Psalm 139: Pt. 7, Concluding Reflections

David began with an acute awareness of the Lord’s knowledge of him, knowing that God searches him and knows him. But that isn’t useful unless the psalmist knows what God sees.

Thinking about this, I remembered the first time I saw The Truman Show. There’s this guy who lives in this completely falsely constructed world for the purpose of being entertainment to millions of viewers who watch, scrutinize, and discuss every aspect of his daily life—and I thought to myself, how humbling and helpful would it be for Truman to hear what all those people thought of him, saw in him and about him that he was blind to; it would be an almost inexhaustible resource for personal betterment and growth, in areas he never knew he needed it. He just lived honestly and ignorantly in front of millions of people who could’ve given some very constructive criticism. Well, all of us have an audience who sees and closely observes all of our most unaware living. He knows us perfectly, and while God’s providence is at work in all our lives, there’s something qualitatively different about knowing that we’re known by God and asking him to show us what he sees. This invitation makes us severely vulnerable and requires a submission that none of us are accustomed to, but will invariably (when we listen) result in following God to his heavenly palace where we will dwell with him. This is not an intimacy to be taken lightly, or considered nonchalantly. While we cannot escape from God, his presence is most significant and meaningful when we acknowledge it and choose also to be present with him. The most frightful truth in the world is that God knows us—that the darkness can’t hide us, that God saw our unformed body in the secret place. While these truths are absolutely terrifying, they’re also more wonderful and dignifying than any other truth I could realize in my life—better than a stellar Curriculum vitae, more impressive than many well-invested funds, more impactful than a global ministry I founded. And it’s the truth and acknowledgment of God’s knowledge of me, presence with me, and care for me that is foundational to my willingness to listen to his law, walk in his ways, think his thoughts, be comforted by his presence, and to follow him in the way everlasting.

Psalm 139: Pt. 6, vss. 23-24

Search me, O God, and know my anxious heart;
test me and know my anxious thoughts.
See if there is any offensive way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting.

The crux of the Psalm comes in verses 23-24 as the psalmist invites God to know his anxious thoughts because he knows he can’t get away from God. He invites God to test him, because he is not a good test for himself. If he is to hate properly those who hate God then he must first be searched by the Lord, intimacy between him and the Lord must grow. I think here again of Jonah who made the mistake of not aligning his thoughts with God’s. When the Lord relents of his anger against Ninevah, Jonah gets angry and still desires the hellfire and brimstone God originally threatened. Whereas Jonah should have invited God’s examination of his heart, the Lord asks Jonah in 4:4, ‘Is it right for you to be angry?’ and Jonah simply walks away and takes a seat somewhere to stew. Consequently, the psalmist must be certain that he’s on the right side with his intense anger, so he invites his judge to examine him closely—and as he examines him, to lead him in the way everlasting so that, as he aligns himself with God and seeks to think God's thoughts after him, he would truly perceive the heart and character of God. Only the confidence that comes from knowing that God knows us and lets us know him can quiet the type of anxious thought that David has wrestled through in this psalm.

Psalm 139: Pt. 5, vss. 19-22

The second stanza that we're getting to now is a response to the previous reflection, with the first part (19-22) being a resolution to be like God and the second (23-24) as a request for an ever-deepening intimacy with God.

If only you would slay the wicked, O God!
Away from me, you bloodthirsty men!
They speak of you with evil intent;
your adversaries misuse your name.
Do I not hate those who hate you, O Lord,
and abhor those who rise up against you?
I have nothing by hatred for them;
I count them my enemies.

In verses 19-22 David pleads with God to rid the world of all the wicked, all those who misuse his name, who hate him and rebel against him—make this world what it was always supposed to be, David pleads to God. It’s harder to see the Lord when we know so many misuses for his name; it’s difficult to perceive his goodness when there are those who seek your blood, who want to ruin your name; it's difficult to believe God is always present with us when people can be so wicked to us. But counting God’s thoughts, as David speaks of doing in verse 18, includes hating those who hate God. We only understand this by seeking to know God's heart both for the world and for himself. Israel is the new humanity he's gathering in the Old Testament, the community of people who are called to image and represent him in spite of their sinfulness. Being like God includes owning God's enemies as one's own enemies, viewing the world through the lens of God's own righteousness. This frees the people of God to express their moral indignation, to feel justified in their anger when the things in this world and in their lives go horridly wrong. It's hard to know exactly what had happened to David that he so implores God to crush his enemies here, but it seems that the desperation that we hear and sense in the rest of the psalm is rooted in the way these bloodthirsty men sought after David; he needed the truth of God's intimacy with him in all ways and at all times and in all places. Being confident in this truth elicits a particular response: God-likeness.

