Still My Soul and Make it Quiet - October 8
Today’s Readings: AM Psalm 131, 132, [133]; PM Psalm 134, 135; Micah 3:1-8; Acts 24:1-23; Luke 7:36-50
Over the past month, I have been teaching a class online to people who are learning about the Episcopal Church and the Christian Faith. This week’s class is titled, “What is Prayer” and we are exploring the breadth and depth of prayer in our tradition. I start off showing the blessing scene from a classic movie “Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby” where Will Farrell gives praise to 8 lb., 6 oz. baby Jesus, swaddled in gold, and follow up with a scene from the blockbuster, Bruce Almighty. Prayer can take many different shapes and forms!
In Bruce Almighty, Bruce, aka Jim Carrey, complains to God about his luck and by his misfortune is given the chance to play God. Once Bruce finally owns being God and moves beyond his own selfish motivations, he decides to listen to other people’s prayers. It is overwhelming to say the least. There is this scene where his room is fluttered instantly with millions of post-it notes with the concerns of the world. Bruce realizes that method of categorizing prayers isn’t going to work, and he creates an email system. Poof, and with the voice of AOL, “You have 1,785,459 new prayers.” He starts answering a few. As he is now God, his hands move quite quickly. You can see the glee as the answers fly from his fingers. He hits refresh on the computer and to his surprise, there are now over three million new prayers. We humans have a lot of prayers. And it might be impossible to get to them all.
Can you imagine all of the concerns that we as humans carry, especially right now? I am having more conversations with people about the angst and what will happen in our world and our country. Everyone is concerned and it seems to be affecting mental health. Hopefully, the angst is turning into prayer, but it is still overwhelming to consider. I would guess that God has a few more than three million new prayer requests each day. There is a lot that we carry as human beings when we open our eyes to the suffering of the world and in a time like this, it can feel like a bunch of noise drowning out the voice of God that comes from within us.
The words of the Psalmist this morning are a reminder and a call for us. “But I still my soul and make it quiet, like a child upon its mother’s breast; my soul is quieted within me” (Psalm 131:3). This is not the only place in the place in the Psalter where we hear a similar message. Psalm 62:5 proclaims, “for you, O Lord, my soul in stillness waits.”
The image is important. As a young parent, Anne and I would lay with the kids. Both of us would often fall asleep with Jack or Bailey, asleep on our chests. We still had all the worries in the world for them, but their worries were reduced because we were there. Maybe some of their worries (or baby cries) were transferred upon us. And they could go and rest.
I am an advocate for striving for justice and of deepening our empathy to feel the pain and suffering of our fellow sisters and brothers that share this gift of life and earth with us. But if we are to have faith that Jesus is Lord, and that our lives become extensions of Christ’s love for this world, then how can we learn to rest our worry upon the one we call upon. In the words of the Psalmist and in this time of angst, and concern, “how can we rest upon our mother’s breast?”
Trust, faith, and hope can allow us to still our souls. May we lean into that hope in this time of noise and angst. Let God be the one who holds our prayers and concerns, maybe with a few million post-it notes.
John+
Questions for Self-Reflection: What are you most worried about in the world today? Do you have any ability to control the outcome of that worry?
Daily Challenge: Make a list of what you are most worried about and pray that God shares in holding your concern with you. It may take a few days of this practice to help make a difference.