Psalm 139: 1-15

FCC Pasadena

Rev. Marlene W. Pomeroy

Oct. 18, 2009

Sometimes I hear people compare the Old Testament with the New Testament. One of their claims about the Old Testament is that it has a much more impersonal God, whereas the New Testament reveals God through the person and life of Jesus. The argument is that the Old Testament God is distant and majestic, powerful and one to be feared. The Old Testament God creates the world out of swirling chaos and leads the people into the Promised Land through the might of battle. The Old Testament God is strong and mighty, but distant, whereas the New Testament has a loving, sacrificing God who comes to dwell among us. And yet, here and there we see glimpses of another side of this majestic Old Testament God. We see a compassionate and caring God who is dismayed by suffering - a God who liberates God's people from slavery in Egypt; a God who negotiates with Abraham through the conversation about saving the righteous in  Sodom and Gomorrah; the God who hears Sara's agony about not bearing a child; a God who suffers with them as they are dragged into captivity in Babylon; and then there are the Psalms - song after song of people opening their hearts to God and claiming that God cares for them in return! There are many images of the personal, intimate God in the pages of the Old Testament that reveal the softer side of the Almighty.

Take Psalm 139. It portrays God more like a person pursued by their beloved than by a fearful distant God. "If I take the wings of the morning and settle at the farthest limits of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me fast." The psalmist emphatically declares that God cares for us no matter what; that God lays a protective hand on us throughout our lives.

But this God has some requirements for us as well. God seeks a relationship that is not one-sided with God doing all the loving. This softer side of God demands a response from us as well.  Intimacy cannot be sustained if there is no partnership. Cleary, the psalmist states, God is desirous of a relationship with us. Do we create space for God in return?

I'll be honest - this is not the lectionary text assigned for today. The lectionary text was a text from Mark that urged us to give of ourselves to others. It is a perfectly fine text that needs to be heard, it's just that I think for many of us this month, our cups are not full. We can only give fully and freely and continuously to others when our own cups are overflowing, and I have heard from a lot of you that your lives are crammed full with commitments and requirements and things that are begging for our attention.  Plus the flu has come early this year and many of us our not feeling that our cups are full because we don't feel well. How do we take time to replenish and re-fill our cups? I believe the way we do that is to find space to cultivate our relationship with God.

Margaret Guenther, Episcopal priest, spiritual director and professor, says that we learned long ago that "we are what we eat." Likewise, she says, "we are how we pray." If we don't take time out to be in prayer with our God we will feel flat and out of balance spiritually. But what do we really have to do? Do we have to sit and prayer for hours at a time, reciting the same lines? Not necessarily, says Guenther, who wrote a book called, The Practice of Prayer, where she outlines the many different ways for us to pray. She says there is a whole history of the Church that holds up many different kinds of ways to be with God. She suggests that prayer is when we ask questions like these:

Where is God in all this?

How has the Holy Spirit been active in my life?

What is the will of God for me right now?

That seems simple enough - just Remembering to ask where God is in our lives. It is like any of our other relationships - we need to take time to make the call, ask how someone is, take an interest in their life if we are to let them know that they are important to us. Our very best friends require almost no effort to do that. We enjoy their company, we enjoy clearing our schedules to spend time with them. However, other people in our lives require a little more commitment - remembering to call your mother or your grandmother; taking the time to return the call to the family member who takes more than they give. We all have people like that in our lives. So, where is God for you in that spectrum? Is God the easy friend who makes you smile when their number registers on in-coming call; or is God the family member who you dread? 

Well, we need to change that if God is the latter!!!!  Spending time with God in prayer is supposed to be a healing, nurturing, replenishing act. If it isn't, you aren't doing it right!! Perhaps you are praying in a way that doesn't fit your personality type. Maybe you are engaging in a spiritual practice that works against where you are in life. I remember a couple of spiritual directors I had at different stages of my life. One asked me to get up early and devote up to an hour in silent prayer and meditation to God. I laughed. I had a full-time job and two small children at the time. I was exhausted! I would have hated God if I had to add another early morning commitment to my already full life. I needed to meet God after a good nap or after someone cooked me a home-cooked meal during that phase of my life.

Another spiritual director really, really wanted me to sit in silence with him for up to an hour and just feel the presence of God. I told him that this did not work for me. I wanted to move. I tried to sit still, in silence for an hour and it was not time well spent for me. I didn't even like God at the end of that hour. Well, guess what, I finally wandered into a yoga class and for an hour I listened and moved in silence and that is my time of meditation and listening. And at the end of an hour, I feel very close to God and very able to feel the presence of the Divine in my life.  Every one of us has to find their way to God and if it feels like drudgery, it isn't your path!!!!