We are likewise called to think God’s thoughts after him. On this side of the cross, this still includes moral indignation for deeds done in violation of God’s good name and character; but God’s thoughts towards the wicked look different now in light of Christ’s work on the cross and subsequent resurrection. As the new humanity that God is gathering under the new covenant in Christ, we are now the community of people called to image and represent him in spite of our own sinfulness. We still own God's enemies as our enemies, but God interacts with his enemies differently now. While David was calling on him to crush his enemies, he has crushed his Son and is being patient because he wants that none should perish. (God's patience is why we ourselves came to be a part of this thing called his Church.) Viewing the world through the lens of God's righteousness now means seeing evil for what it is but knowing what will become of it. We still call God to action when we see the bloodthirsty, when we hear words of evil intent, we rise up against those who hate the Lord--but we do it as those who were once enemies of God and now know the love displayed on the cross. We know that God's righteousness now is worked out in mercy, compassion, and patience, but when he decides to make all things new in the return of Christ his righteous wrath will be applied like never before. Through his great power in judgment and his discernment of human hearts, the whole world and everyone in it will show forth his glory and holiness continually. As his people, we participate now in glorifying him with the expectation of seeing his glory fully revealed. We pray now for the wicked and give ourselves in love to the wicked because we are called to live in this age like Christ, but we know that there will be a time when such things will be unnecessary and the pain the wicked afflict will be a thing of a very distant past. Then we will see how God will finally respond to his people's prayers of desperation and for deliverance, such as David's supplication in Psalm 139.

Thomas Cranmer to Peter Marty (1555)

An excerpt from a letter Cranmer, while imprisoned, wrote to fellow reformer Peter Martyr Vermigli:

"I have not deemed it right to pass over this one thing, which I have learned by experience, namely, that God never shines forth more brightly, and pours out the beams of his mercy and consolation, or of strength and firmness of spirit, more clearly or impressively upon the minds of his people, than when they are under the most extreme pain and distress, both of mind and body, that he may then more especially shew himself to be the God of his people, when he seems to have altogether forsaken them; then raising them up when they think he is bringing them down, and laying them low; then glorifying them, when he is thought to be confounding them; then quickening them, when he is thought to be destroying them. So that we may say with Paul, 'When I am weak, then am I strong; and if I must needs glory, I will glory in my infirmities, in prisons, in revilings, in distresses, in persecutions, in sufferings for Christ.' I pray God to grant that I may endure to the end!"

Thomas Cranmer was burned at the stake in Oxford on March 21, 1556.

Psalm 139: Pt. 4, vss. 13-18

For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother's womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.
My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place.
When I was woven together in the depths of the earth
your eyes saw my unformed body.
All the days ordained for me were written in your book
before one of them came to be.

How precious to me are your thoughts, O God!
How vast is the sum of them!
Were I to count them,
they would outnumber the grains of sand.
When I awake, I am still with you.

In verses 13-18, David hasn’t neatly intellectualized what he knows about God, but has enacted his theology in a forthright and frighteningly pragmatic way—listen to what he says in verse 14, ‘I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.’ Whereas in other psalms, David points to the birds of the air or the creatures in the sea, to God’s historic fidelity to Israel, to God’s goodness in dwelling among Israel as reasons to praise God, here David recognizes that he need go no further than his own hand and foot to have compelling reason to praise God. This connection is not incidental following on the previous 13 verses. We are given a beautiful description of the meticulous care that God took in creating David. All of those other things David could shut his eyes to, he could ignore them, he could refuse to consider them as he looked for reasons to praise God—or reasons not to praise God, as it were. When we get enough anxiety in our lives, such things aren’t readily apparent to us—the ways God’s been faithful, how he drew us to himself in the first place, the great gifts he’s given us, the amazing and generous spouse we have by our side. While we really are capable of shutting our eyes and our hearts to all these things, whenever you find yourself and wherever you find yourself, the point of commonality is you. And David couldn’t shut his eyes or ignore that.

When we think there is nothing good around us, when we are blinded by our own sin or our own bitterness or the insults of those around us, we cannot avoid our very selves— the wonder of our bodies, the sensation of being our inmost being. The sequence of thought so far is that: “God sees the psalmist at all times, even in the dark, and he sees into the depths of his being, into his conscience—and that is no surprise since God was responsible for its creation.” We are known and that is both unavoidable and praiseworthy; when we can think of no other reason to praise God, his care in creating us is more than sufficient. Indeed God took the care to write all the days ordained for David before one of them came to be—he knows David’s life backwards and forwards, and not just because he’s read ahead but because he wrote it himself. For these reasons, God’s thoughts seem wonderful to David, worth savoring and cherishing. And this is how David knows that God is with him and that he is with God.

