The following three stories pair well with the Narrative Lectionary passage for the coming week. They are followed by my sermontelling footnotes which explore the stories’ theological connection to the passage as well as insights into craft and performance. My advice is to read the story first before digging into the footnotes. These notes are best experienced in a browser or in the substack app. Subscribe to receive this newsletter in your inbox every Monday morning.
BIBLE STORY: Before There Were Psalms
There were no psalms in Israel in those days.1
People had prayers to be sure. They gathered at hilltop shrines and offered sacrifices. And someone likely chanted something. A priest would invoke the deity to partake of the offering rising in the smoke. He would bless the people. And they would all eat. Roving bands of prophets would chant prayers as they went: some fixed, some extemporaneous. See, the priests and prophets were professionals with esoteric prayer books that belonged only to their guilds. But the uninitiated… The people who ate the meat of the sacrifice… The people who watched the prophets pass… they had no psalms.
People had songs to be sure. Each of the twelve tribes had their own songs. They had love songs about shepherds and shepherdesses meeting in the field. They had war songs about chariots being thrown and Chieftains uniting the people in victory. They had blessings from their ancestors that extolled the various virtues of the tribe. These songs often described the wondrous acts of YHWH on behalf of his people in times long past. But they had no psalms.
A psalm is different than a song or a prayer. A psalm is meant for everybody and anybody. A psalm is also eternally current; it speaks to God in the here and now. A psalm gives words to people who have no words. Words people can speak confidently to the LORD that expresses the deep feelings of their heart: Words of lament for times when people needed to beat their breasts and wail at their God. Words of petition for times when people needed to ask their God for provision or deliverance. Words of thanksgiving for when they needed to express their deepest gratitude for God’s amazing act on their behalf.
A psalm is found in a psalter. A prayer book that belongs to everybody, which an organized temple with a dedicated scribal school would be in charge of compiling and teaching. But nothing like that existed in those days. There weren’t even inspired Kings composing psalms in their palaces as they plucked their harps. There were no palaces. There were no kings. And there were definitely no psalms.2
Hannah really could have used some psalms. Year after year, when she went to Shiloh with her husband to offer their annual sacrifice, and she went to pray yet again that God would grant her children, she sure could have used words3 like:
Answer me when I call to you, my righteous God. Give me relief from my distress; have mercy on me and hear my prayer.
Then when her husband’s other wife would tease her and provoke her, she could have used words4 like:
LORD, see how my enemies persecute me! Have mercy and lift me up from the gates of death, that I may declare your praises in the gates of Daughter Zion, and there rejoice in your salvation.
And when, year after year, she would conceive no children, she sure could have used words5 like:
How long, LORD? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and day after day have sorrow in my heart? How long will my enemy triumph over me?
But Hannah could say none of these things.
Think of it. Hannah was the wife of a shepherd. Her whole life felt like a stroll through the darkest valley. And she had been coming to the house of the LORD forever to eat at a banquet prepared in the midst of her enemies. But she had no words to express any of that. Because she had no psalms.6
One year Hannah went down to Shiloh, with her husband Elkanah and his other wife Peninnah. Like she had so many times before, she stood up after the meal and went to the house of the LORD to pray. She was at the end of her rope. Once more she had gone a year without her miracle. Once more she was taunted by her rival. And once more she had to make petition to a God who din’t seem to hear her. And this time, as she delivered the vow she had made year after year: that she would dedicate her first born to the priesthood if God would just open up her womb, something in her heart changed.
When she completed her formal vow, she kept praying.
What did she pray? Your guess is as good as mine.
She had no psalms. She had no formal words. No thees and thous. No leadeth me beside still waters, No lift mine eyes to the hills, No How majestic is thy name in all the earth— Nothing a priest, scribe, or prophet would have composed in perfect parallelism —Just her own heartfelt whispers.
She poured out her soul before God: her longing, her pain, her trust. All the things that she had longed to say for so long but couldn’t because she’d been given no words to do it. They just spilled out of her: ugly, messy, and barely audible.
The priest on duty didn’t know what to make of it. He had never seen anyone pray like this. He assumed Hannah was drunk.
But he blessed her anyway with his formulaic blessing: “Go in peace, and may the God of Israel grant you what you have asked him.” And that seemed to be enough for Hannah.
She had heard that blessing many times before. She did not have any hope that this time would turn out any different. She’d certainly not been given some divine promise. But she felt different. She felt a sense of relief having unburdened the contents of her heart. Somehow she felt nearer to God. Because for the first time in years she felt truly heard.
