The Cornerstone

The following is one of the lessons for the fifth week of Lent from the small group study we are doing at our church entitled Christ in the Psalms. You can purchase the entire study for 99 cents on Amazon.com at this link.

Read 1 Peter 2:1-10

            Like Matthew, Mark, Luke, and Acts, 1 Peter also makes use of Psalm 118:22. However, 1 Peter ties this verse into an entire “stone” motif; quoting it along side other verses which speak of stones.[1] Also like the other passages we have already explored, this one in 1 Peter uses these “stone” verses to speak of Christ as a stone rejected by men but chosen and precious in God’s sight. 1 Peter, however, adds a twist.

            It is not only Christ who is a chosen and rejected stone. Christ’s followers are also living stones being built up into a “spiritual house”, “a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God.” In other words, 1 Peter envisions Christ’s followers being built into a new temple. Peter declares that the churches of Asia Minor to whom he writes, not the temple in Jerusalem, are actually the temple of God. They are the place where God’s presence dwells and where God’s forgiveness is available. As this new temple, Christ serves as their cornerstone; the one who provides the basis for a sturdy foundation and serves as a guide for the spiritual building that they are.

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[1] Isaiah 28:16 and 8:14

The Reproaches of Those Who Reproached You Fell On Me

The following is one of the lessons for the fourth week of Lent from the small group study we are doing at our church entitled Christ in the Psalms. You can purchase the entire study for 99 cents on Amazon.com at this link.

Read Romans 15:1-7

            In Romans 15, Paul is admonishing those within the church at Rome to think of each other first; building up others rather than thinking only of one’s own needs. Those who are strong in the Roman church, Paul says, should not use their strength to build themselves up and put others down. Instead, they should be using it to strengthen those who are weak. Christ himself is the model for such action since he was stronger than all of us but did not use that strength to his own advantage. He laid his strength aside, becoming weak for us, so that we might become like him.

            Paul could have simply left it at that; referring solely to Christ as an example. Instead, he chooses to back up his understanding of Christ with the words of Psalm 69:9. Similar to what we saw in John, Paul understands the words of Psalm 69 as referring to Christ. He then adds an interesting word of explanation about his use of this Scripture, saying “For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.”

            There are very few statements about Scripture in Scripture so we should take note here when Paul tells us what he believes about the nature and purpose of Scripture itself. Paul states here that whatever was written before Christ was written for our instruction. This is why Paul can quote Psalm 69 as referring to Christ in the way that he does. He believes that even though it was written by David long ago it was also written for those who came later. Paul tell us that it serves not only for our instruction but also for our encouragement and hope. 

David's Son or David's Lord?

The following is one of the lessons for the third week of Lent from the small group study we are doing at our church entitled Christ in the Psalms. You can purchase the entire study for 99 cents on Amazon.com at this link

Read Mark 12:35-37

            Psalm 110 is described as a Psalm “Of David.” In the lesson on Psalm 110, it was noted that this Psalm was about King David.[1] That is, someone else wrote a song praising Yahweh (“the Lord”) for sitting King David (“my Lord”) at God’s right hand. We can gather from Jesus’ words in Mark 12:35-37 that “Of David” was understood differently in the first century. Instead of being about David, Jesus speaks of this Psalm having been written by David about the coming Messiah.[2] Other writings from the time period suggest that this was not merely Jesus’ interpretation of Psalm 110 but one that was widely accepted by Jews in the first century. That means those whom Jesus is teaching in Mark 12 would have simply taken it for granted that Psalm 110 was talking about the promised Messiah.

            It also seems to have been widely accepted in the first century that this Messiah, the deliverer of Israel, would be a descendant of the great King David. When the crowds welcome Jesus into Jerusalem as their deliverer they shout “Blessed is the coming kingdom of our father David!” Likewise, the early Christians seem to have accepted this premise and spoke of Jesus as the “Son of David.” Matthew and Luke, for example, both go to great trouble to trace Jesus’ lineage through King David.

            In his quotation of Psalm 110:1, Jesus seems to accept the first of these premises but reject the second. That is, he agrees that “my Lord” in Psalm 110:1 is about the Messiah but he rejects the idea that the Messiah is David’s son. He says “David himself calls him (the Messiah) Lord. So how is he his son?” No one calls his son “Lord” so if Psalm 110:1 really is about the Messiah then the Messiah must not be David’s son if David calls him Lord.

            Why would Jesus reject the notion that the Messiah would be David’s son? And if he did, why did the gospel writers still bother to present Jesus as the “Son of David”? These are difficult questions for which there are not easy answers. However, it seems significant to me that Jesus makes this claim in the midst of his controversy with the religious leaders while he is still at the temple. Much of that controversy arises because the religious leaders do not believe that Jesus has the authority do the kinds of things he has been doing, especially his wild and reckless acts in the temple. I think that by posing this enigmatic question from Psalm 110 Jesus is communicating to the religious leaders that he is the Messiah but that they don’t completely understand what that means. They think that means a descendant of David who will rule as David did. Jesus is essentially saying that his identity as Israel’s Messiah is much greater than that. He is not merely David’s descendant. He is David’s Lord. Jesus’ authority is greater than David’s and that is why he can overturn tables in the temple and declare that its days are numbered.

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[1] Or possibly one of David’s descendants. Although the Psalm is “Of David,” most scholars don’t think it was written that early. Instead, it is usually considered to be “Of David” in the sense that it speaks about the promise God made to David now fulfilled in one of David’s descendants as he fills David’s kingly office.

[2] Your translation may have “Christ” rather than Messiah. Christ is simply the Greek translation of the Hebrew word Messiah which means “anointed one.” 

A Body You Have Prepared for Me

The following is one of the lessons for the second week of Lent from the small group study we are doing at our church entitled Christ in the Psalms. You can purchase the entire study for 99 cents on Amazon.com at this link

Read Hebrews 10:1-10

One of the primary concerns in the Epistle to the Hebrews is to argue that Jesus is our sacrifice and our high priest who has inaugurated a new covenant with us by his blood. By his own sacrificial death, he has ascended into heaven thereby entering the true heavenly tabernacle or Holy of Holies where he intercedes for us continually. As a result of Christ’s continual intercession as our priest, animal sacrifice has been rendered unnecessary as a part of our new covenantal relationship with God. Instead, we are called to offer the sacrifices of faithful obedience and praise. By the time we reach chapter 10, the author of Hebrews is coming to the climax of this argument.

Given that Hebrews wants to emphasize that faithful obedience and praise are more important than animal sacrifice, we can see why the author would turn to Psalm 40. We saw in our previous lesson that Psalm 40 is focused precisely on these two things; faithful obedience and praise, even to the point of denigrating the role of animal sacrifice. As a faithful Jew, the author of Psalm 40 surely was not encouraging others to stop offering animal sacrifices at the temple. His point is simply that its not really the sacrifices themselves that God wants but the trust and obedience represented in the offering of those sacrifices. The author of Hebrews takes the argument further than the Psalmist probably intended and argues that faithful obedience renders animal sacrifice completely unnecessary.

What is even more interesting is that Hebrews takes these words attributed to David and says that it is Christ who speaks them (10:5, when Christ came into the world, he said...). Hebrews presents Psalm 40 as words spoken by Jesus to God. In this speech to God, Jesus acknowledges that it is not animal sacrifice the Father wants. Instead, God has prepared a body for Jesus which will become the proper sacrifice through Jesus’ own faithful obedience.6 Hebrews declares that by Christ speaking the words of this Psalm, he has set aside the first covenant involving animal sacrifice and established a new covenant based on Jesus’ faithful obedience.

