Pray the Psalms: Psalm 22
Guideposts Executive Editor Rick Hamlin shares how to pray Psalm 22.
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[MUSIC PLAYING] Psalm 22 is maybe the saddest Psalm of all. “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”– the words that Jesus said Himself on the cross when He felt forsaken. Don’t we often feel like that?
My bones are melted like wax. My tongue is dried up. Everything is wrong. I have a friend who’s a counselor, and he spends all his days with people who feel forsaken. He himself feels forsaken. And I asked him, why do you do it?
And he says there’s healing in it for him. It’s his calling. He is with those who feel forgotten by God, even as he feels forgotten by God. And somehow they find their way to healing.
When I sing this on Maundy Thursday– we always say it on Thursday before Easter– I always feel, oh gosh. Let Easter come. Let the promises of the Resurrection come.
But you know, I have to acknowledge there are times I feel forsaken. So I pray it. “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Psalm 22.