This reflection on Psalm 23 has next to nothing to do with the Psalm itself and everything to do with another thought it invokes for me.

Psalm 23 would be one of the most well known and repeated Psalms I’ve known in my lifetime. It begins with those words many know so well “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures and leads me beside still waters…” and later “thought I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil; for you are with me; your rod and your staff – they comfort me.” (NRSV)

It’s well known because it’s comforting and encouraging. It’s also well known because it gets repeated often. It’s this that I want to reflect on a bit.

I’ve mostly grown up around faith traditions where repetition, except if it’s repeating the chorus of a song over and over and over, has been frowned upon. Using a written liturgy and worse still, largely the same one every week, is considered by many to be lifeless, rote, mindless and dead. The same goes for using the same pre-written prayers regularly. I’ve even heard someone have a go at the Lord’s Prayer being used regularly in worship services.

Psalm 23 and its prominence highlights the value of repetition. I’ve seen people turn to it as a go-to passage when they’ve been feeling down and have wanted something to call on that acts as a lift and an assurance. To be able to call to mind such things is really valuable.

I did do a short stint in a set liturgical church environment when I was younger (for various reasons I’ve pretty much experienced all denominations and expressions in New Zealand through my life) and I remember not being engaged by it. In my adult years I’ve spoken to many people who grew up in liturgical churches, largely repeating the same liturgies week after week for years. Many of those people are now in churches that express themselves in other ways, if they’re in church at all. With some of them I’ve had the pleasure of administering communion in informal settings and to do so I’ve used sections of the New Zealand Prayer Book (Anglican). For each of them they’ve found it very familiar and for each, the words have come flooding back when I’ve used it. As those internal memories have surfaced and they’ve prayed along with me from memory they’ve sensed the richness of what they learnt and have re-engaged those words in a deep and meaningful way. It’s the years of repetition that sparked it. What was boring as a youngster has proved to be very meaningful and rich when a spark has brought it all back. Clearly it won’t be true of everyone who grew up with such practice, but it’s true of enough to demonstrate its significance.

Are there times when repetition is boring and feels meaningless? Yes, but there is real value in it. Growing isn’t about being entertained and always having great feelings. Repetition ingrains stories, values and truths within us. Just as learning the alphabet, multiplication and so many other things we take for granted gives us valuable things to draw from in our functional lives when needed, so liturgies, scriptures, songs and prayers repeated over and over give our soul something to draw on in those times when we need it but the written words aren’t readily accessible and we don’t have anything else to bring to the moment spontaneously.

There’s that old saying, ‘repetition is the mother of learning’ and it’s true for classical education, but it’s also true for the learning our inner being needs to do in order for us to be shaped towards the image of Christ. Let’s embrace it as a way of strengthening who we are and who we are becoming.

Read more of my reflections on the Psalms.

Here’s why I’m walking this journey through the Psalms.

Note: I used the picture above to lead this post (the last Communion of St Jerome) because Holy Communion is the most repeated tradition throughout Christianity. It tells our story over and over and over. If we don’t see the value in that then we haven’t properly understood it.