Verses 1-18 is a song of trust (a motif of a petition psalm)—David has drawn us into his own existential sense of God’s relationship to him—knowing him, near to him, and caring for him; ultimately trustworthy and good.

To the Tune "Song of Divination"

Ode to the Mume Blossom
by Lu You

Beside the broken bridge and outside the post-hall,
A flower is blooming forlorn.
Saddened by her solitude at night-fall,
By wind and rain she's further torn.

Let other flowers their envy pour.
To Spring she lays no claim.
Fallen in mud and ground to dust, she seems no more,
But her frangrance is still the same.

Psalm 139: Pt. 3, vss. 7-12

Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?
If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
I I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
even there your right hand will guide me,
your right hand will hold me fast.

If I say, "Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,"
even the darkness will not be dark to you;
the night will shine like the day
for darkness is as light to you.

In verses 7-12, David now openly asks, ‘Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?’ There’s almost an anxiety to his inquiry—he knows the answer, but it seems like he still feels he must ask the question. Some might call this a rhetorical question, as though he’s setting himself up to give an answer everyone already knows; but it seems more like a plea of desperation. Almost like thinking through a multiple choice question, David considers his options: the heavens, but you are there; the depths, but you are there, the wings of the dawn, no; if I could just make it to the far side of the sea, but no; darkness just doesn’t cut it, and night shines like the day before him. So, none of the above. But what do you say to answer that question, where do you go to escape God’s Spirit, to flee from his presence? We all ask this question, and pose our own answers. Jonah had his own answer, too. The first three verses of the book of Jonah tell us that “The word of the Lord came to Jonah son of Amittai: ‘Go to the great city Ninevah and preach against it, because its wickedness has come up before me.’ But Jonah ran away from the Lord and headed for Tarshish. He went down to Joppa where he found a ship bound for that port. After paying the fare, he went aboard and sailed for Tarshish to flee from the Lord.” He flees and flees and flees, until he finds himself in the belly of a big fish and realizes that even the darkness is not dark to the Lord. So where do you go to flee? Where do you find the darkness that isn't dark to the Lord?

But do you, like David, know just how wrong your answer is? David artfully and honestly walks us through his own fear and trembling—even the darkness cannot conceal him from God’s penetrating sight. There is no depth of despair or height of ecstasy that the Lord is blind to; indeed he truly sees everywhere we are, everywhere you are.

To the Tune "Pure Serene Music"

Passing One Lonely Night at Boshan
by Xin Qi-ji

Around the bed run hungry rats,
In lamplight to and fro fly bats.
On pine-shad'd roof the wind and shower rattle,
The window paper-scraps are heard to prattle.

I roam from north to south, from place to place,
And come back with gray hair and wrinkled face.
I woke up in thin quilt on autumn night.
The boundless land I dreamed of still remains in sight.

(and so with the Christian life...)

Psalm 139: Pt. 2, vss. 1-6

O Lord, you have searched me
and you know me.
You know when I sit and when I rise;
you perceive my thoughts from afar.
You discern my going out and my lying down;
you are familiar with all my ways.
Before a word is on my tongue
you know it completely, O Lord.

You hem me in--behind and before;
you have laid your hand upon me.
Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,
too lofty for me to attain.


In verses 1-6, David affirms that the Lord knows him. David observes how the Lord knows when he sits and when he rises, when he goes out and when he lies down. By book-ending the events of his day-to-day life, David is recognizing that God knows all his places and all of his times. There’s a profoundly mundane feeling to this Psalm that makes it so palatable to us. We can’t read this and not think about our alarm clock going off in the morning, preparing for the day’s activities, and arriving home evening after evening. Listening to David’s own self-consciousness of God’s knowledge of him in his own mundane living, we’re challenged to conceptualize the pervasive presence of God in our own day-to-day life. The Lord is present in my life, and that is both terrifying and dignifying.

One Effect of Expectations

From Jonathan Edwards' Diary on Sunday, January 12, 1723:

"The reason why I so soon grow lifeless, and unfit for the business I am about, I have found out, is only because I have been used to suffer myself to leave off, for the sake of ease, and so, I have acquired a habit of expecting ease; and therefore, when I think I have exercised myself a great while, I cannot keep myself to it any londer, because I expect to be released, as my due and right. And then, I am deceived, as if I were really tired and weary. Whereas, if I did not expect ease, and was resolved to occupy myself by business, as much as I could; I should continue with the same vigor at my business, without vacation time to rest. Thus, I have found it in reading the Scriptures; and thus, I have found it in prayer; and thus, I believe it to be in getting sermons by heart, and in other things."

