Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 103, the best known and best loved of the psalms of praise.
Bless the LORD, O my soul; and all my being, bless God’s holy name. Bless the LORD, O my soul, and forget not all God’s benefits.
Psalm 103:1-2
Blessing the Lord is easy for me today.
My life is filled with those “benefits” – happiness, love, friends, and celebration.
My dear brother and sister-in-law are visiting from Tennessee after nearly a two year hiatus.
My precious grandniece is being baptized today.
And my Sister in community is celebrating her 75th birthday. (And, yes, I did just about find time to write this blog! 🙂
Psalm 103 reminds us that in both joyful and sorrowful days, God’s Presence is our abiding blessing. And for this, we can always bless God:
In a 2016 Facebook post (a precursor of the blog) for this day, I wrote:
Today, in Mercy, we humbly praise God for being present in every moment of our lives. We lift our hands in praise for the joys that have revealed God’s beauty, and for the sorrows that have revealed God’s compassion. May we reverently live our thanks by our kindness to one another.
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 47, one of seven enthronement psalms which celebrate a “coronation” of God.
All you peoples, clap your hands, shout to God with cries of gladness, For the LORD, the Most High, the awesome, is the great king over all the earth.
Psalm 47: 1
Used for the feast of the Ascension, the point of the psalm is much more than an exercise of pageantry. It is an act of faith and reverence to God, the Loving Omnipotence who chose to redeem us by assuming our humanity.
It is a confirmation that we believers do see the Supreme Being in the human Jesus we have come to love. This is what Paul prays for the Ephesians in our second reading:
May the eyes of your hearts be enlightened, that you may know what is the hope that belongs to his call, what are the riches of glory in his inheritance among the holy ones, and what is the surpassing greatness of his power for us who believe, in accord with the exercise of his great might, which he worked in Christ, raising him from the dead and seating him at his right hand in the heavens, far above every principality, authority, power, and dominion, and every name that is named not only in this age but also in the one to come.
Ephesians 1:18-21
The Great Commission, found in today’s Gospel, is the true gift of the Ascension.
Go into the whole world and proclaim the gospel to every creature.
Mark 16:15
Jesus tells us that his time on earth is complete. The lesson of Love has been taught. We now are given the power to continue the message for all time.
Jesus promises that our faith will:
–overcome evil -create new possibilities to preach the Gospel -show courage against antagonism -resist suppression -heal and strengthen others to believe
These signs will accompany those who believe:
-in my name they will drive out demons, -they will speak new languages. -They will pick up serpents with their hands, -drink any deadly thing, it will not harm them. –lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.
If we believe and open our hearts to this message, indeed, it is a day for trumpet blasts! Here are a few from one of my favorite triumphal pieces! If the Apostles had only had trumpets, they might have played something like this for the Lord as He ascended 🙂
Poetry: Ascension Sonnet – Malcolm Guite
We saw his light break through the cloud of glory
Whilst we were rooted still in time and place
As earth became a part of Heaven’s story
And heaven opened to his human face.
We saw him go and yet we were not parted
He took us with him to the heart of things
The heart that broke for all the broken-hearted
Is whole and Heaven-centred now, and sings,
Sings in the strength that rises out of weakness,
Sings through the clouds that veil him from our sight,
Whilst we our selves become his clouds of witness
And sing the waning darkness into light,
His light in us, and ours in him concealed,
Which all creation waits to see revealed.
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 148, one of the “Laudate Psalms”.
The Laudate Psalms are the psalms numbered 148, 149, and 150, traditionally sung all together as one psalm in the canonical hours, most particularly the hour of Lauds, also called “Morning Prayer”, which derives its name from these psalms.
from Wikipedia
I’ve always loved the morning with its radiant possibility spilling over the horizon. Morning comes like a rainbow pantone, speaking not only to the weather outside but within our own spirits.
Praise the name of the LORD, for this name alone is exalted; The Lord’s majesty is above earth and heaven.
