The Lord said to my Lord, 'sit here'

For different reasons, this clearly messianic Psalm is also difficult to paraphrase without departing too far from the enigmatic biblical text, headed like the previous two ‘A Psalm of David’. PHRW’s ‘Evangelical Psalter’ text actually starts Father, Son, and Holy Spirit and weaves many divine titles (including ‘a Priest for ever’) into its 18 lines. At first sight, someone has said, the Psalm seems like a page torn from an Index of First Lines! But this time, too, the Davidic authorship is crucial to our understanding, for which we have the clues in the use made of it by the Lord Jesus Christ (Mark 12) and his first followers (from Acts 2 onwards). Like Phinehas in 106, Melchizedek makes his sole appearance in the Psalms in a text by Emma Turl, completed at Waltham Abbey, Essex, and first published here. Like 53 (but no others of hers) it was written with the tune WENTWORTH (209) in mind. She was not fully happy with its final stz, and revised it in 1995 following a study of Hebrews 7 led by her pastor David Hircock, exploring the high-priestly role of Jesus. Hebrews 7:1,3 also heads the 2001 version by Martin Leckebusch (without Melchizedek), Appointed by the Lord as Lord of all creation. As often, Gill Berry has set her friend’s words to music at the committee’s request, some years after first seeing them. They have the same metre as 53, but she ‘wanted to convey an entirely different mood with this tune’. INWOOD was composed at Shrewsbury on 8 April 1999, and appears here in print for the first time. Inwood is a small valley in the Church Stretton hills in Shropshire; the composer adds: ‘When our children were young (and not so young) they loved sliding down the hill, playing in the stream there, building dams and getting themselves thoroughly wet.’ Perhaps a happy reminder of ‘the brook by the way’ in Psalm 110:7? Cf 123, note.

b Shrewsbury 1946. Stamford High Sch (Lincs) and Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford (MA English and Cert Ed). Born into a literary household, she loved poetry from childhood, and was converted aged 13 at a Scripture Union camp. She worked as VSO (Voluntary Service Overseas) for two years in Ugandan ‘revival country’. Following this she married John and spent the next ten years (1971-81) in Ghana, afterwards returning to live in Waltham Abbey, Essex, where she and her family joined Goldings Hill Evangelical Free Ch, Loughton (1982–2002). She now attends the Abbey Church. While enjoying chanted Psalms as a student she longed for more congregationally accessible ways of singing them, and attributes her first desire to write ‘Bible oriented verse’ to a literary household, and Anglican services (St Ebbe’s Oxford) with readings and canticles. Her first metrical versions were written between 1983 and 1985, during which time she had paraphrased the entire Psalter. A few of these Psalm texts were printed with other verses in Treasures Old and New, 1989, followed by Time to Celebrate 1999, with suggested tunes from her husband John and friend Gill Berry, qv. Some of these are specially needed to accompany a number of unusual metres. Subsequently she has revised many of her original texts in the light of further comments and computer assisted discoveries, and has also added some new versions.
The monthly Evangelicals Now (see under Benton J) published her work occasionally from 1993; Praise! is the first hymnal to include her texts and one of these features in the 2004 edn of CH. Her sight began to deteriorate early; by the age of 13 she could read only with a strong magnifying glass, reading became increasingly difficult and slow, and by her mid 20s she was completely blind. This made her unaware of ‘the oustanding new hymns and Psalm versions which others were already producing, which could have inspired me but could well have put me off’. See her comments on some ‘blindness/sight’ hymns, with practical pastoral considerations, in ‘Singing without seeing’ in HSB234 (Jan 2003). In an earlier Bulletin review (no.225, Oct 2000), Basil E Bridge calls her hymns ‘thoroughly biblical…well – sometimes ingeniously – crafted…I am sure we shall be hearing more of Emma Turl in the future’. Her own choice of 15 of them appears in the collection of contemporary hymns, Emma now attends the abbey church in Waltham Abbey. More of her hymns can be found on the website of The Jubilate Group: www.jubilate.org
Come Celebrate (2009). Nos.30C, 53, 84A, 106, 107, 110, 119G, 123, 130, 168, 825, 1011, 1014, 1034, 1038, 1041, 1045, 1053, 1054, 1058, 1059, 1062, 1063, 1069, 1087, 1088, 1089, 1091, 1092, 1096, 1101, 1103, 1107, 1108, 1110, 1134, 1137, 1195, 1213, 1216, 1239, 1246.