Getting Back on Track - August 30
Today’s Readings: AM Psalm 25; PM Psalm 9, 15; 2 Chron. 6:32-7:7; James 2:1-13; Mark 14:53-65
I shared in my sermon yesterday, an image from a reflection by the Rev. Nadia Bolz-Webber about an old apartment. Here is her image that I found so powerful and helpful in this time:
“I used to live in a very old apartment building with super sketchy electrical wiring. Were I to audaciously assume my hair drier could run while my stereo was on, I would once again find myself opening the grey metal fuse box next to the refrigerator and flipping the breaker. My apartment had been built at a time when there were no electric hair driers, and the system shut down when modernity asked too much of it.
I think of that fuse box often these days, because friends, I just do not think our psyches were developed to hold, feel and respond to everything coming at them right now; every tragedy, injustice, sorrow and natural disaster happening to every human across the entire planet, in real time every minute of every day. The human heart and spirit were developed to be able to hold, feel and respond to any tragedy, injustice, sorrow or natural disaster that was happening IN OUR VILLAGE.
So my emotional circuit breaker keeps overloading because the hardware was built for an older time.”
She continues and you can read her reflection here (just be warned her language is raw and honest). I am intrigued by her post, because I feel like a lot of the people I know, myself included, are trying to figure out why our circuit boards keep overloading. Her post is really about the shame that permeates our culture of instant gratification on social media and how that leads us to feel like we can’t do enough.
Our Psalm this morning is once again a plea to God asking us to put our trust in God. “Show me your ways, O Lord, and teach me your paths.” Sometimes when I read a verse like this, I think that one day I will know the path of the Lord, or that maybe I am on that path already. But there is something to waking up every morning and reading the Psalms over and over, of returning to this Psalm every few weeks (and every other Psalm) where the repetition begins to sink in. I’m asking once again for “God to lead me in [his] truth” once again, just as I did seven weeks ago. We wake up, and we try again.
I am especially struck by how Psalm 25 ends when the author pleas “Deliver Israel, O God, out of all his trouble.” Or maybe a more relevant translation might be, “Deliver us who believe in you, out of the trouble we are in.” The Israelites had trouble, the early Christians had trouble, our ancestors had trouble, and so do we. And at each turn, they turned to God as a source of strength and to be led in his truth.
The challenges are still there as I awake this morning, but the Psalm is a reminder that no matter how often the switches are flipped, we have the ultimate source of wisdom to get us back on track.
John+
Questions for Self-Reflection: What resonates with you in today’s reflection? How have the Psalms been helpful in your faith journey?
Daily Challenge: Read Psalm 25 this morning. Wait to read Psalms 9 and 15 until this evening or before you go to bed. This is the pattern of morning and evening prayer. If you are up for it, try using the Psalms for bookends of the day.