Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 145 in which the psalmist, filled with gratitude and joy, makes a prodigious promise:
Every day will I bless you, and I will praise your name forever and ever. Everyday! Forever and ever!
Psalm 145:2
Such a promise requires all one’s attention, discipline and practice. We must learn to see all experience in God’s Light so that everything becomes a reason for praise.
Paul, guiding the Colossians to live that kind of life, tells them:
As you received Christ Jesus the Lord, walk in him, rooted in him and built upon him and established in the faith as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.
Colossians 2:6-7
Powerful words: ~ walk in Christ ~ be rooted and built in Christ ~ be established in faith ~ be abundant in thanksgiving
God is gracious and merciful toward us as we pray for the psalmist’s prayer to be fulfilled in us and in our lives:
Let all your works give you thanks, O LORD, and let your faithful ones bless you. Let them discourse of the glory of your Kingdom and speak of your might.
Psalm 145:10-11
Poetry: from the Book of Hours – Rainer Maria Rilke
You are the future, the great sunrise red
above the broad plains of eternity.
You are the cock-crow when time’s night has fled,
You are the dew, the matins, and the maid,
the stranger and the mother, you are death.
You are the changeful shape that out of Fate
rears up in everlasting solitude,
the unlamented and the unacclaimed,
beyond describing as some savage wood.
You are the deep epitome of things
that keeps its being’s secret with locked lip,
and shows itself to others otherwise:
to the ship, a haven — to the land, a ship.
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 97, one of several psalms categorized as “enthronement psalms”. These psalms celebrate God as king, a king exponentially greater than any human sovereign.
But Psalm 97 shows us that this Divine Ruler is also exponentially different from the flawed and often oppressive human rulers Israel (and others throughout history)has/have experienced.
For that reason, God is the only one who should rule our lives, and all human authority should mirror God’s perfect balance of love, mercy, and justice.
The psalm indicates how God is uniquely supreme:
JUSTICE – God’s reign is founded on justice, not domination
The LORD is king; let the earth rejoice; let the many isles be glad. Justice and judgment are the foundation of his throne.
97:1-2
UNIVERSALITY – God’s power moves earth and heaven, beyond any human ability
The mountains melt like wax before the LORD, before the LORD of all the earth. The heavens proclaim his justice, and all peoples see his glory.
97:5-6
GOODNESS – God loves goodness, not evil; uprightness, not power plays
The LORD loves those who hate evil; he guards the lives of his faithful ones; from the hand of the wicked he delivers them.
97:10
JOY – God’s reign brings universal joy, not subjugation. It inspires gratitude, not fear:
Light dawns for the just; and gladness, for the upright of heart. Be glad in the LORD, you just, and give thanks to God’s holy name
97:11-12
Psalm 97, though constructed on a metaphor that doesn’t speak to many of us, still has much to teach us.
How do we image God?
How does that image inspire, define, or control our behaviors and choices?
In whatever form we exercise authority, how do we reflect God’s authority?
Especially in our influence over younger, or vulnerable persons, what image of God would they learn from us?
For Christians, Psalm 97 points to a most contradictory “king”, one who loves the “beatitude person” and is willing to suffer and die for them. The psalm so clearly foreshadows Christ that it is the psalm prayed at Mass on Christmas Day.
In Christmas the Church does not simply celebrate the birth of a wondrous baby. Through that birth we celebrate the cosmic reality that God has entered the process of the world in a decisive way that changes everything toward life. The entry of God into the process of the world is the premise of the poem in Psalm 97.
Walter Brueggemann, Psalm 97: Psalm for Christmas Day
Poetry: The Kingdom – R. S. Thomas
It’s a long way off but inside it There are quite different things going on: Festivals at which the poor man Is king and the consumptive is Healed; mirrors in which the blind look At themselves and love looks at them Back; and industry is for mending The bent bones and the minds fractured By life. It’s a long way off, but to get There takes no time and admission Is free, if you will purge yourself Of desire, and present yourself with Your need only and the simple offering Of your faith, green as a leaf.
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 90 whose selected verses for today present three brilliant images for our prayer.
The image of an eternal God, who spins time like the threads of a dream:
You turn us back to the dust and say, “Go back, O child of earth.” For a thousand years in your sight are like yesterday when it is past and like a watch in the night. You sweep us away like a dream; we fade away suddenly like the grass.
Psalm 90: 3-5
The image of us, ordering our days on the great abacus of Grace:
So teach us to number our days aright that we may apply our hearts to wisdom. Return, O Lord; how long will you tarry?
