Read, Mark, Learn.

He will be a lead instructor at the Workshop on Biblical Exposition this week at College Church from May 8-10, and will end his time here by preaching Sunday morning. We are delighted to have him with us this week and invite you to join us Sunday morning.

How do you preach the Psalms? Consider Psalm 130:

¹ Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord!
² O Lord, hear my voice!
Let your ears be attentive
to the voice of my pleas for mercy!

³ If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities,
O Lord, who could stand?
⁴ But with you there is forgiveness,
that you may be feared.

⁵ I wait for the Lord, my soul waits,
and in his word I hope;
⁶ my soul waits for the Lord
more than watchmen for the morning,
more than watchmen for the morning.

⁷ O Israel, hope in the Lord!
For with the Lord there is steadfast love,
and with him is plentiful redemption.
⁸ And he will redeem Israel
from all his iniquities.

In Journey to Joy I call my chapter on this psalm “Living Guilt Free.” That is because right at the core of the psalm (sometimes called “De Profundis” because of the beginning words “Out of the depths”) is a wrestling with sin and forgiveness. Most authorities on the Psalms would instruct me when preaching this form of literature to be particularly aware of the genre of the psalm, that it is Hebrew poetry, not the more familiar types of literature that we more commonly preach. Helpful as that reminder is – and commentaries which point to the structures of various psalms – it is, I think, especially important to allow the picture language of the psalm to embed itself in the imaginative center of my mind.

I have to “see” the depths. I have to imagine what it would feel like to be crying out to God pleading for mercy. I have to wrestle with the strange cognitive dissonance of calling upon God with whom there is forgiveness and that therefore he is to be feared. I have to imagine the watchmen, with their long wait for the morning.

Preaching the Psalms is less like scanning through the narrative flow of a portion of drama in the Bible than it is like staring at a painting. I have to sit down opposite the picture. I have to let my mind settle down and really “see” the painting as it is. What does this Caravaggio mean? Why is Salvador Dali painting these clocks in this particular way? What about Banksy’s urban art – what is it that is being said in this graffiti?

This, I think, is why the Psalms particularly appeal to people who are in “De Profundis.” Often the Psalms are written by hurting people, desperate people; other times they are written by people on the heights (and not just in the depths). But always they are written by people who are fully experiencing what they are experiencing. They touch us when we need to be touched and shaped by something (and ultimately Someone) real.

The forgiveness in this psalm hangs a question mark whose solution is only found at the cross. But then this psalm is also a crucifixion and resurrection itself. It is a pattern – a pattern I have to see to grasp – whose meaning reaches in and reshapes my mental imaginative landscape to be more in line with the Painter Himself.

The Workshop on Biblical Exposition is taking place at College Church May 8-10, 2013. David Helm is the Executive Director of the Charles Simeon Trust which sponsors the workshop, as well as pastor of the Hyde Park congregation of Holy Trinity Church, Chicago.

On Thursday evening, May 9, at 7:00 p.m., David will be giving a lecture on how he would study a passage in Luke through the lens of the whole Bible. The lecture will demonstrate how a passage’s meaning in the New Testament is illumined, deepened and even more meaningful when seen in the context of the story of the Bible.

This event is free and open to the public and will be in Commons Hall at College Church. We are delighted to have David with us and invite you to join us.