How do we pray? Do we pray with
the same reverence that the disciples would have brought to their prayers? I don’t know about you, but I struggle with
it at times. I would argue that most of
us focus our prayer energy on winning God’s favor and getting him to do things
for us. The psalms teach us that we have
this backwards. The purpose of prayer is
not to question God, but to answer him. It is not to win his favor, but for him
to win our hearts. It is not to bend his
will to ours, but to bend ours to his.
Prayer is about coming to know Jesus and learning to live like him. Using Psalm 16 as our guide, this lesson
explores how we might rethink our prayers as a way to know our Lord.
Listen to Praying the Psalms: Learning to Pray
Lesson Plan
Jesus cried on the cross, “My God, my God, way
have you forsaken me!” These words haunt
us as we imagine him nailed to the cross, dying an excruciating death for
crimes he didn’t commit. But what did he
really mean? Did he really think God had
forsaken him, or did he have something else in mind? Psalm 22 helps us unpack the mystery of the
cross, giving us a greater understanding of our faith and how God hears our
prayers.
Listen to Praying the Psalms: Psalm 22
Lesson Plan
Joy
and anger are the focus of this lesson on Psalms. True joy reflects our
connection with God. Its absence may indicate that we are not as well
aligned with God as we should be. Anger can be a righteous reaction to
injustice, but more often it is a prideful response to not getting our own way. Connecting these emotions to Easter week, we see how Christ's disciples
found true joy after the resurrection while those who despised Christ were
consumed even more by their unrighteous anger. How do we find righteous
joy?
Listen to Emotions at Work #4 - Joy and Anger
Lesson Plan
Handout
This
lesson continues the connection between prayer and emotion. How do the
Psalms provide guidance for us in addressing life's challenges and opportunities,
specifically "Trust" and "Fear"? We are taught to
trust in God in order to overcome fear. What does that really mean and
how do we do it? The answer comes back to the most basic teaching in all
of the Bible: love God and love each other as ourselves.
Listen to Emotions at Work, Trust and Fear
Lesson Plan
Handout
C.S. Lewis said of Psalm 19, “I take this to be
the greatest poem in the Psalter and one of the greatest lyrics in the
world.” Indeed, its effusive praise for
God’s general revelation through nature and special revelation through
Scripture introduces us to an integrative understanding of God that moves us to
a response. Knowing that Jesus embodies
the full law only heightens the response.
Listen to Declaring the Glory of God, Psalm 19
Lesson Plan
The
lesson is the second in a sub-series connecting the Psalms to our emotions and
everyday lives. This week, we examine "Anticipation" and
"Sadness". Anticipation has both a negative side (anxiety) and
positive side (confidence). How do we harness this emotion productively?
Likewise, sadness is a natural part of life. How do the Psalms
teach us to support others who are sad and to act when we are sad ourselves?
Most of all, how does Jesus model anticipation and sadness for us?
Listen to Emotions at Work, Anticipation and Sadness
Lesson Plan
Handout
