STIRRED BY A NOBLE THEME
The book of Psalms in the life of the church
Edited by Andrew G Shead
IVP – Apollos. 291 pages. £14.99
ISBN 978 1 783 590 117
Apollos, the academic imprint of IVP, has done us a favour here in publishing the content of the Moore College 2012 School of Theology on the Psalms.
A highly stimulating , serious publication. You can’t speed read this book! To finish the 12 chapters having properly digested their truths, creates the exciting possibility of reentering the psalms with new eyes and ears.
The various authors come from a similar stable, but that doesn’t mean a thin sameness in perspective. The footnotes alone will tell you how wide are the reading circles of the individual contributors. As a result the reader is always aware that this is reflective research, based upon existing scholarship. But that experience , though not for the faint hearted , is ultimately rewarding. For there is a freshness and breadth about the material, an imaginative wrestling with some of the dilemmas raised, for example, by the imprecatory psalms.
Chapters on the ‘Patristic Preaching of the Psalms’ and ‘The Politics of Praise’ mix it with how to use Psalms liturgically and simultaneously enjoy Powerpoint slide images!
Busy pastors, who know they need to freshen up their sermons on Psalms, will love it. It’s a book which will help them get up to speed with some of the latest theological reflections on the hymn book of the Christian. Theological students will appreciate it, especially those with a desire to go up a level in a specialist area. And anyone with an interest in language, literature and theology will benefit from the frequent overlapping of such disciplines in the book.
The value of this sort of collection of essays lies in the leisure to read them individually and over time, rather than all at one sitting. Do that and you will have many enjoyable hours ahead of you.