There are those throughout history who have found God in the ordinary - through their lives, in the mundane. People have written about how they meditate and think about God while they are cooking, gardening, rocking the baby; folks experience the presence of God through ironing, walking the dog, listening to music; others do so while folding the laundry, riding on the train. Some folks are able to incorporate talking with God into their usual routines - times to reflect and invite the holy into the `conversation. You will notice that all those things are done silently. There is a connection between holy listening and quiet. Some of us find time to pray while doing these silent or mostly silent actions.

Other people find that they cannot incorporate holy listening into the everyday - that there is too much blending of the mundane and the holy to be meaningful. Instead, some folks feel like they need a break from their lives and a chance to enter into another realm. They need to set aside deliberate time to be away - on actual retreats where things are quiet and simple - or on mini-retreats where they go for a walk in a park or sit in a specific part of their house and devote time to a spiritual exercise. I had a friend who actually devoted an entire room in her house to prayer. She had a shrine in the corner of things that were spiritual for her and she entered that room only to pray and sit with God. Another friend inMaine had a third floor room that had a corner of it devoted to her blessings. She had pictures of her children and images of the Divine and she went up there to sit and pray and to listen.

I haven't been feeling very well this week. We have all been fighting off colds, bronchitis and the flu in our house this week. One day I simply went to the store, bought soup supplies, and made soup. It was a chance for some holy listening and some holy chopping. I didn't turn on the TV, I just stood in my kitchen in silence, chopping and stirring and thinking, telling God how lousy I felt and making a pot of soup. It was exactly what I needed to do. I think there are times when we can find God in the midst of our day and there are times that we need to carve out some deliberate space for God. I like being in retreat centers with their quiet air of calm simplicity. I also like to make a pot of soup. My mind wanders to the presence of God in my life during those lingering, creative places. Some people like to start their day by writing in their journal. Whatever works for you is fine!

I remember once when William Sloan Coffin came to stay with us in our condo near Boston; he was a spiritual giant in my life. He was a presenter at my church for an anniversary celebration. He got up early in the morning and went out to the cul-de-sac in front of our condo and he just walked around it for about 20 min. It was a spiritual stroll. He looked around, watching the morning light, the birds, the sounds of the morning and just strolled. I never stroll like that and it inspirational and meditative just to watch him walk with his hand behind his back, open to whatever the day would bring.

I had a spiritual director once who urged me to invite Jesus to dinner to deepen my relationship with him. I asked her what she meant. Did she actually want me to set a place for Jesus? Yes, she said. Make a meal, set an extra setting and have a conversation with him. I didn't do that. It felt weird and artificial to me. She, however, lived alone and ate alone most of the time and for her it was a communion meal to sit with the presence of Jesus. Different things work for different people. She did teach me to connect things continually with scripture. I would lay before her an idea or something I was thinking about. She would sit and reflect and then refer me to a theme or story in the Bible to aid my reflection. That was really helpful and the breadth of her knowledge of scripture was astounding, and she increased my own knowledge of scripture.

Remember the questions of Margaret Guenther: Where is God in this? How has the Holy Spirit been active in my life? What is God's will for me? These questions can be asked in any situation and cultivated during our spiritual practice.

Someone said to me this week: Everything happens for the best. And then the follow-up: whenever God closes a door, God opens a window. I have to be honest, I have a hard time with that simplified understanding of God's presence. I hear that it is a claim of hopefulness during hardship, but especially when pain, exploitation or suffering is attached to the situation, I can't just say that everything is good that happens. I don't think it was the best that Jesus died on the cross or the person was attacked or my friend lost her job. I don't think it was the best when your child steered off into drugs or your husband was hit by a car. I think those are difficult things. I do think that God is especially attentive to us during those times and there are paths out of those situations that are lined with grace or redemption. I do believe that out of suffering there can be great growth or change or epiphanies. But simply to say or think that it is all good is too neat and simple for me. We need to ask where is God in this situation? How is the Holy Spirit moving in my life? What is God's will for me here in this? These questions invite reflection and conversation with God.

Hear the psalmist again: If I say ?Surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light around me become night,' even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is as bright as the day, for darkness is as light to you." Our God does not shy away from pain or suffering or fear. In fact, our God moves closer to us during those times and comforts us when we cannot see our way. Our God desires for our cups to be overflowing so that we might be full of God's presence and be useful to someone other than ourselves!!!

So, find a way to be with God that is not drudgery or obligation. Find a way to ask the questions of faith that will sustain us as we listen for answers. It may be a replenishing retreat, it may be a meal with Jesus; it may be a beautiful yoga practice that day; it may be a pot of soup that was made prayerfully. May your cup be filled to overflowing with the grace and presence of God! Amen.