Psalm Meditation 1109 Proper 20 September 19, 2021 Psalm 22 1 My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from helping me, from the words of my groaning? 2 O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer; and by night, but find no rest. 3 Yet you are holy, enthroned on the praises of Israel. 4 In you our ancestors trusted; they trusted, and you delivered them. 5 To you they cried, and were saved; in you they trusted, and were not put to shame. 6 But I am a worm, and not human; scorned by others, and despised by the people. 7 All who see me mock at me; they make mouths at me, they shake their heads; 8 “Commit your cause to the Lord; let him deliver—let him rescue the one in whom he delights!” 9 Yet it was you who took me from the womb; you kept me safe on my mother’s breast. 10 On you I was cast from my birth, and since my mother bore me you have been my God. 11 Do not be far from me, for trouble is near and there is no one to help. 12 Many bulls encircle me, strong bulls of Bashan surround me; 13 they open wide their mouths at me, like a ravening and roaring lion. 14 I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint; my heart is like wax; it is melted within my breast; 15 my mouth is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue sticks to my jaws; you lay me in the dust of death. 16 For dogs are all around me; a company of evildoers encircles me. My hands and feet have shriveled; 17 I can count all my bones. They stare and gloat over me; 18 they divide my clothes among themselves, and for my clothing they cast lots. 19 But you, O Lord, do not be far away! O my help, come quickly to my aid! 20 Deliver my soul from the sword, my life from the power of the dog! 21 Save me from the mouth of the lion! From the horns of the wild oxen you have rescued me. 22 I will tell of your name to my brothers and sisters; in the midst of the congregation I will praise you: 23 You who fear the Lord, praise him! All you offspring of Jacob, glorify him; stand in awe of him, all you offspring of Israel! 24 For he did not despise or abhor the affliction of the afflicted; he did not hide his face from me, but heard when I cried to him. 25 From you comes my praise in the great congregation; my vows I will pay before those who fear him. 26 The poor shall eat and be satisfied; those who seek him shall praise the Lord. May your hearts live forever! 27 All the ends of the earth shall remember and turn to the Lord; and all the families of the nations shall worship before him. 28 For dominion belongs to the Lord, and he rules over the nations. 29 To him, indeed, shall all who sleep in the earth bow down; before him shall bow all who go down to the dust, and I shall live for him. 30 Posterity will serve him; future generations will be told about the Lord, 31 and proclaim his deliverance to a people yet unborn, saying that he has done it. (NRSV) ¶An old joke that resurfaces from time to time: a couple gets an evacuation order for potential flooding and says they trust God to watch over them and do nothing. As the flooding begins a police car comes by and offers to take them out, again they say that God will watch over them and do nothing. As the waters rise a rescue boat comes and offers them a ride out. ‘Thanks, God will watch over us.’ They stay in the house though they have moved to the upper floor. When the water has forced them on to the roof a helicopter comes to rescue them and they refuse that route as well. They drown. As they stand before God they complain that they trusted God and they were not saved. God responds, “I sent you an evacuation order, a car, a boat, and a helicopter, what more did you want?” ¶All of that to remind us that it may not be that the psalmist is being forsaken by God as the psalmist is ignoring the normal and natural ways that God works in our lives. There are times we feel as if we are drowning only to discover that the water comes up to our waist or knees. People do drown in very shallow water so I do not cast any blame on them in the panic state in which they find themselves. I do know that things are not always as they seem, and if we can keep our wits about us, God is at work in our lives in ways that will not seem miraculous as we tell the story to future generations. ¶The trajectory of this psalm begins with feeling forsaken, goes back and forth from praise to a new trouble and ends in a word of praise. The fact that the psalmist addresses God offers a word of hope from the beginning. The psalmist then stays in touch with God as new calamities pile on, trusting the presence of God to make in difference in the lives of the psalmist and the people of the congregation. What begins as a complaint moves to a word and sense of hope. The ending redefines the beginning as a request for assurance rather than as a complaint against God’s abandonment of the psalmist and us. “All the ends of the earth shall remember and turn to the Lord; and all the families of the nations shall worship before him.” ¶September 13, 2021 LCM

