Today’s little word from those circled in my bible comes from Ps 102, verse 12: “but”. The previous verses are a litany of personal suffering. As Derek Kidner describes it: “The cry of one whose sufferings are unexplained.” When one’s suffering is unexplained, it makes the suffering even more intense. The psalmist pours forth his woe: “My heart is smitten like grass, and withered; I forget to eat my bread. Because of my loud groaning, my bones cleave to my flesh. . . I lie awake, I am like a lonely bird on the housetop . . . for you have taken me up and thrown me away.” These are dire cries from a forsaken soul.
Yet, out of this heartfelt suffering rises the little word, “but”–and that word makes all the difference: “BUT you, O Lord, are enthroned forever; your name endures to all generations. You will arise and have pity on Zion.” Etc. An incredible act of trust and courage. This is indeed heroic hope. A hope and trust placed not in one’s circumstances but in Someone who can be trusted because of Who He is and Whose word never fails.
May this little word encourage each of us. May we pray for the grace to use it in the midst of our own litanies, that we, too, may say: “BUT you, O Lord, are the lover of my soul. Your steadfast love endures forever. Your mercies are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness.”
Little words (2)
More instances of the little word “all” in Scripture.
A follow-up on yesterday’s post about the little word “all”. After reading Amy’s reflection on “all” meaning all, I found myself noticing that little word more. For instance, Ps 25.16: “All the paths of the Lord are steadfast love and faithfulness.” “All” means all, not some. So wherever the Lord leads my steps are full of His steadfast love and faithfulness. No matter how it looks or feels.
Or take Ps 145. I have eleven “alls” circled in my Bible in that psalm. For example, vv. 17-18: “The Lord is just in all his ways, and kind in all his doings. The Lord is near to all who call upon him . . .” Take some time to find the rest of them yourself. . . and better yet, meditate on what that little word means for you. “All” means all.
Little words (1)
Little words in Scripture can be very significant.
I’d like to start a mini-series of posts today–about little words in the Bible. I have quite a few circled in mine. What started me noticing them–and their significance–was a meditation I read years ago by Amy Carmichael. Here it is:
Eph 6.16 Above all taking the shield of faith, with which you can quench all the flaming darts of the evil one.
The word used for shield signifies a great oblong shield which covers the whole body, and the dart mentioned here is the kind which when it strikes a hard object catches fire. The promise is that when the dart strikes the great shield of faith, though it is set on fire, it is quenched. It cannot pierce the shield. It cannot burn the one who is behind the shield. The promise covers all manner of darts. The kind of dart hurled against us makes no difference to the promise. “All” means all. Do we expect “all” to mean all? Is there a secret fear in our hearts about a certain kind of temptation which perhaps we shall not be able to overcome? Away with this fear! It is of the devil. The shield of faith is ready to be taken up and used. If we take it up and use it, not a single dart of any sort will pierce it. All means all.
Think about the power of that little word: “all”–and look for it in other places in Scripture.
What sanctity consists of
Sanctity does not consist in this or that practice, it consists in a disposition of heart which makes us humble and little in the eyes of God, conscious of our weakness but boldly confident in his goodness as Father. (Therese of Lisieux)
More than conquerors
“So let us all take courage; not one of us is too weak to be made more than a conqueror.” (Amy Carmichael)
It’s Monday, so I’m going to rely on my good friend, Amy Carmichael, this morning. She’s always got something good to think about. And this is a good word for a Monday:
Rom 8.37 More than conquerors.
James 1.2 Count it all joy . . . when you meet various trials.Sometimes when we read the words of those who have been more than conquerors, we feel almost despondent. “I shall never be like that,” we feel. But they won through, step by step; by little acts of will, little denials of self, little inward victories, by faithfulness in very little things, they became what they are. No one sees these little hidden steps, they only see the accomplishment; but even so, those small steps were taken. There is no sudden triumph, no spiritual maturity that is the work of a moment. So let us all take courage; not one of us is too weak to be made more than a conqueror.