The amazing thing though is that the LORD remembered Hannah. How could he not after such a prayer? She conceived and gave birth to a son named ‘Samuel.’ And she kept her vow. When the boy was weaned, she brought him back with her to Shiloh to offer her to the LORD as a priest.
This time she came prepared. As she offered her first born to the high priest, she did so with an eloquent prayer. One she had been working on line by line in her head and heart since the day she found out she was pregnant. It went like this:
My heart rejoices in the LORD; in the LORD my horn is lifted high. My mouth boasts over my enemies, for I delight in your deliverance. There is no one holy like the LORD; there is no one besides you; there is no Rock like our God. Do not keep talking so proudly or let your mouth speak such arrogance, for the LORD is a God who knows, and by him deeds are weighed. The bows of the warriors are broken, but those who stumbled are armed with strength. Those who were full hire themselves out for food, but those who were hungry are hungry no more. She who was barren has borne seven children, but she who has had many sons pines away. The LORD brings death and makes alive; he brings down to the grave and raises up. The LORD sends poverty and wealth; he humbles and he exalts. He raises the poor from the dust and lifts the needy from the ash heap; he seats them with princes and has them inherit a throne of honor. For the foundations of the earth are the LORD'S; on them he has set the world. He will guard the feet of his faithful servants, but the wicked will be silenced in the place of darkness. It is not by strength that one prevails; those who oppose the LORD will be broken. The Most High will thunder from heaven; the LORD will judge the ends of the earth. He will give strength to his king and exalt the horn of his anointed.
Those words were beautiful wise and wonderful. They had the rhythm of a good victory song and much of the content of a prayer. But they were different than both of those things. They were words of thanksgiving that anybody in a similar situation could use because they were eternally current.
Because something remarkable happened with these words. Someone wrote them down. Someone, we don’t know who, said, “Other people may need this.” And Hannah’s words were copied and recopied and they eventually found their way into a scroll. They were taught to people who memorized them and they formed the basis of their own prayers. People like a young girl named Mary who, a thousand years later, would draw inspiration from Hannah as she poured her own soul out before God after a visit from an angel.
Because of Hannah, from that day forward, there were psalms in Israel.
LIFE STORY: The Empty Chair
The writer Brennan Manning,7 tells the story of visiting a man named Joe, during his time as a Catholic priest.
Father Brennan was sitting at home when the phone rang. He was new to the parish and so the voice on the other end introduced herself and welcomed him to the community. Then she got on to what she had called about. She asked Father Brennan if he would be willing to go spend time with her Father, Joe who was dying of cancer.
“Of course,” he said.
When Father Brennan arrived at Joe’s home, he found him lying in bed with his head propped up on two pillows. Beside his bed was an empty chair.
Father Brennan looked at the chair and said, “I guess you were expecting me…”
“No, who are you?” Joe said.
Father Brennan was confused. “I’m the new Priest. When I saw the empty chair, I figured you knew I was going to show up.”
“Oh yeah, the chair…” Joe looked around the room to make sure there was no one else around. “Would you mind closing the door?”
Father Brennan closed the door.
Joe explained: “I’ve never told anyone this, not even my daughter… but all my life I have never known how to pray. At the Sunday Mass I used to hear the pastor talk about prayer, but it always went right over my head. So I pretty much gave up on it. Until one day about four years ago. My best friend said to me, ‘Joe, prayer is just a simple matter of having a conversation with Jesus. Here’s what I suggest. Next time you pray, sit down in a chair with an empty chair in front of you. But as you pray, imagine that Jesus is sitting right there in front of you in that empty chair. I know that sounds spooky but Jesus promises to be with us all of our days, so if you’re praying, he is in that chair. So just speak to Him and listen in the same way you’re doing with me right now.’8 So, Father, I tried it, and I like it so much that I do it a couple of hours every day. Only when I’m by myself though. If my daughter saw me talking to an empty chair, she’d have me committed!”9
Father Brennan was deeply moved by the story. He encouraged Joe to keep talking with Jesus and promised to keep the secret about the chair. Then Father Brennan stood by the bed. With one hand he squeezed Joe’s and the other he placed on the back of the chair. And the three of them prayed together.10
Father Brennan was sitting at home when the phone rang once again. It had been about a week since his visit with Joe. It was his daughter again. She called to tell Father Brennan that Joe had passed away earlier that afternoon. After offering his sympathies, Father Brennan asked:
“Did Joe seem to die in peace?”
