Trevin Wax - Psalms in 30 Days: A Prayer Guide Through the Psalter

Psalms in 30 Days Copyright 2020 by Trevin K. Wax. Published by Holman Bible Publishers with permission. Nashville, Tennessee. All Rights Reserved. Christian Standard Bible Copyright 2017 by Holman Bible Publishers.

CSB Text Edition: 2020 The text of the Christian Standard Bible may be quoted in any form (written, visual, electronic, or audio) up to and inclusive of one thousand (1,000) verses without the written permission of the publisher, provided that the verses quoted do not account for more than fifty percent of the work in which they are quoted, and provided that a complete book of the Bible is not quoted. Requests for permission are to be directed to and approved in writing by Holman Bible Publishers, One LifeWay Plaza, Nashville, Tennessee 37234. When the Christian Standard Bible is quoted, one of the following credit lines must appear on the copyright page or title page of the work: Scripture quotations marked CSB have been taken from the Christian Standard Bible, Copyright 2017 by Holman Bible Publishers. Used by permission. Christian Standard Bible and CSB are federally registered trademarks of Holman Bible Publishers. Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture quotations are taken from the Christian Standard Bible, Copyright 2017 by Holman Bible Publishers.

Used by permission. Christian Standard Bible and CSB are federally registered trademarks of Holman Bible Publishers. ePub ISBN 978-1-0877-3149-0 INTRODUCTION by Trevin Wax For generations, Christians have prayed and sung the psalms. It was the prayer book of Jesus. It is the Old Testament book most often quoted in the New. The songs found in this book form the bedrock of both corporate worship and individual devotion.

Through thousands of years of memorization, recitation, and singing, the people of God have found in this book a God-centered view of realitywords that put into perspective all our emotions, conflicting desires, times of suffering, and experiences of faith and doubt. There are other prayers in the Bible, Tim Keller writes, but no other place where you have an entire course of theology in prayer form, and no other place where you have every possible heart condition represented, along with the way to process that situation before God. Songwriter Michael Card, writes: The psalms are a connection for us. When Im lamenting, I may feel disconnected from God. The psalms express that experience. When Im joyful, the psalms give me language to connect to that joy and remember that it comes from God.

He never slumbers. He never sleeps. In the end, the psalms provide for every need, all those misconnections, all the things were hungry for, all the correctives we need to remind us that life isnt about us, but is really all about him. The psalms are a bottomless resource for all the things we need. When you pray the psalms, you may not feel all of the emotions or passions of the psalmist when you read. But thats the point.

The richness of the Word of God ought to determine our prayer, not the poverty of our heart, wrote Dietrich Bonhoeffer. It does not depend, therefore, on whether the Psalms express adequately that which we feel at a given moment in our heart. If we are to pray aright, perhaps it is quite necessary that we pray contrary to our own heart. The Psalms Every Month Many Christians over the years have adopted the habit of reading through the psalms every month. Read five psalms a day, and in thirty days, youll have made your way through the psalter. The only challenge with this approach is the varying length of the psalms.

Some are just a few verses, while Psalm 119 is the longest chapter in the Bible. It is hard to form and keep a habit if the time required fluctuates so wildly. To that end, I have adapted a centuries-old approach to reading the psalms found in The Book of Common Prayer by extending a Morning and Evening reading of psalms into a Morning, Midday, and Evening pattern. There is precedent in the Scriptures for praying three times a day, and there is spiritual blessing in deliberately punctuating your day with moments of prayer and Bible-reading. The three-times-a-day approach is designed to lift your eyes above your current circumstances and to remind you that God is the blazing center of all things. Prayers of Faithful Christians Over the years, Ive also found the written prayers of faithful Christians who have gone before me to be a help in my prayer life.

Praying the written prayers of saints from years gone by is a lot like children trying on the shoes of their parents. We wonder if our feet will ever fit into the spiritual shoes of the giants who have gone before us. We wonder if our devotion will match the intensity and clarity we find in their words. We want hearts that are oriented in such a way that we would ask for and desire the right things. Praying the psalms alongside other Scriptures and other faithful expressions of faith over the years is one way of forming our hearts and minds daily. The Psalms in 30 Days Project This book relies on a pattern of prayer I developed in 2019.

It is the pattern I return to most regularly as I seek to pray through the psalms every month. Here you will find all the psalms, as translated in the Christian Standard Bible, arranged in three-times-a-day readings for thirty days. Before and after the psalms, you will find Scriptures and prayers that follow the specific themes found in the calendar of the Christian year. Every week is a mini-journey through the story of the gospel:

• Day 1: Anticipation for Christs coming
• Day 2: The incarnation of Christ
• Day 3: The manifestation of Christs glory in the world
• Day 4: Repentance and the cross of Christ
• Day 5: The resurrection power of Christ
• Day 6: The power and presence of the Holy Spirit
• Day 7: The glory of the Triune God

Every prayer time begins with a call to prayer and includes the Gloria, the Lords Prayer, and closes with a biblical blessing. The morning prayer guide includes a confession of faith taken from Scripture, the ancient creeds, or a recent confession released in celebration of the 500th anniversary of the Reformation. The evening prayer guide includes a confession of sin and a biblical promise of absolution to all who repent.

The morning and evening prayers also include songs from Scripture as well as written prayers from Christians through the ages, and a time set aside for you to intercede on behalf of others and bring your personal requests to the Lord.. The midday prayer guide is abbreviated, usually with a shorter selection from the psalms, since this is the time of day when it may be more challenging to carve out ten or fifteen minutes for prayer. Suggestions for Regularly Praying the Psalms

• If you print out the guide, set it on a desk, nightstand, or table close to your bed, where you will see it. Let it be a visual reminder whenever you enter the room that nudges you to spend time with the Lord.
• Pray the morning selection as soon as you wake up and the evening selection just before going to bed.
• The abbreviated midday routine is ideal for a brief pause during work, but if you miss a midday prayer time, simply add that psalm selection to the evening prayer guide in order to catch up.
• If you only wish to pray the psalms and not the other selected prayers, simply jump to that portion of the prayer guide and pray the selected psalms three times daily.

My prayer is that this guide will help you make praying through the psalms a regular spiritual discipline that strengthens your love for God and neighbor. May the faithful love of the Lord rest on you, as you put your hope in him (Psalm 33:22). DAY 1 MORNING PRAYER Call to Prayer Our King and Savior now draws near: O come, let us adore him.