The Psalm assigned for this Second Sunday of Lent is sort of innocuous. I don’t mean that in a bad way, honest. But there is really nothing in there that would grab our attention. And in planning for this season, I almost chose something else that would allow me to say what I wanted to say in a more dramatic or obvious kind of way. These verses don’t jump off the page in a way that we would like them to. Important, significant, yes, but almost leads one to a “yes, and ...?” kind of response.
Well, take a look and see what I mean:
Psalm 22:23-31 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.
Good stuff, right? But not necessarily earth shattering. Praise God. Yes, indeed. An important word, a useful reminder, but ... duh ... am I right? At least until you go back and remind yourself that this is Psalm 22. Ah, now that changes things, doesn’t it? Surely you remember Psalm 22! Jesus did. In a difficult moment he remembered that Psalm. On the cross Jesus remembered the 22nd Psalm. How does it begin? “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Yes, it is THAT Psalm 22.
Wow. Now all of the sudden the assigned verses seem to pop a little bit more. Pop? No, they seem to startle, or shock. They seem to move a little further out of reach, as if they are asking an impossible thing. As if they are trying to stretch us pass the limits of understandability.
How can we praise when we are in pain? How can we praise when devastation seems all around us? No doubt there are some right now wondering how we can conduct services of worship on the same weekend when lives are lost to sudden and terrible tornadoes. Some were made homeless, businesses and schools were wiped out in a moment. There is a report of a two year old who was found wandering in a field near her southern Indiana home and her whole family was killed by the storms. “My God, my God, why have you forsaken us?”
Praise seems a long way away all of a sudden. Almost out of reach. How are we expected to heed these words now? How are we supposed to have an attitude of praise when we are broken inside? It seems like too much to ask. Doesn’t it?
I know I’ve used this before, in a sermon if not in this space. But there is a poem of sorts that I stumbled across a few years ago that seems appropriate here. Not so much a poem as a manifesto perhaps, or a statement at least. It was presented as coming from Mother Teresa and was reportedly hanging on a wall in her mission in Delhi in India. Others dispute the origin and yet it is still a powerful statement.
It reads like this:
People are often unreasonable, illogical and self centered; Forgive them anyway.
If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives; Be kind anyway.
If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies; Succeed anyway.
If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you; Be honest and frank anyway.
What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight; Build anyway.
If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous; Be happy anyway.
The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow; Do good anyway.
Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough;
Give the world the best you've got anyway.
You see, in the final analysis, it is between you and your God;
It was never between you and them anyway.
While perhaps emphasizing different experiences, the “anyway” kind of attitude pervades Psalm 22 as well as the poem. Sometimes praise grows out of the joy of living. It is the only kind of response we can make because everything is going well. How does that saying go? “God is in His heaven and all is right with the world.” Those days seem to bring forth praise without any problem, almost without any urging it just happens, it just spills out of us.
But then the other days roll around with all too much frequency. The days when praise seems as far from our minds as anything could possibly be. Those are the days we need to praise anyway. Because praise is what we are made for. And when all else fails to fall back on our reason for being is a pretty good way to go.
Now, my real problem this weekend is that for some reason I chose Fasting and Frugality as the Spiritual Disciplines for this Sunday. How am I going to get from here to there I wonder?
Well, take a look and see what I mean:
Psalm 22:23-31 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.
Good stuff, right? But not necessarily earth shattering. Praise God. Yes, indeed. An important word, a useful reminder, but ... duh ... am I right? At least until you go back and remind yourself that this is Psalm 22. Ah, now that changes things, doesn’t it? Surely you remember Psalm 22! Jesus did. In a difficult moment he remembered that Psalm. On the cross Jesus remembered the 22nd Psalm. How does it begin? “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Yes, it is THAT Psalm 22.
Wow. Now all of the sudden the assigned verses seem to pop a little bit more. Pop? No, they seem to startle, or shock. They seem to move a little further out of reach, as if they are asking an impossible thing. As if they are trying to stretch us pass the limits of understandability.
How can we praise when we are in pain? How can we praise when devastation seems all around us? No doubt there are some right now wondering how we can conduct services of worship on the same weekend when lives are lost to sudden and terrible tornadoes. Some were made homeless, businesses and schools were wiped out in a moment. There is a report of a two year old who was found wandering in a field near her southern Indiana home and her whole family was killed by the storms. “My God, my God, why have you forsaken us?”
Praise seems a long way away all of a sudden. Almost out of reach. How are we expected to heed these words now? How are we supposed to have an attitude of praise when we are broken inside? It seems like too much to ask. Doesn’t it?
I know I’ve used this before, in a sermon if not in this space. But there is a poem of sorts that I stumbled across a few years ago that seems appropriate here. Not so much a poem as a manifesto perhaps, or a statement at least. It was presented as coming from Mother Teresa and was reportedly hanging on a wall in her mission in Delhi in India. Others dispute the origin and yet it is still a powerful statement.
It reads like this:
People are often unreasonable, illogical and self centered; Forgive them anyway.
If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives; Be kind anyway.
If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies; Succeed anyway.
If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you; Be honest and frank anyway.
What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight; Build anyway.
If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous; Be happy anyway.
The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow; Do good anyway.
Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough;
Give the world the best you've got anyway.
You see, in the final analysis, it is between you and your God;
It was never between you and them anyway.
While perhaps emphasizing different experiences, the “anyway” kind of attitude pervades Psalm 22 as well as the poem. Sometimes praise grows out of the joy of living. It is the only kind of response we can make because everything is going well. How does that saying go? “God is in His heaven and all is right with the world.” Those days seem to bring forth praise without any problem, almost without any urging it just happens, it just spills out of us.
But then the other days roll around with all too much frequency. The days when praise seems as far from our minds as anything could possibly be. Those are the days we need to praise anyway. Because praise is what we are made for. And when all else fails to fall back on our reason for being is a pretty good way to go.
Now, my real problem this weekend is that for some reason I chose Fasting and Frugality as the Spiritual Disciplines for this Sunday. How am I going to get from here to there I wonder?
Stay tuned.
Shalom,
Derek
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