Psalm 135

The idols of the nations are silver and gold,
the work of human hands.
They have mouths, but they do not speak;
they have eyes, but they do not see;
they have ears, but they do not hear,
and there is no breath in their mouths.
Those who make them
and all who trust them
shall become like them.

We hear God if we will listen.

We see God if we are willing to look carefully.

We worship God in what we say and how we say it.

We fulfill God's intention by what we do.

In living fully we come to know God.

Psalm 135

Psalm 130

I wait for the Lord, my soul waits,
and in his word I hope;
my soul waits for the Lord
more than those who watch for the morning,
more than those who watch for the morning.

The Hebrew translated above as "wait" is קָוָה or qavah.

Especially for this setting of the psalm, wait is the right translation.

But qavah can also mean to collect, to bind together, or to gather.

This is how we are to wait for the Lord, by binding together that which has been separated.

Psalm 130

Psalm 126

Restore our fortunes, O Lord,
like the watercourses in the Negeb.
May those who sow in tears
reap with shouts of joy.
Those who go out weeping,
bearing the seed for sowing,
shall come home with shouts of joy,
carrying their sheaves.

The streams of the Negev desert are restored seasonally, but most of the year are bone dry.

I often seek to abstract scripture's meaning, but in this case the use of "restore our fortune" is misleading.

"Redeem our captivity" is closer to the intended meaning. Those who were exiled in Babylon seek restoration.

Those of us lost, separated, dry, and nearly dead ask to be rejoined with the life-giving abundance of God.

As rain in the desert causes a sudden profusion of life, restore me O God.

Psalm 126

Psalm 106

Happy are those who observe justice,
who do righteousness at all times.

אַשְׁרֵי, שֹׁמְרֵי מִשְׁפָּט; עֹשֵׂה צְדָקָה בְכָל-עֵת.

Those who perpetually guard the community's sources of discovery, creativity, and care, those who constantly celebrate individual creativity and wholeness, and those who themselves practice creativity and wholeness will walk straight and make good progress.

Psalm 106

Psalm 145

The Lord is gracious and merciful,
slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.
The Lord is good to all,
and his compassion is over all that he has made.

חַנּוּן וְרַחוּם יְהוָה; אֶרֶךְ אַפַּיִם, וּגְדָל-חָסֶד.

The One Who Exists inclines toward us, abides with us and loves us,
is patient, and constantly growing in goodness and kindness.

טוֹב-יְהוָה לַכֹּל; וְרַחֲמָיו, עַל-כָּל-מַעֲשָׂיו.

Being, Becoming, Abiding is wholly pleasant, joyful, and good,
and this reality is the womb from which all unfolds.

(My own translation of the original Hebrew)

Psalm 145

Psalm 33

Rejoice in the Lord, O you righteous.
Praise befits the upright.
Praise the Lord with the lyre;
make melody to him with the harp of ten strings.
Sing to him a new song;
play skilfully on the strings, with loud shouts.
For the word of the Lord is upright,
and all his work is done in faithfulness.
He loves righteousness and justice;
the earth is full of the steadfast love of the Lord.

This is not the best of all possible worlds, but God has given us the best possibilities. We are free to choose among the possibilities.

Candide suffers from his own foolishness, the vanity, avarice, and worse of others, and from the unfolding of nature.

In giving thanks - exuberantly and often - for what we have been given we are encouraged to be mindful of all that is possible if we would join God in cultivating faithfulness, righteousness, and justice.

The image is an illustration from Candide by Catherine Edlinger-Kunze.

Psalm 33

Psalm 107

Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble,
and he saved them from their distress;
he brought them out of darkness and gloom,
and broke their bonds asunder.
Let them thank the Lord for his steadfast love,
for his wonderful works to humankind.

Some may perceive that my God is distant and detached.

There is more than a whiff of deism and deus ex machina, I will admit.

But in my own experience God is always present. The "close-at-hand" of Jesus is literally true both physically and spiritually.

God respects creation too much to undo the laws by which nature unfolds. God honors us with the gift of freedom.

But God is entirely ready to help us better know the laws and choose wisely.

Psalm 107

Psalm 105

He sent darkness, and made the land dark;
they rebelled against his words.
He turned their waters into blood,
and caused their fish to die.
Their land swarmed with frogs,
even in the chambers of their kings.
He spoke, and there came swarms of flies,
and gnats throughout their country.
He gave them hail for rain,
and lightning that flashed through their land.
He struck their vines and fig trees,
and shattered the trees of their country.
He spoke, and the locusts came,
and young locusts without number;
they devoured all the vegetation in their land,
and ate up the fruit of their ground.
He struck down all the firstborn in their land,
the first issue of all their strength.

Is this how God behaves?

Was the Tuscaloosa tornado designed to persuade some and free others?