Psalm 139: Pt. 1

For the past 6 months or so I've kept returning to Psalm 139. One of the reasons, I think, is that it's so familiar but I keep seeing new things in it. Bruce Waltke in his notes for the January class Judges-Poets had some comments on it that precipitated some of my thoughts. The thought that I've found most refreshing in my readings and re-readings of the psalm is that the psalm is very intimately written. It’s often said that this psalm teaches three omnis: God’s omniscience, God’s omnipresence, and God’s omnipotence. While each of these doctrines under-gird David’s understanding of God as he writes, it doesn’t seem that these formal concepts were in the forefront of his mind as he was writing—he’s not so much concerned that God knows everything or that God is everywhere or that God can do anything. Rather, he’s concerned that God knows everything about him, that God is everywhere he goes and could go, and that God has done everything in his own life. There’s an intensely personal flavor to this psalm as David walks us through his existential sense of God’s self in his life—the divine ‘you’, here, is as significantly real as the human ‘I,’ as one commentator put it. In this way, the theology of the psalm is applied theology.

Over the next few days I think I'll post some of my thoughts on the specific sections of the psalm.

Sabbath Thoughts

Abraham Joshua Heschel in his book The Sabbath says,

"Judaism is a religion of time aimed at the sanctification of time. Unlike the space-blinded man to whom time is unvaried, iterative, homogenous, to whom all hours are alike, qualitiless, empty shells, the Bible senses the diversified character of time. There are no two hours alike. Every hour is unique and only one given at the moment, exclusive and endlessly precious. Judaism teaches us to be attached to holiness in time, to be attached to sacred events, to learn how to consecrate sanctuaries that emerge from the magnificent stream of a year. Sabbaths are our great cathedrals; and our holy of holies is a shrine that neither the Romans nor the Germans were able to burn; a shrine that even apostasy cannot easily obliterate: the Day of Atonement. According to the ancient Rabbis, it is not the observance of the Day of Atonement but the Day itself, the 'essence of the Day,' which, with man's repentance, atones for sins of man."

Having inherited the Christian understanding of time from Judaism, it's worth considering how we are called to live in time. In thinking about the Sabbath and a God-honoring observance of the Sabbath, I've been noticing how I view time as a commodity--something to be spent carefully rather than received as a gift. We don't give our time to God, but God has given our time to us. Stanely Hauerwas argues that "We learn to be in time as God's creatures. In worship we take time, or more accurately, in worship God gives us time." In fact, he gives us time that has been sanctified through the resurrection. The day is holy. "Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work....For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy (Exodus 20:8-11)." Our understanding of Sabbath provides us with both a work ethic and a rest ethic. God accomplished a myriad of wonderful things that required much effort, thought, personal application, and care in the first six days of the week. Then he rested--and his rest sanctified the day, made it holy. If entering into eternal life is knowing the Father and the Son whom he sent (John 17:3), then we live by entering into his pattern of work and rest.

This pattern isn't one of activity followed by passivity, though. This is strongly demonstrated in the resurrection rest that we are promised--the resurrection wasn't a rest that Jesus effected for himself so he could live forever in a glorified human body. It's a rest he accomplished on our behalf so that we could taste that glorified humanity that we're destined for as we come into worship on Sundays where the full restoration of our fellowship with God is weekly anticipated and preliminarily tasted. He desired that this fellowship would be our reality. Our rest is no more passive than his rest; our rest must also be characterized by bringing restoration and redemption to ourselves, our families, our friends, and to the community we are a part of. "Christians believe that Sabbath has been forever changed through the Resurrection. Jesus was raised on the eighth day, becoming for us a new creation, giving us back time in a way we would not have had without God's raising Jesus from the dead. Just as God entrusted to Israel the Sabbath so that the world might know God's intentions for Creation, so Christian worship on the day of the Resurrection, thereby signaling that God's promise to Israel has gone to all the world. All are created to share the rest, the salvation, that comes from worship of the true God. In our Sunday worship Christians serve the world by showing the world that God has not left us alone and that we have good work to do (Hauerwas)."