Psalm 90:12-13
The image of God, each morning answering our prayer, and we weaving that delicate gift, like fine lace, into the handiwork of our lives
Fill us at daybreak with your kindness, that we may shout for joy and gladness all our days. And may the gracious care of the LORD our God be ours; prosper the work of our hands for us! Prosper our fragile handiwork!
Psalm 90:14,17
These images converge to remind us that time, from our perspective, is brief. But, with God, there is no “time”. God has breathed us forth, a song without end, into an eternal melody of love and joy.
The psalmist prays to honor that indescribable gift of life by making something beautiful of it in the time allotted.
We pray for that too, and are invited to reflect on Paul’s prayer for the Thessalonians in our first reading. This prayer captures what Paul believes to be something beautiful for God:
Now may God our Creator, and our Lord Jesus direct our way to you, and may the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all, just as we have for you, so as to strengthen your hearts, to be blameless in holiness before our God and Creator at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his holy ones. Amen.
1 Thessalonians: 3:11-13
Prose: Something Beautiful for God – Mother Teresa
What I can do, you cannot. What you can do, I cannot. But together we can do something beautiful for God. Yes, you must live life beautifully and not allow the spirit of the world that makes gods out of power, riches, and pleasure make you to forget that you have been created for greater things – to love and to be loved.
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 149, the beautiful praise song which is part of the rousing conclusion of this Book:
Let them praise God’s name in the festive dance, let them sing praise to God with timbrel and harp. For the LORD loves this people, and adorns the lowly with victory.
Psalm 149: 3-4
Let them praise God’s Name in festive dance, for the Lord takes delight in them. Psalm 149: 3-4
Walter Brueggemann describes these final psalms here:
One of the richest deposits of such hymns of praise is at the conclusion of the Psalter in Psalms 146–150, in which the particulars of psalmic praise wanes, and the exuberance of praise becomes more vigorous and bold. In Psalm 148, the singers can imagine all creation, all creatures, including sea monsters and creeping things, united in praise of YHWH. By the culmination of the sequence in Psalm 150, there is a total lack of any specificity, and users of the psalm are invited to dissolve in a glad self-surrender that is to be enacted in the most lyrical way imaginable. Such praise is a recognition that the wonder and splendor of this God—known in the history of Israel and in the beauty of creation—pushes beyond our explanatory categories so that there can be only a liturgical, emotive rendering of all creatures before the creator.
Walter Brueggemann: From Whom No Secrets Are Hid
For me, these final psalms are like a resounding cymbal crash at the masterpiece’s end. It is a prayer simply to let these glorious lines sing and dance in our hearts:
Hallelujah! Sing to the Lord a new song; sing the praises of God in the beloved community. Let us rejoice in our maker; let us be joyful in our sovereign God. Let us praise the name of the Lord in the dance; let us sing praise to God with timbrel and harp. For the Lord takes pleasure in this people and adorns the poor with victory. Let the faithful rejoice in triumph; let them be joyful even as they rest.
Psalm 149
No poem today. Instead two pieces of music to delight in Psalm 149
Total Praise: One of my favorite hymns beautifully performed here in sign language.
2. Psalm 149 by Antonín Leopold Dvořák, original Czech. English version and sample of music below.
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 146, chosen today to complement our first reading which is a rare lectionary passage from the Book of Ruth. In it, we meet Naomi who is, at one point, widowed and alone.
The fatherless and the widow the Lord sustains, but the way of the wicked is thwarted.
Psalm 146:9
Ruth Carries Her Gleanings – James Tissot
The Book of Ruth is familiar to many of us because some of its charming story and verses seem a lovely fit for weddings and anniversaries. But in some ways, that isolated use tends to trivialize the powerful messages embedded in this short volume.
If we have a limited view of the Book of Ruth, Psalm 146 can help us widen it. The psalm points to elements central to a hopeful and just community, to a community in right relationship with God. This too is a core message of Ruth.
It is a community strengthened by compassion, loyalty, inclusivity, trust, hope and grateful praise. Each character, at some point in the story’s unfolding, exhibits some aspect of God’s merciful nature and steadfast attachment to us. They put flesh on the psalm’s Antiphons:
Happy are they who have the God of Jacob for their help! For their hope is in the Lord their God, who made heaven and earth, the seas, and all that is in them; who keeps promises for ever; who gives justice to those who are oppressed, food to those who hunger and sets the prisoners free. The Lord opens the eyes of the blind! The Lord lifts up those who are bowed down and loves the righteous. The Lord cares for the stranger and sustains the orphan and widow, but frustrates the way of the wicked. The Lord shall reign for ever, your God, O Zion, throughout all generations. Hallelujah!
