Psalm Meditation 861
Fourth Sunday of Advent
December 18, 2016

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)

Most of us don’t know what it is to be poor so we have no sympathy for those who live in poverty. Popular wisdom is that those who are poor must have done something to bring this on themselves. Because of that the best course of action is to stand at a safe distance and counsel them to get jobs and education so that they can be just like us. In most cases, though, folks who are poor are caught in a systemic web of blocks and obstacles that keep them in the poverty to which they have been consigned. The psalmist tells us that this is not the way of God.

God calls us to consider the poor. To consider the plight of those relegated to a status of ‘other,’ people who are shuffled off and ignored. God asks us to work with individuals at the same time we are working to change the systems that keep segments of the population in poverty and on the brink of despair. As we consider those whose place is on the fringes of society and culture we become aware of the variety of ways people are helped and hurt by the current order of things.

The psalmist may have become ill due, in part, to ignoring the plight of the poor in general or a particular victim of poverty. Either way, we have the assurance that God is with us when we pay attention to those in poverty and will attend to us when we confess our sin in hopes of turning toward God and the people of God’s favor.

December 12, 2016
LCM