Good morning…
“I have learned now that while those who speak about one’s miseries usually hurt, those who keep silence hurt more,” Christian writer C.S. Lewis famously said. As the chaplain of the Lovett School in Atlanta, Georgia for nearly twenty-five years, my husband Steve has been speaking candidly to this affluent community about the unique miseries we face at this time in our world’s history. His chaplain’s message for this week breaks the silence about our honest struggle to gain strength from a Scripture passage intended to sustains us all.
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Devotional Thoughts on Psalm 146 by Rev. Steve Allen
I sometimes struggle to relate the Bible to current circumstances. Take this week’s text, Psalm 146. Praise the Lord who executes justice for the oppressed; gives food to the hungry; sets prisoners free; opens the eyes of the blind. Uplifts the orphan and the widow.
Psalm 146 is fantastic news if you’re hungry, imprisoned, blind, orphaned or widowed. But here’s the problem – if I’m going to be honest – food insecurity is not an issue for many of our own families. If you’re reading this devotional, then, you’re not blind and if you’re reading it at home or at work, you’re not in prison. Few of us have been orphaned and only a handful have been widowed. I’m in no way making light of these things. It’s amazingly good news that God works for those who have suffered in these ways. I’m simply pointing out that some of the things that highlight God’s greatest work in the world do not apply to a large portion of us here at Lovett, in Atlanta, or even in much of the United States for that matter. Many of God’s promises seem to miss the mark for those of us who haven’t experienced some of life’s greatest challenges. I can understand the student who said to me not long ago, “I just don’t feel like the Bible relates to me and my life.”
The Bible contains timeless truths that hold power and meaning but it’s also true that the writers knew nothing about the kinds of things many of us are facing today. 2000 years ago people didn’t have to contend with social media telling us how amazing and successful our friends and their kids are. While the Bible people may have been wrestling with gender and sexual identity, racial conflict and political divisiveness, it feels as if we’re dealing with those issues on steroids (also something they didn’t have to contend with). And while I’m sure they had stress, anxiety and depression, it seems to me that the stress, anxiety and depression we’re dealing with is on a whole different level. I sometimes wonder how the Bible can speak to us here and now.
I think what I’ve come to realize is this – while the Bible doesn’t fully reflect the complexity of every time period in history and it doesn’t always speak to you and me in our specific circumstances, the underlying truth of Psalm 146 is that God meets people’s needs through whatever ways in which they may be feeling less than whole. It simply used the words “the oppressed” of their time. We may not be hungry, blind or in prison and yet the psalmist would want us to know that if our God can comfort those who are deeply afflicted like that, then surely, he can handle our deepest needs as well. While the specific issues may change from year to year, decade to decade and millennium to millennium, the promises of God are the same to all people, whatever our needs may be.
When we read texts like Psalm 146, may we hear in those words the reminder that C.S. Lewis notes in Mere Christianity – “There seems to be a way in which God is the answer for the things we long for; in every time and every generation; and that includes you and me, here and now.”
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Praise the Eternal!
Praise the Eternal, O my soul;
I will praise the Eternal for as long as I live.
I will sing praises to my God as long as breath fills my lungs and blood flows through my veins.
Do not put your trust in the rulers of this world—kings and princes.
Do not expect any rescue from mortal men.
As soon as their breath leaves them, they return to the earth;
on that day, all of them perish—their dreams, their plans, and their memories.
Blessed are those whose help comes from the God of Jacob,
whose hope is centered in the Eternal their God—
Who created the heavens, the earth,
the seas, and all that lives within them;
Who stays true and remains faithful forever;
Who works justice for those who are pressed down by the world,
providing food for those who are hungry.
The Eternal frees those who are imprisoned;
He makes the blind see.
He lifts up those whose backs are bent in labor;
He cherishes those who do what is right.
The Eternal looks after those who journey in a land not their own;
He takes care of the orphan and the widow,
but He frustrates the wicked along their way.
The Eternal will reign today, tomorrow, and forever.
People of Zion, your God will rule forever over all generations.
Praise the Eternal! (Psalm 146:1-10, VOICE).
…Sue…
