Pitiful comes from pity, but neither seem to come from pit. Sorry, a little etymological research today. We’re in a pit again. No, that’s not right. We’re remembering a pit. We’re out of it actually. Celebrating breathing the fresh air. It’s an ex-pit, a former pit experience. A wiping of the brow and saying “whew!” Glad that’s over. Or is it?
Pits appear in the bible all over the place. Often in speculative situations. “Suppose someone falls in a pit.” Or an animal. An ethical puzzler. Or a legal brief sometimes. If someone digs a pit and leaves it open and animal falls into it, the pit producer is liable for the value of the animal. That’s in Exodus where they’re trying to figure out how they are going to live as a new nation. This from the pit owners lobby. Or the clumsy animal supporters. I don’t know. But pits occupy the attention frequently.
The first pit reference is in Genesis. You know the story. Joseph, that sharp dressed little daddy’s boy, gets his brothers in such a lather they decide to kill him. Luckily one of them regains his senses enough to say, let’s not kill him. Just throw him in the handy pit. Which seems like a good idea. Better than fratricide, certainly. And it ends well. Eventually. Still, I imagine Joseph had pit-ophobia for the rest of his life. Though he spent time in an Egyptian jail, that was probably pit like.
Pit like is what Daniel faced too, you remember. It was called a den, but no lazyboy chairs and big screen TVs here. Just lions, hungry ones, in a pit. Daniel is lowered down and his friend the foreign king wipes away a tear and goes home to dinner. That one ends well too, and the king finds Daniel the next morning curled up with the ravenous lions like they were kittens sharing his bed and hogging the blankets, though they do leave a warm spot when they do finally move.
There are pits aplenty in the Psalms. Which is where we are settling this week. Fifteen different psalms rhapsodize about a pit. Some of them are wanting a pit, for the enemies, the oppressors. Throw them in a pit, Lord! Some of them are petitions to help avoid the pit. Some of the pits are capitalized. Not just any old pit, but the Pit. Don’t send me to the Pit. Redeem me from the Pit.
Our particular pit is kind of messy. Mud and mire, just a mess. The kind of mess that sticks to you. That you can’t shake off, even after you’re out. Maybe that’s why it comes up again. Even after being rescued, something clings. A memory, a grief, a wound that just won’t heal, a scar that reminds, a limp that persists. Like Paul’s thorn in the flesh, it is a reminder that you’ve been helped before, that there is a weakness in you that makes you need to lean on a savior, reminds you that you rely on a power that comes from outside of you. A rope dropped down into the pit to pull you up. Not so that you are worthless, or a failure. This limp isn’t a reminder of that. Instead it is a reminder of the joy. A reminder that rescue happens. That transformation is possible.
That’s what we hear in these verses. Listen!
Psalm 40:1-11 I waited patiently for the LORD; he inclined to me and heard my cry. 2 He drew me up from the desolate pit, out of the miry bog, and set my feet upon a rock, making my steps secure. 3 He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God. Many will see and fear, and put their trust in the LORD. 4 Happy are those who make the LORD their trust, who do not turn to the proud, to those who go astray after false gods. 5 You have multiplied, O LORD my God, your wondrous deeds and your thoughts toward us; none can compare with you. Were I to proclaim and tell of them, they would be more than can be counted. 6 Sacrifice and offering you do not desire, but you have given me an open ear. Burnt offering and sin offering you have not required. 7 Then I said, "Here I am; in the scroll of the book it is written of me. 8 I delight to do your will, O my God; your law is within my heart." 9 I have told the glad news of deliverance in the great congregation; see, I have not restrained my lips, as you know, O LORD. 10 I have not hidden your saving help within my heart, I have spoken of your faithfulness and your salvation; I have not concealed your steadfast love and your faithfulness from the great congregation. 11 Do not, O LORD, withhold your mercy from me; let your steadfast love and your faithfulness keep me safe forever.
Good news. I waited patiently for the Lord, and He heard me. He heard me. Drew me up, dropped a line and I scrambled to safety. I lay there panting, dripping with the mire that clings, and I started to sing. To laugh and to sing.
Can you imagine? Do you remember such a moment? You need to. You need to remember that song. The song you sang when the mud still clung to you. When the memory of not being able to breathe was still a terror in your heart. You need to remember the song you sang with passion and with joy, because you were made new. The song you sang to everyone you met. To old friends and new strangers, to neighbors and family members. You sang it so much and those who knew you wept with joy to see the new you, the rescued you.
And all you wanted to do was to please your rescuer. You were the first one at worship when the doors opened and the ushers were still sorting out the bulletins. You signed up to set up tables at the potluck dinners, you offered to wash dishes at the community meal. You packed boxes and delivered Christmas gifts. Remember, you taught Sunday school even though you thought you didn’t know anything. But you were there. You held crying babies and tears came to your own eyes as you realized this was you. This little life afraid of everything and everyone, needing more than you knew how to find; but Someone came and held you in arms stronger than the fear and a love deeper than the pit. Held you until you stopped crying and started singing.
What happened to that? To that passion and that joy? What happened to the song that you sang so long and so loud that even those who loved you thought you were a little bit crazy? Some will say, well I never really had that passion. I grew up in the faith and it was just there, you know, not a big life changing thing. So, all this doesn’t really fit me. I’ve seen folks like that, heard their stories. That’s just not me.
Really? Never fell in a pit? Ever? Never had the feeling that the walls were closing in on you? Never walked through fire and somehow survived; never lost a battle you thought you should have won; never hurt someone who then forgave you even though you didn’t deserve it? Never felt relief, rescue, grace? Think again. Go back to Psalm 40 and keep reading. The pit is always there. It comes back, just when we think we are safe and secure. Just when we say “No thanks God, I’m doing fine on my own.” It clings, the muck and the mire. Our pit is always near. The only thing that keeps it away is to sing the song that was put in your heart. And to keep singing. In and out of the pit.
Shalom,
Derek
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