The daughter paused.
“Yes. I was with him when it happened. It was the strangest thing, though. I told him that it was okay for him to let go. Then with the last of his strength, he leaned over and rested his head on the empty chair beside his bed. He smiled and breathed his last.”
Retold from a story in ABBA’S CHILD, by Brennan Manning
WISDOM STORY: Greeting the Sun
The disciple asked the master, “What can I do to attain God?”
The master replied, “What can you do to make the sun rise?”
The disciple thought for a moment.
“Nothing of course. But if there is nothing we can do to obtain God, why do you teach us all of these prayers?”
The master smiled.
“So you will be awake when the sun rises.”11
In the rustic hill country of medieval France, there lived a shepherd who had never been to the village. He spent all his days tending sheep in and around his childhood cottage. Until one day one of his sheep went missing.12
While searching for his lost sheep several days, he managed to get lost himself. Needing directions back to his home, he entered a village for the first time. He was amazed at all the buildings and the hustle and bustle of activity. Everyone looked much to busy to give him directions.
So he went straight to the tallest building in the village. When he entered through its wide open doors, he saw rows of wooden benches facing a table and a statue of a dying man. What sort of place was this?
The room seemed empty but the shepherd called out. “I’m lost! Will anybody help?”
“I will help you.” came a voice.
At first the shepherd thought it was the statue of the dying man.
“Come inside.” The voice came again.
Then the shepherd realized the voice was coming from a large wooden cabinet. So he entered. It was dark inside, except for a face behind a lattice.
“How long has it been since your last confession?” Asked the priest.
“What’s a confession?” The shepherd asked.
The priest was dumbfounded.
“What’s a confession? It’s when you tell God your sins.”
“What are sins?” The shepherd asked.
“What are sins? Sins are things you’ve done wrong. When you do wrong you ask God for forgiveness in prayer.”
“What’s prayer?”
The priest was incredulous.
“What’s prayer? Prayer is when you talk to God! Have you never prayed before?”
The shepherd thought for a second. He could tell his questions were annoying the man that lived in the cabinet.
“I think I know what your talking about, now. See every morning, when I wake up, I go up to a high hill. To greet the sun. When the sun rises and I see its first ray of light, I say “Hello, Mr. Sun. Thank you for another lovely day! Is that prayer?”
The priest was apoplectic.
“Mr. Sun… Is that… NO! Get out of here you pagan! Come back when you’ve learned a thing or two!”
The priest opened the door to the confessional to let the Shepherd out. He sternly pointed to the door.
The shepherd hurriedly walked toward the door but he stopped midway.
The shepherd said, “Just a minute… let me fasten my sandal.”
“Fine… make it quick.” said the priest.
Now there was a beam of sunlight coming through a nearby window. The shepherd casually hung his large wooden crook13 on the beam of light. And he bent over and fastened his sandals. Then he looked at his crook hanging on the beam of light and said, “Thank you, Mr. Sun!” Then he took it and left.
The priest’s jaw hung open. Then he knelt before the beam of light and prayed: “Forgive me, Lord. I did not recognize you!”
Two traditional tales
The Sermontelling Circle
Stories are meant to be developed and told in community! So feel free to enter the circle and start a conversation. I’d love to hear your own sermontelling thoughts and tips. And of course your stories. I long to hear your wonderful stories!
I also appreciate your help widening the circle!
SERMONTELLING NOTES:
For this newsletter, I’ve tried to present ‘different takes’ on the Narrative Lectionary passage for the week. That’s not because I think a straightforward retelling of the Bible story isn’t worth doing. It very much is. I’m a firm believer that these stories get under people’s skin through hearing rather than through reading. Stories that are told from the pulpit often, like the stories of Jesus talking to the woman at the well, pardoning the adulteress, or eating with Zacchaeus are some of the best known and best loved. I am also convinced that people’s lack of familiarity with the great stories of the Bible has as much to do with our preaching habits as it does with their reading habits. Whenever I get to teach lay speakers, I make a point of saying, “Don’t tell them ABOUT the stories, tell them the stories.”
This is to say, you don’t have to come up with a novel approach to the Biblical story Sunday after Sunday. Telling them faithfully and passionately is more than enough. For this newsletter though, I like to provide different takes. My hope is that these creative retellings may help you look at the story with new eyes regardless of whether you employ the telling in your own preaching.