Was the earthquake-and-tsunami in Japan intended to awaken us to God's purpose?

Is the continuing misery in Haiti divine judgment for our discernment?

The random complexity of nature and free will of humankind can each produce terrible outcomes. There may be meaning to be found. But I do not expect to find specific divine intent. I have experienced God-with-me in the midst of pain. I have never found God to be the cause of pain.

Psalm 105

Psalm 119

I have done what is just and right;
do not leave me to my oppressors.
Guarantee your servant’s well-being;
do not let the godless oppress me...
Trouble and anguish have come upon me,
but your commandments are my delight.
Your decrees are righteous for ever;
give me understanding that I may live.

If I have not done what is just and right, how might God's guarantee, surety, pledge on my behalf be executed?

I see nothing in scripture or experience or (most)tradition that suggests God guarantees everyday well-being... mine or others.

Instead I see a God who is with us in trouble, inspires hope in oppression, and cultivates a very realistic understanding of good and evil.

In the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus we may perceive a guarantee of ultimate well-being, but this is not what the psalmist seems to seek.

Psalm 119 is a long litany of complaint, defensive justification, and asking for vengeance, but from this eventually unfolds, "Give me understanding that I might live."

God will work with us to cultivate discernment, understanding, and wisdom. God is not a lucky charm.

Psalm 119

The image is God answering Job by William Blake.

Psalm 94

O Lord, you God of vengeance,
you God of vengeance, shine forth!
Rise up, O judge of the earth;
give to the proud what they deserve!

What does it mean to take vengeance?

The Hebrew is נָקַם or naqam which is to avenge, have vengeance, and to take revenge. No other English words are suggested.

The English words emerge from French derived from the Latin vindicare.

The Latin means to lay claim, as a legal owner might lay claim to property seized by another. It is also the term used to free slaves. Vindicare is to make right what has gone wrong, to protect against false claims, and to clarify.

When the Romans sought revenge -- as they often did -- they would speak of vimdicta, meaning to speak or show authority.

I expect the psalmist was asking God to punish his enemies.

But God's vengeance, God's authority, God's claim surely extends to all those enslaved by self-serving sinfulness.

Psalm 94

Psalm 89

How long, O Lord? Will you hide yourself for ever?
How long will your wrath burn like fire?

The psalmist perceives that God chose and then abandoned David.

I perceive we are each chosen to participate in God's creation and abundance.

I perceive we are each likely to suffer, as Jesus suffered.

Even if we have done no wrong we are likely to suffer, as Jesus suffered.

Moreover, I have often done wrong and have not been made to suffer.

God causes the sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.

Rather than look for wrath, we ought look for love and give thanks.

Psalm 89

Psalm 111

Great are the works of the Lord,
studied by all who delight in them.
Full of honour and majesty is his work,
and his righteousness endures for ever.
He has gained renown by his wonderful deeds;
the Lord is gracious and merciful...
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom;
all those who practise it have a good understanding.

Many churches celebrate today as Trinity Sunday.

I am not much of a Trinitarian, but slowly over the years I have come to appreciate the doctrine as positively articulating the mystery of God.

I experience the active influence of an eternal, cosmos creating, still creating, source of fundamental and ultimate reality.

I perceive that God is one, but a complex singularity far beyond my accurate comprehension or specific explanation.

Trying to make sense of even three moving parts is sufficiently complicated to suggest the fullness of God.

Psalm 111

Psalm 136

O give thanks to the Lord, for he is good,
for his steadfast love endures for ever.
O give thanks to the God of gods,
for his steadfast love endures for ever.
O give thanks to the Lord of lords,
for his steadfast love endures for ever;

God is good. See טוֹב or towb.

God is beautiful, bountiful, joyful, generous, gracious, happy, ripe, sweet, and wise.

God intends for us to be good.

Psalm 136

Psalm 88

For my soul is full of troubles,
and my life draws near to Sheol.
I am counted among those who go down to the Pit;
I am like those who have no help,
like those forsaken among the dead,
like the slain that lie in the grave,
like those whom you remember no more,
for they are cut off from your hand.

This is not my current condition, but I identify with the psalmist.

At least five times in my life I have felt forsaken and entirely lost.

I carry the wounds of these times, I will suddenly awake drenched in sweat each scar sharp in painful memory.

In each case the path that brought me out of the pit has been unexpected, entirely beyond prediction. Even in retrospect I am amazed to have found it and how it brought me out.

Each path has had its own character: one narrow, another broad; one dark and itself frightening, another dappled in light beside a glittering cascade of water; two of the paths have been straight and steep, three have been so maze-like and winding that I was long unaware of even being on an ascending path.