Psalm 148: 13
Waking each morning, I wait for the day to speak to me. It finds itself in the sun or clouds, the warmth or cold. And then it finds me in whatever weather my heart might rest.
Prayer begins after that discovery, inviting the transforming and comforting power of God into whatever the day offers. Essentially, it is always a prayer of thanksgiving that I am alive and given another day to, by the power of God’s grace, know and be Love in the world:
Praise the LORD from the heavens; praise God in the heights. Praise God, all you angels; praise God, all you hosts.
Psalm 138: 1-2
As we wait for the Holy Spirit on the great feast of Pentecost, let us trust Jesus’s Gospel words in today’s Gospel. Let us find each morning, and each day, full of promise!
Jesus said to his disciples: “I have much more to tell you, but you cannot bear it now. But when the Spirit comes, the Spirit of truth, you will be guided to all truth.
John 16:12-13
Poetry: Morning Poem – Mary Oliver
Every morning
the world
is created.
Under the orange
sticks of the sun
the heaped
ashes of the night
turn into leaves again
and fasten themselves to the high branches–
and the ponds appear
like black cloth
on which are painted islands
of summer lilies.
If it is your nature
to be happy
you will swim away along the soft trails
for hours, your imagination
alighting everywhere.
And if your spirit
carries within it
the thorn
that is heavier than lead–
if it’s all you can do
to keep on trudging–
there is still
somewhere deep within you
a beast shouting that the earth
is exactly what it wanted–
each pond with its blazing lilies
is a prayer heard and answered
lavishly,
every morning,
whether or not
you have ever dared to be happy,
whether or not
you have ever dared to pray.
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 138, a prayer of tender, personal thanksgiving for deliverance.
The psalmist has had a tough experience:
On the day I cried out, you answered; you strengthened my spirit.
Psalm 138:3
We can all relate to days like this. Maybe it’s not today, but sometime in our lives we’ve just cried out to God for help. And God has responded, perhaps not with the specific answer we prayed for, but with even more – the strength to find God’s Name and Promise hidden in our experience:
Because of your kindness and your truth, you have made great above all things your name and your promise. When I called, you answered me; you built up strength within me.
Psalm 138:2-3
Today might be a good day to gratefully remember those experiences in our prayer, or to bring our present need before our God who is always faithful:
Your right hand saves me. What God has begun on me, God will complete; your kindness, O LORD, endures forever; forsake not the work of your hands.
Psalm 138:7-8
May our prayer raise up deep thanksgiving and love in our hearts.
Poetry: Psalm 138 – transliteration by Christine Robinson
I give thanks to you, O God, with my whole heart. Wherever I find you, I sing your praise. I notice nature’s intricacy, I ponder your stirrings in my heart. I see your Way lure the world towards peace, justice, and love. You care for the lowly You keep me safe when I walk through troubles and turmoil. I live your Way, for your love endures forever.
Music: With All My Heart – sung by Nancy Sebastian Meyer
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 98, an exuberant celebration of God’s predilection and fidelity toward Israel. But at the same time, it is a call to recognize God’s love for ALL Creation:
The LORD has made his victory known; has revealed his triumph in the sight of the nations
Psalm 98;2
If we read the whole psalm, we might imagine all Creation assembled like a magnificent choir and orchestra – something like a supersized Mormon Tabernacle Choir. As the psalm progresses, the choirmaster-psalmist incorporates successive components into an awakened awareness until there is one universal melody of praise.
First, in a theme we met recently, the call to a NEW song:
Sing a new song to the LORD, who has done marvelous deeds… ..remembering mercy and faithfulness toward the house of Israel. All the ends of the earth have seen the victory of our God.
Psalm 98: 1-3
Next, the vocals and the instruments
Shout with joy to the LORD, all the earth; break into song; sing praise. Sing praise to the LORD with the lyre, with the lyre and melodious song. With trumpets and the sound of the horn shout with joy to the King, the LORD.
Psalm 98: 4-6
Then nature’s “orchestra”
Let the sea and what fills it resound, the world and all who dwell in it!
