In the light be our joy
29th April 2017
To you we come, radiant Lord,
the goal of our desiring,
beyond all earthly beauty;
gentle protector,
strong deliverer,
in the night you are our confidence;
from the first light be our joy;
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
This prayer is found in the Anglican church's prayer book that accompanies services for morning and evening prayer and compline. The psalter in the prayer book has accompanying prayers for each of the 150 psalms. This one is for Psalm 63, which was this morning's set psalm. This psalm is a beautiful and vivid expression of the deep sense of thirst and longing we have for God; and when I say 'we', I mean the whole of humanity (and, indeed, creation). Here are the first nine verses:
O God, you are my God; eagerly I seek you; my soul is athirst for you. My flesh also faints for you, as in a dry and thirsty land where there is no water. So would I gaze upon you in your holy place, that I might behold your power and your glory. Your loving kindness is better than life itself and so my lips will praise you. I will bless you as long as I shall live and lift up my hands in your name. My soul shall be satisfied, as with marrow and fatness, and my mouth shall praise you with joyful lips. When I remember you upon my bed and meditate on you in the watches of the night. For you have been my helper and under the shadow of your wings will I rejoice. For my soul clings to you; your right hand shall hold me fast.
In my limited experience, it has been thirst and deep frustration or dissatisfaction which have tended motivate me most to seek God and hear God's purposes for my life. It is not when we are content that we tend to push on and go beyond what we already know. It is when we are dry and weary and thirsty. This is a paradox.
As we consider this theme of vocation, God's call to us, perhaps we should be praying for dissatisfaction and frustration rather than fulfillment? For when I am indeed utterly and truly in that place of longing, then the radiance of Christ emerges.
It is, again, my limited experience that revelation and radiance comes only after the nighttime of my fears. And, as the psalmist has written, when, in the nighttime we learn to meditate upon Christ and not on our own fears, then are we made ready to greet the radiance of Christ. Part of this greeting of Christ comes in acknowledging the most profound reality of all - that as I cling to Christ, even in my weak and two-minded doubts, it is God's right hand that holds me fast.
How I read Psalm 63 today is that it speaks of a longing for God which is expressed in gazing on him and meditating on him, a silent and strengthening waiting in his presence. So I'm wondering if when discerning our vocation we include silent resting in God's presence rather than prayers of words asking for God to show us what to do or be.
ReplyDeleteDoes vocation need to be something new we hadn't considered before, or a change of direction? In this morning's sermon one phrase has stayed with me: "staying put". I think sometimes we (or do I mean just I?) can feel restless, or uncertain, or frustrated, because I still can't quite accept my calling for various reasons. I suspect pride and ego have a lot to do with this when other vocations might seem more exciting or of greater worth. We can be thirsty even when we are right next to the well of life, with God's bucket overflowing with water waiting to be drunk. So the paradox may be that we are already living out our vocation, we just don't recognise the Lord is already there.
In my, also limited experience, "staying put", though, is never static. When we stay put in God, when we return to him, our source of life and grace, when we stay put with God and gaze on him, we will soon find that he beckons us to step out in trembling courage.
It's so difficult and time consuming to write my comments that often I think about things to write, but just can't get them written.
ReplyDeleteMy personal answer to Fee's question about what things, other than technology stop us being God's image has been consistently fear. Over time how I interpret imy fears has changed. It is much less intense and kicks in much less often that it used to, but it's still there. Also, I think it used to be so overwhelming that it masked other things. I'm aware of feeling guilty, particularly, but not only, for existing, and that kicks in especially when I can't sleep. On the nights, by no means all of them, when I am able to pray for other people my prayers always include a prayer for peace and confidence and I usually think of Romans 8 and particularly the thought of God bringing good out of everything. Asking that for someone is a deep reminder that it's what God does for me.
When I first realised that God loved me and wanted me it was so wonderful I did just love God back. I wanted to serve God. So far so good, but I wanted to do fantastic things for God, not such a good idea. While I can see that came from my own needs and insecurities there is an unhelpful way that commitment has been preached/taught, possibly because there has been a lack of imagination, wisdom or discernment on the part of the preacher/teacher.
I'm glad that one of the things that has been mentioned several times is the importance of recognising of the ordinary. It's about realising that God loves me, God wants me, God is with me, always has been and always will be and that changes everything. It is in desiring and having the willingness to see Jesus in everyone I know/meet and wanting to treat them as if they are Jesus, which is ok for my friends and the people I like and trust, but ...
I don't feel this begins to say what I want to, but it's late and my battery is running out and the charger is downstairs...
'... dry, weary and thirsty..." from the main blog reminded me of Moses encountering the burning bush. Was Moses called in the wilderness after fleeing the pharaoh, because he had changed as a person and because he had wrestled with his faith?
ReplyDeleteGod lost patience with His chosen people. He told Moses He would make a race from Moses' descendants. What greater recognition can there be of ones greatness? How could Moses decline the offer and ask for mercy for the people he led? Is it that he had been through stormy times himself, and knew what it was like to be tested?
Exodus 32:9-14
7 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go down, because your people, whom you brought up out of Egypt, have become corrupt. 8 They have been quick to turn away from what I commanded them and have made themselves an idol cast in the shape of a calf. They have bowed down to it and sacrificed to it and have said, ‘These are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.’
9 “I have seen these people,” the Lord said to Moses, “and they are a stiff-necked people. 10 Now leave me alone so that my anger may burn against them and that I may destroy them. Then I will make you into a great nation.”
11 But Moses sought the favor of the Lord his God. “Lord,” he said, “why should your anger burn against your people, whom you brought out of Egypt with great power and a mighty hand? 12 Why should the Egyptians say, ‘It was with evil intent that he brought them out, to kill them in the mountains and to wipe them off the face of the earth’? Turn from your fierce anger; relent and do not bring disaster on your people. 13 Remember your servants Abraham, Isaac and Israel, to whom you swore by your own self: ‘I will make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and I will give your descendants all this land I promised them, and it will be their inheritance forever.’” 14 Then the Lord relented and did not bring on his people the disaster he had threatened.
His humility is profound and genuine. He asks God to blot his name from His book if He cannot forgive the Israelites.
Exodus 30:31
31 So Moses went back to the Lord and said, “Oh, what a great sin these people have committed! They have made themselves gods of gold. 32 But now, please forgive their sin—but if not, then blot me out of the book you have written.”
Such humility can only come from huge suffering. I wonder what Moses did to anger God so much that he was not allowed to enter the promised land.