Ruth was the great-grandmother of David and blood ancestor of Jesus. Her story, and the tender mercy it declares, foretells the character of the Beloved Community Christ will establish.
The heart of that community – our community – is aptly described in today’s Gospel. When the Pharisees ask Jesus what is most important, he replies:
You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. The second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments.
Ruth already knew what was most important. May we learn it deeply from her story.
Poem: Ruth and Naomi by Frances Ellen Watkins Harper (1825-1911), an African American abolitionist and poet. Born free in Baltimore, Maryland, she had a long and prolific career, publishing her first book of poetry at twenty and her first novel, the widely praised Iola Leroy, at age 67.
"Turn my daughters, full of woe,
Is my heart so sad and lone?
Leave me children — I would go
To my loved and distant home.
From my bosom death has torn
Husband, children, all my stay,
Left me not a single one,
For my life's declining day
Want and woe surround my way,
Grief and famine where I tread;
In my native land they say
"God is giving Jacob bread.”
Naomi ceased, her daughters wept,
Their yearning hearts were filled;
Falling upon her withered neck,
Their grief in tears distill'd.
Like rain upon a blighted tree,
The tears of Orpah fell
Kissing the pale and quivering lip,
She breathed her sad farewell.
But Ruth stood up, on her brow
There lay a heavenly calm;
And from her lips came, soft and low
Words like a holy charm.
"I will not leave thee, on thy brow
Are lines of sorrow, age and care;
Thy form is bent, thy step is slow,
Thy bosom stricken, lone and sear.
Oh! when thy heart and home were glad,
I freely shared thy joyous lot;
And now that heart is lone and sad,
Cease to entreat — I'll leave thee not.
Oh! if a lofty palace proud
Thy future home shall be;
Where sycophants around thee crowd,
I'll share that home with thee.
And if on earth the humblest spot,
Thy future home shall prove;
I'll bring into thy lonely lot
The wealth of woman's love.
Go where thou wilt, my steps are there,
Our path in life is one;
Thou hast no lot I will not share,
'Till life itself be done.
My country and my home for thee,
I freely, willingly resign,
Thy people shall my people be,
Thy God he shall be mine.
Then, mother dear, entreat me not
To turn from following thee;
My heart is nerved to share thy lot,
Whatever that may be.”
Music: Ruth’s Song – Marty and Misha Goetz
(Verse 1) All my life, I have wondered Wondered where I might belong Feeling lost, like a stranger Wandering far all on my own (Verse 2) Without a home. Without a people Without a hope, without a prayer Without a way, that I could follow Then I turned, and you were there (Chorus) Where you go, I will go Where you stay, I will stay forever Where you lead, I will follow So I can know the one you know (Verse 3) Under his wings, you found a shelter You have no fear, you have no shame And when you call, he seems to answer He even seems to know your name (Chorus) (Bridge) Then somehow should I find his favor I won’t look back on all I’ve known Your people then will be my people And Your God my God alone (Chorus) Where you go, I will go And you know I will never leave you Not even death, will ever part us Now that I know the one you know I will go now, where you go
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 40, and wow, do we need it after an astounding heartless first reading!
The Return of Jephthah by Giovanni Antonio Pellegrini The Yorck Project ( Public Domain)
The story of Jephthah and his daughter is one of the most disturbing in the Bible! It contains so many flaws in faith and reason that it becomes almost unusable for prayer. Then again, maybe that’s the very reason we should pray with it.
Jephthah:
was so full of his own lust for victory that he made a promise to God which God would never want.
was so focused on himself that he ignored the maxim against human sacrifice
had such a distorted concept of God that he made an excuse to kill on God’s supposed behalf
The lesson for me? Don’t be like Jephthah.
We can use God, distort God, and manufacture what we believe to be God’s Will. Countless people have done so down through the centuries and are still doing it. Just shake a history book, and a thousand Jephthahs fall out wrapped in other inglorious names.
We constantly see religion manipulated into a tool for political and personal aggression. The world is full of people who purport to know God’s Will for the rest of us.
Psalm 40 blessedly contradicts this kind of idolatry. We must never attempt to create God in our own image, to satisfy our own agendas.
Psalm 40 lists those practices that will help us to sincere relationship with God and God’s power in our lives:
steadfast trust
unvarnished honesty
humble praise
prayerful obedience
responsiveness to grace
Happy are they who trust in the Lord! they do not resort to evil spirits or turn to false gods. Great things are they that you have done, O Lord my God! how great your wonders and your plans for us! There is none who can be compared with you. Oh, that I could make them known and tell them, but they are more than I can count. In sacrifice and offering you take no pleasure (you have given me ears to hear you); burnt-offering and sin-offering you have not required.