Out of the Mouths of Infants

The following is one of the lessons for the first week of Lent from the small group study we are doing at our church entitled Christ in the Psalms. You can purchase the entire study for 99 cents on Amazon.com at this link.

Read Matthew 21:12-17

            It would be difficult to overstate just how important the temple was in first century Judaism; both practically and symbolically. It was the place of sacrifice, forgiveness, a house of prayer, the central place of worship for every faithful Jew, and a symbol of the presence of God with his people. But it wasn’t just a religious building. It was also connected to Israel’s kings, a place tied to God anointed authority. Its history went all the way back to the great King David who had first asked if he could build a house for God. The first temple was built by David’s son, King Solomon. The temple in which Jesus stood in this passage was built by King Herod the Great as a symbol of his power.

            So when Jesus, a peasant from Galilee, enters the temple and starts turning over tables and driving people out, the religious leaders naturally want to know who he thinks he is and why he has the authority to behave this way. Likewise, when the children in the temple start shouting “Hosanna to the Son of David!” thereby speaking of Jesus as a messianic deliverer in the line of King David, the chief priests and scribes become indignant and ask Jesus if they hear what the children are saying. The implication is that if Jesus had heard the words of these children, he would silence them immediately to prevent them from making such a blasphemous claim about him.

            Instead, Jesus quotes Psalm 8:3.[1] The remarkable thing about this is that Psalm 8 was addressed to God. The praise from the mouths of infants and babies was to be for Yahweh alone and Jesus now says it is appropriate for that same praise to be directed toward him. Rather than rebuking the children for hailing him as the Davidic messiah, Jesus has actually upped the ante. He has essentially said that it is not only right for them to call him “Son of David” but even to praise him as they would praise God. Just as the Psalmist marveled at the wonders of the heavens and praised God for it, these children have seen the wonderful things that Jesus has done (v.14-15) and sing his praises for it.

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[1] You might have noticed that what Jesus quotes is a little different than what you read yesterday. Most translations of Ps 8:3 say that God established “strength” out of the mouths of babies and infants whereas Jesus says “you have prepared praise.” This is because most translations of the Psalm follow the Hebrew version of the Psalm whereas Jesus’ quote in Matthew comes from the LXX (Septuagint), the Greek version of the Old Testament. Since the NT authors wrote in Greek rather than Hebrew, it was very common for them to quote from the LXX rather than the Hebrew text. 

You Are My Son

The following is the lesson for Ash Wednesday from the Lenten small group study we are doing at our church entitled Christ in the Psalms. You can purchase the entire study for 99 cents on Amazon.com at this link.

http://www.amazon.com/Christ-Psalms-Lenten-Journey-ebook/dp/B00AWGELDO/ref=sr_1_2?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1360773600&sr=1-2&keywords=christ+in+the+psalms

Psalm 2 was a song of promise concerning the rule of Israel’s king. It may even have been written for the day of the king’s coronation. It celebrates the reign of Israel’s king and the close relationship that the king enjoys with Yahweh.
The Psalm begins by acknowledging that there are other powers in the world. Indeed, the Psalmist says that the kings of the earth plot and fight against Yahweh and his anointed king. The promise of this Psalm, however, is that whatever the other nations and kings do, it is God who ultimately reigns supreme. God, in all his sovereignty, sits on his throne and laughs at the weak attempts of earthly kings to overthrow his rule. 

In contrast to these kings, Israel’s king is the very means of God’s righteous purposes in the world. As a result, God promises to work on behalf of Israel’s king. In fact, Israel’s king enjoys such a favored status with Yahweh that Yahweh declares of the king “You are my son. Today I have begotten you.” Given Israel’s stringent commitment to monotheism (belief in only one God), this is not a declaration that the king of Israel is actually divine. It is to say that God’s anointed king enjoys a relationship with Yahweh unlike any other. Yahweh and king are like Father and Son. As a result, God tells the king that all he has to do is ask and all the nations will be given to him as an inheritance. Psalm 2 envisions God’s sovereignty being embodied in Israel’s king as he reigns over every nation on earth. 

Given what the first Christians believed about Jesus, its not hard to see how they began to see this Psalm with Jesus in mind. They believed that Jesus was the Christ (Greek equivalent of the Hebrew “Messiah” which means “anointed one”), the king who would one day rule the nations and that the people had, indeed, plotted against him. They confessed that Jesus enjoyed a uniquely close relationship with Yahweh; one they described as Father and Son. 

However, it is just as easy to see that Jesus does not fulfill this Psalm in an obvious or simplistic way. One would already have to be convinced that the titles of Messiah and Son of God should be applied to Jesus in order to think that he could be found in Psalm 2 in any way. There is no room in the kingly imagery of Psalm 2 for God’s anointed to experience crucifixion. In fact, one would be hard pressed to find an image more against the grain of Psalm 2 than Jesus on the cross. For most first century Jews, Jesus’ shameful and disgraceful death would have been the surest sign that he was not who he had claimed to be. 

With this in mind, we can see that it is an especially bold move that Mark makes when he links the promise of Psalm 2 specifically to Jesus’ crucifixion. The Psalm first appears in Mark 1:11. Jesus has just been baptized by John and coming up out of the water, the heavens are torn open, the Spirit descends upon Jesus and a voice from heaven echoes Psalm 2, saying “You are my beloved Son, with you I am well pleased.” This is a promising beginning to Jesus’ ministry but we will see that it is also a foreshadowing of the cross that awaits him. A voice speaks from heaven with the same words again in chapter 9 after Jesus’ transfiguration, declaring “This is my beloved Son; listen to him.” The very next words that Jesus speaks warn the disciples not to tell anyone what they had seen “until the Son of Man has risen from the dead.” The disciples wonder what Jesus could possibly mean by this. Finally in Mark 15, Jesus is crucified, the temple curtain is torn in two (remember the heavens at his baptism?), Jesus breathes out his Spirit, and rather than a voice from heaven, we hear a centurion standing nearby say “Truly this man was the Son of God!” Thus we see that Mark portrays Jesus’ baptism and his declaration as Son as intimately connected to his crucifixion. 

Likewise, we are called sons and daughters of God. Although, unlike Jesus, ours is an adoption into the family of God, it is an adoption which leads to the same path as Jesus’ Sonship. Our baptism was the beginning of our journey toward the cross; our transformation for the purpose of taking up our cross and following Jesus. On Ash Wednesday, as we begin the season of Lent and are reminded of Jesus’ journey toward the cross, we are reminded that we have been saved for the same journey. We receive ashes to remind us of our own weakness and frailty. We receive them in the shape of the cross to remind us that weakness is also the shape of our redemption. As we receive our ashes this evening, let us remember that the way of our King, Messiah, and Son of God is the way of the cross.

Christ in the Psalms - A Preview

The text below is the introduction to a study on Christ in the Psalms that I'm writing for the small groups at our church for next Lent. I thought I'd post it here as a preview and to give others a chance to give feedback about the idea as I continue to write the lessons. 

This study is an attempt to read Scripture in a different way - or more precisely, an attempt to return to reading Scripture in a very old way. Finding Christ in the Old Testament is nothing new. Even the most cursory reading of the New Testament demonstrates quite obviously that its authors were concerned with articulating their beliefs about Jesus in the language of the Old Testament. What is surprising, at least to me, is the way that they went about that task.