There are sometimes when a novel retelling may be necessary for the needs of your congregation. For instance, this retelling is born out of the fact that motherhood and fertility is such a painful and sensitive topic for a lot of people in our congregations. Maybe as you read these words, a face or two come to mind. Many tellings of the Hannah story really emphasize the outcome. The unfortunate message (whether it is meant or not) is that Hannah really wanted children so she kept praying and because she was so faithful in her praying, God granted her children. Therefore, if you really want children…
The purpose of this retelling is to focus on a different but equally important aspect of the story: the nature of prayer. Hannah’s story isn’t just about a person going from having no baby to having a baby; it’s also a story about a person going from having no words to having words. When Hannah prays to God at Shiloh, she is a blubbering mess. Eli thinks she’s drunk! She is barely audible which in an ancient person’s mind would raise the question if YHWH even heard her. But God does! God hears Hannah’s wordless groaning just as God hears ours. This is good news.
I’m struck by the detail in the text that Hannah’s disposition has changed following the prayer. Her face is no longer downcast. Aside from a formulaic blessing from the priest (which Hannah has no doubt heard on many of her other pilgrimages to Shiloh), Hannah is given no indication that her situation has changed. But she has changed. Somehow in pouring out her soul to the LORD she has found peace and intimacy with God. I believe this vision of prayer, rather than one that is focused on desired outcomes is the one our congregations need most.
Though this telling deemphasizes the outcome, it doesn’t leave it out entirely. The purpose of creative retellings is not to hide parts of the text that we’d rather not deal with. The purpose is to shine a spotlight on parts of the text that we too often march right past.
I realize that it may appear to be a wild swing to claim there were no psalms in Israel during the era of the judges. It is true, technically. The purpose of the preceding paragraphs was to make my best case. There was a draft of this footnote that was a full on defense of this claim taking into account want we know about cultic practices in the Ancient Near East, the development of Israelite religion before and after the Exile, and the composition of the Psalter, but then I realized: I’m not an expert in any of those things. I’m simply someone who frequents different sections of Barnes & Noble than normal people. So I’ll spare you the armchair Biblical scholarship.
I’ll just leave it at this: Israel’s earliest poetry appears to be of the commemorative sort. Communal praise to God memorializing specific events (See Exodus 15 and Judges 5). There were probably more of these than have survived in whole or in part but they are very different than what is found in the Book of Psalms. While the Psalter does contain commemorative psalms, it is mostly made up of formulaic psalms that can be used more generally by the everyday worshipper(s) in a temple setting. They are specifically designed this way to provide words that anybody can use.
In the Bible as we have received it, the first person to really utter the sort of formula prayer we find in the book of Psalms is Hannah. Leaving textual criticism out of it, this makes Hannah the first Psalmist.
Psalm 4:1
Psalm 9:13-14
Psalm 13:1-2
If I were going to break up the story, I would do it here. If I were using a four act approach to the sermon, it might look something like this:
I. Hannah could not find the words to address God
II. We cannot find the words to address God
III. God heard Hannah when she poured out her soul
IV. God hears us when we pour out our souls
By the way, this 4act approach to the sermon is found in THE FOUR PAGES OF THE SERMON by Paul Scott Wilson. It’s not the only structure I use but it lends itself well to a sermontelling approach. It envisions the sermon in four movements: Trouble in the Bible, Trouble in the World, Grace in the Bible, Grace in the World.
Brennan Manning tells this story in ABBA’S CHILD as a first person narrative. I have taken his narrative and made it a third person narrative. I’ve also put it in to a more oral form.
I chose this story because it is about pouring your soul out before the LORD. Like Hannah, Joe doesn’t need a fancy theology of prayer. He simply needs to approach God and unburden his heart. The empty chair can help your congregation think about how they might approach God as a listening friend rather than a distant judge hidden behind seven layers of heaven.
All of these stories are meant to be internalized, not memorized. You will be in charge of recreating Joe’s monologue in your own words. Your mission is twofold: 1) You’re give us a sense of Joe’s personality. He’s the kind of guy who would feel goofy if someone walked in on him talking to an empty chair. It’s doubtful his daughter would actually have him committed. He just doesn’t want to have to explain it. But he also finds this method of prayer very meaningful and that should come through as well. 2) You’re also giving the hearer practical instruction on prayer in the form of a story. Joe’s friend is a stand in for you. Have him say what you might say to someone sitting in your office who was having a similar struggle.
