URC Daily Devotion Sunday 18 September 2022
1.Give to the winds thy fears,
hope and be undismayed;
God hears thy sighs and counts thy tears;
God shall lift up thy head.
2. Through waves and clouds and storms,
He gently clears the way;
wait thou His time, so shall this night
soon end in joyous day.
3. Still heavy is thy heart,
still sink thy spirits down?
Cast off the weight, let fear depart,
and ev’ry care be gone.
4. What though thou rulest not,
yet heav’n, and earth, and hell
proclaim, God sitteth on the throne,
and ruleth all things well.
5. Leave to His sov’reign sway
to choose and to command,
so shalt thou wond’ring own His way,
how wise, how strong His hand!
6. Far, far above thy thought
His counsel shall appear,
when fully He the work hath wrought,
that caused thy needless fear.
7. Thou seest our weakness, Lord,
our hearts are known to Thee;
O lift Thou up the sinking heart,
confirm the feeble knee.
8. Let us in life, in death,
Thy steadfast truth declare,
and publish with our latest breath
Thy love and guardian care.
John Wesley; Author: Paul Gerhardt (1656)
You can hear the tune for this Psalm here: https://hymnary.org/media/fetch/198960
Reflection
Have you ever tried looking out through a keyhole? I left my seat for a moment, just to try out the effect first hand.
There’s a down-spout and a flourishing quince close by, and, in the distance, a luminous shrub (being pedantic cotinus coggygria, golden spirit or smoke bush). This is no rounded view of our late summer garden, much loved despite too many weeds.
John Wesley, and Paul Gerhard before him, penned life-giving messages. ‘Give to the wind thy fears’ and ‘Befiel Du Deine Wege’ are inspirational, assuring us that God’s deep, dependable care encompasses all that threatens to overwhelm.
While the hymn writers are broadly true to Psalm 109 a certain selectivity means that we never see the wild parts of the garden, nor the lavender, nor fruit tree, not even the patch of catnip or nepeta cataria where our little monster likes her regular fix.
We hardly need Walter Bruggemann to highlight that Psalm 109 is, in part, ‘a song of hate’. Nasty accusations have seeped into the narrator’s bones like oil. People have even prayed that his descendants may be ‘blotted out’. He cries out to God:
“I fade away like an evening shadow, I am brushed off like a locust”, v.23. The injured one wants God’s help to even the score.
We shun difficult verses at our peril. Disowning the brutish sides of our natures, the unwelcome thoughts, the barely conscious passive aggression, yes, even the sharp claws, is nothing short of negligence. How much better it is to name these things and to entrust them to God, the One who can handle reality and who remains Holy in the face of all evil.
Prayer, whether in words or in silence, gives perspective. Facing our indignation clears the path towards fairness and transparency. Underneath the weeds lies the steadfast love of God.
Prayer
Eternal Spirit, earth-maker, pain-bearer, life-giver,
Source of all that is and that shall be,
Father and mother of us all, Loving God in whom is heaven.
The hallowing of your name echo through the universe!
The way of your peace be followed by the peoples of the world!
Your heavenly will be done by all created beings!
Your commonwealth of peace and freedom
Sustain our hope and come on earth.
With the bread we need for today, feed us.
In the hurts we absorb from one another, forgive us.
In the times of temptation and testing, strengthen us.
From trials too great to endure, spare us.
From the grip of all that is evil, free us.
For you reign in the glory of the power that is love,
Now and forever. Amen.
The Rev’d Jim Cotter’s version of the Lord’s Prayer from the
Anglican prayer book from Aotearoa, New Zealand