Psalm 146 is one of my favorites. It’s the first of five “Halleluyah Psalms,” which praise God’s power and ongoing care for the chosen people. Its text goes hand in hand with the Beatitudes in laying out, item by item, what God has done, is doing and will continue to do for God’s people:

• keeping faith with those who have been wronged;
• defending the cause of the oppressed, bringing them justice;
• giving food to those who hunger;
• setting prisoners and slaves free;
• opening the eyes of the blind;
• raising up those bent down by their burdens.

Why?

Because God loves the just, and protects the powerless—strangers, widows and orphans—but will continually frustrate the wicked.

That’s a tall order, isn’t it?

I wrote a setting in 1996 using the folk melody “In the Good Old Colony Times,” first published in an 1804 broadside called “The Miller, the Weaver and the Little Tailor,” about three jolly rogues who got their comeuppance. I thought its jaunty tune underscored the confidence of God’s people, even in hard times, even when things appear to be going poorly.

This psalm shows up in the lectionary several times, so to have a setting your community enjoys singing is like having money in the bank.