And even the suggestion of tambourine dancers along the river’s edge
Let the rivers clap their hands the mountains shout with them for joy, before the LORD who comes, who comes to govern the earth, To govern the world with justice and the peoples with fairness.
Psalm 98: 8-9
This inclusive psalm serves our other readings so well. The early Church in Acts has folded the Gentiles into the chorus.
Then Peter proceeded to speak and said, “In truth, I see that God shows no partiality. Rather, in every nation whoever fears him and acts uprightly is acceptable to him.”
Acts 10: 34-35
And Jesus gives us the underlying truth that, in his Love, we are ALL part of this cosmic symphony:
“As the Father loves me, so I also love you. Remain in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and remain in his love. “I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and your joy might be complete.
This is my commandment: love one another as I love you.
Poetry: Shoulders – Naomi Shihab Nye
A man crosses the street in rain, stepping gently, looking two times north and south, because his son is asleep on his shoulder. No car must splash him. No car drive too near to his shadow. This man carries the world's most sensitive cargo but he's not marked. Nowhere does his jacket say FRAGILE, HANDLE WITH CARE. His ear fills up with breathing. He hears the hum of a boy's dream deep inside him. We're not going to be able to live in this world if we're not willing to do what he's doing with one another. The road will only be wide. The rain will never stop falling.
Music: OK – it’s not the Mormon Tabernacle 😀 but it captures the spirit for me! I hope it puts you in the rhythm too, beloveds!
“Joy is God in the marrow of our bones.” (Eugenia Price) Joy is a deep well. If, in times of sorrow, we go down under the sorrow, we will discover that joy is still alive.
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 100, considered by some to be the most revered and important of all the psalms. Walter Brueggemann says this:
This psalm is one of the best known and best loved in the entire repertoire of the Psalter. It breathes a faith of simple trust, glad surrender, and faithful responsiveness. It is not sung by newcomers who are only now embracing the faith but by those who are seasoned and at home in this faith and piety.
Psalm 100 is a prayer of pure, complete and confident joy in God. What a great way to live our lives!
Sing joyfully to the LORD, all you lands; serve the LORD with gladness; come before him with joyful song.
Psalm 100: 1-2
This is the kind of joy experienced by the early Church in Acts:
Day after day the churches grew stronger in faith and increased in number.
Acts 16:5
It is the joy which makes us impervious to hate, as Jesus describes in the Gospel:
Jesus said to his disciples: “If the world hates you, realize that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, the world would love its own; but because you do not belong to the world, and I have chosen you out of the world, the world hates you.
John 15: 18-19
Here is a line I love:
Don’t let the devil steal your JOY!
I first saw it from Pat Livingston, a wonderful speaker and writer on spirituality. But its roots are in John 16:22 as Jesus bids farewell to the disciples:
Now is your time of grief, but I will see you again and you will rejoice, and no one will take away your joy.
Let us look at Jesus in our prayer today, and let him look deeply into us. May that prayer give us immense joy!
Poetry: Happiness Is Harder
To read a book of poetry from back to front, there is the cure for certain kinds of sadness. A person has only to choose. What doesn’t matter; just that— This coffee. That dress. “Here is the time I would like to arrive.” “Today, I will wash the windows.” Happiness is harder. Consider the masters’ description of awakened existence, how seemingly simple: Hungry, I eat; sleepy, I sleep. Is this choosing completely, or not at all?
Music: Jubilate Deo – Mozart
Jubilate Deo omnis terra; servite Domino in lætitia. Introite in conspectu ejus in exsultatione. Scitote quoniam Dominus ipse est Deus; ipse fecit nos, et non ipsi nos. Populus ejus, et oves pascuæ ejus, introite portas ejus in confessione; atria ejus in hymnis, confitemini illi. Laudate nomen ejus, quoniam suavis est Dominus; in æternum misericordia ejus; et usque in generationem et generationem veritas ejus.
