Happy the people who refuse

Standing at the head of the Book of Psalms in the Bible, as in Praise!, this foundational or ‘frontispiece’ Psalm sets out ‘the two ways’, as a signpost at a crossroads. The alternatives confront us through the Psalms as through the whole of Scripture and of life. Our Lord Jesus Christ often used similar picture-language in presenting the only two options; or rather, the need to say Yes to one, No to the other. C H Spurgeon calls this ‘The Preface Psalm, having in it a notification of the contents of the entire Book … the text upon which the whole of the Psalms make up a divine sermon’. It has also been dubbed ‘the Holy Spirit’s preface’ to all the rest. David G Preston’s LM version in 5 stzs, Happy the man who never trod, appeared in The Book of Praises (Carey Publications 1986, henceforward BP). He offered a revision of this for the present book, having earlier considered drafting 3 six-line stzs (sestets) but hesitated to compress vv1–2 into 6 lines. The eds of the Pss section, however, ‘asked me to try in 3 sestets, so I obliged’—DGP. This text, revised and finalised Oct 1997 and subsequently also chosen as one of 3 versions in CH2004, takes care to retain among other distinctives the opening sequence ‘walk, stand, sit’, and the alternative paths of its conclusion. But it is essentially a God-centred song; Weiser adds that, as seen here, the law of God ‘is already a step in the direction of the gospel’. Which is just as well, for if here and elsewhere the only hope of the vision of God is for ‘the just’ or ‘the righteous’, we shall also urgently need to find the means to be ‘justified’. Among contemporary writers who have paraphrased most or all of the Psalms, Martin Leckebusch begins his series of Songs of God’s people: the Psalms made for singing (Vol 1 2001) with ‘A depth of satisfaction: the promise is made known/ to all who turn from evil and make the Lord their own;/ who heed no wicked counsel, no cynic’s mocking voice …’ Emma Turl’s earlier, closer but so far unpublished text (1984) is ‘How blessed they are who turn/ from where the wicked walk;/ they’ll not with sinners stand/ or sit with those who mock …’ The tune GREENHILL, named after an area of Harrow and first published here, was requested from John Barnard for this text and immediately welcomed; he composed it at the piano in 1998.

b London 1939. d 2020. Archbishop Tenison’s Grammar School, Kennington, London; Keble College Oxford (MA Mod Langs.) He worked as a French Teacher, including 11 years at Ahmadu Bello Univ, Nigeria, and gained a PhD on the French Christian poet Pierre Emmanuel (1916 84). A member of Carey Baptist Ch, Reading, for many years, he later moved to Alweston, nr Sherborne, Dorset. He compiled The Book of Praises (Carey Publications, Liverpool) in 1987, with versions of 71 Psalms; these include modified texts of Watts and a few other classic paraphrasers, but most are by contemporary writers including himself. 60 of his metrical Psalm versions are so far published, including one each in Sing Glory (2000), the Scottish Church Hymnary 4th Edn (2005) and Sing Praise (2010), and 3 in the 2004 edn of CH; also 10 tunes. His writing and composing has taken place in Leicester, Reading, Nigeria and his present home; he was a member of the editorial board throughout the preparation of Praise! and had a major share in the choice of music for the Psalm texts (1-150). His convictions about the Psalms, as expressed in the Introduction to BP, are that ‘There is nothing to compare with their blend of the subjective and the objective, the inner life and practical goodness, the knowledge of one’s own rebellious heart and the knowledge of God…Today’s general neglect of congregational Psalm singing is a symptom of the spiritual malaise of our churches. When the preaching of the Gospel has prospered, bringing into being churches vibrant with spiritual life, men and women have taken great delight in praising their Maker and Redeemer through these scriptural hymns’. 15 of his own, self-selected, feature as his share of ‘contemporary hymns’ in the 2009 Come Celebrate; he has also served as a meticulous proof-reader. Nos.1, 2A, 5*, 6, 7, 11, 15, 16, 17, 19A, 24A, 27A, 30B, 32*, 33*, 38, 40, 42, 43, 47, 51*, 52, 55, 57*, 64, 66, 74, 76, 77, 84, 90, 91A, 96*, 97, 99, 100B, 101, 114*, 120, 126, 132, 139, 142*, 143, 145A, 147*, 824*, 830*, 963*.