Dr Paul Allen

Serve the LORD with gladness! Come into his presence with singing! —Psalm 100:2 As spring draws near, it is as though all creation bursts into life. Flowers bloom, trees blossom, grass grows, and weeds shoot up like they have been fertilized. Thus, it is time to break out the weed-eater, which soon leads to firing up the blower. However, these gas-powered instruments for beautifying the yard cannot crank with just one tug on the pull cord. The engine requires priming, which involves pushing a small pump to deliver fuel, making the engine ready for combustion. Our hearts are like those cold engines. To be ready for worship, fired in our souls to give God the praise due His name, we need shots of truth, heart-focusing facts about the greatness of the Lord and His grace, so that our cold hearts would be roused to action. Psalm 100 can be such a primer for us. Psalm 100 is the climax of a collection of psalms focused on the Lord as King. From the declaration of Psalm 93:1, “The Lord reigns...

Dan Crabtree Heman, Ethan, and Asaph were brothers, at least in the Hebraic sense. They all came from the same tribe – the tribe of Levi. They all knew King David and served during his monarchy. And they all played, sang, and wrote songs that endure today. These three brothers are responsible for the authorship of 25 psalms, one-sixth of the entire psalter. So, what do we know about these musicians? Quite a bit, actually. The Songs of the Psalm Brothers Heman, a descendent of the Levite Korah, was the founder of the Sons of Korah, a group of musicians who led music in the temple and were responsible for writing twelve of the Psalms (Psalms 42-29, 84-85, 87-88). While Heman himself is only listed as the author of Psalm 88, it’s possible that he could have authored other “Sons of Korah Psalms” as well. Either way, his work in organizing the Sons of Korah led to the writing of these psalms by this band of music leaders. Knowing that Psalm 42 was written by a music leader in Israel adds so...

Impreca-what? “Imprecation” is a fancy way of saying “curse,” and an imprecatory psalm is a “cursing psalm.” We see imprecatory prayers regularly in the Bible, such as when Nehemiah utters a more refined version of “I’m rubber, and you’re glue”: “Turn back their taunt on their own heads and give them up to be plundered in a land where they are captives. Do not cover their guilt, and let not their sin be blotted out from your sight, for they have provoked you to anger in the presence of the builders.” (Neh. 4:4–5). ‘Imprecation’ is a fancy way of saying ‘curse,’ and an imprecatory psalm is a ‘cursing psalm.’   Paul wasn’t averse to issuing curses either: “If anyone has no love for the Lord, let him be accursed” (1 Cor. 16:22). And even Jesus gave “woes” upon the scribes and Pharisees (Matt. 23) and upon Judas (26:23–24). Nehemiah prayed against Sanballat and Tobiah, infamous antagonists of God’s people in Jerusalem. Paul prayed against those who turned away from God, and Jesus aimed...

Not long ago, I received a moving letter from a friend who is working as a missionary in a Muslim portion of the Philippines. He wrote, We heard gunshots the other day and the sounds of running feet as people rushed by our ministry center. The coffee and rubber farms were on fire. We were in shock because we were told it was most likely intentionally done. Many tears were shed, but we prayed that what people intended for evil God would work for good. We don’t know how, but because God is good, it should work out so. So, we could sleep. The last words of his letter echo Psalm 127:2: “He gives to his beloved sleep.” If we’re awed by the fact that Almighty God loves us and that he’s working all things toward our best interests, then we really can be free from anxiety. Isaiah 26:3 tells us, “You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you because he trusts in you.” Isn’t that wonderful? If our minds are focused on the Lord Jehovah, then our hearts can be at peace. Realities of Li...

Let everything that has breath praise the Lord! Praise the Lord! (Psalm 150:6) The first and last psalms tell us a great deal about what God wants us to see and hear in all the psalms. The first is quoted far more often than the last: Blessed is the man      who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners,      nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the Lord,      and on his law he meditates day and night. (Psalm 1:1–2) Psalm 1 tells us that the happiest and most fruitful people, anywhere on earth and at any point in history, will be those who delight most in the words of God. The words of this book — and every other book in the Bible — are meant to be read slowly, wrestled with, and savored. And not just for a few minutes each day, but throughout the day. The psalm is an invitation into the rich and rewarding life of meditation. If the first psalm tells us how to hear from God, though,...

“I find myself turning again and again to the imprecatory psalms,” wrote Tish Harrison Warren this week at Christianity Today.  “Each morning I’m praying Psalm 7:14–16 with Vladimir Putin in mind: ‘Behold, the wicked man conceives evil and is pregnant with mischief and gives birth to lies. He makes a pit, digging it out, and falls into the hole that he has made. His mischief returns upon his own head, and on his own skull his violence descends’ (ESV).” Like Warren,  “I don’t usually know what to do with” poetry that comes from a source I regard as divinely inspired, perfect, and authoritative, yet “[calls] down destruction, calamity, and God’s judgment on enemies.” Like her, and I’d guess most people who follow Jesus, “I am often uncomfortable with the violence and self-assured righteousness found in these psalms.” Perhaps even more so than her; I can’t say I’ve been praying imprecations on Vladimir Putin, much as I despise his actions. But I understand her argument that the c...

Life will triumph over death. Goodwill overcomes evil. The defiled will be cleansed, the broken mended, the wicked judged, the faithful rewarded, and God’s creation purposes will be accomplished. All these realities play into biblical hope. From this perspective, the psalmists write. The psalmists have come to understand that Israel will be exiled from the land, but they also believe that Yahweh will keep His promises to show mercy in the form of a new exodus and return from exile (see Deut 4:25–31, and esp. the quotation of Deut 32:36 in Ps 135:14). They know that though the Davidic king may be dethroned (Ps 89), ultimately God will keep his 2 Sam 7 promises to David (Ps 110). Gary Millar concludes, “To pray in the psalter, then, is to call on the name of Yahweh, as the psalms fill out the conviction that has shaped the other material in the Old Testament.” The Fear of God The most important thing that can happen to anyone who studies the Psalms is precisely what their authors intende...

Many of the 150 canonical   psalms   have superscriptions or titles, like: “Of David,” “For the choirmaster,” and “According to the lilies.” Are these   superscriptions in the psalms   original? Or were they added at a later time?  In this excerpt adapted from  Bible Study Magazine , Peter J. Gentry explores the evidence in the manuscripts, the meaning of the most common superscription, whether we should consider the titles part of inspired Scripture—and how we can benefit from the titles in our interpretation of the psalms. 1 Most English Bibles display the superscriptions in fine print. This suggests to the modern reader that these superscriptions are secondary in some way. But this is not what we find in our best manuscripts. As far back as the famous and respected Aleppo Codex (ca. AD 930), carefully written Hebrew Bibles display poetry in couplets—that is, pairs of lines separated by spacing or accents. Although the psalm superscriptions sometimes appe...

Anxiety is mystifying and elusive. Some people have experienced debilitating anxiety that has found them in the back of an ambulance, while others have the occasional anxious thought that passes briefly through their minds before they fall into a peaceful sleep. For some, anxiety can make it difficult to perform daily rudimentary tasks. For others, anxiety comes around only a few times every year and doesn’t significantly disrupt everyday life. Whatever form anxiety takes, Christians need to know how to meet it with biblical directives and wisdom for our unsettled hearts. When anxiety rears its ugly head, what are we to do? When anxiety is a constant companion for the Christian, how do we remain faithful? Before considering these questions, it’s worth noting that our God-given fight-or-flight instincts are good.   God created our brains to alert us to potential danger. But our brains are subject to the effects of the fall, so our danger-sensing systems can sometimes lead us astray...