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 57, a prayer of fervent praise to our awesome God.
Photo credit: Neil Rosenstech @neilrst
The act of prayerful praise can be hard to understand . The concept of human praise can get in our way.
Prayerful praise in not flattery, or compliments, or the giving of deserved admiration to a distant God. Rather, as Psalm 57 shows us, it is an outpouring of reverent gratitude before Unimaginable Love.
Be exalted above the heavens, O God; above all the earth be your glory!
Psalm 57:12
Such a prayer rises from our heart’s awestruck silence not only to be in the Presence of, but to be loved by such Divine Wonder.
We may not be able to stand before a majestic mountain today to image God’s magnificence as we pray. But we can bow our hearts before the abundant evidence of God’s love for us. God created us and holds us in love with every breath we take.
Today, we may simply want to breathe our praise.
Poetry:Why I Wake Early by Mary Oliver
Hello, sun in my face. Hello, you who make the morning and spread it over the fields and into the faces of the tulips and the nodding morning glories, and into the windows of, even, the miserable and crotchety– best preacher that ever was, dear star, that just happens to be where you are in the universe to keep us from ever-darkness, to ease us with warm touching, to hold us in the great hands of light– good morning, good morning, good morning. Watch, now, how I start the day in happiness, in kindness.
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 96, a song which dances with jubilation. It filled my prayer with images and music. No worded reflection … no Vatican documents. Just let the exuberant scriptures uplift you today.
That’s what I share with you today, beloveds❤️
Sing to the Lord! Toss away any old dirge trying to weigh your spirit down!
And sing anew because Jesus has given us this infinite gift.
Poetry: I Call You Beloved – Rabindranath Tagore
When You command me to sing, it seems that my heart would break with pride, and I look to your face, and tears come to my eyes. All that is harsh and dissonant in my life melts into one sweet harmony— and my adoration spreads wings like a glad bird on its flight across the sea. I know You take pleasure in my singing. I know that only as a singer I come before your presence. I touch, by the edge of the far-spreading wing of my song, Your feet, which I could never aspire to reach. Drunk with the joy of singing, I forget myself and call you Beloved, who are my Lord.
Music: Two songs, one classical, one a little devilment, but I couldn’t help singing it.🤗
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 122 which celebrates the beauty and stability of Jerusalem as a symbol of God’s enduring faithfulness to us.
I rejoiced because they said to me, “We will go up to the house of the LORD.” And now we have set foot within your gates, O Jerusalem.
Psalm 122:1-2
Think of the peace this psalm brought to its reciters – the kind of peace we seek in a confusing world.
The disciples in our passage from Acts sought the same kind of peace. As the early Church – the “New Jerusalem” – developed, and diverse converts joined the community, everyone had an opinion about that development. We all know what that’s like! 😉
Many of us have been in discussions about how to use church/community resources, respond to new initiatives, or celebrate liturgy. While it’s great to have expanded energy in the discussion, it can be exhausting, particularly if some opinions are uninformed by prayer, justice, or humility.
The real issue for the early Christians wasn’t simply circumcision. The core challenge was how to remain true to the Gospel as it met the first of many generations of interpretation. To do so, they returned to the “compact unity of Jerusalem”. They held fast to the roots of Jesus’s teaching.
Jerusalem, built as a city with compact unity. To it the tribes go up, the tribes of the LORD.
Psalm 122: 3-4
The topic of circumcision has long since been resolved by gathering the community in prayerful discernment and humble obedience. But as the ages pass, the Christian community will forever be called to return/remain in the “Jerusalem” of Christ’s teaching.
We do so by continually returning to the roots of the Gospel. That’s what it means to live in radical faith.
Remain in me, as I remain in you. Just as a branch cannot bear fruit on its own unless it remains on the vine, so neither can you unless you remain in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever remains in me and I in him will bear much fruit, because without me you can do nothing.
John 15: 4-5
May we constantly grow in our love, understanding, and obedience to the Gospel so that we more fully contribute to our community of faith.
