Searched Me Out and Known Me: Journeying Lent with the Psalms

Author Charlie Bell
Publisher DLT £12.99
Format pbk
ISBN 9781915412782

Charlie Bell enthuses about the Psalms and their influence on him as a chorister. In his Preface he introduces the themes of renewal and change through an opportunity to do ‘some of the deep thinking and re-situate ourselves within the divine life to which we are called.’

Although this is arranged as a Lent book and the chapters are set out and labelled from Ash Wednesday through the Sundays of Lent to Holy Week and Easter Day, it is a valuable general resource for individuals and groups. It enables reflection to reflect on the significance of a Psalm and a linked Gospel text which refer to their liturgical setting, but have a significance for any context in which to pause and consider the meaning of words we are very familiar with using but may not have delved into more deeply: forgiveness, repentance, identity and relationships, holiness, belief and trust and the nature of waiting.

It is quite unusual to pair up Psalms and Gospel readings in quite this way adding a commentary and then discussion options if needed. This is immensely helpful as a way into meditating on how our faith connects us to the world and inspires us to dwell on ways through the busyness and contradictions we journey in as we move in a timetable imposed on us by the way life is.
Having sung in church choirs for most of my life, the words of the Psalms from the Book of Common Prayer have unconsciously taken root in my vocabulary of faith. So I may be biased in favour of this book, but I would really recommend it as a fresh, invigorating and challenging way to ‘Hear the words of joy, faith, hope, and love, and realise they are spoken to you and to the whole world.’

Reviewed by ROSEMARY WALTERS

Lent