Inspiration can come from anywhere
In the summer of 2024, I participated in a summer Bible study on the Psalms of Ascent, 15 Psalms, 120-134 with the accompanying commentary by Eugene Peterson, A Long Obedience in Same Direction. After summer was over, as well as the study, I had a strong impulse and idea to paint the Psalms we had studied. It was an exercise and a challenge for me in listening skills, the same skills I try to teach in The Maker's Space using art. What would emerge as I was guided by the Holy Spirit and my inner intuition of design and color was a new way of visualizing the Psalms. It seemed like a crazy idea, as well as daunting, but I was so motivated to try as a way of freeing myself up as an artist and to believe that the Creator of the Universe really does like to create with me!
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Psalm 120
Repentance
“I’m in trouble. I cry to God,
desperate for an answer:
“Deliver me from the liars, God!
They smile so sweetly but lie through their teeth.”
Do you know what’s next, can you see what’s coming,
all you barefaced liars?
Pointed arrows and burning coals will be your reward.
I’m doomed to live in Meshech,
cursed with a home in Kedar,
My whole life lived camping among quarreling neighbors.
I’m all for peace,
but the minute I tell them so,
they go to war!”
Psalms 120:1-7 MSG
Eugene Peterson says this Psalm describes a person submerged in a wilderness culture of lies and ill-will towards others. Such dissatisfaction with the world, puts one on a journey towards God, longing for peace and truth. There is a reason why this Psalm starts the journey toward Jerusalem in the 15 Psalms of Ascent toward feast days of worship because it starts where we find ourselves.
We can all relate to today in a culture which is determined to eliminate all trace of God, when God is the very thing this world needs to be on the journey of peace and truth. There are many layers of chaos in this painting, marking confusion and chaos, where no one has an answer or a path forward. Only as we make the first decision to go toward God, does the pathway out become more clear, step my step, as his mercy [in green] pours down over us. There is always a crossroad decision, to go our own path or go toward God. As we go toward God, the chaos gets less, and the peace of God [blue] pours over us. As the painting developed, an anchor emerged. Early on, there was always a “Y” in the road of decision, even though the way is not clearly marked, one can go back toward the known or onward toward God and the unknown.
Psalm 121
Providence
“I look up to the mountains;
does my strength come from mountains?
No, my strength comes from God,
who made heaven, and earth, and mountains.
He won’t let you stumble,
your Guardian God won’t fall asleep.
Not on your life!
Israel’s Guardian will never doze or sleep.
God’s your Guardian,
right at your side to protect you—
Shielding you from sunstroke,
sheltering you from moonstroke.
God guards you from every evil,
he guards your very life.
He guards you when you leave and when you return,
he guards you now, he guards you always.”
Psalms 121:1-8 MSG
There are many dangers and accidents that can harm us as travelers. At the time that this was written, there were many shrines of pagan worship on the hilltops. Many relied on appeasing the gods by sacrifice or buying trinkets in order to procure favor from them and protection from calamity. Worship of nature and the beautiful hills, stars and flowers was also practiced This Psalm is a reminder of the only one, the one who made nature, that can keep us from harm along the journey. This does not mean that tragedies will never strike us, but they will never separate us from God’s help to help us through.[edited from Eugene Peterson]
Psalm 122
Worship
“When they said, “Let’s go to the house of God,”
my heart leaped for joy.
And now we’re here, O Jerusalem,
inside Jerusalem’s walls!
Jerusalem, well-built city,
built as a place for worship!
The city to which the tribes ascend,
all God’s tribes go up to worship,
To give thanks to the name of God—
this is what it means to be Israel.
Thrones for righteous judgment
are set there, famous David-thrones.
Pray for Jerusalem’s peace!
Prosperity to all you Jerusalem-lovers!
Friendly insiders, get along!
Hostile outsiders, keep your distance!
For the sake of my family and friends,
I say it again: live in peace!
For the sake of the house of our God, God,
I’ll do my very best for you.”
Psalms 122:1-9 MSG
Worship is the one thing that we will do forever in eternity. God commands it of us, even though many times we don’t feel like it, He knows that action can change feelings. Eugene Peterson says that worship gives us three things: a workable structure for life; worship nurtures our need to be in relationship with God; worship centers our attention on the decisions of God.
