Psalm Meditation 666
Palm/Passion Sunday
March 24, 2013

Psalm 147
1 Praise the LORD! How good it is to sing praises to our God; for he is gracious, and a song of praise is fitting.
2 The LORD builds up Jerusalem; he gathers the outcasts of Israel.
3 He heals the brokenhearted, and binds up their wounds.
4 He determines the number of the stars; he gives to all of them their names.
5 Great is our Lord, and abundant in power; his understanding is beyond measure.
6 The LORD lifts up the downtrodden; he casts the wicked to the ground.
7 Sing to the LORD with thanksgiving; make melody to our God on the lyre.
8 He covers the heavens with clouds, prepares rain for the earth, makes grass grow on the hills.
9 He gives to the animals their food, and to the young ravens when they cry.
10 His delight is not in the strength of the horse, nor his pleasure in the speed of a runner;
11 but the LORD takes pleasure in those who fear him, in those who hope in his steadfast love.
12 Praise the LORD, O Jerusalem! Praise your God, O Zion!
13 For he strengthens the bars of your gates; he blesses your children within you.
14 He grants peace within your borders; he fills you with the finest of wheat.
15 He sends out his command to the earth; his word runs swiftly.
16 He gives snow like wool; he scatters frost like ashes.
17 He hurls down hail like crumbs— who can stand before his cold?
18 He sends out his word, and melts them; he makes his wind blow, and the waters flow.
19 He declares his word to Jacob, his statutes and ordinances to Israel.
20 He has not dealt thus with any other nation; they do not know his ordinances. Praise the LORD!
(NRSV)

Praise the Lord. It is a simple three word sentence that could take all of our time and energy if we were to live out those three simple words. The psalmist gives many reasons to offer praise, the one that caught my eye this time, is that God lifts up the downtrodden and casts the wicked to the ground. It would be nice if the distinction between the downtrodden and the wicked were a simple matter of dividing people into those two groups so that one group could be lifted up and the other group could be taken down a peg. While we have our own lists of people who need to be lifted up and the ones we would like to seen taken down, it is probably not as simple as it looks.

Each of us has a place of insecurity, a place that could use a lift from God. It is the place where we hold our fears and doubts, a touch of anger at the way things have not gone according to our own plans and hopes. It is the place that holds us back from being the person we always hoped we would be. God offers to lift us up from that sense of being held down by both internal and external influences on our life plans.

Each of us has a place of drive and ambition that encourages us to push people out of the way so that we can achieve our own goals, even if it means denying others the desires of their hearts. Our dreams may be fueled by the very fears that keep others from pursuing theirs. God offers to throw down the ambitions that do damage to others through a disregard of their needs and wants.

God lifts up the downtrodden pieces of our lives and gives them back to us filled with new sense of hope. God casts down the pieces of our lives that do damage to others and gives them back to us with a new sense of community. God is worthy of praise as the one who helps us sort out our lives in a way that builds up what needs building and tears down what needs to be reworked. With the psalmist, Praise the LORD!

March 18, 2013
LCM manifold@lightbound.com
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