Psalm Meditation 741
Twelfth Sunday of Ordinary Time
August 31, 2014
Psalm 141
1 I call upon you, O LORD; come quickly to me; give ear to my voice when I call to you.
2 Let my prayer be counted as incense before you, and the lifting up of my hands as an evening sacrifice.
3 Set a guard over my mouth, O LORD; keep watch over the door of my lips.
4 Do not turn my heart to any evil, to busy myself with wicked deeds in company with those who work iniquity; do not let me eat of their delicacies.
5 Let the righteous strike me; let the faithful correct me. Never let the oil of the wicked anoint my head, for my prayer is continually against their wicked deeds.
6 When they are given over to those who shall condemn them, then they shall learn that my words were pleasant.
7 Like a rock that one breaks apart and shatters on the land, so shall their bones be strewn at the mouth of Sheol.
8 But my eyes are turned toward you, O GOD, my Lord; in you I seek refuge; do not leave me defenseless.
9 Keep me from the trap that they have laid for me, and from the snares of evildoers.
10 Let the wicked fall into their own nets, while I alone escape.
(NRSV)
It is not always easy to tell good from bad, right from wrong, righteousness from sin. The psalmist is caught between following the practices and habits that lead to God and the temptation, from within or without, to take up a new set of habits that lead down a path to destruction. Despite our protests to the contrary, words do have the power to hurt and to heal, so the psalmist asks for God’s help in keeping hurtful words out of lips and heart. Even though the promise of hurtful words is that they will be sweet, for a moment, there is also the recognition that there is a price to pay for them. As with any sweet treat, there is the initial pleasure followed by the price that must be paid for the indulgence.
Once we get drawn in to a course of action, a group of practices, it becomes very hard to break free of whatever habits we may have formed for good or ill. While it may take discipline and vigilance to form good habits, it is possible to make and keep them without a lot of thought or effort once we have established our pattern. Bad habits may be easier to form since they take less effort from the beginning, however they take a much higher toll on us through the weeks, months and years.
As we join the psalmist in asking God’s help in avoiding evil practices and habits in the first place we do not have to fight to break the habits and still have the price to pay for them. As we are able to guard our lips, our hearts, our hands from the tempting evils in the first place the more readily we can turn to God with our whole hearts in every part of life.
August 25, 2014
LCM
Monday, August 25, 2014
Monday, August 18, 2014
Psalm Meditation 740
Eleventh Sunday of Ordinary Time
August 24, 2014
Psalm 60
1 O God, you have rejected us, broken our defenses; you have been angry; now restore us!
2 You have caused the land to quake; you have torn it open; repair the cracks in it, for it is tottering.
3 You have made your people suffer hard things; you have given us wine to drink that made us reel.
4 You have set up a banner for those who fear you, to rally to it out of bowshot. Selah
5 Give victory with your right hand, and answer us, so that those whom you love may be rescued.
6 God has promised in his sanctuary: “With exultation I will divide up Shechem, and portion out the Vale of Succoth.
7 Gilead is mine, and Manasseh is mine; Ephraim is my helmet; Judah is my scepter.
8 Moab is my washbasin; on Edom I hurl my shoe; over Philistia I shout in triumph.”
9 Who will bring me to the fortified city? Who will lead me to Edom?
10 Have you not rejected us, O God? You do not go out, O God, with our armies.
11 O grant us help against the foe, for human help is worthless.
12 With God we shall do valiantly; it is he who will tread down our foes.
(NRSV)
For the ancients wars and battles were waged from the heavens and the people involved were tokens and pieces in the game being played by the deities of the various nations. When one side was winning it was because their heavenly rulers were paying attention to the contest on the field of battle. The folks who were losing were being ignored or rejected by their divine warlord. The psalmist is aware that Israel is not doing well in this battle, so it must mean that they have been rejected for some fault of theirs. This psalm serves to remind God of promises of victory made to Israel against the surrounding nations and to ask how this victory can be achieved without the help of God.
While we no longer see war as a chess match pitting national deities against each other, we do find ourselves wondering where God is when our own lives, or the lives of our loved ones, are not going well. We wonder why God is allowing us to suffer, to go through this particular trial without divine help. As with the psalmists, we find ourselves asking these questions of God even as we wonder why God is not present for us. In one sense we answer a part of our own question by asking it of God. We have an awareness that God is around here somewhere, we simply have no idea where. As with children playing peek-a-boo to learn that people and things do not disappear when they are not seen, we learn that God is with us even when we don’t know where or how.