St. Augustine said, “A Christian should be an alleluia from head to foot.” “That is the reality. That is the truth of our lives. God made us, redeems us, provides for us.”- Peterson.
The praise and worship of God begins from where we are, a dark place or a joyous place. It becomes a place of peace and of blessings,[the blues] raining down on us. We get glimpses of God’s glory [the gold] as we ascend into God’s presence, out of our surroundings, seeing things from God’s perspective. Starting worship by giving thanks, allows us to enter the throne room.
Psalm 123
Service
“I look to you, heaven-dwelling God,
look up to you for help.
Like servants, alert to their master’s commands,
like a maiden attending her lady,
We’re watching and waiting, holding our breath,
awaiting your word of mercy.
Mercy, God, mercy!
We’ve been kicked around long enough,
Kicked in the teeth by complacent rich men,
kicked when we’re down by arrogant brutes.”
Psalms 123:1-4 MSG
“In Psalm 123, we observe that aspects of the life of discipleship takes place under the form of servanthood. Service begins with an upward look to God. God is over us. He is above us. The person of faith looks up to God, not at him or down on him. The servant assumes a certain posture, If we fail to take that posture, attentive responsiveness to the master’s commands will be hard.”-Eugene Peterson
Looking up to the the mysterious sky, reminds us of the mystery and awe of God. Above the grand mountains is the glory of a spectacular sky and the glimpse of amazing colors. We wait, we watch, we don’t know what will come next with God! It reminds us of our place, where we are in the dark without Him. We are kicked around by people who don’t care about us. Why wouldn’t we want to serve a benevolent, awe inspiring God who cares about us and wants the best for us?
Psalm 124
Help
“If God hadn’t been for us
—all together now, Israel, sing out!—
If God hadn’t been for us
when everyone went against us,
We would have been swallowed alive
by their violent anger,
Swept away by the flood of rage,
drowned in the torrent;
We would have lost our lives
in the wild, raging water.
Oh, blessed be God!
He didn’t go off and leave us.
He didn’t abandon us defenseless,
helpless as a rabbit in a pack of snarling dogs.
We’ve flown free from their fangs,
free of their traps, free as a bird.
Their grip is broken;
we’re free as a bird in flight.
God’s strong name is our help,
the same God who made heaven and earth.”
Psalms 124:1-8 MSG
“The proper work for the Christian is witness, not apology. It does not argue God’s help, it does not explain God’s help; it is a testimony of God’s help in the form of a song. The song is so vigorous, so bursting with reality, that it changes the question from, “Why did this happen to me?” to “How does it happen that there are people who sing with such confidence ‘God’s strong name is our help’?”-Eugene Peterson
Our witness to a life of discipleship is our story and what happens to us and how God helps us. It encourages the next generation to persevere under God’s mighty salvation.
Psalm 125
Security
“Those who trust in God
are like Zion Mountain:
Nothing can move it, a rock-solid mountain
you can always depend on.
Mountains encircle Jerusalem,
and God encircles his people—
always has and always will.
The fist of the wicked
will never violate
What is due the righteous,
provoking wrongful violence.
Be good to your good people, God,
to those whose hearts are right!
God will round up the backsliders,
corral them with the incorrigibles.
Peace over Israel!”
Psalms 125:1-5 MSG
“
The emphasis of Psalm 125 is not on the precariousness of the Christian life but on its solidity. Living as a Christian is not walking a tightrope without a safety net high above a breathless crowd, …it is sitting secure in a fortress. Jerusalem was set in a saucer of hills. It was the safest of cities because of the protective fortress these hills provided. Just so is the person of faith surrounded by the Lord. Better than a city wall, better than a military fortification is the presence of the God of peace.”
God’s peace and mercy,[greens and blues,] surround us just as He says in His Word how he surrounds Jerusalem. He has promised to encircle us, whatever that means and whatever that looks like, we can be assured that it is so.Psalm 126
Joy
“It seemed like a dream, too good to be true,
when God returned Zion’s exiles.
We laughed, we sang,
we couldn’t believe our good fortune.
We were the talk of the nations—
“God was wonderful to them!”
God was wonderful to us;
we are one happy people.