As a “bonus” today, I’m adding another short homily to the “Talks” tab above, under “Other Talks.” This one is by Fr. Ken McKenna, an Oblate of St. Francis de Sales and a good friend of our community. He is an excellent homilist, short and to the point. He gave this homily this past Saturday on “Blessed are those who hear the word of God and observe it.” Some of his examples are more pertinent to us, but I thought you would all benefit from–and enjoy–his homily. Click here. (It’s only 7 minutes long.)
Humility
“[Humility] is to have a place to hide/when all is hurricane outside.” (Jessica Powers)
This Sunday’s poem is by Jessica Powers:
Humility
Humility is to be still
under the weathers of God’s will.
It is to have no hurt surprise
when morning’s ruddy promise dies,
when wind and drought destroy, or sweet
spring rains apostatize in sleet,
or when the mind and month remark
a superfluity of dark.
It is to have no troubled care
for human weathers anywhere.
And yet it is to take the good
with the warm hands of gratitude.
Humility is to have place
deep in the secret of God’s face
where one can know, past all surmise,
that God’s great will alone is wise,
where one is loved, where one can trust
a strength not circumscribed by dust.
It is to have a place to hide
when all is hurricane outside.
Jessica Powers (1947; 1984)
“God’s heart so abounds in love . . .”
From Francis de Sales–about how much God loves you:
God’s heart so abounds in love and his good is so great and infinite that all men may possess it while no one man thereby possesses less of it. This infinite goodness can never be exhausted, even though it fill the spirits of the universe. (Treatise on the Love of God, 10.14)
God pours his love in no less measure into one soul, even though he loves an infinity of others along with it, than if he loved that soul alone. (ibid.)
The God of hope
“The God of Hope” hopes for us, even for us. (Amy Carmichael)
I guess it’s obvious if you look at my “Category Cloud”–scroll down the sidebar on the right–that Amy Carmichael is indeed a present and favorite author of mine. She has been consistently present in my life for many years. When I pause to consider why, the reason is simply because reading her has always fostered great hope in me. She helps me to be a witness to hope. And so I quote her often in my blog in the hopes that she will also foster hope in you.
Rom 15:13 says: May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.
Amy begins her reflections on this verse first by looking at some other verses in Scripture, verses that seem contradictory and surprising: In Lk 22.28, Jesus says: You are those who have continued with me in my trials. Yet, just a few hours later, he says: Could you not watch with me one hour? And then (Mt 26.56): Then all the disciples forsook him and fled.
Another set of conflicting verses: In Jn 17.6, Jesus says to His Father: They have kept Your word. Yet we know differently–as is so evident in Lk 22.24, describing their activity right after the institution of the Eucharist (!) (but who am I to judge?!): A dispute arose among them, which of them was to be regarded as the greatest.
And so Amy wonders: How could Jesus say: They have kept Your word.
How could He say it? What does it mean to us? Just this: Our Lord of Love, our blessed Lord Jesus, looks upon us with such loving eyes that He sees us as we are in our deepest, lowliest, holiest moments, in those hours when, like John, we lean upon His bosom, and He speaks to us, and we all but see His face.
He knows, as no one else can know, how far we fall. “Not as though I had already attained”–He knows that; but “I press on”–He knows that, too.
The love of the Father has the same golden quality of hope. “The God of Hope” hopes for us, even for us. He never loses hope. He accepted the word of His beloved Son: “They have kept [intently observed] Thy word”, in spite of times when they had seemed most grievously to disregard it–when for example at our Lord’s own table they strove about the dreadful matter of pre-eminence. The God of Hope saw what they wished to be, what they yet would be. And He looks at us like that. Is there not something in this that touches us to the quick? How grieve a love like that? And is there not encouragement, too, for the strengthening of our souls?
(Edges of His Ways, p. 145)
How long, O Lord?
