OUR DWELLING PLACE: ANOTHER ANSWER TO THE GREAT ?
LENT 4 - Psalm 23
Rev. Tiare L. Mathison, Pastor & Soul-Tender
A PANDEMIC VOCABULARY
Unnerving, crazy, wild, scary, disconcerting, disturbing, dislocated, frightened, jumbled, chaotic, distrustful,
I’ve got about 5 threads to sew into some kind of whole cloth this morning. Bear with me. Some of this discombobulation is simply being alive every day this week. We wake up each morning to new, more disturbing news of illness levels and death in our state and around the world. New restrictions of movement, new practices - shelter in place, self-isolate, family members now quarantined - two of my family’s 7 households in Seattle have been directly exposed. Can’t get a test without a fever; are these Coronavirus symptoms or simply my spring allergies? Work from home with kids home from school. Right.
What about the Internet? Will our home WiFi hold with the added pressures of two or more computers working at full steam?
Hear Psalm 23 again, this time my interpretation:
Ps. 23 Interpreted
You are my guardian
I have all I need
Verdant pastures
Cool streams of living water
Sabbath time of rest,
I am restored, the right way unfolds.
Death Valley is present
but I have no fear - You are with me!
The meal, oh the meal!
In front of my enemies even;
Oil, warm oil on my forehead,
My cup is full.
Goodness, only goodness, follows me every step
Forever, and ever, I will dwell in You.
A FAITHFUL VOCABULARY
Provision, abundance, restoration, comfort, courage, verdant, present, gratitude, grace, mercy, trusting,
We teeter between the two. Pandemic and faith. Life and death. Broken relations with no hope of restoration. Healing and hope, again.
Psalm 23. Read and spoken at countless funerals over the years. I always invite folk to say it with me, if they know it by heart. A beautiful chorus of older voices blend together, “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want...”. Most everyone of a certain age has memorized the King James Version.
Psalm 23 offers a wide-angle view of the possibilities of life.
Shepherd means King, sovereign, Lord--the one who directs my life, claims my loyalty, is my authority, has power over me. I am answerable to him, and him only!. I trust and serve this Shepherd. The Poet says, YAHWEH! Writ large. And no other.
Pre-Israel was a herding economy, nomadic; it was God's gift of sustenance that gave understanding to the term, shepherd. Then the monarchy got started and shepherd was applied to the leader/King. As the permanent agricultural economy developed, shepherds were classified in Jesus' day with tax collectors, Gentiles, Sinners, outsiders. Like our migrant farm workers today. Jesus calls himself the Good Shepherd and says, 'my sheep know my voice' in John's gospel. It makes some people very angry.
They know what he means. It is a political statement against Caesar. It is a submission of the will - this one I serve and no other. While kings fail, God does not.
Psalm 23: Take note: God is Shepherd, all the way through the darkness and then becomes Host. The enemies disobey the fundamental value of hospitality in ancient Mediterranean culture. Yet, the table is set with the most beautiful cloth, the finest china, the best food and the most marvelous wine, by Yahweh, this Gracious Host who feeds, provides and protects.
OUR DWELLING PLACE
Psalm 23. Throws up an interesting theological challenge: It is a powerful critique of our democratic capitalism in this country. While we are so productive and there is good in all this, yet what goes missing is any sense of gratitude or humility or connection to where resources come from. We are bombarded by ads to buy more, get more, have more, hoard more. With what results? Excessive individualism and a level of greed that is nothing less than shameful. It is what gives rise to the statement, “I should not have to see these homeless people on my street.” It warps our thinking about wants and needs at a very deep level. Not having enough, we are dissatisfied all the time. Which leads us to a state I call, ‘dis-empathy’ that is, our capacity for generosity is thwarted by the constant drumbeat of, ‘I want, I need, I want, I need’. These twin evils, individualism and greed, must be thoroughly cleansed from our thinking and our daily practices. I admit, envy is still a besetting sin. Nonetheless, I submit my will to the Good Shepherd who gives me everything I need. Our Dwelling Place.
Psalm 23. I want to offer another possibility to understand this amazing poem. Let me set it up for you. Because of the excessive individualism I mentioned above, we only hear this psalm as between God and me, the I-Thou relationship, singular. It’s defined as God protecting me, feeding me, loving me, as if we are each a silo unto the Lord.
But what if we learned to think ‘we’ rather than ‘me’? If you look to the communities on the continent of Africa, they already know this. Just ask Melody or Allen. And what if, every relationship you have, WPC, family, friends, co-workers, neighbors, everyone, is God’s provision for you? We have all we need, with each other. There is no want in community. There is always plenty, abundance, generosity, reciprocity, giving.
So, it goes like this:
The Lord is OUR Shepherd, we shall not want
He makes us lie down in green pastures, He leads us beside still waters,
He restores our souls.
He leads us in paths of righteousness for His Name’s sake.
Even though we walk through the valley of death, we fear no evil.
For You are with us; Your rod and Your staff they comfort us.
You prepare a table before us in the presence of our enemies,
You anoint our heads with oil, our cups overflow.
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow us all the days of our lives
And we will dwell in the House of the Lord our whole lives long.
In this pandemic time, God has provided everything we could ever need through Jesus Christ, Our Lord and Savior. By the power of the Holy Spirit we are called into community with one another. We stay together, no matter what. We offer support and help to each other and to all the hurting neighbors, friends and strangers we can see. We hear the cry of the lonely and isolated and desperate. We are strong. We got this.
Our Dwelling Place: Another Answer to the Great ?
Amen