Some folks are content to believe that bad things happen to us, and especially to others, as punishment from God. Others see God as present in every situation, leading and guiding us forward through the trials of our lives, or at least being present to ache and cry and suffer alongside us. I can certainly appreciate the assurance that comes from knowing that God is in charge, making things happen in each one of our lives. I find much more comfort in God being with us in every situation, giving comfort and assurance and being present with us in every circumstance of our lives.
August 18, 2014
LCM manifold@lightbound.com
http://psalmmeditations.blogspot.com/
Eleventh Sunday of Ordinary Time
August 24, 2014
Psalm 60
1 O God, you have rejected us, broken our defenses; you have been angry; now restore us!
2 You have caused the land to quake; you have torn it open; repair the cracks in it, for it is tottering.
3 You have made your people suffer hard things; you have given us wine to drink that made us reel.
4 You have set up a banner for those who fear you, to rally to it out of bowshot. Selah
5 Give victory with your right hand, and answer us, so that those whom you love may be rescued.
6 God has promised in his sanctuary: “With exultation I will divide up Shechem, and portion out the Vale of Succoth.
7 Gilead is mine, and Manasseh is mine; Ephraim is my helmet; Judah is my scepter.
8 Moab is my washbasin; on Edom I hurl my shoe; over Philistia I shout in triumph.”
9 Who will bring me to the fortified city? Who will lead me to Edom?
10 Have you not rejected us, O God? You do not go out, O God, with our armies.
11 O grant us help against the foe, for human help is worthless.
12 With God we shall do valiantly; it is he who will tread down our foes.
(NRSV)
For the ancients wars and battles were waged from the heavens and the people involved were tokens and pieces in the game being played by the deities of the various nations. When one side was winning it was because their heavenly rulers were paying attention to the contest on the field of battle. The folks who were losing were being ignored or rejected by their divine warlord. The psalmist is aware that Israel is not doing well in this battle, so it must mean that they have been rejected for some fault of theirs. This psalm serves to remind God of promises of victory made to Israel against the surrounding nations and to ask how this victory can be achieved without the help of God.
While we no longer see war as a chess match pitting national deities against each other, we do find ourselves wondering where God is when our own lives, or the lives of our loved ones, are not going well. We wonder why God is allowing us to suffer, to go through this particular trial without divine help. As with the psalmists, we find ourselves asking these questions of God even as we wonder why God is not present for us. In one sense we answer a part of our own question by asking it of God. We have an awareness that God is around here somewhere, we simply have no idea where. As with children playing peek-a-boo to learn that people and things do not disappear when they are not seen, we learn that God is with us even when we don’t know where or how.
Some folks are content to believe that bad things happen to us, and especially to others, as punishment from God. Others see God as present in every situation, leading and guiding us forward through the trials of our lives, or at least being present to ache and cry and suffer alongside us. I can certainly appreciate the assurance that comes from knowing that God is in charge, making things happen in each one of our lives. I find much more comfort in God being with us in every situation, giving comfort and assurance and being present with us in every circumstance of our lives.
August 18, 2014
LCM manifold@lightbound.com
http://psalmmeditations.blogspot.com/
Monday, August 11, 2014
Psalm Meditation 739
Tenth Sunday of Ordinary Time
August 17, 2014
Psalm 110
1 The LORD says to my lord, “Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.”
2 The LORD sends out from Zion your mighty scepter. Rule in the midst of your foes.
3 Your people will offer themselves willingly on the day you lead your forces on the holy mountains. From the womb of the morning, like dew, your youth will come to you.
4 The LORD has sworn and will not change his mind, “You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.”
5 The Lord is at your right hand; he will shatter kings on the day of his wrath.
6 He will execute judgment among the nations, filling them with corpses; he will shatter heads over the wide earth.
7 He will drink from the stream by the path; therefore he will lift up his head.
(NRSV)
Knowing that God is willing and able to fight our battles for us can be a great source of comfort. To be able to sit back and watch the battle rage, knowing that victory is assured, can be pretty thrilling. The difficulty comes when we begin to believe that our enemies are also The enemies of God. In that case we see God as under our command, one we can send out to do our bidding no matter what the conflict. We then become arrogant and nasty as we know that we are unstoppable and unbeatable. Our giant can crush the heads of any and all who stand against us.
