During an artist’s residency at Laity Lodge, Jon Guerra felt drawn to sing psalms in the Canyon.
“There’s something about the capaciousness of the canyon that feels appropriate for the psalms,” he says. These ancient songs capture the heights and depths of human expression—what Walter Brueggemann describes as “Godward humanity.”
Jon chose three modern psalms that represent the breadth of Biblical worship. There’s Psalm 23, a beloved expression of hope and security. He meditates on Psalm 121 in “Hiding Lord,” where he asks the question repeated over and over in the Psalms: where is God? To close is “One Thing I Ask of the Lord,” based on Psalm 27. “That’s the nucleus of the longing of the Christian life,” says Jon. “God’s desire for us is that we might be close, that the lover might be united with the beloved.”
