Daily Psalms - Classical Psalms Every Day

Psalm 72: The King We Keep Waiting For
David, in what is marked as his last recorded prayer, asks God to give his son Solomon the one thing a king cannot manufacture: righteous judgment toward the poor. It is a strange wish list from a dying father — not wealth, not military success, not glory — but that his son might come down "like rain upon the mown grass," refreshing what the world has cut short. The psalm then swells beyond Solomon to a reign that stretches from sea to sea, from the river to the ends of the earth, a kingdom where the needy cry out and are actually heard. And we know, of course, that Solomon did not quite fill the robe. None of David's sons did. The prayer outgrew its first addressee and kept traveling — across centuries, across empires — waiting for a King who could actually catch it. And then one day, in a carpenter's town, it did. "The prayers of David the son of Jesse are ended," the psalm says. Ended, yes — and also, finally, answered.
00:00 Give the King Thy Judgments
01:00 From Sea to Sea, to the Ends of the Earth
02:00 His Name Shall Endure Forever

Psalm 71: The Long Faithfulness
There is a particular kind of prayer that only an old person can pray, and this is one of them. The psalmist looks back across an entire life — from the womb, where God held him up; through youth, where God was already his trust; to old age, where he now stands, grey-headed, watching his strength fail. And his chief petition is not rescue but continuity: "Cast me not off in the time of old age; forsake me not when my strength faileth." He has spent his whole life telling people about God; now he asks to live long enough to tell one more generation. Notice the strange, touching line — "I am as a wonder unto many." He knows he looks odd: an aging man who keeps hoping, who has made God his habit and his home for seventy or eighty years. The world does not quite know what to do with a person whose trust has outlasted their teeth. But such a person is, among all the creatures God has made, perhaps the most convincing argument for God that exists.
00:00 In Thee, O Lord, Do I Trust
01:00 A Wonder Unto Many
02:00 Forsake Me Not When Grey-Headed
03:00 My Tongue Shall Talk of Thy Righteousness

Psalm 70: Make Haste
There is a kind of prayer that does not have the strength for long sentences, and this tiny psalm knows it. "Make haste, O God, to deliver me; make haste to help me, O Lord." Two words repeat all through it — make haste — the breathless petition of someone who has run out of time and diplomacy. David does not construct a theological argument; he does not compose elegant parallelisms; he simply knocks on heaven's door and asks God to open it now. And notice what he does not ask for: he does not ask to be strong, or wise, or admired. He calls himself, plainly, "poor and needy," and treats that confession as sufficient credentials. This psalm is short enough to pray with your last breath, and that may be exactly why it was written. When the soul is too tired for eloquence, the Psalter hands you this little prayer and says: here — take this. It is enough.
00:00 Make Haste, O God
00:15 Let Them Be Turned Backward
00:30 Aha, Aha
00:45 Let All Those That Seek Thee Rejoice
01:00 I Am Poor and Needy
01:15 O Lord, Make No Tarrying

Psalm 69: When the Waters Come In
"Save me, O God; for the waters are come in unto my soul." Some prayers do not bother with preamble. David is drowning, and he knows it — sunk in deep mire, throat dried from crying, eyes failing while he waits. He is not even sure he is innocent; he confesses his foolishness in the same breath as his lament. But he refuses to pretend, and that is the gift of this psalm. It gives voice to the prayer of the person who feels forsaken not only by God but by the ordinary comforts of human company: "I looked for some to take pity, but there was none; and for comforters, but I found none." And yet, astonishingly, somewhere in the rising water the psalm begins to sing. "I will praise the name of God with a song." Not after the rescue — during the drowning. That is faith stripped of everything but its sinews. The New Testament writers would later see the face of Christ in these verses, and they were right to; but before it became prophecy, it was simply the honest cry of a man going under who refused to stop talking to God on the way down.
00:00 The Waters Are Come In
00:30 Mine Eyes Fail While I Wait
01:00 The Zeal of Thine House
01:30 In the Multitude of Thy Mercy
02:00 Let Not the Pit Shut Her Mouth
02:30 They Gave Me Gall and Vinegar
03:00 Let Their Table Become a Snare
03:30 I Will Praise Him With a Song
04:00 The Lord Heareth the Poor

Psalm 68: The God Who Marches
Reading this psalm is a little like standing in a parade as the procession passes — you cannot quite catch every banner, but you can feel the ground shake. David imagines God on the move, and the imagery tumbles over itself: enemies scattered like smoke, wax melting before fire, a father to the fatherless, a judge of widows, a God who setteth the solitary in families. That last line alone could carry a whole sermon. The God of the thunderstorms is also the God of the adoption paper. The One who rides upon the heavens of heavens is the same One who makes a home for the lonely. And in the middle of it all comes a verse the Apostle Paul could not get out of his head: "Thou hast ascended on high, thou hast led captivity captive." The great procession, it turns out, is not merely God parading his strength — it is God hauling away everything that has ever held us, and scattering gifts as he goes.
00:00 Let God Arise
00:30 A Father of the Fatherless
01:00 The Earth Shook at His Presence
01:30 As Wings of a Dove Covered With Silver
02:00 The Chariots of God
02:30 Thou Hast Ascended on High
03:00 The Issues From Death
03:30 The Singers Went Before
04:00 Kings Shall Bring Presents
04:30 His Strength Is in the Clouds