Psalm Meditation 1108 Proper 19 September 12, 2021 Psalm 97 1 The Lord is king! Let the earth rejoice; let the many coastlands be glad! 2 Clouds and thick darkness are all around him; righteousness and justice are the foundation of his throne. 3 Fire goes before him, and consumes his adversaries on every side. 4 His lightnings light up the world; the earth sees and trembles. 5 The mountains melt like wax before the Lord, before the Lord of all the earth. 6 The heavens proclaim his righteousness; and all the peoples behold his glory. 7 All worshipers of images are put to shame, those who make their boast in worthless idols; all gods bow down before him. 8 Zion hears and is glad, and the towns of Judah rejoice, because of your judgments, O God. 9 For you, O Lord, are most high over all the earth; you are exalted far above all gods. 10 The Lord loves those who hate evil; he guards the lives of his faithful; he rescues them from the hand of the wicked. 11 Light dawns for the righteous, and joy for the upright in heart. 12 Rejoice in the Lord, O you righteous, and give thanks to his holy name! (NRSV) ¶Verse 10 has an alternate translation in the notes, “You who love the Lord hate evil.” It is the two sides of one coin. God’s love is showered on those who hate evil, and those who love God also hate evil. God’s love comes first. It is our whole reason for being. We are born out of God’s love to give it a focus and object. The loneliness of God from the creation story in Genesis rises out of the desire of God to have a focus for all of the love that God has to offer. ¶The alternate reading puts some responsibility on each of us. We can hold opposing views, even loves, in our lives, though we do have to choose a priority that will shift and change from time to time. When we find ourselves loving God, we find that we are opposed to evil. When we turn to evil we either have to redefine God in our image or turn away all together. With either reading the psalmist points us to the love of God as more lasting than the love of and participation in evil. ¶‘The Lord loves those who hate evil,’ can be seen as a limit to God’s love. I believe that God loves each and all of us, so this statement is not a limit on God as much as a limit on our ability/willingness to experience God’s love in our lives. When our hearts turn to evil, God gets crowded out and ignored rather than hated. No matter what, God loves us. “The heavens proclaim his righteousness; and all the peoples behold his glory.” September 6, 2021 LCM

Psalm Meditation 1107 Proper 18 September 5, 2021 Psalm 71 1 In you, O Lord, I take refuge; let me never be put to shame. 2 In your righteousness deliver me and rescue me; incline your ear to me and save me. 3 Be to me a rock of refuge, a strong fortress, to save me, for you are my rock and my fortress. 4 Rescue me, O my God, from the hand of the wicked, from the grasp of the unjust and cruel. 5 For you, O Lord, are my hope, my trust, O Lord, from my youth. 6 Upon you I have leaned from my birth; it was you who took me from my mother’s womb. My praise is continually of you. 7 I have been like a portent to many, but you are my strong refuge. 8 My mouth is filled with your praise, and with your glory all day long. 9 Do not cast me off in the time of old age; do not forsake me when my strength is spent. 10 For my enemies speak concerning me, and those who watch for my life consult together. 11 They say, “Pursue and seize that person whom God has forsaken, for there is no one to deliver.” 12 O God, do not be far from me; O my God, make haste to help me! 13 Let my accusers be put to shame and consumed; let those who seek to hurt me be covered with scorn and disgrace. 14 But I will hope continually, and will praise you yet more and more. 15 My mouth will tell of your righteous acts, of your deeds of salvation all day long, though their number is past my knowledge. 16 I will come praising the mighty deeds of the Lord God, I will praise your righteousness, yours alone. 17 O God, from my youth you have taught me, and I still proclaim your wondrous deeds. 18 So even to old age and gray hairs, O God, do not forsake me, until I proclaim your might to all the generations to come. Your power 19 and your righteousness, O God, reach the high heavens. You who have done great things, O God, who is like you? 20 You who have made me see many troubles and calamities will revive me again; from the depths of the earth you will bring me up again. 21 You will increase my honor, and comfort me once again. 22 I will also praise you with the harp for your faithfulness, O my God; I will sing praises to you with the lyre, O Holy One of Israel. 23 My lips will shout for joy when I sing praises to you; my soul also, which you have rescued. 24 All day long my tongue will talk of your righteous help, for those who tried to do me harm have been put to shame, and disgraced. (NRSV) ¶A portent is a warning about the future, a sign of something about to happen, usually something bad. For the psalmist to be a portent means that folks have pointed and said, ‘See that person? You don’t want to be like that or you will end up in the same spot.’ Or, folks use this terrible looking person to emphasize an unrelated lesson, ‘See that? I bet that person never ate vegetables as a child, and look what happened.’ A portent may or may not be an accurate description of a person; still, no one wants to be one. ¶The psalmist continues that through all the hardships that have led to this place, God has been present as a source of comfort in every time and place. The psalmist replies, ‘Yes, I may look as if I wear the consequences of bad choices on my body, however, I believe that my life would have been a lot worse if it had not been for the presence of God. I believe that you, O God, will lift me up to a place of honor and comfort in the end.’ ¶Some of us are born with silver spoons in our mouths while others are born into hardship and trial. While it can be tempting to believe that it is the rich and influential who have God’s favor, the Scriptures tell us repeatedly that the heart of God has an honored place for the poor and needy. The psalm ends with the reminder, the portent, that those who make light of the poor and needy will themselves be put to shame and disgraced. August 30, 2021 LCM

Psalm Meditation 1106 Proper 17 August 29, 2021 Psalm 146 1 Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord, O my soul! 2 I will praise the Lord as long as I live; I will sing praises to my God all my life long. 3 Do not put your trust in princes, in mortals, in whom there is no help. 4 When their breath departs, they return to the earth; on that very day their plans perish. 5 Happy are those whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord their God, 6 who made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them; who keeps faith forever; 7 who executes justice for the oppressed; who gives food to the hungry. The Lord sets the prisoners free; 8 the Lord opens the eyes of the blind. The Lord lifts up those who are bowed down; the Lord loves the righteous. 9 The Lord watches over the strangers; he upholds the orphan and the widow, but the way of the wicked he brings to ruin. 10 The Lord will reign forever, your God, O Zion, for all generations. Praise the Lord! (NRSV) Most of us don’t know who drew our dividing lines, however we are sure which side we have chosen as our own. We will put our trust in the prince/princess who keeps our toes on our chosen line and rallies us against everyone else. Those who have made any other choice are not simply different, they are wrong. If our prince/princess wavers even slightly from the prescribed line they run the risk of being pushed aside in favor of the next one who will give us what we want to hear. There are times in which our lines are drawn in the sand, they are flexible, changeable, able to give and take with some fluidity. Other times our lines are set in stone and they do not give at all. We would rather lose friends and former compatriots than see our crisply drawn line change even slightly. We will take our disagreement to a dangerous and deadly conclusion rather than change our minds or our behavior. The psalmist invites us to put our trust in God rather than in a set of arguments that have no flex or give. The way of God leads to hope, faith, justice, freedom, and vision for all just to name a few. All of these are for each person and are not confined to our group alone. The way of God offers a place for each and all, a place of honor and respect. Even those whose plans and paths are ruined will find shelter in the love of God. August 23, 2021 LCM

Psalm Meditation 1105 Proper 16 August 22, 2021 Psalm 46 1 God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. 2 Therefore we will not fear, though the earth should change, though the mountains shake in the heart of the sea; 3 though its waters roar and foam, though the mountains tremble with its tumult. Selah 4 There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy habitation of the Most High. 5 God is in the midst of the city; it shall not be moved; God will help it when the morning dawns. 6 The nations are in an uproar, the kingdoms totter; he utters his voice, the earth melts. 7 The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge. Selah 8 Come, behold the works of the Lord; see what desolations he has brought on the earth. 9 He makes wars cease to the end of the earth; he breaks the bow, and shatters the spear; he burns the shields with fire. 10 “Be still, and know that I am God! I am exalted among the nations, I am exalted in the earth.” 11 The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge. Selah (NRSV) There are situations in which it is impossible to be still. There are times of great joy that need to be shouted from the rooftops, there are times of sadness that need to be wailed from the depths of our souls, there are times of rage that need to be raged wherever we are. These are but a few of the triumphs and traumas that are not meant to be held in or suffered in silence. These are not the times, places, situations in which we are to “Be still, and know that I am God!” After we have expressed our joy, sadness, or rage, when we are sitting exhausted from the height and depth of our emotion, we can experience the presence of God in the stillness. When we sense that God is with us in the stillness, we can trace that presence back into our emotional experience as well. We can see, we can know that God is no stranger to heights and depth of emotion, that God is with us no matter what. From the stillness we learn that YHWH, the Lord, is with us in every time and place as a refuge. God as our refuge is not a hiding place, tempting as it can be to hide from the world in God. God is a refuge who calls us into the world secure in the knowledge that we are not alone, that we are never abandoned, that we have gifts to give to and receive from the world in which we live. Even as nations are in an uproar and realms totter, God is with us, inviting us to “Be still, and know that I am God!” August 16, 2021 LCM