Psalm 40:4-8
These virtues are powereded by a deeply prayerful and reflective life which roots God’s Goodness in our souls.
And so I said, “Behold, I come. In the roll of the book it is written concerning me: ‘I love to do your will, O my God; your law is deep within my heart.’”
Psalm 40:
Poetry: I Know What You Want – a Psalm 40 prayer by Rev. Christine Robinson
I have trusted You, Holy One
and waited for You.
When I was mired in misery
you touched me with your spirit.
You pulled me out
and set me on solid ground.
You put a song in my heart and work in my hands.
I praise you.
I know what you want from me,
and where the meaning of my life lies—
Not in rituals, offerings, sacrifices, or creeds,
just my heart; open to others, and open to You.
I try to live that way.
I fail often but you nudge and beckon and I follow.
I pray that my words, my song, my life
show forth your light and light others’ way.
May all who seek you find you.
Touch us with your spirit, that we may be glad.
Music: Take, Lord, Receive – John Foley, SJ
This prayer is the Suscipe of St. Ignatius Loyola found in the final part of his book, “The Spiritual Exercises”.
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 16, a prayer for God’s protection and blessing on the path of life. It is the prayer of one whose heart is committed to God, and recognizes God as the Source of All Life.
Keep me, O God, for in you I take refuge; I say to the LORD, “My Lord are you.” O LORD, my allotted portion and my cup, you it is who hold fast my lot.
Psalm 16: 1-2
In our first reading, as Israel takes possession of the Promised Land, Joshua gathers the people in a recommitment reflective of Moses’ call to the people at Sinai. Joshua says that there is no either/or. Today is the day to choose and commit to the One God of your life:
Fear the LORD and serve him completely and sincerely. Cast out the gods your fathers served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the LORD. If it does not please you to serve the LORD, decide today whom you will serve, the gods your fathers served beyond the River or the gods of the Amorites in whose country you are dwelling. As for me and my household, we will serve the LORD
Joshua 24: 14-15
Like those ancient Israelites, we need faith and courage not to fall back on our false gods — half-heartedness, hard-heartedness, heartlessness. This beautiful offering of Psalm 16 by the Dameans is a prayer for protection and grace for our commitment.
Music: And to give Joshua stage time, here is another song
As for Me and My House – Pat Barrett, Chris Tomlin
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 114, eight short but extremely powerful verses. They summarize the entire faith journey of Israel, a People born in the Exodus and coming to full promise as they pass over the Jordan.
Crossing the Jordan by James Tissot
Our first reading describes that Jordan passage which mirrors the miraculous passage through the Red Sea. Joshua becomes the new Moses leading the people, finally, into the Promised Land
As early as the 6th century, Psalm 114 was included in funeral and burial liturgies in order to emphasize the triumphant and joyful character of our final passage into heaven.
It’s hard for us to think of death that way. On a purely human level, death feels sad – like an end or a loss. But our faith says differently.
Even throughout life, in all our smaller losses, frustrations and failures, our faith encourages us to see things differently. Faith calls us to see each “exodus” , each “crossing”, as the beginning of a journey to a new promise. It calls us to remember that the seas and rivers will part – that God always makes a way.
Faith calls us to receive life’s contradictions and impasses as opportunities to learn a different way.
In Psalm 114, the poet-psalmist uses natural metaphors to remind us of God’s transformative presence in our lives. The Red Sea disappears. The Jordan River opens a path. Mountains skip and hills leap out of our way.
Why was it, sea, that you fled? Jordan, that you turned back? Mountains, that you skipped like rams? You hills, like lambs?
Psalm 114: 5-6
When we face turbulent seas, overwhelming passages, exoduses from the comfortable places, may we find courage in remembering God’s faithfulness as Psalm 114 encourages us to do.
Poetry: The Valley of Vision – Taken from The Valley of Vision: A Collection of Puritan Prayers & Devotions, edited by Arthur Bennett.
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.
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 112, particularly chosen for the Feast of St. Lawrence
Blessed the one who fears the LORD, who greatly delights in God’s commands. That one’s posterity shall be mighty upon the earth; the upright generation shall be blessed. Well for the one who is gracious and lends, who conducts all affairs with justice; That person shall never be moved; the just one shall be in everlasting remembrance.