The Needfulness of a Griddle

On some Saturday mornings, when it seems pleasing to us, Steve and I wake up and make some form of hearty breakfast. This morning it took close to an hour. We don't spend that amount of time on most dinners. We mix the pancakes (this morning it was blueberry), we prepare the bacon, we get the eggs in the deck ready for when the pan is available. Each pancake, as I'm sure you know, is to be cooked for 1-1&1/2 minutes on each side over medium heat. We make about 10 of those, but it inevitably takes more than 20 minutes. Then we decide what to do with the eggs. This morning it was eggs in a basket. So Steve prepared our bready baskets and got out the eggs, all the whle microwaving our bacon. I'm not sure how this step took the remaining 40 minutes. We put the buttered bread baskets on the pan (one at a time, of course--small pan) and let them sizzle. Dumping the egg in, we let it cook for the prescribed 1-1&1/2 minutes then flipped it and let it cook. We repeated with the second one, again, all the while microwaving the bacon. One would think that a prescribed 1-1&1/2 minutes on both sides for two eggs in a basket wouldn't result in an overly lengthy breakfast preparation process. But it did. This length of time was further accented by the fact that I once watched my college roommate Emily make breakfast at her house in 10 minutes flat--and she produced more food than we did this morning. The secret to her success? (Besides being from the South) A Griddle. And that's all I could think as I pulled up the barstool to the stove as I flipped pancakes--get a griddle, get a griddle, get a griddle. It's better for your back...

Valley of Vision: A Puritan Prayer

Lord, high and holy, meek and lowly, Thou hast brought me to the valley of vision, where I live in the depths but see Thee in the heights; hemmed in by mountains of sin I behold Thy glory. Let me learn by paradox that the way down is the way up, that to be low is to be high, that the broken heart is the healed heart, that the contrite spirit is the rejoicing spirit, that the repenting soul is the victorious soul, that to have nothing is to possess all, that to bear the cross is to wear the crown, that to give is to receive, that the valley is the place of vision. Lord, in the daytime stars can be seen from deepest wells, and the deeper the wells the brighter Thy stars shine; let me find Thy light in my darkness, Thy life in my death, Thy joy in my sorrow, Thy grace in my sin, Thy riches in my poverty, Thy glory in my valley.

Bertrand Russell and "Descriptions": An Excerpt

I've gotten a few inquiries into the title of my blog. While I have no apology for the subtitle, I do have a distinct source for the title itself: More than my description. As some may know, I was a Philosophy major in college. One of my favorite readings from my courses during that time period comes from Bertrand Russell's Introduction to Mathematical Philosophy. Before you think I'm too much a geek, I should tell you the reason I liked it so much--it made me laugh. Hard. He has an entire chapter devoted to descriptions, part of which I will now share with you:

"The question of "unreality," which confronts us at this point, is a very important one. Misled by grammar, the great majority of those logicians who have dealt with this question have dealt with it on mistaken lines. They have regarded grammatical form as a surer guide in an analysis than, in fact, it is....

"For want of the apparatus of propositional functions, many logicians have been driven to the conclusion that there are unreal objects....Logic, I should maintain, must no more admit a unicorn than zoology can; for logic is concerned with the real world just as truly as zoology, though with its more abstract and general features. To say that unicorns have an existence in heraldry, or in literature, or in imagination, is a most pitiful and paltry evasion. What exists in heraldry is not an animal, made of flesh and blood, moving and breathing of its own initiative. What exists is a picture, or description in words. Similarly, to maintain that Hamlet, for example, exists in his own world, namely, in the world of Shakespeare's imagination, just as truly as (say) Napoleon existed in the ordinary world, is to say something deliberately confusing, or else confused to a degree which is scarcely credible. There is only one world, the "real" world: Shakespeare's imagination is a part of it, and the thoughts that he had in writing Hamlet are real. So are the thoughts that we have in reading the play. But it if of the very essence of fiction that only the thoughts, feelings, etc. in Shakespeare and his readers are real, and that there is not, in addition to them, an object Hamlet. When you have taken account of all the feelings roused by Napoleon in writers and readers of history, you have not touched the actual man; but in the case of Hamlet you have come to the end of him. If no one thought about Hamlet, there would be nothing left of him; if no one had thought about Napoleon, he would have soon seen to it that someone did. The sense of reality is vital in logic, and whoever juggles with it by pretending that Hamlet had anothing kind of reality is doing a disservice to thought. A robust sense of reality is very necessary in framing a correct analysis of propositions about unicorns, golden mountains, round squares, and other such pseudo-objects."

