Praying : Remembering God’s Remembering “Remembering God’s Remembering” This odd title comes from Psalm 105:5, 8, and 42. God remembering his people and his people remembering God lead the psalmist to compose Psalm 105, a hymn celebrating the mighty works of the LORD on Israel’s behalf. It tells of God’s faithful love in Israel’s early history. ( describes Israel’s failures in that period of time.) Both Psalm 105 and 106 are storytelling or historical . Five historical psalms recall the unfolding story of God’s dealings with his people from the very beginning of Israel’s history to the raising up of and the Davidic . You can read these storytelling/historical psalms with their poetic allusions to major events in Israel’s history in the following chronological order: 1. Psalm 105: a historical summary paralleling the Pentateuch from Genesis 12 forward, the time of the patriarchs to the time of the conquest, written as a hymn of gratitude 2. Psalm 106: a similar summary in a penitential mood, written as a community lament 3. : a summary that carries the story up to the selection of David and the choice of Jerusalem (Mount ), told in a penitential mood 4. Psalm 135: a historical summary that includes a reference to God’s power as creator in vv. 5-7 and to the plight of people sufering from idolatry in vv. 15-18 5. Psalm 136: an antiphonal summary of the LORD’s great deeds, beginning with creation and ending with more recent acts of God’s deliverance and care in vv. 23-25 These 5 historical/storytelling psalms show the people of Israel who they are and what their God is like. They provide the backdrop for the “mighty acts of love” by which their God ultimately revealed himself in Jesus Christ for the redemption of the whole world. So their story is our story too, and these historical psalms prepare us for the story of Jesus and of us. Here’s what Dietrich Bonhoefer wrote about praying storytelling/historical psalms: We pray these Psalms when we regard all that God does once for his people as done for us, when we confess our guilt and God’s grace, when we hold God true to his promises on the basis of former benefts and request their fulfllment, and when we fnally see the entire history of God with his people fulflled in Jesus Christ, through whom we have been helped and will be helped. For the sake of

Toni Salmon 1 June 13, 2021 Jesus Christ we bring God thanksgiving, petition, and confession. (Dietrich Bonhoefer, Psalms: The Prayer Book of the , p. 35) Now back to Psalm 105 and and its recital of God’s wonders, his impossibilities made possible. Israel’s LORD does these wonderful acts, and Psalm 105 calls his people (and us) to talk about what God has done. (This lesson includes “An Overview of Old Testament History” and a “Time Line - Genesis to Nehemiah.”) 1. Psalm 105 is ultimately not as concerned with facts of history as it is with theology, the study of God and his relation to his people. (Psalms 105:1-15 is included in I Chronicles 16:8-22 as part of a song for David’s moving the ark of. the covenant to Jerusalem, celebrating God’s faithful presence with his people.) So to start with, the LORD is to be worshipped. Underline all of the actions/verbs in 105:1-6 for worship. Why did the psalmist pile up so many instructions? (Think of your own experience with these worship behaviors. Which ones are developed and strong in you and which ones do you tend to neglect? What has helped or hindered your growth in worship?) Compare verses 3 and 6. What do you learn about descendants of ? Are all the descendants physical descendants? 2. Psalm 105 makes a sweeping survey of God’s dealings with his people that covers many years but “paints one picture” of God. Read Psalm 105 with an eye for what Israel’s God is like, what he does, and what appears to be motivating what he does. Here is an outline of Psalms 105’s history of the LORD’s dealings with his people in three stages: I. The Patriarch Period (Genesis 12-50): 105:7-11 alludes to the inauguration of the covenant frst with Abraham and then with his son Isaac and Isaac’s son Jacob, and also this psalm’s emphasis on the promise of the land 105:12-15 the period of the nomadic wandering in Canaan by Abraham and his early descendants when they were few in number and owned no land 105:16-22 the story of Joseph, “a man sent ahead of them” in Egypt and a story that requires serious refection on God’s mysterious ways (both protection and adversity) II. Time of (Exodus 1-12): 105:23-25 the Hebrews entering Egypt 105:26-36 Moses and 8 of the 10 plagues, starting with the ninth plague (darkness) and ending with the tenth plague (the frstborn)

Toni Salmon 2 June 13, 2021 105:37-38 Moses leads the Exodus which blesses the people and relieves the Egyptians III. The Journey in the Wilderness (Exodus 13-19) 105:39-43 God’s protection and provision (cloud, fre, quail, manna, water) and remembering his promise The Entrance into Canaan (Joshua) 105:44 God gave them the land What does Psalm 105 seem to want its readers to understand about the LORD’s character? (vv. 8-11, 42-43) What else stands out to you about who Israel’s God is and what Israel’s God does, especially what he does for his people? 3. As you refect on all the “wondrous works of the LORD” described in Psalm 105, what “impossibilities made possible” come to mind about your own individual or communal history/story with God? What saving actions of God in your own history do you need to tell others about? Where are you in your awareness of God’s awareness of you and God’s faithfulness to you? 4. The verb “remember” in the Psalms does not mean that we or God forget something and then call it back to mind. “Remember” refers to “active involvement,” bringing it to everyone’s memory. To remember something means to act on it, to be loyal to it. Remembrance in the Old Testament is more than an act of cognition; it is a call on Israel to appropriate the memory by gaining their confdence in the present and their hope for the future…As just stated, remembrance means more than simple mental recall; God acts on his covenant and will always do so. (Longman, Psalms, 364-365) How do we respond to such a God who “remembers” with such a display of promise-keeping, protection, anticipation of need, deliverance and provision? Read 105:1-6 and 105:45. Paraphrase 105:45, the other important reason God gave Israel the gift of the land. What response did God want from Israel? Amos 5:23-24 describes how God ended up despising Israel’s worship when it didn’t match how they actually lived. Recall Jesus’s words to the Samaritan woman he met at noon at a well, “You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour is coming and now is here, when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” John 4:22-24

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