Fortunately, God is willing to stand with us when we oppressed, downtrodden and in the right. God is not at our beck and call so much as on the side of justice and righteousness. God is not a celestial bully or mercenary who fights on the side of the highest bidder. When God fights with us it continues to be a struggle for us as the opposing forces are strong, entrenched and convinced of the rightness of their position. My guess is that in most conflicts God has a place on each side. Most arguments, conflicts, battles and wars are made by folks who have a kernel of truth, justice and righteousness surrounded by self-justification, pettiness, scarcity thinking, arrogance and lust for power. God supports the justice and righteousness and joins the battle against the rest.
On every side of a conflict there are voices raised in a call for justice and righteousness. We want to ignore those voices since they fly in the face of our other reasons for this battle. Those voices call us to see and appreciate the personhood of those with whom we disagree. Those voices call us to move toward justice and righteousness even, and especially, when it means we do well to repent of the thoughts, words and actions that lead away from the justice and righteousness we claim to seek. Those voices call to turn to God.
August 11, 2014
LCM manifold@lightbound.com
http://psalmmeditations.blogspot.com/
Tenth Sunday of Ordinary Time
August 17, 2014
Psalm 110
1 The LORD says to my lord, “Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.”
2 The LORD sends out from Zion your mighty scepter. Rule in the midst of your foes.
3 Your people will offer themselves willingly on the day you lead your forces on the holy mountains. From the womb of the morning, like dew, your youth will come to you.
4 The LORD has sworn and will not change his mind, “You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.”
5 The Lord is at your right hand; he will shatter kings on the day of his wrath.
6 He will execute judgment among the nations, filling them with corpses; he will shatter heads over the wide earth.
7 He will drink from the stream by the path; therefore he will lift up his head.
(NRSV)
Knowing that God is willing and able to fight our battles for us can be a great source of comfort. To be able to sit back and watch the battle rage, knowing that victory is assured, can be pretty thrilling. The difficulty comes when we begin to believe that our enemies are also The enemies of God. In that case we see God as under our command, one we can send out to do our bidding no matter what the conflict. We then become arrogant and nasty as we know that we are unstoppable and unbeatable. Our giant can crush the heads of any and all who stand against us.
Fortunately, God is willing to stand with us when we oppressed, downtrodden and in the right. God is not at our beck and call so much as on the side of justice and righteousness. God is not a celestial bully or mercenary who fights on the side of the highest bidder. When God fights with us it continues to be a struggle for us as the opposing forces are strong, entrenched and convinced of the rightness of their position. My guess is that in most conflicts God has a place on each side. Most arguments, conflicts, battles and wars are made by folks who have a kernel of truth, justice and righteousness surrounded by self-justification, pettiness, scarcity thinking, arrogance and lust for power. God supports the justice and righteousness and joins the battle against the rest.
On every side of a conflict there are voices raised in a call for justice and righteousness. We want to ignore those voices since they fly in the face of our other reasons for this battle. Those voices call us to see and appreciate the personhood of those with whom we disagree. Those voices call us to move toward justice and righteousness even, and especially, when it means we do well to repent of the thoughts, words and actions that lead away from the justice and righteousness we claim to seek. Those voices call to turn to God.
August 11, 2014
LCM manifold@lightbound.com
http://psalmmeditations.blogspot.com/
Monday, August 4, 2014
Psalm Meditation 738
Ninth Sunday of Ordinary Time
August 10, 2014
Psalm 41
1 Happy are those who consider the poor; the LORD delivers them in the day of trouble.
2 The LORD protects them and keeps them alive; they are called happy in the land. You do not give them up to the will of their enemies.
3 The LORD sustains them on their sickbed; in their illness you heal all their infirmities.
4 As for me, I said, “O LORD, be gracious to me; heal me, for I have sinned against you.”
5 My enemies wonder in malice when I will die, and my name perish.
6 And when they come to see me, they utter empty words, while their hearts gather mischief; when they go out, they tell it abroad.