 For a good portion of my life, I had always assumed that Jesus’ identity as Israel’s Messiah was plainly laid out in the Old Testament, easy to find for anyone who was willing to do the work of searching. The relationship between the Old Testament and Jesus, I often thought, was as simple as prediction and fulfillment; that is, the Old Testament outlined clearly what the coming Messiah would look like and Jesus fit the bill perfectly. Jesus’ identity as the Messiah was so plainly obvious that only the Pharisees and other religious leaders in all their hard-hearted tradition and legalism could miss what was obvious to everyone else. If only they had traded in their man-made laws and traditions for a plain reading of God’s word in Scripture then they too would have known that Jesus was the Christ.

 More recently, I’ve come to the conclusion that these assumptions don’t seem to match-up with the way the New Testament authors themselves made use of the Old Testament to talk about Jesus. Far from treating the Old Testament as a book of predictions, I noticed that the New Testament authors seemed to be reading the Old Testament much less literally than I did, applying passages of Scripture to Jesus in very creative ways; so creative, in fact, that the first authors of those passages probably never imagined that what they had written would be used to describe Israel’s Messiah. So, for example, the author of Hebrews can make use of a Psalm that sings the praises of the God who rescues the faithful (Ps 40) to say that Jesus’ own faithfulness makes animal sacrifice an unnecessary part of the new covenant he inaugurates. Likewise, Psalm 110:1, the single verse of the Old Testament quoted in the New Testament more often that any other, is used repeatedly to speak of Jesus’ exaltation to the Father’s right hand and ascension into heaven even though the Psalm’s author almost certainly did not have ascension into heaven in mind when he wrote the Psalm.

 Upon closer inspection, it seems the prediction-fulfillment formula is actually just the opposite of how the earliest Christians understood the relationship between Jesus and their Scriptures. If anything, it appears they viewed the relationship the other way around. It was not so much Scripture which was determinative for their understanding of Christ as much as it was Christ who was determinative for their understanding of Scripture. To be sure, all of Jesus’ first followers believed that Jesus fulfilled the Scriptures. However, he did so in such radical and unexpected ways that it was by no means an obvious truth to everyone who encountered him. In other words, the Pharisees actually had a pretty good point in their arguments with Jesus. The Pharisees were the ones who were looking at what Scripture said about the Messiah and looking at Jesus and seeing that he clearly didn’t fit the mold. Claiming that he was the Messiah and that he was himself authoritative over Scripture and the temple and Israel was enough to get him killed, itself the surest of signs that he was not the Messiah he claimed to be.

 If all of this is true, then why did those first Christians become disciples of Jesus? If Jesus so obviously did not fit everyone’s Messianic expectations as shaped by Scripture, then why did his first followers so boldly proclaim him as the Christ and even the Son of God, even to the point of giving their own lives? It seems to me that it was because they knew they had encountered in the flesh and blood of Jesus the full, definitive Word of God personified and that Word trumped every other word that had ever been spoken or written. They may not have fully realized this as he healed the sick and proclaimed the kingdom of God and they surely doubted whatever they had previously believed as Jesus hung dying and defeated on the cross. But the resurrection and the consequent pouring out of the Holy Spirit planted firmly in the minds and hearts of his followers that God had done something unique in Jesus. So much so that they began to re-read their own Scriptures in completely new ways through the lens of what they knew to be true in Jesus. For the first Christians, Jesus was the light by which the Scriptures were to be read.

This should come as no surprise to us. It is, after all, what the New Testament authors themselves tell us. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God...and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us”[1] and “God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son.”[2] Jesus as the Word of God, the Son by whom the Father has spoken, is one of the most fundamental affirmations in all the Christian faith.

 In spite of that, it seems to me that we often fail to read our Scriptures in accordance with that basic confession. Instead, we approach the pages of Scriptures as if the ink on those thin little pages of paper were the full and definitive Word of God for us, forgetting that title belongs first and foremost to Jesus and only derivatively to Scripture as it witnesses to Jesus by the power of the Holy Spirit. Likewise, we often speak of “Scripture alone” being enough to answer all of our questions. So we assume that if we can simply “prove” something from Scripture then it can serve as a universal truth for our doctrine and ethics. But what if Jesus’ disciples had stuck to Scripture alone over and above their experience of Jesus? Can you imagine them meeting with Jesus shortly after his resurrection and saying “Well, there’s no verse that says the Messiah was supposed to be raised from the dead so we’re not convinced.”? In my opinion, when we read Scripture as a document with one fixed and inerrant meaning given to us by God to serve as a source for an unassailable system of doctrine and ethics, we become more like the Pharisees who rejected Jesus and less like the early Christians who proclaimed him as Lord. 

 This is, by no means, an attempt to diminish the importance of Scripture. It is, however, an attempt to recapture its rightful place in the life of the Church and the believer: as a witness to Christ. When we remember that this is its purpose, I think it can actually raise our respect for Scripture by reminding us that God’s Word is not something written long ago, lifelessly locked into words on a page. Rather, “the Word of God is living and active,”[3] a Word that speaks to us presently. It goes to work on us like a sharp scalpel cutting us open and laying bare our weak and broken nature before the Great Physician in whose hand it serves as a powerful tool.

 Of course, the New Testament authors quote from a vast array of passages and books in the Old Testament. The Psalms, however, were a favorite of these first Christian theologians, especially as they reflected on the identity of Christ. A few Psalms in particular are quoted repeatedly in the New Testament with reference to Jesus. It is those Psalms which form the basis of this study.

 Each week will focus on a different Psalm, beginning with Psalm 2 on Ash Wednesday and ending with Psalm 16 on Easter.  Most weeks will consist of four lessons; one about the Psalm and three about its various uses in the New Testament. As a part of each lesson you will also be encouraged to interact with the Psalms as prayers. The readings for each Sunday’s worship are also included along with space for sermon notes.  Each week will also include a small group meeting in which you will discuss the passages you have read in the previous week as well as some quotes from the earliest Christian theologians about those passages. You can move through the lessons at your own pace within the week and, depending on when your small group meets, you may not complete all the lessons by the Sunday they are read in worship. (Even though the Sundays in the outline below appear after days 1-4, if your group meets on Wednesdays you might do days 1-2 on Thurs - Fri and days 3-4 on Mon - Tues.) However, you should attempt to complete all the lessons before your small group discusses them later in the week so that you can contribute to the discussion. Here is an outline of what lies ahead.

Psalm 2

Ash Wednesday - Ps. 2; Mark 1:9-11; 9:2-8; 15:39

Thursday - Meditate on Psalm 2, Lesson on Hebrews 1:1-5

Friday - Pray Psalm 2, Lesson on Acts 4:23-31

First Sunday in Lent - Psalm 2:1-9; 2 Samuel 7:1-17; Hebrews 1:1-5; Luke 4:1-13

Small Group Discussion: What stood out to you from this week’s Scripture readings? This week’s sermon? Quotes from Church Fathers with questions for reflection. 

