Many hands... inside an ITU - how many needed to care for one pandemic victim
1 O God, you have rejected us, broken our defences;
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.[a] Selah
5 Give victory with your right hand, and answer us,[b]
so that those whom you love may be rescued.
6 God has promised in his sanctuary:[c]
‘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 sceptre.
8 Moab is my wash-basin; 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.
Who is asking God for help here? Is it a nation or people with a sense of privilege who expect God to act for them come what may? Or is it a poor people with no powerful help? This matters. Is it a psalm for an elitist ‘chosen’ nation or a cry of help from a people who have learnt wisdom and humility and put their trust in God rather than ‘human help’?
Elitism is an issue in our day. The kind of elitism I refer to is where ordinary people stick to rules for their safety (with great sacrifice and heart-breaking consequences, such as not being able to be at the bedside of a dying parent or child) but those with political influence or power then apparently ignore or find ways of justifying their actions as somehow reasonable interpretations of those rules.
The dominating story for six days is a strange political scandal to do with Dominic Cummins, the Prime Minister’s principal political adviser who breached the ‘stay at home’ rules during the height of the lockdown when he drove his wife (who had Covid-19 symptoms) and young son 260-miles to his parents’ farm near Durham during the lockdown (as the public were repeatedly been told to ‘stay at home’ – a slogan believed to have been created by Cummins). His subsequent 60-mile round trip to Barnard Castle some two weeks later (apparently, to test his eyesight and capacity to drive back to London) also breached lockdown rules that people should not travel distances to exercise. What has been interesting is how Cummins, in a lengthy attempt to describe the full details and motivations of all his actions, and the Prime Minister, have backed themselves into a corner – defending the indefensible rather than admitting errors of judgement for reasons which the public might have more sympathy for.
It seems that all elites with power lose touch with ordinary people eventually, even those who begin by being anti-elite in their rhetoric, conviction or lifestyle. Cummins, the architect of the anti-elite Brexit referendum victory, has, it seems, lost touch with the currents of public opinion and his hubris could do the government great damage – and more importantly, could harm the health of this country if, when a second wave of Coronavirus strikes, people do not feel so inclined to follow rules because the elite have not done so. This is why this farcical scandal matters. For it is, in the end, about trust. If those who make the rules can’t be trusted to keep the rules, then who do we trust?
I come back to the psalm. The clue to the correct interpretive lens for reading it seems to lie in verse 11: ‘O grant us help against the foe, for human help is worthless.’ Here is a nation which is reeling from great defeats and sufferings. It is as if it has been struck by an earthquake. The familiar structures of state and people are tottering. And there seems to be no defence. Human help is worthless, says the psalmist. It seems the military option does not work anymore. Theologically, the problem is that God does not seem to care anymore either. All the usual signs of God’s blessings – victory against armed assailants, safety in the land, a sense of wellbeing – have gone. God is the problem. Yet God is also the solution.
The turning point for the psalmist is realising that God has to act to save us against ourselves and the usual levers of power or influence that we may reach for.
‘To put it somewhat differently,’ writes J Clinton McCann, ‘we must take seriously that Psalm 60 is the prayer of suffering and oppressed persons (vs3). Their prayer is not of the powerful, who seek to claim God’s sanction to enforce the status quo. Rather, their prayer is the desperate plea of those who turn to God as the only possible hope in an apparently hopeless situation (vs11).’[2]
Watching an extended news item on BBC TV last night of the reporter Clive Myrie in the Royal London Hospital was a reminder again of the hopeless situations which Covid-19 creates. Yet we also are reminded, as in the prayer of St Theresa of Avila, that God has no hands but ours, no feet, no eyes with which to look with compassion. The medical expertise and compassionate care which surrounds each ITU patient, swirling around each bed like bees around a hive, reminded me of a dance of Trinitarian care.
The truth is, human help is far from worthless when put to work with sacrifice and care, when the patient is privileged by those who attend to them, rather than the powerful. Remember, even the PM, the symbol of elitism, was a patient in ITU. We are all helpless human beings in need of God’s help. The only obstacle to humility and praying God’s help is hubris.
[1] New Revised Standard Version, Anglicised
(NRSVA) New
Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition, copyright © 1989, 1995 the
Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of
Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights
reserved.
Footnotes:
Psalm 60:4 Gk Syr Jerome: Heb because of the truth
Psalm 60:5 Another reading is me
Psalm 60:6 Or by his holiness
[2] New Interpreters’ Bible, Abingdon Press ©1996, pg917-8
Footnotes:
Psalm 60:4 Gk Syr Jerome: Heb because of the truth
Psalm 60:5 Another reading is me
Psalm 60:6 Or by his holiness
[2] New Interpreters’ Bible, Abingdon Press ©1996, pg917-8
The phrase that catches my eye is “Moab shall be my washpot”, a word we haven’t read in the psalms up to now. It is an image of a humble washpot used for washing dusty and dirty sandal wearing feet. The Israelites didn’t put their feet into the pot itself but instead poured water over their feet while they held them over the washpot which held the dirty water. So the washpot represents something filthy. Moab, which had threatened Israel, was now subdued and made to serve God. It brings to mind Jesus’ act of washing the disciples’ feet, the way of humble service. Humility is, indeed, a much needed virtue for us all.
ReplyDeleteI’ve also discovered that Stephen Fry entitled his autobiography “Moab is my Washpot”. Apparently he compares writing about his early years as “scrubbing the grime of years”.