This would be a good false stop. A false stop is what I call it when you wrap up a story in a sermon and the hearer thinks you’re done with it forever. And then you return to the story later and show them its true ending. This is one of my favorite techniques. The trick is to end on a sense of closure, not a cliff hanger. In this case, you could tell the story midway through the sermon and close the story with the image of Father Brennan, praying with Joe and the empty chair. And the three of them prayed together is a nice little ending (not in the original version) and the hearer will assume that’s where the story was always headed. You can then talk about the simplicity of prayer, and come back around at the end of the Sermon: Father Brennan was sitting at home when the phone rang once again...
I gave you two stories for the price of one, here. Both of them are old tried and true Christian legends. Both tie the image of greeting the sun to prayer. But each makes a slightly different point. The first one makes the case for learning fixed forms of prayer and developing disciplines so that we are awake when the sun rises. The second story makes the point that what God truly cares about is purity of heart and intention. Theses two views are irreconcilable. They are true in their own way but there is a tension between them. It’s a tension I also find in the Hannah story. Hannah pours her soul before the LORD in wordless groaning. That would seem to bolster the tale of the shepherd. But her wordless groaning comes in the context of an annual sacrifice, a vow, and a composed response of thanksgiving. That seems to speak to the importance of ritual. Like the shepherd and the disciple, like Hannah, we are called to value both: spontaneous heart-felt prayer and regular holiness-forming piety.
This short little paragraph illustrates the tried and true method of starting a story. I call it: Somewhere, Someone, Each Day, One Day. If you are ever unsure how to get a story going, this is the way to go, especially in oral storytelling where ambiguity more often creates confusion than tension. Here are the steps:
Somewhere. When in doubt start with a time and place. Naming a time and place helps the hearer to begin imagining the world the story will take place in. Starting with the setting hijacks the hearer’s imagination and transports them to the world of your story. They don’t need much, by the way. If you say: In southern Louisiana, there is an old abandoned house by a graveyard… that is enough of a cue for the hearer to begin imagining the sort of dilapidated plantation style home that is usually inhabited by ghosts. The only reason to add any more detail would be if there were something pertinent to the story that you need to make sure gets painted in to the scene. And in the front yard is an old civil war cannon…
Someone. Once you’ve painted a picture, you need to introduce a character. In oral storytelling, you trust the imagination to do most of the work. You describe the character very briefly: their name (or title) and any defining characteristics. You don’t have to describe them down to the freckle on their left hand. Just enough that the hearer can paint a proper picture. The captain of the boat was named Burt. He had white hair, his face was tough and tan like old leather, and he had a glass eye. If he gave a damn what anyone thought he would have worn an eye patch. But he didn’t.
Each Day. Before you jump into the story, you want to set up the status quo that is about to be interrupted. Some stories each day is literally each day: Each day, on her way to school, Janelle would pass by the gates of the amusement park and imagine what it would be like to go inside and ride the rides. But each day she would remind herself that she had responsibilities and go on to class. But in other stories each day is a more general description of the status quo. The whole time he’d been Sheriff, Clark and never pulled his gun out of its holster. He helped ladies across the street, led drunks back to the cell to sober up, helped find missing horses… but all that he did with his gun safely in the holster.. Once he almost pulled it out to fire at some vultures but they flew off before he got the chance.
One day. Something happens that disrupts the status quo and the story begins. Sometime this is called the inciting incident. I don’t like that phrase because it makes it sound like a gun has to go off or something. All we need is a new day on which something different is going to happen.
In a novel, this is usually the first chapter and the order might be played with in some interesting ways. In a short oral story, this is the order you want to use and you want to get it done pretty quickly.
(Somewhere) In the rustic hill country of medieval France,
(Someone) there lived a shepherd
(Each Day) who had never been to the village. He spent all his days tending sheep in and around his childhood cottage.
(One Day) Until one day one of his sheep went missing.
The versions of this story I’ve heard have the priest sneering at the shepherd and saying something like: “Your friend, Mr. Sun is here, why don’t you have him hold your coat…” And then the shepherd tosses his coat on the sun beam and it just hangs there as he leaves. Then the priest drops to his knees and says: “Forgive me, Lord. I did not recognize you!” Maybe I was just in too many Christmas pageants as a kid but to me one of the defining attributes of the shepherd is that large wooden crook. I thought it would be neat if the shepherd hung his crook on the beam of light. I really have no deep reason why this is better but it’s my story and I can tell it how I want.