Mary’s Mixtape
Last summer, I had a revelation. If you had asked me before then to describe the formative music of my childhood, I would have immediately launched into hard rock, beginning with Led Zeppelin and tracing the thread through the arenas of the eighties and grunge of the nineties. But last July, a favorite artist of mine released somewhat of a throwback album, drawing on what he has called his “mom’s music.” A departure from his usual blues infused riff-rock, this was more the easy listening of Steve Winwood, Phil Collins, and Toto.
All of a sudden, I realized that although I had often preferred and chosen the music I heard in my dad’s pickup, it was the songs aimed at my mother and her peers that formed the more frequent soundtrack of my childhood. Air Supply was what played in the doctor’s office waiting room and grocery store aisles. Acts like Don Henley and Jackson Browne were the gentle score of everyday life. And I believe they were every bit as formative to my sensibilities as the stuff I chose for myself.
That’s why, although we are officially launching our series on the Messianic Psalms this week, I’m beginning with a New Testament text. (Happy Mothers’ Day!) You see, when Mary was told she’d be the mother of God, she immediately burst out in Psalm. Lots of them, actually. Her Magnificat is like a greatest hits mixtape, just like the ones we used to make and wear out in the days of Magnavox. Her theology is richly layered and broadly sourced from the music of her people. And there is no reason whatsoever to believe that she didn’t fill her house with the sounds of her soul, immersing her children in a world of poetic imagery that forever shaped the way they would see the world.
The whole book of Psalms is Messiah music; what Calvin called “an anatomy of all parts of the soul,” spelled out across individual experiences and scaled to the story of Israel and the nations. And Jesus rightly saw himself as the keynote and melody of that whole collection. His mom’s music was his own.
I often have lunches with folks who say, “I just don’t know what to do with the Psalms.” And I tell them, don’t try to drink the seven seas. Just swim in them. To be immersed in the Psalms is to be awash in language for every aspect of the human condition, and thus to see the heart of Jesus. So, in addition to joining us for worship this summer as Will and I lay open the heart of Jesus in the Psalms, here are 3 things you can do to get good and saturated in them:
1. Join us in the Soul Room each weekday morning and pray the Psalms back to God.
2. Pick up and savor a book like Open and Unafraid by David Taylor or Reflections on the Psalms by C.S. Lewis
3. Find a playlist (or make your own mixtape!) of Psalms sung by gifted musicians like The Corner Room or Poor Bishop Hooper
