Lenten Words

In the last post...I invited you to find a hymnal and start looking for a hymn that might point toward a melody that these words are awakening right now:

20.  God
21.  Jesus/Christ
22.  Spirit
23.  Trinity
24.  Friends
25.  Strangers
26.  Efficient

The hymnal our church uses every Sunday starts with "Immortal, Invisible God only Wise".  As you read these words, what sorts of ways to the sentences seek to define and describe God?

Immortal, invisible, God only wise,
In light inaccessible, hid from our eyes,
Most blessed, most glorious, the Ancient of Days,
Almighty, victorious, Thy great name we praise.

Unresting, unhasting, and silent as light,
Nor wanting, nor wasting, Thou rulest in might;
Thy justice, like mountains, high soaring above
Thy clouds, which are fountains of goodness and love.

To all, life Thou givest, to both great and small;
In all life Thou livest, the true life of all;
We blossom and flourish as leaves on the tree,
And wither and perish—but naught changeth Thee.

There is in these words, what the theologian Karl Barth called, a "Holy Other".  God as beyond what we can grasp.  In some ways the mysterious more than of God is a good remember, especially to folks like me who try to capture and contain God in words.  As one author said, "God's first language is silence."  I am also struck by the third verse.  God as life-giver...creator...relationship initiator... forming and fashioning all that is seen and unseen.  Genesis 1 isn't just about God who created all this stuff around us...but God who began to create and is still crafting to this day.  The Holy impulse of an artist is woven into our DNA.  While you may think, "Whoa...wait just a moment here...I am not an artist."  I would suggest that when you sing a congregational hymn in church you are part of a choir.  When you read you an opening prayer in church you are part of a poetry reading.  When you listen to a sermon, which in my mind are words being painted on a canvas, you are part of the art ~ after all if a sermon is preached in an empty church is it still a sermon?  When you laugh with someone else, it is the art of friendship.  When you hold another person's hand in difficult time, it is the art of caring.  When you cook...clean...walk outside...talk...work...volunteer...move about this planet with prayer... you are participating in the art of living.  The One who swirls and sustains us, continually invites us to see every moment like a line of a hymn...a stroke of a brush on a canvas...thread sewn on a quilt... or fill in an image with your wonderfully creative mind here.

What else from the above words leap off the screen and land in your heart, awakening your imagination?

One other hymn that sings to my heart is, "Bring Many Names".  I've posted a video at the end of the blog if you want to listen...but I am especially taken by the second verse where Brian Wren writes,

Strong mother God,
       working night and day,
planning all the wonders of creation,
       setting each equation
       gen-i-us at play:
Hail and Hosanna,
strong mother God!

First, I love that Brian reminds us that throughout Scripture, God is both mother and father ~ not just either or...but both and.  God's wisdom is proverbs is known by the female Sophia.  Jesus says God is like a mother hen...longing to gather her brood.  God as beyond gender.  We can get so caught up trying to defend our one description for God.  But that says more about us than it does about God.  Second, I love the way Wren is clear that God's strength is found in God's feminine parts.  Notice the line about "Genius at play" could be a reference back to the Proverbs truth I pointed out previously.

Part of what I hope you are hearing is that our hymnal is our theological prayer book.  What we sing on Sundays is shaping us more than we ever might have realized.  On Sunday mornings, when you get to church, take a moment not only to find the hymns, but read over them ~ letting the words meet you where you are before you sing them.

May there be more than a trace of God's grace in that moment of both reading and singing this week.  Amen.

Or this one is also swirling around in my soul for the way the Spirit composes and conducts a song in my life: