Commentary on Ps 32 for the 19th Sunday of Year C

 

 

 

 

 

 

Short Movie: Commentary Ps 32- Small

Script:    Psalm 32 Commentary by Dr Noel Donnelly

Psalm 32 is a great hymn of praise. A hymn, as you will remember from “Praise My Soul the King of Heaven”, has a three-fold structure: first, it has praise my soul the King of Heaven; second, why praise? Because we are ransomed, healed, restored, forgiven: and so thirdly, praise with us the God of grace!   Our complete psalm being a hymn, has this structure. In verses 1-3 it praises God; then, in answer to why we should praise, it thanks God for us being “the people God has chosen as God’s own”, in verses 4-15; the hymn ends in 20-22 with renewed hope in the Lord we have been praising.

Verse one of this psalm has a special introductory word for the instrumentalists: here the harp and the lyre are mentioned as symbolic of all the players in the group. But they are encouraged in verse 2 to play skilfully and to remember they are playing “for the Lord” and not for their own satisfaction.

The first stanza that we sing in today’s selection of verses chosen by the liturgists rejoices in being chosen by God, a blessing that we repeat throughout in our response, “Happy the people the Lord has chosen as his own!”

Our second stanza hopes in God’s love, a word that is repeated in our third stanza and used six times in the full psalm. Love is so important for the psalmist!

The psalm once again bridges our readings which cover the map of God’s love, journeying right through the Egyptian deliverance to our present Gospel situation of waiting in joyful hope. What links these three readings is joyful expectation.

Our psalm concludes with a prayer for hope. Hope for the psalmist means preparing positively while putting our future in God’s hands and moving confidently forward  with the Lord guiding our steps in our loving service. If you use a GPS (Global Positioning System) when you’re driving or hill-walking, we might add the idea that God is available to guide us with his  GPS, his Godly Positioning System. (Maybe God delegates that to the Guardian Angel!)

Anyway, as we jpurney through the week ahead, we might prayerfully adapt that final stanza of today’s psalm and sing, “Our soul is waiting for the Lord. The Lord is our GPS and our shield! May your love be upon us O Lord as we place all our hope in you!”

setting 1:

Ps 32: We place our trust in you, the God of love

The word of the Lord is faithful, and all his works can be trusted
The Lord shows justice and right, fills the earth with love
We place our trust in you, the God of love.

The Lord looks on those who revere him, on those who hope in his love,
To rescue their souls from destruction, feed them when famine comes
We place our trust in you, the God of love.

Our soul is waiting for Yahweh, the Lord is our help and our shield
May your love be upon us forever. Lord we hope in you
We place our trust in you, the God of love.

(For use outside of Mass)
Glory to the Father, glory to the Son,
glory to the Holy Spirit now and for evermore.
We place our trust in you, the God of love.

Psalm 32 (b) : Words and music  Noel Donnelly (c) Kevin Mayhew

setting 2:

Ps 32: He fills the earth with his love.

The word of the Lord is faithful, we trust him in all he does.
The Lord loves justice, justice and fairness, he fills the earth,
he fills the earth, he fills the earth with his love.
He fills the earth with his love.

By his word the heav’ns were made; the breath of his mouth made the stars.
The Lord looks on those, those who revere him, on those who hope, on those who hope,
on those who hope in his love.
He fills the earth with his love.

 And so we await the Lord, the Lord is our help and shield.
We trust that your love will be upon us, we place our hope, we place our hope,
we place our hope in you.
He fills the earth with his love.

 Words  taken from The Psalms : A New Translation published by William Collins & Co Ltd  (c) The Grail Grail. Music Gerry Fitzpatrick © Kevin Mayhew.

audio: 1: tomorrow