And now, God, do it again—
bring rains to our drought-stricken lives
So those who planted their crops in despair
will shout hurrahs at the harvest,
So those who went off with heavy hearts
will come home laughing, with armloads of blessing.”
Psalms 126:1-6 MSG
“There is a false stereotype of a Christian as joyless. “This Psalm is the authentic Christian note, a sign of those who are on the way of salvation. Joy is characteristic of Christian pilgrimage. Joy is not a requirement of Christian discipleship, it is a consequence. It is not what we have to acquire in order to experience life in Christ, it is what comes to us when we are walking in the way of faith and obedience. None of us have it in ourselves to be joyous. Joy is a product of abundance. It is a life working together harmoniously. We cannot make ourselves joyful. But there is something we can do. We can decide to live in response to the abundance of God and not under the dictatorship of our own poor needs. We can decide to center ourselves in the God who generously gives and not in our own egos which greedily grab. This joy is not dependent on our good luck in escaping hardship and pursuing pleasure. It is not dependent on our good health and avoidance of pain. Christian joy is actual in the midst of pain suffering, loneliness and misfortune.”-Eugene Peterson
The colors that came to me are colors of both pain and joy with exuberance.
Psalm 127
Work
“If God doesn’t build the house,
the builders only build shacks.
If God doesn’t guard the city,
the night watchman might as well nap.
It’s useless to rise early and go to bed late,
and work your worried fingers to the bone.
Don’t you know he enjoys giving rest to those he loves?
Don’t you see that children are God’s best gift?
the fruit of the womb his generous legacy?
Like a warrior’s fistful of arrows
are the children of a vigorous youth.
Oh, how blessed are you parents,
with your quivers full of children!
Your enemies don’t stand a chance against you;
you’ll sweep them right off your doorstep.”
Psalms 127:1-5 MSG
“This Psalm shows both the right way and the wrong way to work. It posts a warning and provides and example to guide Christians in work that is done to the glory of God. The main difference between Christians and others is that we take God seriously and they do not. We pay attention to what God is and what God does and that he is the central reality of all existence. We also realize that he works and his work is defined and described in Scripture.”-Eugene Peterson
Even though we were created to work, either the work of caring for creation or the work of worship, the best works are the works that God does. Children are one of those works that God gifts to us and grows as only God can. They are represented as the arrows and the grapes and should be seen as blessings and gifts. People are at the center of God’s work and relationships matter to God.
Psalm 128
Happiness
“All you who fear God, how blessed you are!
how happily you walk on his smooth straight road!
You worked hard and deserve all you’ve got coming.
Enjoy the blessing! Revel in the goodness!
Your wife will bear children as a vine bears grapes,
your household lush as a vineyard,
The children around your table
]as fresh and promising as young olive shoots.
Stand in awe of God’s Yes.
Oh, how he blesses the one who fears God!
Enjoy the good life in Jerusalem
every day of your life.
And enjoy your grandchildren.
Peace to Israel!”
Psalms 128:1-6 MSG
“There is a prevalent assumption in the world that it is extremely difficult to be a Christian. But that is as far from the truth as the east is from the west. The easiest thing in the world is to be a Christian. What is hard is to be a sinner. Being a Christian is what we were created for. The life of faith has the support of an entire creation and the resources of a magnificent redemption. The structure of this world was created by God so we can live in it easily and happily as his children. The history we walk in has been repeatedly entered by God, most notably in Jesus Christ, first to show us and then to help us live full of faith and exuberant with purpose. In the course of Christian discipleship we discover that without Christ we are doing it the hard way and that with Christ we are doing it the easy way. It is not Christians who have it hard, but non-Christians.” Eugene Petersen
In Hebrew culture, the symbol of a full and abundant life was a wife with many children around the table as a fruitful vine and olive shoots. The meaning is still clear, an abundant life is a meeting of souls who share and increase in abundance. We don’t have an abundance problem, we have a greed problem that doesn’t share the abundance. When there is plenty to go around, it is a life of blessing. That is the way God designed the world and intended it to function. But the world does not follow God and is ruled by human pride and arrogance. The road followed by Christians is a life of discipleship and a way of blessing though the world does not see it. The road in the painting is veiled. Once you are on the road, the way becomes clear.