After the martyrdom of Pope Sixtus II in 258 AD, the prefect of Rome demanded that Lawrence turn over the riches of the Church. St. Ambrose is the earliest source for the narrative that Lawrence asked for three days to gather the wealth. He worked swiftly to distribute as much Church property to the indigent as possible, so as to prevent its being seized by the prefect. On the third day, at the head of a small delegation, he presented himself to the prefect, and when ordered to deliver the treasures of the Church he presented the indigent, the crippled, the blind, and the suffering, and declared that these were the true treasures of the Church. One account records him declaring to the prefect, “The Church is truly rich, far richer than your emperor.” This act of defiance led directly to his martyrdom.
Wikipedia
There are many lessons for us in the life of St. Lawrence. The most striking for me is his gift for seeing the most vulnerable people as the Church’s greatest treasures.
Praying Psalm 112 today, we might ask God to deepen that gift of sublime generosity which imitates God’s own Mercy to us:
Lavishly they give to the poor, Their generosity shall endure forever; Their name shall be exalted in glory.
Poetry: Khalil Gibran- On Giving
You give but little when you give of your possessions.
It is when you give of yourself that you truly give.
For what are your possessions but things you keep
and guard for fear you may need them tomorrow?
And tomorrow, what shall tomorrow bring
to the over-prudent dog burying bones in the trackless sand
as he follows the pilgrims to the holy city?
And what is fear of need but need itself?
Is not dread of thirst when your well is full,
the thirst that is unquenchable?
There are those who give little of the much which they have–
and they give it for recognition and their hidden desire
makes their gifts unwholesome.
And there are those who have little and give it all.
These are the believers in life and the bounty of life,
and their coffer is never empty.
There are those who give with joy, and that joy is their reward.
And there are those who give with pain, and that pain is their baptism.
And there are those who give and know not pain in giving,
nor do they seek joy, nor give with mindfulness of virtue;
They give as in yonder valley the myrtle breathes its fragrance into space.
Through the hands of such as these God speaks,
and from behind their eyes He smiles upon the earth.
It is well to give when asked,
but it is better to give unasked, through understanding;
And to the open-handed
the search for one who shall receive is joy greater than giving.
And is there aught you would withhold?
All you have shall some day be given;
Therefore give now, that the season of giving
may be yours and not your inheritors’.
You often say, “I would give, but only to the deserving.”
The trees in your orchard say not so, nor the flocks in your pasture.
They give that they may live, for to withhold is to perish.
Surely he who is worthy to receive his days and his nights,
is worthy of all else from you.
And he who has deserved to drink from the ocean of life
deserves to fill his cup from your little stream.
And what desert greater shall there be,
than that which lies in the courage and the confidence,
nay the charity, of receiving?
And who are you that the poor should rend their bosom and unveil their pride,
that you may see their worth naked and their pride unabashed?
See first that you yourself deserve to be a giver, and an instrument of giving.
For in truth it is life that gives unto life
while you, who deem yourself a giver, are but a witness.
And you receivers… and you are all receivers…
assume no weight of gratitude,
lest you lay a yoke upon yourself and upon him who gives.
Rather rise together with the giver on his gifts as on wings;
For to be overmindful of your debt, is to doubt his generosity
who has the freehearted earth for mother, and God for father.
Music: God Loves a Cheerful Giver – Steve Green has fun with the kids. I hope you do too!🤗
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 51 which expresses the ardent desire for forgiveness and reconciliation.
The psalm reflects back to our first reading – an episode of sibling rivalry, jealousy, and hidden motives.
Moses, favored of God and leader of the people, makes a questionable choice. He marries outside the tribe, after telling everyone else not to. Hmmm. His siblings, Aaron and Miriam, don’t like that. So they indignantly complain:
Is it through Moses alone that the LORD speaks? Does God not speak through us also?
Numbers 12:2
God hears their complaint and sees through it. God sees that they are less concerned about the marriage and more concerned about themselves. They’re tired of Moses telling them what to do. They think God could have picked a better leader — one of them!
God sets them straight about how special Moses is, and their responsibility to support, not undermine, him.
Should there be a prophet among you, in visions will I reveal myself to him, in dreams will I speak to him; not so with my servant Moses! Throughout my house he bears my trust: face to face I speak to him; plainly and not in riddles. The presence of the LORD he beholds.
Numbers 12:6-7
The whole story is really about motives. Everything we do must be done out of love – out of reverence for God, and out of respect and hope for ourselves and others. This is what it means to have a clean heart. And it is the plea of Psalm 51.
A clean heart create for me, O God, and a steadfast spirit renew within me. Cast me not off from your presence, and your Holy Spirit take not from me.
Psalm 51:12-13
Reflection: This is a great piece by Sister Joyce Rupp on a clean heart (published in America magazine)
Lavish Mercy 