Psalm 8

Week 1 of Lent

Day 1 - Read Psalm 8, Lesson on Psalm 8

Day 2 - Meditate on Psalm 8 (let God speak to you), Lesson on Matt 21:12-17

Day 3 - Pray Psalm 8 (let it speak for you to God), Lesson on Hebrews 2:5-9

Day 4 - Hear Christ in Psalm 8 (Christ speaks with you), Lesson on 1 Cor 15:20-28

Second Sunday in Lent - Psalm 8; Isaiah 8:11-18; Hebrews 2:5-9; Luke 9:28-36

Small Group Discussion

Psalm 40

Week 2 of Lent

Day 1: Read Psalm 40, Lesson on Psalm 40

Day 2: Meditate on Psalm 40, Lesson on Hebrews 10:1-10

Day 3: Pray Psalm 40, Lesson on Ephesians 5:1-2

Day 4: Hear Christ in Psalm 40, Lesson on Luke 7:18-23

Third Sunday in Lent: Psalm 40:1-8; Hosea 6:1-6; Hebrews 10:1-10; Luke 13:1-9

Small Group Discussion

Psalm 110

Week 3 of Lent

Day 1: Read Psalm 110, Lesson on Psalm 110

Day 2: Meditate on Psalm 110, Lesson on Mark 12:35-37

Day 3: Pray Psalm 110, Lesson on Mark 14:53-64

Day 4: Hear Christ in Psalm 110, Lesson on Hebrews 1:13; 7:11-22

Fourth Sunday in Lent: Psalm 110; Exodus 29:1-9, Hebrews 5:1-10, Luke 20:41-47

 Small Group Discussion   

Psalm 69

Week 4 of Lent

Day 1: Read Psalm 69, Lesson on Psalm 69

Day 2: Meditate on Psalm 69, Lesson on John 2:13-22

Day 3: Pray Psalm 69, Lesson on John 15:18-27

Day 4: Hear Christ in Psalm 69, Lesson on Romans 15:1-7

Fifth Sunday in Lent Psalm 69:4-9; Isaiah 53:3-9; Romans 15:1-7; John 12:1-8

Small Group Discussion

Psalm 118

Week 5 of Lent

Day 1: Read Psalm 118, Lesson on Psalm 118

Day 2: Meditate on Psalm 118, Lesson on Matt 21:1-44

Day 3: Pray Psalm 118, Lesson on Acts 4:1-12

Day 4: Hear Christ in Psalm 118, Lesson on 1 Peter 2:4-10

Palm Sunday: Psalm 118:19-29, Isaiah 28:14-22, 1 Peter 2:4-10, Luke 19:28-40

Small Group Discussion  

Holy Week

Maundy Thursday: Read Psalm 22, Lesson on Psalm 22 and Hebrews 2:10-18

Good Friday: Meditate on Psalm 22, Lesson on John 19:23-27

Holy Saturday: Hear Christ in Psalm 22, Lesson on Matt 27:45-50

Easter Sunday: Psalm 16:5-11, Acts 2:22-36, 1 Corinthians 15:1-11, John 20:1-18

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[1] John 1:1, 14, ESV.

[2] Hebrews 1:1-2, ESV

[3] Hebrews 4:11

Of Fruit and Temples

I planned to preach from Psalm 118 this Sunday and probably will still refer to it one way or another.  Since this is the Psalm the lectionary provides for every Palm Sunday and because it is quoted in the New Testament, I've already interacted with this Psalm a number of times before.  Some conglomeration of what I've written here, here, and here will probably all end up in my sermon this Sunday.  But for now I want to focus on one particular irony of the way this Psalm shows up in the Gospel of Mark.

It is especially striking to me the way quotations from Psalm 118 form bookends to a group of stories in Mark 11 and 12.  The (sort of) short version, without rehearsing too much of what I've said in those other posts, is that Jesus rides into Jerusalem during the week of Passover and the crowds welcome him with shouts of "Hossana!" and "Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord."  That is to say, the people are welcoming Jesus as their deliverer by using the words of Psalm 118, a psalm used at Passover as a celebration of the Lord's deliverance.  Jesus' procession stops at the Temple, much as the Passover procession in which Psalm 118 was recited climaxed as the temple, but Jesus' procession is sort of anti-climatic in that after arriving at the Temple he simply leaves.

On the following day, he is on his way back to the Temple when he spots a fig tree.  Upon closer examination, Jesus finds that the tree is not bearing fruit and curses it.  This seems a little unfair for the poor fig tree since Mark notes that it was not even the season for figs.  Apparently still grumpy about missing out on his fig-breakfast, Jesus then enters the Temple and does his whole righteous anger thing, kicking out all those buying and selling.  Upon leaving the Temple, the disciples notice that the fig tree Jesus cursed has withered.  It is here that we see a piece of Mark's masterful story telling on display: the fig tree is a symbol for the Temple in that it too has failed to bear fruit and is now out of season.  As a result, Jesus cursed it just as he did the fig tree.

Naturally, the religious leaders want to know where Jesus gets his authority for all this cursing and carrying on.  So they ask him.  And naturally, Jesus answers with an enigmatic question of his own and a story.  The story is about some tenants who refuse to give the landowner his share of the harvest.  The tenants beat and reject the owner's servants and even kill his son.  At this point even the religious leaders agree that those tenants are in trouble.  Jesus then responds with more words from Psalm 118; "The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; this was the Lord's doing and it is marvelous in our eyes."  Mark notes upon the conclusion of this story and quotation that the religious leaders wanted to arrest Jesus but were afraid to do so because of the people.

So we have this pattern:
Quote from Psalm 118
A tree that fails to produce its fruit
A temple that fails to produce its fruit
Tenants that fail to produce their fruit
Quote from Psalm 118

It would seem Mark wants us to read these stories about failures of fruit bearing within the framework of deliverance celebrated in Psalm 118.  When we do so, these stories become thick with irony.  In Psalm 118, it was Israel which was the stone the builders (the other nations) rejected but that God made the chief cornerstone of his plan.  The religious leaders saw themselves as protecting Israel's place in that plan.  However, Jesus has declared their efforts fruitless and proclaimed that he is now God's chosen cornerstone; that it is through himself that the deliverance of Psalm 118 will come.  The words of the very same Psalm can be used in the people's celebration of Jesus' deliverance and the religious leaders rejection of him.  And in doing that rejecting, the religious leaders show themselves to be exactly the fruitless tenants who reject God's chosen one that Jesus has said they are.  They fulfill his prophecy about them in their rejection of him as a prophet.

Despite the literary intricacy and skill involved in Mark's telling of these stories, I suppose the question for us is still a relatively simple one.  Do our lives bear the fruit of God's deliverance?  However, if the question is simple, Mark's telling of the story cautions us against a simplistic answer.  For we must remember that the religious leaders would have readily answered this question with a clear and resolute "Yes!  Of course, we are bearing the fruit of God's deliverance.  We are God's chosen, after all!"  It might be just as tempting for us to say "Yes!  Of course, we are bearing the fruit of God's deliverance.  We are Christians, after all!".  Perhaps we too have confused certain labels and institutions with real fruit bearing.  May these final weeks of Lent be a time when we re-examine our assumptions about what kind of fruit it is that God desires.

Love Means Holding Your Nose

Several weeks ago, as we began the season of Lent, we heard Psalm 25 as a pattern for prayer.  It served as one example of what it means to respond to this life with God.  And good pattern though it is, it is just one example since there are 149 other Psalms, 149 other prayers ready to be offered.  In fact, we heard a very different prayer the very next week.  One that traded the reverence and diffidence of Psalm 25 for anger and accusation.  But somewhat remarkably we confessed that the words of Psalm 22, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" was just as much an appropriate part of our God-speak as were the pious words of Psalm 25.  Two weeks ago we heard a Psalm of praise for the God who is revealed both in creation and in the Law.  This week we have a prayer of yet another variety; one of confession and a request for cleansing from sin.

"Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy, blot out my transgressions."  The Psalmist is quite literally asking God to "plaster over, to whitewash" his sin.  The Psalmist is looking for forgiveness so thorough that all record of the wrong is erased; asking God to act out of God's mercy and faithfulness rather than according to what the Psalmist deserves.  In fact, God is asked to "Hide your face from my sins" even as God is doing the blotting out.  The image is something akin to someone painting over an image they find so abhorrent that they can't even look at what they are painting over; like a parent trying to avoid the smell of dirty diaper even as they clean up their child.

This Psalm reminds me of the few times my daughter ate too much too close to bedtime when she was younger.  One time in particular I remember waking up to the sound of her crying and walking down the hall to her room wondering what was wrong but the moment I walked into her room, even in the darkness of night, any question about what was wrong immediately left me.  The smell of vomit was undeniable and overwhelming; enough to force me to concentrate very hard on not making my own contribution to the problem.  The introduction at the beginning of Psalm 51 says that the Psalm was written by David as a response to Nathan's uncovering of David's rape of Bathsheba and murder of Uriah.  Perhaps when we read that story we should see God doing his best not to puke over what David has done.

The words of this Psalm show that David recognizes the repugnant nature of his sin.  It is so foul that it threatens to drive God away.  In spite of that the Psalmist also recognizes that it is only God who can clean him up.  So he asks God not only to blot out the outward marks of his sin but also to "Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me."  The Psalmist is in need of not only forgiveness but a cleansing so deep that it goes to the very core of his being.

The smell of Hannah's vomit was nearly enough to drive me away as well.  But here was this little girl that I adore, who was sick and confused, and who only wanted her daddy to hold her and clean her up.  So I did my best to hold my nose and my gag reflex and did what she couldn't do for herself.  Obviously, this doesn't make me extraordinary.  It only makes me her father.

Growing up, I often heard the idea that God the Father turned his back on his Son while he hung on the cross.  The reasoning went that Jesus had taken upon himself the sin of the whole world and that God in all his holiness could not possibly look upon all that sin so he had to turn from his Son.  Why else, it was said, would Jesus have uttered those words of Psalm 22 "My God, why have you forsaken me?".  This strikes me as, at best, only getting half the story right.  Yes, of course, God finds our sin repulsive, so much so that God wishes to avert both eyes and nostrils from its sight and smell.  There is a very real sense in which sin threatens to drive God away from us.

But the other half of the story is that of the Father who, even while nearly gagging on the stench we have created, still reaches into our vomitaceous mess with his two hands of Son and Spirit in order to do for us what we can not do for ourselves; a Father whose love is greater than his gag reflex.  Perhaps, when we think of Jesus on the cross, rather than the Father turning his back on the Son, we should imagine the Father holding close his beloved Son, even as he wreaks of the sin of the world.  Perhaps this is the real glory of proclaiming that God is love; that even when the profane horror of crucifixion and the weight of all the world's sin threatened to break the bond of love between Father and Son that bond held fast.  That  even when sin itself entered the very life of the Triune God by Jesus taking it upon himself it did not dissolve the loving relationships between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit but instead that love swallowed up the sin of the world and overwhelmed it.  Perhaps this, most of all times, was when Jesus knew his Father as his Abba.

Psalm 51 speaks out of the conviction that God is willing to hold his nose for us.  Indeed, our Father is even willing to get some of our own filth and stench all over him if that is what it takes to hold us in his arms and clean us up.  Because his love for us is greater than his repulsion at our sin.  Because this kind of love is who God is.  Because this is what it means for us to call him our Abba.

A Pattern of Prayer

Switching gears from preaching in Paul's letters to the church at Corinth to preaching the Psalms is a kind of intercanonical culture shock.  These two disparate genres pretty well represent the varied literary landscape of Scripture.  Paul's writings are letters which means they are highly contextual, written for a specific group of people at a specific place at a specific time.  These letters often take the form of carefully reasoned rhetoric as Paul's tries to persuade his audience to a specific course of action.  The Psalms, on the other hand, are anything but rhetoric and anything but contextual.  While scholars have assigned a few of the Psalms to specific times or events within Israel's story, most resist such labeling.  The very purpose of most of the Psalms is to transcend their context and have a universal quality to them; they are meant to be prayed and sung by anyone, anywhere, at anytime.  These are ready-made words for God...a pattern for our own words...words for when we have no words.

This is especially true of Psalm 25.  In Hebrew, this Psalm is an acrostic; each line beginning with a successive letter of the Hebrew alphabet (with the exception of two letters and one letter repeated).  This Psalm is a pattern of prayer.  To say it is a pattern, however, is not to say it teaches the right way to pray or that it is a pattern that must be followed in robotic fashion.  After all, if this were so, there wouldn't be much point in having 150 different Psalms.  The existence of the collection itself witnesses to the plurality and freedom of prayer.  Perhaps the Psalm is not meant to be "taught" or "followed" at all.  Perhaps it is simply to say here is a pattern that contains movements familiar to those who have made a habit of prayer, to say this is how we have repeatedly found ourselves responding to the God who has saved us.

That pattern of response goes like this:

The Psalmist begins (v. 1-3) by expressing trust in God to deliver, asking God that he not be put to shame by his enemies.  Part of the Psalmist's expression of trust is to say that none who wait on the Lord will be put to shame.  This leads to the next movement of the prayer (v.4-5) in which the Psalmist recognizes his own need to wait upon the Lord if he is not to be put to shame.  So the Psalmist asks God to teach him God's ways.  This is the Psalmist's waiting; not only waiting to be taught by God but also waiting and trusting that God's reaching will be proved true.  This prayer to be taught by God reminds the  Psalmist of all the ways he has failed to be taught by God.  The next section of his prayer (v.6-7) asks God to remember his mercy and not the sins of the Psalmist.  The Psalmist is confident that God will do this, not because the Psalmist deserves it but because God is good and upright (v.8-10).  In fact, God's name, that is, God's reputation is honored when God provides for those who respect God as the Psalmist does (v.12-15).  Finally, the Psalmist ends his prayer by returning to his original request that God would deliver him (v. 16-21).  Then, just in case we missed that this prayer is not limited to one individual, the final verse "re-voices" the prayer as one for "Israel" - the man in whom all Israelites find their identity.

I trust you God.


Teach me to trust you God.


Forgive me for when I haven't trusted you God.


I know you'll forgive me God not because I deserve it but because you are just that good.  You are love.


May you be glorified in my life.


I present my request to you again because I trust you.

I can't tell you how many times I've prayed this prayer - and not because I was trying to imitate this Psalm or any other.  Anyone else find themselves praying basically this prayer over and over?  Sometimes it feels like I hardly know anything else to pray.  These are not the overly pious words of someone who has all the answers about God and prayer.  These are just the words of anyone who has ever tried to live with God for any sustained period of time.

There is a substantial market out there for books on prayer and how to pray.  Anyone who knows me knows I love books.  In fact, love probably isn't strong enough of a word.  Its more of an obsession.  I even have a couple of books on prayer.  But I've found that the only books I've ever encountered on prayer that were really worth anything weren't the ones that tried to explain what prayer is, how prayer works, how to go about praying, or how to make my prayer life more "effective" (whatever that means).  They were the ones that simply offered different kids of prayer, the ones that included prayers to be prayed.  They were the ones that simply got me praying.  It could be that's the kind of book Psalms is to be for us - just the kind that gets us praying - because prayer is a hands-on activity.  It is the real work of the Church.  And over time, if we'll keep wrestling and being honest with ourselves and God, we'll find that our prayers sound an awful lot like the Psalms, not because we wanted them to but just because this is what life with God is like.

