Voices Who Tell the Story – October 1
Today’s Readings: AM Psalm 105:1-22; PM Psalm 105:23-45; Hosea 5:8-6:6; Acts 21:27-36; Luke 6:1-11
I have a faint memory of listening to a cassette tape recording of my mom’s grandmother telling tales of growing up at the end of the 1800s. The sound quality was crackly, and her voice was nearly as thin as my recollection. Sitting here at my home office desk reflecting on scripture this morning, I felt this nudge to dig deeper. At the back of the top drawer, there was a plastic baggie that had been in my mom’s desk. I kept it across our moves. Just now, I looked more closely at the contents.
The very tape I was remembering, and three others, are now stacked in front of me. The one of my memory is marked with my grandfather’s handwriting: “Lessie Clay and Miss Carey Hotchkiss, 3/28/1971, MJ and I were recording their conversation at Miss Carey’s house in Sunday nite (sic)”. Lessie was the hired help who raised my mom and her brothers. Lessie’s family was Black, and her family had served my family for several generations, before and after slavery was ended. Miss Carey was the mother of my grandmother Martha Jane (MJ). What rests upon my desk right now is a grey cassette tape. But even more, it holds the voices who tell the story. While I have no concrete memories of the contents, I can guess. Some were stories of joy, and others were stories of hardship and loss.
We hear the story of God’s people retold in Psalm 105 today. It is not in a crackly voice, but in a refined tone that has been sung and proclaimed for generations and generations. Walter Bruggemann wrote that this psalm offers the Exodus story through the point of view of a song of harmony between God and the people. The Lord has been “mindful of his covenant” (v. 8). “He let no one oppress them” (v. 14). “The Lord made his people exceeding fruitful.” (v. 24). This type of historical psalm reframes the story and, in its retelling, our identity as people of God continues to be formed. Our understanding grows. Brueggemann describes this as “a powerfully present past” which compels us to continue retelling the history, in order to connect generations across time and space to the God who is at the center. What we experience in Psalm 105 today is the continuation of relationship between a people and their God in an ongoing, open-ended conversation.
I invite you to lift your voice to praise God and “remember the marvels he has done” (v. 5), and know that the conversation continues, in times and tones of harmony or conflict. Think about what voices have participated in the past. For whose voices will you listen? What voices are missing? Who is waiting to hear your voice retell the story of God, who is at the center?
-- Katherine+
Sources:
Walter Brueggemann, Abiding Astonishment: Psalms, modernity and the making of history, 1991, John Knox Press.
Silvia Purdie, www.conversations.net.nz.
Questions for Reflection
What are the stories in your family that tell of relationship? Promises kept or broken? Surprises? Surrender? Blessing?
Where do you spot the action of God in your family life?
Daily Challenge
The voice we hear in psalm 106 is a different voice; there is bitterness and conflict. Read Psalms 105 and 106 as companion historical psalms and note how tone affects the story told. Make a decision about the tone you’ll take when telling your story today.