Poetry: Palm Sunday by Malcolm Guite
Now to the gate of my Jerusalem, The seething holy city of my heart, The saviour comes. But will I welcome him? Oh crowds of easy feelings make a start; They raise their hands, get caught up in the singing, And think the battle won. Too soon they’ll find The challenge, the reversal he is bringing Changes their tune. I know what lies behind The surface flourish that so quickly fades; Self-interest, and fearful guardedness, The hardness of the heart, its barricades, And at the core, the dreadful emptiness Of a perverted temple. Jesus, come Break my resistance and make me your home
Music: Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem – Herbert Howells
Lyrics:
O pray for the peace of Jerusalem.
They shall prosper that love thee.
Peace be within they walls
And plenteousness within thy palaces.
Psalm 122 vv. 6, 7
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 145 which reveals a wonderful secret – how to be a Friend of God:
Pope Francis describes friendship with God in a recent Angelus address:
God is not a distant and anonymous being: God is our refuge, the wellspring of our peace and tranquility. God is the rock of our salvation, to which we can cling with the certainty of not falling; one who clings to God never falls! God is our defence against the evil which is ever lurking. God is a great friend, ally, parent to us, but we do not always realize it. We do not realize that we have a friend, an ally, a parent who loves us, and we prefer to rely on immediate goods that we can touch, on contingent goods, forgetting and at times rejecting the supreme good, which is the love of God. Feeling that God is our Parent, in this epoch of orphanhood, is so important! In this orphaned world…
The early Christians persevered in unfolding this secret as told in Acts today:
After they had proclaimed the good news to that city and made a considerable number of disciples, they returned to Lystra and to Iconium and to Antioch. They strengthened the spirits of the disciples and exhorted them to persevere in the faith, saying, “It is necessary for us to undergo many hardships to enter the Kingdom of God.”
Acts 14: 21-22
In our Gospel, Jesus speaks to his disciples before his Ascension. He gives them the secret of hope, peace and encouragement. In that gift, they will stay true friends to him as he is to them:
And now I have told you this before it happens, so that when it happens you may believe. I will no longer speak much with you, for the ruler of the world is coming. He has no power over me, but the world must know that I love the Father and that I do just as the Father has commanded me.
John 14: 29-31
May we live joyfully as Friends of God, confident of and making known God’s merciful Name by our faith, love, mercy, generosity, and hope.
May my mouth speak the praise of the LORD, and may all flesh bless God’s holy name forever and ever.
Psalm 145: 21
Poetry: I Am – Rainer Maria Rilke
I am, you anxious one. Do you not hear me rush to claim you with each eager sense? Now my feelings have found wings, and, circling, whitely fly about your countenance.
Here my spirit in its dress of stillness stands before you, — oh, do you not see? In your glance does not my Maytime prayer grow to ripeness as upon a tree?
Dreamer, it is I who am your dream. But would you awake, I am your will, and master of all splendor, and I grow to a sphere, like stars poised high and still, with time’s singular city stretched below.
Music: Friend of God written by Israel Houghton and sung by the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir
I am a friend of God
I am a friend of God
I am a friend of God
He calls me friend
Who am I that You are mindful of me?
That You hear me when I call
Is it true that You are thinking of me?
How You love me
It's amazing
Who am I, Lord
Who am I that You are mindful of me?
That You hear me when I call (is it true O Lord?)
Is it true that You are thinking of me?
How You love me (it's amazing Jesus)
It's amazing (I am a friend of God)
I am a friend of God ....(repeated)
What a priviledge it is, yeah
Who am I that You are mindful of me?
That You hear me when I call (is it true, is it true?)
Is it true that You are thinking of me?
(Oh Lord sometimes I don't understand)
How You love me (how You love me Lord?)
It's amazing (oh it's so amazing)
It's amazing (Lord it's so amazing)
It's amazing
I am a friend of God
(These phrases are repeated with lots of praise in between. I hope you feel it too!❤️😇)
Lavish Mercy 