There aren't many ways of casting perspective that make me want to be like Napoleon, but Russell has here found one that I wouldn't have thought of on my own. Napoleon would still (have) exist(ed) even if never described, just like me; the referent of his description is more than a set of thoughts and feelings in someone's imagination, just like me; the aspects and truth of who Napoleon was are not exhausted in his description, just like me. Hamlet has a definite end in the human imagination; he may reflect aspects of personal realities because he is a purportedly human character imagined by a human and audienced by humans, but he is words on pages that reference thoughts and feelings in Shakespeare's mind. He is open for interpretation by director and actor and viewer; he is not his own, he belongs to everyone because he is no one. But a real referent in history directs our understanding of Napoleon so that his identity is governed by more than an imaginative description. Indeed, I am much more than my description. And if you're reading this, so are you.

Now everyone can let out that pent up 'duh.'

Two Years as of Yesterday

Steve and I have decided that, as long as it is possible, we're going to try to do a little weekend something for our anniversary. So far, there's only been two opportunities to make good on this. The second was this past weekend. We took a few days down in Tampa with our annual Busch Gardens passes to give ourselves some time to not be distracted by our respective responsibilities here. We're both very grateful to be in a position with his work and my school to run off for a couple of days without major consequence 'back home.' Being able to do this creates the mental and physical space for us to just talk and process and reflect and enjoy.

This weekend, one of the things that kept running through my mind is how marriage always seemed extremely strange to me when I was younger but now being married to Steve seems perfectly natural. I think part of that was because all marriage in my youthful life involved truly adult people--32 or above. Not people I found it easy to relate to when I was 15 (I was one of those shaky, shifty teenagers that didn't know how to talk to people who were out of college). It never occured to me until I went to college that one could marry before the age of 30. No one in my family did. It was sometime in college that I realized that marriage was more than a social contract or a polite legal agreement between two people (apparently male and female, but not necessarily--whoa, now I've admitted too much) or a manner of religious coercion between a man and a woman (the first Christian marriage I ever encountered was headed up by a man who once 'grounded' his wife for gaining 5 lbs). Marriage was all of those things and a cloud of amorphous unknowing for me, too.

But in college marriage took a different face altogether. There were two couples who were very formative in my desire ever to get married, let alone get married young. The Boroughs and the Kapics had marriages where the mutual respect was obvious and constant (at least when I was around). The husband and wife enjoyed each others' company, were polite and appreciative to each other, spoke as equals, trusted each other--their marriages seemed like glorified friendships. Granted they were much more than friendships, but friendship had never been associated with marriage much before that for me. It hadn't occured to me that I could be friends with someone I married.

I feel so daft writing it all now because, well, I am married and I wouldn't be married if those things weren't true of how my husband relates to me--with respect and trust, as an equal, appreciative and polite, very patient and kind, honestly and openly. And I'm continually surprised that I can relate to him in the same way. I can't help but believe and be thankful that God heard us in our prayers as we sought marriage and in the worship of our wedding ceremony. Enjoying my husband's company proves to me that God is blessing this covenant we've made. And that is unavoidably humbling.

Bring Your Body Home

An excerpt from Henri Nouwen's Inner Voice of Love

'You never felt completely safe in your body. But God wants to love you in all that you are, spirit and body. Increasingly, you have come to see your body as an enemy that has to be conquered. But God wants you to befriend your body so that it can be made ready for the Resurrection. When you do not fully own your body, you cannot claim it for an everlasting life.

How then do you bring your body home? By letting it participate in your deepest desire to receive and offer love. Your body needs to be held and to hold, to be touched and to touch. None of these needs is to be despised, denied, or repressed. But you have to keep searching for your body's deeper need, the need for genuine love. Every time you are able to go beyond the body's superficial desires for love, you are bringing your body home and moving toward integration and unity.

In Jesus, God took on human flesh. The Spirit of God overshadowed Mary, and in her all enmity between spirit and body was overcome. Thus God's Spirit was united with the human spirit, and the human body became the temple destined to be lifted up into the intimacy of God through the Resurrection. Every human body has been given a new hope, of belonging eternally to the God who created it. Thanks to the Incarnation, you can bring your body home.'

I've been reading out of this volume in the mornings and found this reading compelling in that it explores how we understand the redemption of our bodies now, before the final resurrection. We participate now in Christ's new humanity by being united to him and are able to anticipate in this life as ourselves the life to come as ourselves made new in every way through the Holy Spirit in us. The fact of the incarnation has ramifications for how we live as humans made of flesh and blood.

Birth as Worship

My college roommate Emily just gave birth to her and her husband McGee's first child, a little boy affectionately called 'Jack.' I remember in one of my first doctrine courses in college learning about the concept of imitating God and bringing honor to him as his image-bearers. My professor argued that the act of birth is one of, if not the, most worshipful acts that any human can perform. That God delights in life, and when we are bringing new life forth from an overflow of love that we are communicating something about God to the world that can be said in no other way. So cheers for new life and new birth that reminds us who quickens us and tells the world of a love that suffers through pain for the sake of an irreplaceable relationship.