Let us, in the middle of any difficult situations we may be, choose to put our trust not in the quality of our faith, but in God’s desire to deal bountifully with us.
The verse, “How long, O Lord? Wilt thou forget me for ever?” in yesterday’s meditation by Amy Carmichael caught my heart, so I decided to do a little scripture study on the psalm from which it comes, Ps. 113. I remember distinctly a time quite a few years ago when I was going through a very dark time in prayer. Not only did God seem distant, I couldn’t even find Him. I was on retreat at a Trappistine abbey, and I remember a prayer time there when I cried out to the Lord with very similar words to David’s: “Lord, have You forgotten me?” I did not hear an answer, but, needless to say, there was grace to keep persevering in prayer.
Psalm 13 is short, only six verses. The first four express the psalmist’s distress, both in his relationship with God, but also with the enemy. These are verses that we all have, or will pray, someday. But what struck me the most yesterday as I was pondering the psalm, were the last two verses:
But I have trusted in thy steadfast love;
my heart shall rejoice in thy salvation.
I will sing to the Lord,
because he has dealt bountifully with me.
Anyone can pray the first four verses, but it takes faith, hope, and a great confidence in the Lord to pray those last two. Listen to Derek Kidner’s comments on these two verses:
The I of verse 5 is emphatic (as in NEB, etc.: ‘But for my part, I . . .’), and so, to a lesser degree, is thy steadfast love. However great the pressure, the choice is still his to make, not the enemy’s; and God’s covenant remains. So the psalmist entrusts himself to this pledged love, and turns his attention not to the quality of his faith but to its object and its outcome, which he has every intention of enjoying. The basic idea of the word translated dealt bountifully is completeness, which NEB interprets attractively as ‘granted all my desire’. But RSV can hardly be bettered, since it leaves room for God’s giving to exceed man’s asking. As for the past tense in which it is put, this springs evidently from David’s certainty that he will have such a song to offer, when he looks back at the whole way he has been led. (emphasis added)
Let us, in the middle of any difficult situations we may be, choose to put our trust not in the quality of our faith, but in His desire to deal bountifully with us.
The age-long minute
If you feel like Jesus may pass you by, have hope–He is coming to you.
The title of this post comes from a meditation by Amy Carmichael on Ps 107.29-30: He made the storm be still, and the waves of the sea were hushed. Then they were glad because they had quiet, and he brought them to their desired haven. I have to say that my first thought after reading Then they were glad because they had quiet, were: “This verse must mean a lot to parents of toddlers and teenagers!” Amy’s reflection was other–and deeper–than mine 🙂
“Then they were glad because they had quiet;” the words were music to me. Then in reading the different stories of the Lord calming the sea, I found this: “He came to them . . . and meant to pass by them” [Mk 6.48]. The more literal the translation the more startling it is. As I pondered the matter I saw that this “age-long minute” was part of the spiritual preparation of these men for a life that at that time was unimagined by them–a life of dauntless faith and witness in the absence of any manifestation of the power of the Lord; and it must be the same today. Such minutes must be in our lives, unless our training is to be unlike that of ever saint and warrior who ever lived. Our “minute” may seem endless–“How long wilt Thou forget me,” cried David out of the depths of his–but perhaps looking back we shall in such an experience a great and shining opportunity. Words are spoken then that are spoken at no other time . . . We have a chance to prove our glorious God, to prove that His joy is strength and that His peace passeth all understanding, and to know the love of Christ that passeth knowledge.
And the “minute” always ends in one way, there is no other ending recorded anywhere: “But immediately he spoke to them, and said, ‘Take heart, it is I; have no fear” . . . and the wind ceased” [Mk 6.50].
“Then they were glad because they had quiet; and he brought them to their desired haven.”
(Edges of His Ways, pp. 143-44)
If you feel that you are in “an age-long minute”, have hope–He is coming to you and will bring you to your desired haven.
Witnesses to Hope 