What all five paths have shared is the companionship of fellow-travelers who helped me find and continue on the path and the opportunity for co-creation. It is through our relationships and our creating that pits are filled and mountains are climbed.

Psalm 88

Psalm 85

Steadfast love and faithfulness will meet;
righteousness and peace will kiss each other.
Faithfulness will spring up from the ground,
and righteousness will look down from the sky.

Another translation offers: "Lovingkindness and truth have met together."

What makes each of us unique will kiss that which fulfills us in community.

That which is certain and that which is complex will be joined.

We are made whole by embracing what can seem our opposite.

Psalm 85

Psalm 81

Sing aloud to God our strength;
shout for joy to the God of Jacob.
Raise a song, sound the tambourine,
the sweet lyre with the harp.
Blow the trumpet at the new moon,
at the full moon, on our festal day.

Today is the full moon.

I have no tambourine or trumpet at hand.

But I can shout for joy, I can sing.

Mostly I should listen, listen carefully...

Seeking and walking the way of God.

Psalm 81

Psalm 78

He sent among them swarms of flies, which devoured them,
and frogs, which destroyed them.
He gave their crops to the caterpillar,
and the fruit of their labour to the locust.
He destroyed their vines with hail,
and their sycomores with frost.
He gave over their cattle to the hail,
and their flocks to thunderbolts.
He let loose on them his fierce anger,
wrath, indignation, and distress,
a company of destroying angels.

I have tried to interpret "He" out of the scripture, but I cannot.

Swarms of flies, caterpillar, locust, hail and more still trouble us.

In today's troubles I perceive nature and randomness, not a purposeful and punishing God.

At the close of the psalm we read, "With upright heart he tended them,and guided them with skilful hand."

Can we have God in one place and not the other? I hope so.

Psalm 78

Psalm 77

I cry aloud to God,
aloud to God, that he may hear me.
In the day of my trouble I seek the Lord;
in the night my hand is stretched out without wearying;
my soul refuses to be comforted.
I think of God, and I moan;
I meditate, and my spirit faints.
You keep my eyelids from closing;
I am so troubled that I cannot speak.

I slept soundly last night, ten hours in all.

But there have been -- will be -- times such as that described by the psalmist.

There have been -- will be -- times when I refuse to be comforted.

The kind of comfort referenced is interesting. In Hebrew it is נָחם or racham.

In scripture racham is found most frequently in Jeremiah. There God is relenting from punishment or humankind is repenting of wrongdoing. Comfort is a form of self-restraint.

Every third day I choose a picture to illustrate these meditations. Typically I take one of the key words and see what pictures are offered. Today's Google search mostly offered a range of pictures that represent the opposite of self-restraint. Self-restraint can be silly or even self-loathing (see above). But our culture's encouragement to self-indulgence may suggest why we are so often in need of comfort.

Concretely racham means to sigh or take a deep breath.

Psalm 77

Psalm 145

The Lord is gracious and merciful,
slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.
The Lord is good to all,
and his compassion is over all that he has made.

The English word compassion is a Latin compound meaning to have passion with, together, and completely.

In modern English passion is any strong emotion, especially associated with sexual feeling. The Latin is derived from the Greek pathos which is any experience or emotion, but especially of suffering.

The shift in tone from suffering to sexuality strikes me as reflective of a shift in cultural preoccupation.

The Hebrew from which this Greek-Latin-English complex unfolds is רחם or racham. Prior to Isaiah scriptural use of racham is infrequent. In Isaiah it is a divine attitude or action that suggests mercy, pity, and common cause.

I am in need of your compassion dear God.

Psalm 145

Psalm 108

My heart is steadfast, O God, my heart is steadfast;
I will sing and make melody.
Awake, my soul!

My soul, my essential self, the self created of God may be steadfast.

But my physical, intellectual, and emotional selves are uncertain, confused, and inconsistent.

Through singing I can sometimes allow my soul to command my being.

Psalm 108

Psalm 107

Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble,
and he saved them from their distress;
he sent out his word and healed them,
and delivered them from destruction.
Let them thank the Lord for his steadfast love,
for his wonderful works to humankind.
And let them offer thanksgiving sacrifices,
and tell of his deeds with songs of joy.

When in trouble I cry to the Lord.

I ask for help, inspiration, and insight.

I expect transformation but I do not expect God, alone, to transform.

I seek the spirit of God to inform and guide me in how I might work with God and my neighbors to transform the situation.

While I can tell of God's deeds with songs of joy, perhaps I have also sought to limit God's wonderful works.

Psalm 107

Psalm 105

Then he brought Israel out with silver and gold,
and there was no one among their tribes who stumbled.
Egypt was glad when they departed,
for dread of them had fallen upon it.
He spread a cloud for a covering,
and fire to give light by night.
They asked, and he brought quails,
and gave them food from heaven in abundance.
He opened the rock, and water gushed out;
it flowed through the desert like a river.
For he remembered his holy promise,
and Abraham, his servant.

