Out of the mouths of babes:
God, our living God
you are amazing!
You are higher than I can look,
You are wider than I can see.
But I can hear you – Listen!
We can hear you in the laughter of a little child,
We can hear you in the babbling of a baby.
You don’t need words to tell us of your power.
Why do you need us at all?
We are so small, and the world is so big,
the stars are so many and space is so enormous.
God, our living God,
You are amazing!
You made everything.
Why do I matter?
But we do matter!
God cares for us most of all,
and through us God cares for all the world.
You put everything into our care,
all the animals, all the birds, all the fish,
everything that creeps or flies or runs or swims,
even the land and the air and the sea.
It is all ours to look after.
God, our living God,
you are amazing!
(Psalm 8)
Rev Silvia Purdie has crafted these wonderful ‘kids friendly’ Psalms to open up the wealth in the Psalms in ways that kids (and adults!) can relate to in fresh ways. They are designed especially for use in worship or children’s ministry groups. They could be used as a call to worship, read by a child, or alternate lines by a child and an adult, or responsively with the congregation.
The book of Psalms is the greatest worship and prayer resource we have. Unfortunately Psalms can be hard to use with children … they jump from one emotion to another, they rave on about enemies and threatening violence, they are often too long or too short and we don’t know if we’re allowed to just use the bits we like and ignore the bits we don’t. Traditional translations are full of big words and experiences that kids struggle with … and so we tend to use other forms of poetry and prayer with kids and forget about the Psalms. Which is a tragedy!!
These are not translations of the Biblical Psalm, but a response to it. They seek to honour the meaning and context of the Psalm and to enable our congregations, including the children, to bring to God our own emotions and experience. Psalms are 3,000-year-old treasures, and bringing them alive again today will, I hope, deepen our participation in the life of God, in Christ Jesus, through the Holy Spirit. I hope you find them helpful.” Silvia Purdie.
Download more Kids Friendly Psalms or email Silvia about her work and she’ll happily send you more Psalms, reworked in different ways.