Psalm 39

"And now, O Lord, what do I wait for?
My hope is in you.
Deliver me from all my transgressions.
Do not make me the scorn of the fool.
I am silent; I do not open my mouth,
for it is you who have done it.
Remove your stroke from me;
I am worn down by the blows of your hand.

"You chastise mortals
in punishment for sin,
consuming like a moth what is dear to them;
surely everyone is a mere breath.


"Hear my prayer, O Lord,
and give ear to my cry;
do not hold your peace at my tears.
For I am your passing guest,
an alien, like all my forebears.
Turn your gaze away from me, that I may smile again,
before I depart and am no more."

The psalms resonate with every possible tone emitted by the human heart...including the lament of the one who says ... enough already.

As a subscriber to the daily readings sent out by the ELCA every day, I "open" the suggested reading in the early morning moments of prayer and devotion. Today, there it was....Psalm 39...the raw emotions of the psalmist expressing a type of approach avoidance. As we follow Christ, who himself laments "Oh Lord, let this cup pass from me" (Matthew 26:39)it is likely that we will be led to the edge of our human reality. It can pierce us. It can generate a cry that says oh please, can't I return to the easy way of normalcy when I could overlook what YOU see?

Oh, the tension of being drawn toward the clarifying love of the Lord...and the temptation to back away and say...Oh, please, don't expose that aspect of my imperfection...that degree of truth. Why, oh why, are you making me see it again... I come to you in hope, oh giver of life... and you remind me again that this...or that...in me must and will die before I am the new creation that you intend.

There was a day that I smiled at the stirring of this (or that) tendency that was part of "me" yet alien to who I can be when resting in you. I didn't know that it was undesirable to you, for it was easy for me...it seemed so natural.

Then I remember that I am following Christ, returning me to wholeness by going first through the suffering of submission to the will of the Father. I would rather shed tears flowing from the pain of surrendering myself to You, Divine Love, than laugh and smile in the illusion of "my" way.

Because of Christ and His call to my heart, "follow me", I truly do NOT want you to turn your gaze from me. I know that it is in your gaze that your love unleashed in Christ enfolds all that I am.