Psalms for Today

 

Read Psalms 4-6

 

I love the opening line of Psalm 4!  God, give me answers.  If Google can do it in the blink of an eye…if AI can summarize a sermon in a split second…if my microwave can cook a meal in two minutes, why, O God, is Your realm dragging its feet in delay?  Hold that question.  Pray that question.  Let that question sink into your soul, when you have wondered why God doesn’t swoop in and save you.  4:2 could be God’s response, as if God is pointing out that we (that is you and me) are not exactly punctual either.  I know I can push aside prayer time for more “important” work.  I know I can miss the color purple in the field because the news still has my brain in fight or flight.  I know I complain and get cynical.  Notice, how this psalm of soft verbs with lament ends again with lying down.  I wonder if the psalmist, like me, had insomnia?  If the psalms wrestled with God at 2 a.m.?  How I keep hungering for external evidence as some kind of proof that God does in fact care.  When you turn to Psalm 5, we hear echoes of Psalm 1.  There is a part of me that both is offended by how the Psalmist classifies and compartmentalizes people ~ that some are “wicked”.  And yet, so do I.  Read and re-read 5:7-8 as another echo of Psalm 1.  Only this time, the metaphor is not a tree but being in God’s presence.  No sooner to we think that things are going to calm down, then Psalm 6 comes rumbling and roaring in singing about how God rebukes the Psalmist.  The phrase, “How long, Lord, how long” is found in verse 3.  Waiting is not easy.  This is true today and was true when Psalm 6 was penned and put down those words years ago.  Remember that some Psalms are ones of orientation.  Other Psalms belt out feelings of disorientation/feeling dizzy/mind racing like a hamster on a wheel, like verse 1, feeling God has not only deserted the Psalmist but is demanding answers now!  I am moved by verse 6 in Psalm 6 ~ where are you worn out by groaning and moaning?  Where is your bed soaked or soggy with tears?  Hold the heartbreak that is honest meeting us in these days.  Psalm 6, a lament, does end with a hopeful note that the enemies will be overwhelmed.  And yet, when?  It is good to sing, “We Shall Overcome some day,” but as Rev. Dr. Ottis Moss asks honestly, “When is someday??”  Hold this question today letting it open the garage door to your soul in these May days.  Amen.