Discipleship: More Than Palm Waving

Scholars debate who it is that is speaking in Isaiah 50:4-9 and the rest of the so called "suffering servant" passages.  Is this Isaiah speaking? Is it a prophetic successor of Isaiah?  Should we understand this as the collective voice of Israel as a nation that suffers as God's servant?  Is this a prophecy about the coming Messiah, about Jesus?

Obviously, for those of us who believe that Jesus is the Messiah, it is easy to jump to that last option.  So many of the images found in Isaiah 49-53 seem to fit Jesus so well.  While I am not convinced that Isaiah (or the disciple of his who wrote these words) had Jesus in mind, I am convinced that Jesus must have often had these words in mind throughout his life and ministry, especially as he drew nearer to the cross.  In other words, I don't think it is so much that Jesus perfectly fulfilled some pre-existing expectation of what it meant to be Messiah (in fact, I am quite certain he was constantly exploding the pre-existing notions of Messiah) as much as he found his understanding of who he was as the Messiah in places where no one else was looking.  While others were looking for Moses, Elijah, and David all rolled into one, Jesus found his Father calling him to stand in the line of rejected prophets like Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel.

It is fitting then that Isaiah 50 is one of the texts for Palm Sunday.  Those waving their palm branches welcome Jesus into Jerusalem as that Moses/Elijah/David figure.  But this celebration only lasts as long as the crowd fails to see Jesus as he sees himself, as long as they see him as one who has come to save by power when, in fact, he has come to save by suffering and weakness.  It takes less than a week for the chants of "Hosanna" to become chants of "Crucify him".

The role of prophet and disciple as described in Isaiah 50 and as modeled by Jesus in his journey to the cross serves as a sharp contrast to the fickle crowds of Palm Sunday.  The crowds celebrate only as long as things are going their way.  In contrast, the prophet/disciple has a face set like flint, a determination that can be compared only to the solid, steadfastness, and unwavering nature of rock.  The prophet/disciple is certain that the Lord is his present helper even when he is struck and spit on.  The prophet/disciple is confident that he will be vindicated even as everyone goes against him because he hears and is sustained by word of the Lord every morning.

Dust Thou Art...

Last night, I shared death with the group of people with whom I share life.  I reminded them that we are all headed toward the grave.  As I marked each of their foreheads with ashes, it occurred to me what an odd gathering this was; what an odd privilege my role in it was.  What other group of people pays someone to remind them of their mortality?  A lot of people get paid for just the opposite; to help others deny death, put it off, pretend its not on its way.  But here were these people coming to me willingly leaning forward to be marked with dirt and hear the words "You are dust...".

Then I had to mark my own wife, my own children with these same ashes.  It is one thing to mark a group of people for death who are mostly older than you, many of whom are already so pained with varying ailments that they are in little need of being reminded of their own mortality.  It is another to mark the one to whom you have bound yourself for as long as you both shall live.  It is yet another to mark these little ones whose death you pray you will never see.  But even in these little bodies that are so full of life and vitality, the decaying corruption of this world is already sown.  Even these are gifts from God who must come to know the way of the cross.  Even these can not be held back from the God who demands that we trust him with everything if we claim to trust him at all.  The imposition of these ashes was a three day journey to Moriah without leaving the sanctuary of our church.

Prior to our Ash Wednesday service yesterday, I took a half day journey through Weldon Springs.  This time of year, this place that is normally teeming with life and beauty was filled with the browns and grays of decay; too late in the year to be blanketed by snow and too early to show many signs of spring.  While I walked through the decomposing leaves and lifeless brush, one thought seemed to occur to me repeatedly: "In spite of the appearances, no one doubts that the new life of spring is on its way."  It might not come as fast we'd like but we all take it for granted that spring is near.  I had come to the park expecting the dull lifelessness of late winter and that is exactly what I saw.  And yet, all I could think about was the life that would soon surround this lifeless trail.

As the Church, we are not called to be a merely optimistic people but a hopeful people.  What I mean is that we are not a people who simply ignore the death and decay of our world believing that its not really that bad or that it will work out somehow.  Instead, we are a people who mark ourselves with dirt, who gather around a table and meal that commemorate a painful and unjust death, who put the cross at the center of our existence precisely because we recognize just how bad it is and that things will not simply work themselves out unless God intervenes.  But while we are not merely optimistic, we are hopeful because we have no doubt that the new creation is on its way.  It might not come as fast as we'd like it to but we all take it for granted that God's redemption of our world is near, that the kingdom of heaven is at hand.  We are a people recognize the undeniable gravity of the tomb but who also look into its darkness to find it in empty.  We are a people who acknowledge that we are dust but who also believe that the God who originally formed us from that dust of the ground can also raise us anew after we have returned to it. 

The Brokenness of our "Good Friday" World

The Journey from Deliverer to Sacrifice

Maybe it was like an Independence Day Parade.  You know, the kind you see in small town U.S.A.  Local businesses and civic organizations have their floats.  The High School and Jr. High Bands play patriotic music.  Men and women of the armed forces are recognized.  Everyone else stands on the side of the road waving American flags and clapping.  All in celebration of the freedom that was won over 200 years ago and in hope that it is a freedom that we will continue to enjoy.

Passover was like Israel's Independence Day.  It was the festival that commemorated God's deliverance of Israel from its slavery in Egypt.  It is thought that Psalm 118 was sung by those entering the city of Jerusalem during the Passover festival.  You can almost see the movement of the people into the city in the Psalm itself.  They begin at the bottom of the hill:

"Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good; for His loving-kindness is everlasting.  Oh, let Israel say, 'His loving-kindness is everlasting.'  Oh let the house of Aaron say 'His loving-kindness is everlasting.'  Oh let those who fear the Lord say, 'His loving-kindness is everlasting.'"

As those singing make their way toward the city, they recount all that God has done for Israel; how God has defeated all of Israel's foes.  Then as they approach the city gate they sing:

 "Open to me the gates of righteousness; I shall enter through them, I shall give thanks to the Lord.  This is the gate of the Lord; the righteous shall enter through it."

Those celebrating then remember once again all that the Lord has done for Israel.  They rejoice that even though Israel was the stone rejected by the builders of all other nations, God has chosen them to be the cornerstone of His kingdom.  Perhaps now they are approaching the Temple at the center of the city, the center of the whole universe in Jewish thought, the place where God himself resides, saying

"Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.  We have blessed you from the house of the Lord."

The journey climaxes and find its goal with the sacrifice of the passover Lamb. This final sacrifice is where the procession has been headed all along.

"Bind the festival sacrifice with cords to the horns of the altar."  

And the Psalm concludes with the same words of praise with which it began.

 "Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good; for His loving-kindness is everlasting."

Jesus must have made this journey into Jerusalem many times, maybe every year of his life when it came time for Passover.  But the gospels only record in detail for us the last time Jesus would make this pilgrimage.  And in this final trip into Jerusalem, Jesus finds himself as the centerpiece of the Independence Day parade.  Just as feelings of nationalistic pride soar high in the U.S. on the 4th of July, so also Passover was a reminder for Jews of what God had done and a promise that he could do it again.  These crowds had seen what Jesus could do; the healings, the casting out of demons, even raising the dead.  Was there anything that Jesus could not do?  Many in this crowd must have thought that not even the mighty Roman army could stand in Jesus' way.  Maybe Jesus was coming to Jerusalem to claim his throne as king.  So the air in Jerusalem is filled with shouts of Psalm 118

"Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!"

