SFM Abstract

A HEALING JOURNEY THROUGH THREE PSALMS:
SPIRITUAL IMAGINATION AND PSALMS XXII-XXIV

J. Kingston Cowart, M.S.

ABSTRACT

Through spiritual imagination, we may be led to visions of structure in scriptural texts and to a grasp of process in human events of which we might otherwise remain unaware. From that standpoint, the author relates a transit from Psalm XXII to Psalm XXIV and depicts it as a healing journey. In describing the movement of that journey, he suggests that the first lines of each psalm tell the story of an ascent and its consummation:

My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.
The earth is the lord's, and the fullness thereof.

He notes that all three psalms are attributed to Israel's greatest king, David, a man after God's own heart (Acts 13:22), who knew greatness and anguish in equal measure. David is also the first writer in history to use the word "I" autobiographically — that is, in the sense of a personal, interior self. Thus, the author asserts, these three psalms reflect a psychospiritual perspective with insights based on an individual sense of self in personal relation to God; and the journey portrayed involves a raising of that perspective to its utmost human height. He examines various images, including those of sacred geometry, to illustrate how the journey begins with lamentation, passes through a sheltered middle, and arrives at unqualified praise — and shows how it is strategically assisted by unseen movements of Spirit acting on its own initiative. In human terms, the transit is the story of a distraught soul healed of its anguish and raised to a state of lasting peace and harmony.

The path begins with a weak but sustained stirring in the lower half of Psalm XXII, which is a long cry of lamentation. Despite his weakness and irresolution, the psalmist eventually acts decisively, persisting in petition rather than complaint long enough to be available for being raised up by the invisible action of Spirit — first to the higher half of Psalm XXII, a paean of praise, and then to the pastoral peace of the Twenty-Third Psalm. There, he receives comfort rather than pain, care rather than cruelty, and comes to a deeper sense of his own nature. He is then raised yet again: to the heights of the holy hill presented in Psalm XXIV where his spiritual understanding is further increased, the circumference of his spiritual vision is extended, and his condition becomes one of perpetual receptivity to the "Lord of glory."

The author concludes that in our existential condition we may find ourselves again and again surrounded by difficulties and the hostility of those round about us. Each time we must take our stand in calling upon and remaining available to Spirit and we must persist in that stand despite our fear and despair. It is not enough, but it is necessary. Spirit will not fail us. Then, as this brief study in spiritual imagination discloses, redemptive, healing change will come — and we shall be raised to new hope, higher ground, and deeper spirituality each time.

[14 footnotes; 12 references]