World on Fire

In budgeting lately, this video has kept coming to mind. If you haven't ever seen it, you should.

http://www.worldonfire.ca/

Lots of things to think about in how we use our money and how God is honored in the use of our money.

Truth in Worship

True confession: I've spent a lot of time staring at John M Frame's Worship in Spirit and Truth without having read it yet. When I look up from Reggie M Kidd's book for moments of reflection, I see Frame's in the dock on the coffee table. All that to say, my reflections on the title don't come from the book itself so don't blame Frame for anything said here. Or Jesus for that matter--as much I want to be Biblical, I know I'm springboarding beyond John 4 here.

I've had a number of conversations and discussions that have revolved around truth lately--mostly the truths of our personal lives. The question has often come up, Isn't this just all pious introspection, aren't you just having a pity party? While the answer might sometimes be a hearty 'Yes', I think it only goes that far when the thinking and reflection and introspection are devoid of any sense of God's presence, either in the subjects of introspection or in the act of introspection itself. Otherwise, such reflection is essential to our growth as worshippers. The truth of who we are and where we've come from must be explored alongside the truth of who God is and where he's bringing creation. In a way, this is just a reiteration of Calvin in Bk1Ch1 of his Institutes--knowing God requires knowing self, and knowing self requires knowing God. In order to come into God's presence as ourselves with all we have to offer and all we need to receive, we must know who we are. We must know that we are united to Christ, adopted as sons in his covenant, declared righteous, and freed from our slavery to sin into newness of life. But this is true of all Christians; we all participate in the reality of God's kindgom as co-heirs with Christ. Realizing the truth of who God has made us in his Son, how does the existential truth of our own lives impact how we come to God as his children, as slaves to righteousness, as the redeemed humanity? If we are to offer ourselves to God, we must know what is most dear to us. Worshipping in truth seems to require that we know where we've come from and how that impacts our expectations of who God is and how he will meet us in worship. But we cannot ask these questions apart from the Spirit of Christ who will lead us into all truth, even the truths of our own personal lives.

Sermon

It's often argued in Reformed circles that the sermon is the high point of a worship service--everything leads up to the sermon, then there's the sermon, then everything leads down from the sermon. So one might ask, what is a sermon? Kevin Vanhoozer, in typical style, offers a compelling answer to just that question:

"The sermon, not some leadership philosophy or management scheme, remains the prime means of pastoral direction and hence the pastor's paramount responsibility. The good sermon contains both script analysis and situation analysis. It is in the sermon that the pastor weaves together theo-dramatic truth and local knowledge. The sermon is the best frontal assault on imaginations held captive by secular stories that promise other ways to the good life. Most important, the sermon envisions ways for the local congregation to become a parable of the kingdom of God. It is the pastor's/director's vocation to help congregations hear (understand) and do (perform) God's word in and for the present."

Makes me want to hear a sermon.

Worthy Sacrifice

Still thinking about the distinction between Cain and Abel, I'm struck by how a worthy sacrifice is a trusting sacrifice. Cain would've had the same amount of fruit and grain leftover if he had brought the first to show up rather than just 'some' from his overall harvest. Ten apples and a pound of grain is ten apples and a pound of grain. But the amount isn't what concerns God. It's the statement we make about him in our sacrifice that matters to him. The statement of Cain's sacrifice was 'You'll get what you want, and I'll make sure I have what I need.' That's often the statement my sacrifices make. But the statement of Abel's sacrifice was 'I want to give you what I need.' He valued God's pleasure over his own security. There was no guarantee that he'd get any more fat calves that season with which to feed himself and his family, but still he gave God the first calves in all their fattiness and substance. This pleased God. But God's open disfavor of Cain's sacrifice made Cain angry. After all, wasn't Cain giving what he was told to give? He had given up the same amount as Abel had, and yet God was upset? But God didn't leave Cain to stew in his anger.

Confronting Cain, God said, Why are you angry? Why is your face downcast? If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must master it (Gen. 4:6-7). Though he tried to ignore it, Cain knew what he had done wrong. A sacrifice isn't a sacrifice if it's coming from a place of material security. He was called to give the firstfruits and he had given the last. But even when confronted graciously by God, he opened the door to sin. Not even dignifying God with a response, he goes to his brother Abel with a plan. The Lord had told Cain that his sin must be mastered, but instead Cain let himself be mastered by his sin. What started as a selfish gift turned into a conniving, murderous, pre-meditated slaughter. The land that heretofore had provided Cain with his fruit and grain now drank up his brother's blood. Cain's unworthy sacrifice was now manifesting itself in his selfish attitude towards Abel, as though killing his brother would justify him. Then God wouldn't have anyone to compare him to any more. Abel couldn't outdo him any more if he were dead.