7 All who hate me whisper together about me; they imagine the worst for me.
8 They think that a deadly thing has fastened on me, that I will not rise again from where I lie.
9 Even my bosom friend in whom I trusted, who ate of my bread, has lifted the heel against me.
10 But you, O LORD, be gracious to me, and raise me up, that I may repay them.
11 By this I know that you are pleased with me; because my enemy has not triumphed over me.
12 But you have upheld me because of my integrity, and set me in your presence forever.
13 Blessed be the LORD, the God of Israel, from everlasting to everlasting.
Amen and Amen.
(NRSV)
Much of the gossip we share these days is somewhere between harmless and helpful, it is a way to share information about the folks around whom we live and work. There is another kind, the kind by which the psalmist has been victimized. This gossip has as its intent the destruction of the reputation of the one about whom the gossip is being spread. In this type of gossip folks gain the trust of their victim, get all sorts of dangerous and damaging information and then spread that information as widely as possible. The more damage that can be done to the person, the more successful the gossip campaign is seen.
The psalmist turns to the one who already knows all the same information about us and continues to love us and to want the very best and most abundant life possible for us. Yes, there is some vindictiveness in the psalmist’s desire to be raised up in order to repay the damage done by this gossip campaign. It is a great fantasy of those whose lives and reputations have been damaged to be able to inflict the same kind of hurt on those responsible. The deeper intent is to rise above the damage done by these folks and to live in the presence of God as a person of integrity.
God is gracious, lifts us up beyond our revenge fantasies and invites us to live in such a way that any gossip, even the most malicious, is ignored by those who know and love us. We find ourselves aiming toward God in the various parts of our lives, being more concerned about how God thinks of us than how others do and treating others more as God treats us than as any malicious bullies might treat us and those around us.
August 4, 2014
LCM
Ninth Sunday of Ordinary Time
August 10, 2014
Psalm 41
1 Happy are those who consider the poor; the LORD delivers them in the day of trouble.
2 The LORD protects them and keeps them alive; they are called happy in the land. You do not give them up to the will of their enemies.
3 The LORD sustains them on their sickbed; in their illness you heal all their infirmities.
4 As for me, I said, “O LORD, be gracious to me; heal me, for I have sinned against you.”
5 My enemies wonder in malice when I will die, and my name perish.
6 And when they come to see me, they utter empty words, while their hearts gather mischief; when they go out, they tell it abroad.
7 All who hate me whisper together about me; they imagine the worst for me.
8 They think that a deadly thing has fastened on me, that I will not rise again from where I lie.
9 Even my bosom friend in whom I trusted, who ate of my bread, has lifted the heel against me.
10 But you, O LORD, be gracious to me, and raise me up, that I may repay them.
11 By this I know that you are pleased with me; because my enemy has not triumphed over me.
12 But you have upheld me because of my integrity, and set me in your presence forever.
13 Blessed be the LORD, the God of Israel, from everlasting to everlasting.
Amen and Amen.
(NRSV)
Much of the gossip we share these days is somewhere between harmless and helpful, it is a way to share information about the folks around whom we live and work. There is another kind, the kind by which the psalmist has been victimized. This gossip has as its intent the destruction of the reputation of the one about whom the gossip is being spread. In this type of gossip folks gain the trust of their victim, get all sorts of dangerous and damaging information and then spread that information as widely as possible. The more damage that can be done to the person, the more successful the gossip campaign is seen.
The psalmist turns to the one who already knows all the same information about us and continues to love us and to want the very best and most abundant life possible for us. Yes, there is some vindictiveness in the psalmist’s desire to be raised up in order to repay the damage done by this gossip campaign. It is a great fantasy of those whose lives and reputations have been damaged to be able to inflict the same kind of hurt on those responsible. The deeper intent is to rise above the damage done by these folks and to live in the presence of God as a person of integrity.
God is gracious, lifts us up beyond our revenge fantasies and invites us to live in such a way that any gossip, even the most malicious, is ignored by those who know and love us. We find ourselves aiming toward God in the various parts of our lives, being more concerned about how God thinks of us than how others do and treating others more as God treats us than as any malicious bullies might treat us and those around us.
August 4, 2014
LCM
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