Psalm 105 is a quick summary of a good part of Genesis and most of Exodus.

It is an optimist's summary, emphasizing the good bits and leaving out the bad.

The psalm is not untrue but it is far from the whole truth of forty years in the wilderness.

God cares and God redeems, God brings us out of oppression into abundance.

But along the way we make bad choices and experience tough consequences.

Psalm 105

Psalm 119

Trouble and anguish have come upon me,
but your commandments are my delight.
Your decrees are righteous for ever;
give me understanding that I may live.

Understanding will not save us from trouble and anguish.

But understanding is crucial to being fully alive.

With discernment I breath deeply.

Psalm 110

Psalm 95

O come, let us sing to the Lord;
let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation!
Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving;
let us make a joyful noise to him with songs of praise!

We are loved.

We are called to abundance.

We are transformed by thanksgiving.

Through giving thanks we discover who and what we are.

In giving thanks we affirm and strengthen our relationship with God.

Psalm 95

Psalm 89

But now you have spurned and rejected him;
you are full of wrath against your anointed.
You have renounced the covenant with your servant;
you have defiled his crown in the dust.
You have broken through all his walls;
you have laid his strongholds in ruins.

The psalm is accusing God of departing from David.

I have departed and been distracted from God.

I have in real ways spurned and rejected God.

I have built up walls of self-sufficiency and strongholds of pride that separate me from God.

But again and again I have found that with slightest invitation, God has broken through these walls and thrown down these strongholds.

Psalm 89

Psalm 46

There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
the holy habitation of the Most High.

Saint John of the Cross, native of near-desert Spain, celebrates the spiritual potential of arid solitude.

Hildegaard of Bingen, native of the lush Rhine valley, celebrates the spirit's moist verdancy.

But whatever the beauty of creation, we worship the creator, not creation.

We may be reminded of God by creation. We are certainly sustained by God's creation. In our relationship with creation there are many analogues for our relationship with God.

But we are called to continue upstream to find and know the source of the river.

Psalm 46

Psalm 136

O give thanks to the Lord, for he is good,
for his steadfast love endures for ever.
O give thanks to the God of gods,
for his steadfast love endures for ever.
O give thanks to the Lord of lords,
for his steadfast love endures for ever;

הוֹדוּ לַיהוָה כִּי-טוֹב: כִּי לְעוֹלָם חַסְדּוֹ.

The Hebrew חַסְדּ or chesed can be translated as love, mercy, compassion, faithfulness, kindness, and lovingkindness.

The English suffix -ness is applied to adjectives, such as kindly, to produce what is called an abstract noun. This implies a general quality or state.

In Hebrew the word is earthy, complicated, and action-oriented. It is derived from a verb to love, to be kind, to be empathetic.

Somehow in English the word becomes philosophically pristine and distant, still complicated, but as an intellectual problem rather than as perpetual action-in-relationship.

Psalm 136

The image is Landscape of Chesed, the artist is unknown.

Psalm 91

Because you have made the Lord your refuge,
the Most High your dwelling-place,
no evil shall befall you,
no scourge come near your tent.
For he will command his angels concerning you
to guard you in all your ways.
On their hands they will bear you up,
so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.

This is not true.

Evil comes to the righteous, the godly are scourged, the blessed of God have been tortured and killed in their millions.

Later in the same psalm it is written, "When they call to me, I will answer them; I will be with them in trouble, I will rescue them and honour them."

God is with us in trouble. God mourns with us. If we seek God there is an opportunity to redeem our troubles through love.

Psalm 91

Psalm 24

Lift up your heads, O gates!
and be lifted up, O ancient doors!
that the King of glory may come in.
Who is this King of glory?
The Lord of hosts,
he is the King of glory.

Gates exclude and welcome.

Doors may be barred, but they are meant to open.

The Hebrew for gates is derived from the same verb meaning to think, to calculate, and to split open.

Too often I am intimidated by the closed door.

I should knock. I should see if it will open.

Psalm 24

Psalm 68

Let God rise up, let his enemies be scattered;
let those who hate him flee before him.
As smoke is driven away, so drive them away;
as wax melts before the fire,
let the wicked perish before God.
But let the righteous be joyful;
let them exult before God;
let them be jubilant with joy.

Who are God's enemies?

According to one source the Hebrew translated above as enemies is נָצַח or natsach.

Another source disagrees. The second source insists the original Hebrew is אוֹיְבָיו for which I cannot find a pronunciation.

The second is almost certainly correct.

Natsach means eternity, perpetual, supervision, or excellence. But I am sure there are times when these can be enemies of God.

Psalm 68