A Worthy Offering

Now Abel kept flocks, and Cain worked the soil. In the course of time Cain brought some of the fruits of the soil as an offering to the Lord. But Abel brought fat portions from some of the firstborn of his flock. The Lord looked with favor on Abel and his offering, but on Cain and his offering he did not look with favor. So Cain was very angry, and his face was downcast (Gen 4:2b-5).

The difference is Cain knowing he has enough before he comes to God with his offering and Abel coming to God with his offering knowing he will have enough.

Communal Worship

I've been poking around the internet to find information on two of my favorite theologians: Colin Gunton and John Zizioulas. I came across a website hosted by Douglas Knight who studied under Gunton at King's College, London. Gunton's theology has stood out to me because it has proven time and again to be thoroughly Trinitarian, thoroughly God-centered. As Gunton interacts with what it means to be human, he always holds in tension the unfathomable reality that creatures are able to commune with their Creator; that we are images of God and therefore capable of knowing him. Douglas Knight here reflects on how this impacts our worship of God:

"Gunton taught that we creatures are able to know God because the Holy Spirit enables us to confess Jesus, who confesses God the Father. Often quoting Irenaeus to say that the Son and the Spirit are the two hands of the Father, Gunton showed that the doctrine of the Trinity provides us with a doctrine of mediation - God himself is not only the (christological) content but the (pneumatological) medium and bearer of that content. He argued that God is now at work making possible not only our worship and knowledge of him, but also our recognition of one another. God is the means by which I may see you for who you are, and let you become what God intends you to be – a unique and particular person." quoted from www.douglasknight.org

As Knight points out here, the same way we come to know and love God we come to recognize who our brothers and sisters are. The Spirit who carries us in our worship of God also carries us in our relationships with one another, enabling us to recognize the dignity and nobility that we are created with. With the Spirit bearing the truth of Christ's confession concerning the Father, we are simultaneously drawn into God's own love for himself as well as for his people. Consequently, learning to know and love one another occurs alongside learning to worship God. I don't think there could be a stronger argument for communal, or corporate, worship.

Expectation: An Argument Against Misunderstood Strawmen Who Have Upset Me

Many times in my life I've heard from the pulpit, 'Don't come into church asking what you can get, but what you can give.' Nothing kills expectation better than that statement. In effect what the pastor has just said is 'We're not here for you, but you should be here for others.' Beyond creating a community of arrogant, resourceless sheep, this also seems to highlight utilitarian, pragmatic programs. None of the pastors I've heard say the above phrase ever meant to communicate such things, but as a congregant this has been the transliteration that finally seated itself in my impression of the church. There's no doubt that we ought not come into the church in order to defend our own interests, but the church must be a place where our needs can be met.

You'd think that with congregations full of people asking, 'What can I give--What can I give?' that this sort of need-meeting would happen naturally and organically. While personal sin and the corruption of the human heart are the most obvious obstacles to having congregations full of people who meet one another's needs, it seems that there's one specific obstacle that must be addressed: No one expects anything. We also need congregations full of people asking, 'What can I get--What can I get?' We need people who know that God has placed a family of the forgiven in their lives so that he can answer to his children through his children. The kingdom of God is a place for a thousand expectations and our churches should be, too. Worship grows out of, among other things, our experience of God's goodness in his people. We ought to be able to enter our churches with high expectations for what we will see God do in our lives through his people. When being needy in God's church is no longer scary, being humble as God's church will no longer seem unnecessary. Admitting our neediness is the quickest remedy for arrogance; and making our whole selves available to one another fills our churches with resources beyond Zondervan's wildest imaginations. We need pastors who will say from the pulpit, 'We want you coming in here asking what you can get. As you receive what we have to offer, our prayer is that you will be compelled and excited to give what you have to offer.' (So it's not as catchy or Kennedy-ish, but it's more meaningful) Or, as my Worship professor pointed out all week, 'You can't give what you don't have.' The church must be a reliable source of what we have to give.

All the same, the issues of sin and our dirty hearts still remain. The best we have to give, then, is the lived experience and personal knowledge of being made one with Christ and therefore with all those other redeemed sinners who are in Christ. We ought to expect this as we come into our churches, and others ought to be able to expect it from us as they come to the church.