And the crowd adds to this shouts of "Hosanna!" which means in Hebrew "Deliver us!"  The crowds believe Jesus is the one sent to deliver them, to bring them independence once again, just as God had given Israel independence from Egypt at that first Passover meal so many years before.  Then Jesus heightens expectations even further by making his way to the Temple.  The Temple, besides being the place of prayer and sacrifice had also served as a symbol of kingly authority in the past.  The Temple had been built by kings and other kings had solidified their rule through it.  Perhaps Jesus would do the same.

But when Jesus arrives at the Temple, he does the last things that anyone expects.  He starts tearing the place apart, turning over tables, and kicking people out.  Jesus says that those in the Temple have taken what was supposed to be a house of prayer, a place where people seek God, and turned it into the exact opposite, a place where "religious people" could hide from the things that God really cares about.

This is the beginning of the end for Jesus and he knows it.  After the triumphal entry and Jesus' actions in the Temple, Matthew, Mark, and Luke all record Jesus' telling of the parable of the vine-growers.  In this story, the vineyard owner sends a slave and then another slave and a third slave to collect his share of the prophets from the vineyard but the tenets beat all three and send them away empty handed.  The owner finally sends his son but the tenets kill him.  Jesus summarizes the story with the words of Psalm 118:

"The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone."

Whereas it was Israel that was the rejected stone that God had chosen in Psalm 118, now the religious leaders are the ones rejecting Jesus who is the one that God has chosen.  Jesus knows that even though he is God'a chosen one and even though just a few days ago all the people were welcoming him as king, his time is now short.  In just a matter of a few days, the crowds which shouted "Deliver us!" will turn to shouting "Crucify him!"

Humanity hasn't changed much in 2000 years.  We still have our parades to celebrate our independence.  We still talk about how much we value freedom and liberty.  And we should.  But one of the painful truths of Palm Sunday is that we really only value certain kinds of freedom.  We don't really want to be liberated from all of our slaveries.  We want our political freedoms and the liberty to choose what we want.  But what happens when all our choices become a kind of slavery themselves?  We are perfectly happy to continue on in our slaveries of greed, nationalism, lust, and pride.  We don't really want those chains to be broken.  So as long as Jesus plays nice and gives us the freedoms we want then we'll ask him to deliver us.  But if his liberating work begins to actually cause pain, if it demands sacrifice on our part, then like the Pharisees, we too begin to plot how we might get rid of Jesus.

In these final days of Lent, we must remember that to be a follower of Jesus is to be associated with a convicted rebel and criminal.  To accept the liberation and freedom that Jesus brings is to accept the way that he brings it; through death, through the cross, through sacrifice.  It is easy to join in the parade, singing God's praises and waving our palm branches, when we think that this march will end in the fulfillment of our own hopes and dreams but will we continue on this path when we find that the movement of this whole procession is a movement toward sacrifice?

The Journey Between Liberation and Restoration

Psalm 126 is a part of the group of Psalms known as the Psalms of Ascent (Psalm 120-134).  This group of Psalms go by this name because they were sung or recited by faithful Jews as they ascended the path toward Jerusalem.  Faithful Jews made this pilgrimage three times each year at the major festivals of the Jewish calendar: Passover, the Feast of Weeks, and the Feast of Tabernacles, festivals which celebrated both God's deliverance of the people from their slavery in Egypt and his provision for them through the harvest they reaped in the land God had given them.

These festivals were celebrated throughout much of Israel's history.  However, some scholars believe that the practice of singing the Psalms of Ascent during these pilgrimages did not become common practice until the people of Israel had been returned from their exile in Babylon.  Psalm 126 certainly seems to reference that return from exile.

"When the Lord brought back the captive ones of Zion, we were like those who dream."

The first three verses of the Psalm speak of the joy that is shared because of the great deliverance that the Lord has accomplished.  The final three verses express a hope that God will not only deliver but also restore.  Surely the exiles would have rejoiced to return to their homeland, the land that God himself had given them.  However, upon arriving there they would have found a land that had not been lived in or adequately cared for in years.  It was their home but it was not what it used to be.  Now that God had delivered them, these liberated captives also needed God to renew their land.  The renewal of the land even stands for a kind of renewal of the people themselves.

"Those who sow in tears shall reap with joyful shouting."

So here are these newly liberated captives making the arduous climb up to the city of Jerusalem thanking God for his deliverance and asking for the complete restoration that only God could bring.

We find ourselves making the same climb.  We, too, are making our way along the lifelong arduous and demanding journey toward the holy city.  It is, as Eugene Peterson calls it, "a long obedience in the same direction."  It is not a sprint or a sight seeing tour but an intentional journey toward the one thing that matters.  It is a journey that lies between our being liberated and our hope that God still has more work ahead; that God will also renew and restore our land.  We make the climb thankful for what God has done and eager to see what God has yet to do.

More Painful Than Repentance

Psalm 32 sings the praises of a God who forgives.  As Christians, we talk about forgiveness and repentance and confession a lot.  But talking about it a lot sure doesn't seem to make it any easier.  Is there anything more difficult than admitting when we've been wrong about something?  It's so painful, sometimes embarrassing and humiliating to admit when we've done something wrong.  Sometimes being a Christian or being in Church can actually seem to make it harder to repent and confess because we think we're supposed to be better than that or something.  Or maybe we're just worried about what everyone else will think.  Or maybe we're worried about what God will think; that maybe this time God won't be able to forgive us; that we've just gone too far.  Or maybe its just that we can't stand to see ourselves that way; maybe our own self-worth is too wrapped up in being right all the time.

But what's the other option?  Continuing down our current path even though we know its not the right one?  Turning around and starting down an entirely new path may be difficult but it is certainly better to make the correction when we first see the error of our ways than it is to keep going down the wrong path only to be convinced later that we must now back track even further.  I often think of confession and repentance as a kind of spiritual surgery; it is certainly painful at first but the temporary pain is meant to lead to greater overall health.  Without the surgery and the pain that accompanies it we only become more and more ill.

Trust

It is often difficult to determine any kind of context when studying a Psalm.  However, Psalm 63 gives us some help in this matter.  It begins by telling us that this is a Psalm of David when he was in the wilderness of Judah.  (This is verse 1 in the Hebrew text but is placed as a sort of subtitle on the Psalm in many translations.)  This means that this Psalm was probably written during one of the times in his life when David was fleeing form his enemies in the wilderness; either when Saul was pursuing David or when David was feeling the rebellion began by his own son Absalom.  Of these two, the second seems the more likely since v. 11 says "the king will rejoice in God" and David was not yet king when Saul was pursuing him.

If this is indeed the context of this Psalm, then it causes us to consider the weight of David's words.  David speaks of seeking God earnestly because God's loving-kindness is better than life.  David says he will sing the praises of God and that he is satisfied in God.  David says all this not while things are good and easy but while his reign as king has just been attacked and is in jeopardy.  Everything David has spent his life doing is currently at risk.  And all of this because David's very own son is pursuing him and seeks to kill him.  It is in that circumstance that David says he clings to God and is confident that God's right hand will uphold him.

