Regular readers here know I’m a big advocate of singing the Psalms. On the (unfortunately rare) occasions that believers seriously engage in that project, a question comes up pretty quickly: “What do I do with these psalms?”
It ain’t all “As the deer panteth for the water” in the Psalter. There are also prayers that God would break the arm of the wicked (Psalm 10) or their teeth (Psalm 58), pursue and persecute them (Psalm 35), drive them away and kill them (Psalm 68) and so on. What’s a Christian to do with these prayers?
Sing them, that’s what. Three times the New Testament says we should sing psalms (Ephesians 5:19, Colossians 3:16, and James 5:13). The phrase “psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs” is possibly open-ended enough to include more than just the 150 biblical psalms, but it’s certainly not talking about singing less than what God gave us.
As to how we pray them appropriately, it’s important to read them in context. It’s easy for us to read these psalms in terms of middle-class North America, which is pretty tame by comparison to the times and places these psalms were actually written. You may wonder “When would I ever pray that?” because you’ve never faced the kind of adversity that the psalmist was facing. David has Saul trying to kill him, and murdering every man, woman, and child in the city of priests along the way. It’s not so hard to see how these prayers are appropriate in actual life-and-death struggle with genuinely murderous enemies who are killing innocent people.
In less dire situations, the prayers should reflect the reality at hand. You don’t ask God to break the teeth of your barista because she messed up your latte order. Not even if she did it on purpose. “Let the rich glory in his humiliation, for as a flower of the field he passes away.” If that’s what adversity looks like for you, you’d better milk it for all the spiritual benefit you can.
You don’t pray “let his wife be a widow; let his children be vagabonds and beggars” because someone is running a little mean-girl scheme to get your funding reduced. Asking God to cause their designs to come to nothing and their trap to return on their own head might be more appropriate.
That said, there’s one more thing to remember: “With what judgment you judge, you will be judged, and with what measure you measure, it will be measured back to you. That cashes out in two ways: first, the way you forgive other people in this life is how God’s gonna treat you in this life, so bear that in mind when you make your requests. When you ask God to permanently stop someone who’s killing innocent people, you’re effectively also asking Him to do the same to you if you’re ever killing innocent people. You can and should be fine with that, but if you’re not, don’t pray that prayer.
Second, remember that “in wrath remember mercy” is also a biblical prayer, and something we should take to heart. Jesus asked His Father to pardon His murderers. Stephen, following Jesus’ example, prayed a similar prayer, and God honored that prayer by taking the young man who ran the coat check at the murder and turning him into the most famous missionary and church planter in Christian history. Modern martyrs — the Stams, those killed by the Ayore and the Waorani, the persecuted Russian and Chinese saints who died in the gulags and camps — rightly continue the tradition.
Do those examples mean that imprecations should be a thing of the past in the New Testament? It’s a good question, but the answer is no. Imprecatory psalms are invoked in the New Testament. Jesus invokes an imprecatory psalm in John 15:5. The early church follows suit in Acts 4:25, as does Paul in Romans 11:9. Peter applies the threat of Psalm 110 immediately and directly to his audience, in order to provoke repentance in Acts 2:34. There are other examples, but those will suffice to demonstrate that at minimum, Christians should still be reading these psalms and putting them to use in prayer and preaching. Clearly, if you’re serious about following the examples set by Jesus and His early followers, you can’t just exclude the rougher psalms out of hand; they didn’t.
One could use these examples and others to construct a more nuanced argument about the way we use these psalms now. In making that argument, you’ll also have to account for the existence of fresh New Testament imprecations. 2 Timothy 4:14, 1 Corinthians 16:22, Galatians 1:8-9, and Matthew 23 come to mind offhand, and to cap the stack, Revelation 6:10, by saints who can’t possibly be sinning because they’re already dead. There’s a great conversation to be had about how to do this well, but that is a post for another day.
For today, the reason you shouldn’t be averse to imprecatory prayer is very simple: the Bible plainly isn’t. Evangelical culture is, and that aversion is driven by sentiment, not Scripture.
Full Contact Christianity 
One of my favorite psalms is 88. Someone, Brueggemann???, called it the psalm of no hope. And of course, it is that. And it calls forth an authenticity. Sometimes, life really sucks.
Ever buried a child? You can’t hardly get harder than that. Been convicted of something you didn’t do? Dealt with serious illness all your life?
Man, I’ve had a few Tuesday afternoons that took me there.
But of course, our faith is not a faith of no hope.
And as I have studied on it, I’ve come to the conclusion that Psalm 88 is meant to be read twice in the Christian age. The first reading hold’s the psalmist’s hand as we descend into the grave. And it’s okay to really feel all the despair of it. God’s word does not hold back. This song was good enough to make it in the Bible! So, we will sing it.
But mid way through that song, the dying psalmist asks God some very shrill questions that demand an answer. And that poor soul died and went to the grave waiting for the answer to those questions that we have in Jesus.
Do the shades rise to praise You?
Will You work wonders for the dead?
and so forth…
Ahhh…. Soak it in.
Jesus says, YES. Yes, I work wonders for the dead and the shades rise to praise me, faithfulness declared in Abaddon.
My personal meditations have found new juice in God’s word since putting that together for both me and those who pray the psalm with me. And I used to work in prisons and psych wards with people into hard living.
But I am also a major enthusiast of Mark’s Gospel, btw. And, as I am sure you are aware, there is that troublesome “ending.”
It’s all the more troublesome for those who read Greek.
Whazzzup wit dat?
Yeah.
Way back in school, I made a decision to treat this … what I will call… THE HARD WAY. I think Mark intended to end at 16:8 (let the reader understand), and to hold that Mark writes first among the four. His is the first in this genre we call gospel which is not really a biography – especially not Mark’s which has no genealogy and “ends” so strangely.
I’ve developed my own theory. It’s cobbled together from other theories, so almost none of it is really NEW, yet this frankenstinian theory of mine is sorta new on the whole. And I think Mark’s account is meant to be read twice, like Psalm 88. The same words bring a new message, a greater clarity when the blind man is healed twice and the reader realizes she is the blind man in this scenario.
Well, whether you sense I am on to something worthwhile or not, I have the feeling you get what I am saying at this point, and so without pursuing Mark any further in a post on psalms, let me say this:
IF I am right to see the Bible asking to be read twice in at least two passages where this twice reading opens us up to deeper insight a second time, then probably there is more. Could this be the way the whole Bible should be read?
I don’t know. I am not prepared to publish a thesis on it. But I’ve seen enough it has me excited.
Will shades rise to praise You?
That is so shrill the first time and demands that God deal with the fact the answer is NO. All the more powerful then to read it in light of Jesus and see that God did in fact deal with the fact the answer was NO, and he changed it to YES.
I have a deal worked out with God. He may not honor it, since he is now bound by it, but I’m working on that. Anyway, I figure that psalmist is still asleep in that grave to this day wherever that is. That psalmist died expecting God would leave the answer a NO.
I pray that at the great resurrection of the saints, I be raised before that psalmist, brought to that grave so I can watch the expression on her face when she finds out God answered that prayer.
With a YES.
I want to see that.
Yes. Huge swaths of the Bible — particularly the Law and the Prophets — are meant to be read twice. That’s why Luke 24:27 just summarizes rather than giving us all Jesus actually said: it’s an invitation to go back and re-read.