No Words for How I Feel

The distress of my heart has grown great.  From my straits bring me out.  See my affliction and suffering and forgive all my offenses.  Psalm 25:17-18  Robert Alter Distress – Life handed you baggage.  Some of it becomes yours before you were born, but when you arrived, no one told you that you inherited your…

Words Fail Me

I will also praise You with a harp, and Your truth, my God; I will sing praises to You with the lyre, Holy One of Israel.  Psalm 71:22  NASB Harp/ sing – Music is emotional catharsis.  It doesn’t take just words to move you.  The sounds of the instruments, the percussion, the rhythm is enough—to move you…

Mystery Music

I will incline my ear to a proverb; I will express my riddle on the harp.  Psalm 49:4  NASB Riddle – Samson was tested.  Solomon was asked.  David made mention.  But it never confronted Moses.  What is it?  A riddle (ḥîdâ), of course.  “The ḥîdâ is an enigmatic saying, question, or story whose meaning must be determined…

A Theology of the Blues

Sing to the Lord a new song; sing to the Lord, all the earth.  Psalm 96:1  NASB New song– For a long time I’ve known that the Blues reach into my soul.  I find myself among those sad refrains, those struggling lyrics.  Give me Clapton, B.B., Stevie Ray, Ronnie Earl, Aretha, Robert Cray, and Kenny Wayne any day.  Oh,…