Psalm Meditation 1104 Proper 15 August 15, 2021 Psalm 121 1 I lift up my eyes to the hills—from where will my help come? 2 My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth. 3 He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber. 4 He who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. 5 The Lord is your keeper; the Lord is your shade at your right hand. 6 The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night. 7 The Lord will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life. 8 The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in from this time on and forevermore. (NRSV) In the midst of a difficult trial we may find ourselves wondering how we will ever get out of this one. We fret, worry, and forget about all the resources that are at our disposal. We stare off into space, lost in the worry, consumed by the stresses and strains of our current situation. Once we have stewed over it for a while, we begin to seek solutions to our difficulty. At some point we realize that this is going to take more energy than we can muster alone. We may consider the resources our friends have available and wonder if they would be willing to help out. This is where we join the psalmist in the realization that whatever help we may receive, it comes from God. We have the gifts of friends, family, and in some cases strangers who will offer the resources at their disposal to help us out of the situation in which we find ourselves. God is an always available source of help. Depending on the need, we might receive the help directly from God. Most of the time the help comes in the form of people who are open to God’s leading, and who have probably been in a desperate situation or two themselves. Whether the situation works out the way we want it to or not, we can live in the assurance that we have received the help of God. August 10, 2021 LCM

Psalm Meditation 1103 Tenth Sunday of Ordinary Time August 8, 2021 Psalm 21 1 In your strength the king rejoices, O Lord, and in your help how greatly he exults! 2 You have given him his heart’s desire, and have not withheld the request of his lips. Selah 3 For you meet him with rich blessings; you set a crown of fine gold on his head. 4 He asked you for life; you gave it to him—length of days forever and ever. 5 His glory is great through your help; splendor and majesty you bestow on him. 6 You bestow on him blessings forever; you make him glad with the joy of your presence. 7 For the king trusts in the Lord, and through the steadfast love of the Most High he shall not be moved. 8 Your hand will find out all your enemies; your right hand will find out those who hate you. 9 You will make them like a fiery furnace when you appear. The Lord will swallow them up in his wrath, and fire will consume them. 10 You will destroy their offspring from the earth, and their children from among humankind. 11 If they plan evil against you, if they devise mischief, they will not succeed. 12 For you will put them to flight; you will aim at their faces with your bows. 13 Be exalted, O Lord, in your strength! We will sing and praise your power. (NRSV) We would like to have God at our beck and call, to give us our heart’s desire, give us cool stuff, and set fire to all of our enemies and their children. The psalmist tells us that this is how God treats the king of Israel. It is in the Bible, we have to believe that it is true, right? You can if you like, however chances are that the psalmist is celebrating a one time victory and taking it as a sign that God will continue to do these great things for the king, probably David. Having God on our instant contacts sounds pretty cool until we think what it would be like to have God able to contact us instantly and directly. Every time we gave even the slightest thought to turning from God we would get a text reminding us how much you are loved and what a bad idea our considered course of action would be. It is great to think about but probably not much fun in reality. It is no fun to realize that for many of us our daily lives are out of sync with God. It is good to know that God is interested and involved in our lives, that God loves us and wants what it best for us. It can be annoying to realize that what is best for us may not be what we would wish or hope for. We do well to live our lives as best we can, know that we are not always in accord with the ways of God, and be grateful for the forgiveness that God offers to us because we are both flawed and loved; all in the same package. August 2, 2021 LCM