Includes bibliographical references and indexes.

The Psalms and the basic grammar of Christian worship -- Personal address and dialogic structure -- Identifying God's character through metaphor and historical recitation -- The ebb, flow, and fittingness of praise and petition, gratitude and lament -- Individual and communal speech -- Specificity and generality in prayer -- Emotional engagement and range -- Image and poetry in Christian speech -- Interlude: reformation-era testimonies from Luther and Calvin -- Praying the Psalms in Christian worship -- Choosing a Psalm -- Liturgical criteria -- Homiletical criteria -- Pastoral criteria -- Choosing a translation -- Translations and paraphrases of the Psalms -- The liturgical placement of a Psalm -- Framing the congregation's mode of engagement -- Psalm types -- Contemplation or prayer -- Christological framings of Psalm texts -- The Psalms in New Testament context -- Studying the Psalm -- Pace -- Structure -- Script -- Poetic Lines -- Parallelism -- Realizing the Psalms : options for singing or speaking -- Solo reading -- Choral reading -- Responsive or antiphonal readings -- Chant -- Psalm tones and pointed text -- Anglican chant -- Gelineau psalmody -- Plainchant -- Responsorial psalmody (or psalmody with congregational refrains or antiphons) -- Metrical psalmody -- Psalm-based solo and choral anthems, organ and instrumental music -- The Psalms in contemporary and emerging worship, Psalm-based scripture songs, and the Psalms in popular music idioms -- Basis for improvised prayer -- Visual imagery, children's books, calligraphy -- Composite collections of Psalmody -- Children and youth in intergenerational worship -- Selecting from among this methods -- Finding sources -- Pastoral postscript -- Modern testamonies.