Comfort From The Psalms November 9, 2015 Issue

A new song

Aleta Spence

Almost 20 years ago, while I was taking a course at a university on the book of Psalms, each student was required to write a final paper on one of the psalms. I chose Psalm 40, a blending of praise and lament. I especially loved the part that expresses praise and thanksgiving to God, because it includes the act of singing a “new song.” For me this meant sharing a healing experience with others. The Psalmist’s lament and petitioning prayer parts also were appealing, since I had been learning that crying out to God for help was based on the psalm singer remembering how God had saved him or her in the past.

While I was writing the paper, I was struggling with a difficulty relating to my heart. By the time the paper was finished, though, I was able to include an account of my healing—a healing obtained from the deep insights I’d gained from this psalm. Here’s how that complete healing came about.

The “new song” was all about singing my oneness with God.