Psalm Meditation 518
Pentecost Sunday
May 23, 2010

Psalm 123
1 To you I lift up my eyes, O you who are enthroned in the heavens!
2 As the eyes of servants look to the hand of their master, as the eyes of a maid to the hand of her mistress, so our eyes look to the LORD our God, until he has mercy upon us.
3 Have mercy upon us, O LORD, have mercy upon us, for we have had more than enough of contempt.
4 Our soul has had more than its fill of the scorn of those who are at ease, of the contempt of the proud.
(NRSV)

For most of us this psalm is not so much about us as against us. We are the folk mentioned in the last verse, the ones who are at ease heaping scorn and contempt on others. We don’t see ourselves as people of privilege because there are others who have more stuff who are more than willing to heap scorn and contempt on us. So, we are caught in the middle. I imagine there are folk working around us in near anonymity; folks we see and don’t know. At our worst we have gotten to the point of ignoring them. We notice more when they are not there than when they are.

Even the folks who make the effort to know the folks who work around them on a daily basis can’t know all the folk who do the vital services we tend to take for granted. The good thing is that some of the folks who do those dirty jobs take great pride in their work and know that going home tired dirty and under appreciated is a gift they give to those of us who don’t have those jobs and tasks.

Every now and then it is good for us to take a step back from our lives and see what kinds of tasks we know someone else does so that we are free to do things that may be more impressive but are not any more important. Wait for a sanitation workers strike to see how important it is to have regular trash pick up. Wait for a hotel workers strike to see how important it is to have a clean room when we check in. Wait for a day when the kitchen help at your favorite restaurant is too busy to washes dishes before using them to cook and serve your meal. Look to the workers in mines and fields who work for substandard wages so that we can have affordable, often cheap, prices. Take a moment to notice some of the tasks that usually go unnoticed. If it is not practical or possible to thank some of the folks who do those tasks take a moment to thank God for those people and to ask for forgiveness for all the times those folk have been heaped with scorn and contempt.

© May 17, 2010