Psalm 129
Perseverance
“They’ve kicked me around ever since I was young”
—this is how Israel tells it—
“They’ve kicked me around ever since I was young,
but they never could keep me down.
Their plowmen plowed long furrows
up and down my back;
But God wouldn’t put up with it,
he sticks with us.
Then God ripped the harnesses
of the evil plowmen to shreds.”
Oh, let all those who hate Zion
grovel in humiliation;
Let them be like grass in shallow ground
that withers before the harvest,
Before the farmhands can gather it in,
the harvesters get in the crop,
Before the neighbors have a chance to call out,
“Congratulations on your wonderful crop!
We bless you in God’s name!””
Psalms 129:1-8 MSG
“
One of the marks of Christian discipleship is perseverance, The people of God are tough. Scripture is filled with people who persevered in their faith in God to deliver them against all odds. But there are times in a long obedience of Christian discipleship when we get tired and fatigue draws our tempers short. But perseverance does not mean perfection. It means that we keep going when we find that we are not yet mature and there is a long journey still before us.”-Eugene Peterson
The image that came to me when thinking about perseverance was the constant unrelenting rolling in of the tide. It never stops. It might get smaller to barely a ripple, or larger enough to create huge waves, but the tide continues to roll in one after another due to our gravitational pull. I thought of that constant action when I think of never giving up and always showing up even when I don’t feel like it. Just like the waves, God is always there for us, always showing up, always someone to depend on.
Psalm 130
Hope
“Help, God—the bottom has fallen out of my life!
Master, hear my cry for help!
Listen hard! Open your ears!
Listen to my cries for mercy.
If you, God, kept records on wrongdoings, who would stand a chance?
As it turns out, forgiveness is your habit,
and that’s why you’re worshiped.
I pray to God—my life a prayer—
and wait for what he’ll say and do.
My life’s on the line before God, my Lord,
waiting and watching till morning,
waiting and watching till morning.
O Israel, wait and watch for God—
with God’s arrival comes love,
with God’s arrival comes generous redemption.
No doubt about it—he’ll redeem Israel,
buy back Israel from captivity to sin.”
Psalms 130:1-8 MSG
“To be human is to be in trouble. Man and woman alone in the creation, suffer…..A Christian is a person who decides to face and live through suffering with God. By setting the anguish out in the open and voicing it as a prayer, the psalm gives dignity to our suffering. There is no denial but responding to suffering as a reality.” Eugene Peterson
But God is a reality as well and He can do anything. Our hope is the expectation that God will do something. We can’t make the sun rise, but He does every day. Our job is to wait and hope, as a watchman waits for the morning.
Psalm 131
Humility
“God, I’m not trying to rule the roost,
I don’t want to be king of the mountain.
I haven’t meddled where I have no business
or fantasized grandiose plans.
I’ve kept my feet on the ground,
I’ve cultivated a quiet heart.
Like a baby content in its mother’s arms,
my soul is a baby content.
Wait, Israel, for God. Wait with hope.
Hope now; hope always!”
Psalms 131:1-3 MSG
“Psalm 131 nurtures a quality of calm confidence and quiet strength that knows the difference between unruly arrogance and faithful aspiration; knows how to discriminate between infantile dependency and childlike trust; and chooses to aspire and to trust not in ourselves but in God.”-Eugene Peterson
In the forest of our lives, we can think we know the way based on our expertise, or we can think too little of ourselves and not trust our God-given strengths and gifts. In the end, the way through the forest is to rely not on ourselves but on God first and the reflection of what He has shown us. It is again a question of posture and of humbling ourselves before our Maker. Without humility, we cannot know Him.
Psalm 132
Obedience
“O God, remember David,
remember all his troubles!
And remember how he promised God,
made a vow to the Strong God of Jacob,
“I’m not going home, and I’m not going to bed,
I’m not going to sleep,
not even take time to rest,
Until I find a home for God,
a house for the Strong God of Jacob.”
Remember how we got the news in Ephrathah,
learned all about it at Jaar Meadows?
We shouted, “Let’s go to the shrine dedication!
Let’s worship at God’s own footstool!”