Of course, this is the same kind of radical trust in God that Jesus exemplifies for us and calls us to as well when he calls us to take up our own cross and follow him.  If we only trust in God when things are good, then that is not trust at all; that is not faith, at least not the faith of Jesus.  The faith of Jesus is a faithfulness that extends all the way to the cross, all the way to our own death trusting that God has the power to rescue us even then.  To be the people of Jesus is to be a people who seek the Lord's will earnestly even when we are hurting.  It is to be a people who pray "not my will but thine be done."

Does God Play Hide and Seek?

My two-year-old daughter loves to play hide and seek.  Every so often we'll turn all but one of the lights off downstairs.  Hannah will count to ten (inevitably skipping the number seven as she always does when she counts) and I'll go hide in a closet or behind the bathroom door or halfway down the basement steps.  Then I listen for those little footsteps and wait for those little eyes to peek around the corner looking for me. There aren't many things that make Hannah jump, squeal, and giggle all at the same time like me jumping out and saying "Boo!" when she's found me.  These giggles are then immediately followed by "Again!" and we start the whole process over again or switch places.  

"Where is God?"  "Why can't I see him?"  Perhaps one of the most commonly asked questions of God is why he doesn't make himself more readily available to us.  If God is so loving and really wants to be in relationships with us, then why doesn't he come out in plain sight where we can all see him?  Even in the Psalm I am preaching from this week, there is all kinds of talk about seeking God as if God were hidden and difficult to find.   The Psalmist is commanded to seek God and the Psalmist says he will seek God but asks God not to hide his face.  Does God really hide himself from us?  Is this all just a game to God?

The games of hide and seek that we play with Hannah have sort of evolved over time.  It didn't take Hannah long to figure out that the fun part is the finding and being found.  She also knows that one of my most common hiding places is the closet in her playroom.  So, many times when she has gotten bored with a toy in her playroom she has stood up and said "Hide dada!" and usually before I can do anything she is already hiding in the closet.  She then proceeds to open the door and say "Boo!".  She'll do this over and over again, sometimes even pointing to the closet before she re-enters and saying "hide" just in case I hadn't yet picked up on the fact that she was hiding in the closet.  All the while it doesn't at all seem to bother her that her "hiding" doesn't really conceal her location from me.  For her, the only point in hiding is the joy of being found.  

It's not often that I compare God to a toddler.  Usually, in these kinds of analogies it is we who are the children and God who is the loving father.  But I have to wonder if God doesn't do much the same thing as my daughter.  To be sure, God is often not as tangible and immediately available as we might like for God to be.  You can't order up a little bit of God at the McPrayer drive-thru.  But neither does it take a Master of Divinity Detectives degree to track down God.  Instead, it seems that God hides behind the same doors over and over again.  This is because God doesn't hide so as to remain hidden.  God hides because He wants us to seek him.  He wants us to seek him in those places where we've found him over and over again; Scripture, Communion, the Church...

The Psalmist says "One thing I have asked from the Lord, that I shall seek:  That I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord and to meditate in His temple."  The Lord commands the Psalmist to seek Him but the Psalmist already knows where to look because he has found God there many times before.  God calls us to seek Him not because He is difficult to find but because He wants us to find Him. 

In fact, the final verse of this Psalm might be the most telling of all.  "Wait for the Lord.  Be strong and let your heart take courage.  Yes, wait for the Lord.'  After all this talk of seeking, now the Psalmist says "wait".  It's as if after having sought after God, the game of hide and seek has now been reversed and God is seeking us, which is, of course, also true.  Once we've searched and sought after God and finally find Him then we realize that He was actually seeking us all along.  

Dust to Dust

Remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return.

Often, as a pastor, it my job to speak words of hope and comfort.  One of the joys of my calling is to lift others up with words of encouragement and to celebrate the joy and life that we share and anticipate in Jesus Christ.  But it is not my calling simply to make others happy or to tell them what they would like to hear.  I must also speak words of solemn truth, of sobering reality.

On this day, my role as a minister entails nothing less then reminding those in my congregation of their impending death.  I will tell them that they are moving, breathing bodies of dirt and that one day they will cease to be even that.  I will then remind them of this reality by smearing dirt on their faces in the shape of an ancient instrument of torture and execution.

Ash Wednesday reminds us of our death, our own mortality, because that it is the only way to truly understand life.  We must recognize that even as we are living we are dying.  The breath of air you just inhaled, while providing your body with oxygen and life, also signals that you are one breath closer to that inevitable last breath.  We are not immortal gods.  We are finite, fallen, limited human beings made of dust.  Every step of life we take is also a step toward death which should cause us to carefully consider how we want to spend those precious steps.  

Of course, Ash Wednesday is also the beginning of the season of Lent.  This is the season in which we remember Christ's journey toward the cross.  And that journey teaches us another ironic truth; that every step toward death is also a step toward life.  Jesus' shows us that to truly live we must die.  It is only by dying to our own selfish desires and taking up our cross in service to others and obedience to God that we can really live.  This is why we engage in practices like fasting and repentance.  They are ways of dying to ourselves so that we might live for God.

On this day, we remember that we are dust and to dust we shall return.

Prosperity or Presence?

Passages of scripture like Psalm 91 make it easy to see how things like the "prosperity gospel" get started.  You know, the whole idea that if you pray hard enough then God will give you a luxury vehicle, perfect health, and a large house.  After all, the Psalmist says things like "no evil will befall you" and that God will command his angels so that you won't even strike your foot against a stone.  If Psalm 91 was the only part of the Bible we had, then we might conclude that those who are faithful to God never suffer any misfortune ever.

Of course, simple human experience teaches us that the faithful do indeed suffer and clearly Psalm 91 is not the only passage of scripture in the Bible.  Just like any other passage of scripture, we have to allow the words of Psalm 91 to be interpreted by the whole of scripture.  Are the words of Psalm 91 true?  Yes, I believe wholeheartedly that God is with and watches over those who make God their refuge.  I've seen too many instances of this in my own life and in the life of the Church to not believe it.  But Psalm 91 is not the whole picture.  We must understand the promises of Psalm 91 in light of everything else that is said in the Bible rather than creating out entire theology out of a single verse or passage.

In fact, anyone who isn't already convinced of this should consider the New Testament passage in which Psalm 91 is quoted.  In Luke 4:10-11, verses 11 and 12 of this Psalm are quoted by none other than the devil himself.  Satan is tempting Jesus to take short cuts in his messianic mission, a mission which Jesus knows will include suffering, and he uses scripture to do it.  If the devil can quote scripture to support his own evil purposes then surely we can recognize the fallibility of putting too much weight on any single verse or passage of scripture.

Even the words of Psalm 91 itself cause us to consider carefully the promises that are made there.  The final words of the Psalm read:

"He will call upon me and I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble.  I will rescue him and honor him.  With a long life I will satisfy him and let him see my salvation."

The Psalmist assumes there will be trouble.  The promise is not that God will keep us from all trouble but that God will be with us in that trouble.  There is a promise that God will rescue and honor those who seek the Lord but perhaps for some the rescue will only come on the other side of death as it did for God's own Son.  The Bible and the Church's experience are filled with stories of God's protection and deliverance of his people but even as we re-tell those stories we must be ever mindful of the fact that God did not deliver his own Son from the pain and suffering of the cross.  But neither did the Father finally abandon Jesus.  He rescued Jesus when he seemed to be beyond the point of rescue; when he had already been laid in the tomb Jesus was raised to new life.  It is the resurrection which is the ultimate refuge that God provides.  It is not sheltering from every trouble or even from death itself but a promise that God will never abandon us and that death will not have the last word.