Session 1 • Prayer • Devotional
The Psalms were the Prayer Book of Jesus. The Psalms express the entire range of human emotions - fear, love, anger, despair, grief, joy. The Psalms teach us to bring our raw selves to God, to expose all of our deep and true emotions in the safety of God’s presence, knowing that God can handle it all. We can be unfiltered, impolite, and radically honest and this is welcomed by God. The Psalms can teach us so much about prayer, because rather than being songs about God, they are songs to Him, and conversations with Him. It’s possible to find a Psalm that fits with every emotion that we feel and we can therefore use them as a basis for our own prayers. We can pray the Psalms. Some Psalms are full of joy and praise, others are full of confusion and lament, some begin with grief and doubt and end reoriented around the goodness of God or expressing trust in the midst of uncertainty. Praying through a Psalm each day is a way for us to pray using scripture. We can also incorporate journaling and creative expression by writing our own Psalms, according to our own unique circumstances.
There are 150 Psalms in scripture. Below are just a few Psalms that you can pray through. Read through them slowly, and prayerfully. Notice where you feel resonance (you feel positively impacted) and where you feel resistance (you feel negatively triggered). Stop and pray through your own thoughts and emotions. Tell God about it and invite Him to speak to you. If you arrive at a word or phrase that brings you hope, joy, peace or comfort, stay with that verse for a while and allow it to feed your soul. You can even try to commit that verse to memory or use it as a Breath Prayer.
As the deer pants for streams of water,
so my soul pants for you, my God.
My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.
When can I go and meet with God?
My tears have been my food
day and night,
while people say to me all day long,
“Where is your God?”
These things I remember
as I pour out my soul:
how I used to go to the house of God
under the protection of the Mighty One[d]
with shouts of joy and praise
among the festive throng.
Why, my soul, are you downcast?
Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
for I will yet praise him,
my Savior and my God.
My soul is downcast within me;
therefore I will remember you
from the land of the Jordan,
the heights of Hermon—from Mount Mizar.
Deep calls to deep
in the roar of your waterfalls;
all your waves and breakers
have swept over me.
By day the Lord directs his love,
at night his song is with me—
a prayer to the God of my life.
I say to God my Rock,
“Why have you forgotten me?
Why must I go about mourning,
oppressed by the enemy?”
My bones suffer mortal agony
as my foes taunt me,
saying to me all day long,
“Where is your God?”
Why, my soul, are you downcast?
Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
for I will yet praise him,
my Savior and my God.
Lord, our Lord,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!
You have set your glory
in the heavens.
Through the praise of children and infants
you have established a stronghold against your enemies,
to silence the foe and the avenger.
When I consider your heavens,
the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars,
which you have set in place,
what is mankind that you are mindful of them,
human beings that you care for them?
You have made them a little lower than the angelS
and crowned them with glory and honor.
You made them rulers over the works of your hands;
you put everything under their feet:
all flocks and herds,
and the animals of the wild,
the birds in the sky,
and the fish in the sea,
all that swim the paths of the seas.
Lord, our Lord,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!
Lord, do not rebuke me in your anger
or discipline me in your wrath.
Have mercy on me, Lord, for I am faint;
heal me, Lord, for my bones are in agony.
My soul is in deep anguish.
How long, Lord, how long?
Turn, Lord, and deliver me;
save me because of your unfailing love.
Among the dead no one proclaims your name.
Who praises you from the grave?
I am worn out from my groaning.
All night long I flood my bed with weeping
and drench my couch with tears.
My eyes grow weak with sorrow;
they fail because of all my foes.
Away from me, all you who do evil,
for the Lord has heard my weeping.
The Lord has heard my cry for mercy;
the Lord accepts my prayer.
All my enemies will be overwhelmed with shame and anguish;
they will turn back and suddenly be put to shame.
How lovely is your dwelling place,
Lord Almighty!
My soul yearns, even faints,
for the courts of the Lord;
my heart and my flesh cry out
for the living God.
Even the sparrow has found a home,
and the swallow a nest for herself,
where she may have her young—
a place near your altar,
Lord Almighty, my King and my God.
Blessed are those who dwell in your house;
they are ever praising you.
Blessed are those whose strength is in you,
whose hearts are set on pilgrimage.
As they pass through the Valley of Baka,
they make it a place of springs;
the autumn rains also cover it with pools.[d]
They go from strength to strength,
till each appears before God in Zion.
Hear my prayer, Lord God Almighty,
listen to me, God of Jacob.
Look on our shield, O God;
look with favor on your anointed one.
Better is one day in your courts
than a thousand elsewhere.
I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God
than dwell in the tents of the wicked.
For the Lord God is a sun and shield;
the Lord bestows favor and honor;
no good thing does he withhold
from those whose walk is blameless.
Lord Almighty,
blessed is the one who trusts in you.