Up, God, enjoy your new place of quiet repose,
you and your mighty covenant ark;
Get your priests all dressed up in justice;
prompt your worshipers to sing this prayer:
“Honor your servant David;
don’t disdain your anointed one.”
God gave David his word,
he won’t back out on this promise:
“One of your sons
I will set on your throne;
If your sons stay true to my Covenant
and learn to live the way I teach them,
Their sons will continue the line—
always a son to sit on your throne.
Yes—I, God, chose Zion,
the place I wanted for my shrine;
This will always be my home;
this is what I want, and I’m here for good.
I’ll shower blessings on the pilgrims who come here,
and give supper to those who arrive hungry;
I’ll dress my priests in salvation clothes;
the holy people will sing their hearts out!
Oh, I’ll make the place radiant for David!
I’ll fill it with light for my anointed!
I’ll dress his enemies in dirty rags,
but I’ll make his crown sparkle with splendor.””
Psalms 132:1-18 MSG
“The first half of Psalm 132, is the part that roots obedience in fact and …history. The history of the ark was, for the Hebrews,…an account of the presence of God among the people and the danger of trying to use God. It cultivates a hope that gives wings to obedience, a hope that is consistent with the reality of what God has done in the past but is not confined to it. We need roots in the past to give obedience ballast a breadth; we need a vision of the future to give obedience direction and goal. And they must be connected. There must be an organic unity between them.”-Eugene Peterson
I likened this obedience to the two voices of a father and a mother, roots or history of truths learned from the past. Parents who pour into their child, lessons of obedience, their own lessons, merge into lessons for their child. There are grey areas, red areas of pain, yet dark areas of absolute truths that are there for our protection and growth. God says to “Honor thy Father and thy Mother, so you will live well and have a long life.” These are our first lessons of obedience in a life of discipleship. If we struggle with these lessons for whatever reason, we will struggle with this concept with God.
Psalm 133
Community
“How wonderful, how beautiful,
when brothers and sisters get along!
It’s like costly anointing oil
flowing down head and beard,
Flowing down Aaron’s beard,
flowing down the collar of his priestly robes.
It’s like the dew on Mount Hermon
flowing down the slopes of Zion.
Yes, that’s where God commands the blessing,
ordains eternal life.”
Psalms 133:1-3 MSG
“The moment we confess Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior,…we become members of the Christian Church and are among brothers and sisters in faith, a family of faith. This does not mean we are always one big happy family, but God puts us in this community called a church to learn how to develop the maturity to share and exchange God’s grace with all kinds of people. But as living in community is necessary and desirable, it is also enormously difficult.” -Eugene Petersen
This Psalm speaks to the beauty of community. Though we come from different directions and walks of life, when we enter into the circle of community we transform individually and as a group in positive energy even though there is pain in the process. The mingling of ideas into better ones come out of communion. The metallic is the costly anointing oil flowing down that symbolizes God’s blessing as He ordains and advocates for our community. Orange symbolizes the listening that is required for community and the mercy [green] that comes out of the listening.
Psalm 134
Blessing
“Come, bless God,
all you servants of God!
You priests of God, posted to the nightwatch
in God’s shrine,
Lift your praising hands to the Holy Place,
and bless God.
In turn, may God of Zion bless you—
God who made heaven and earth!”
Psalms 134:1-3 MSG
“In Psalm 134, the final Song of Ascents, shows that in discipleship, what began in the first Psalm as an act of repentance, concludes in a life of praise. God gets down on his knees among us, gets on our level and shares himself with us. He does not reside far off and sends us diplomatic messages, he kneels among us. This posture is characteristic of God. He meets us where we are; God stays—he sticks with us through hard times and good, sharing his life with us in grace and peace. And because God blesses us, we bless God. Now that you have made the trip: bless God. You are here because God blessed you. Now you bless God.”-Eugene Peterson
We are commanded to bless and praise the Lord, That is why we were created, to glorify God and to enjoy him forever. Even when we don’t feel like it. Sometimes we need to use our body to act first, by lifting our hands to praise the Lord, and our heart will get the message and follow and be lifted up in praise. God knows what is good for us and what will turn us from a life of self consumption. Our very lives should be enough to make us want to be thankful and to bless God, but even more is gratitude for a God who wants to be with us. These colors bring me joy with glimpses of the gold of God’s glory.