Proper 4 / Pentecost 2 / Ordinary Time 9
Preaching
Hear My Voice
Preaching The Lectionary Psalms for Cycles A, B, C
(See Epiphany 2/Ordinary Time 2, Cycle B. For an alternative approach to vv. 1-12, 23-24, see Proper 11/Pentecost 9/Ordinary Time 16, Cycle A.)
This psalm embodies the tension between a God who knows and a God who acts. The first part, verses 1-18, is the most familiar. The words of imprecation in the second part, verses 19-24 ("I hate them with perfect hatred") are shocking, and as a result have not become a favorite devotional piece, as the first part has.
Yet the two are linked. The psalmist takes comfort in the fact that the Lord has searched him and knows him, that there is nowhere he can flee from God's presence (vv. 1-12). But then, in verses 19-24, he takes God to task for not doing something about the evildoers, whom God surely knows just as thoroughly.
In between are verses 13-18, which form the heart of this week's lectionary reading (vv. 1-6, which precede them, serve as a sort of introduction). As is often the case when the lectionary dismembers a passage and presents it to us in several pieces, it pays to take a look at the whole, before getting down to interpretation.
Verses 13-18 are the conclusion of the first section of the psalm, the full development of the psalmist's meditation on how well God knows him. He reflects on the miracle of human gestation: how, in the mysterious darkness of the womb, a human body becomes infused with life and gradually takes shape. While the psalmist cannot have seen the same images of in utero fetal development we have -- the product of modern medical science and advanced photographic technology -- he must know in general terms something of what goes on in the womb. God, to his mind, tenderly watches over this entire process.
There is a sense of predestination to this passage: "Your eyes beheld my unformed substance. In your book were written all the days that were formed for me, when none of them as yet existed" (v. 16).
This is reminiscent of the famous words of Jeremiah 1:5: "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations."
We may be "fearfully and wonderfully made," but it is also a fearsome and wonderful thing that God knows us so deeply. There are consequences to this, in how we choose to live our lives. As for those who do not recognize this truth and form (or mis-form) their lives accordingly, that is a mystery -- and God's decision to let them be, to persist in their evildoing, is every bit as mysterious.
-- C. W.
This psalm embodies the tension between a God who knows and a God who acts. The first part, verses 1-18, is the most familiar. The words of imprecation in the second part, verses 19-24 ("I hate them with perfect hatred") are shocking, and as a result have not become a favorite devotional piece, as the first part has.
Yet the two are linked. The psalmist takes comfort in the fact that the Lord has searched him and knows him, that there is nowhere he can flee from God's presence (vv. 1-12). But then, in verses 19-24, he takes God to task for not doing something about the evildoers, whom God surely knows just as thoroughly.
In between are verses 13-18, which form the heart of this week's lectionary reading (vv. 1-6, which precede them, serve as a sort of introduction). As is often the case when the lectionary dismembers a passage and presents it to us in several pieces, it pays to take a look at the whole, before getting down to interpretation.
Verses 13-18 are the conclusion of the first section of the psalm, the full development of the psalmist's meditation on how well God knows him. He reflects on the miracle of human gestation: how, in the mysterious darkness of the womb, a human body becomes infused with life and gradually takes shape. While the psalmist cannot have seen the same images of in utero fetal development we have -- the product of modern medical science and advanced photographic technology -- he must know in general terms something of what goes on in the womb. God, to his mind, tenderly watches over this entire process.
There is a sense of predestination to this passage: "Your eyes beheld my unformed substance. In your book were written all the days that were formed for me, when none of them as yet existed" (v. 16).
This is reminiscent of the famous words of Jeremiah 1:5: "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations."
We may be "fearfully and wonderfully made," but it is also a fearsome and wonderful thing that God knows us so deeply. There are consequences to this, in how we choose to live our lives. As for those who do not recognize this truth and form (or mis-form) their lives accordingly, that is a mystery -- and God's decision to let them be, to persist in their evildoing, is every bit as mysterious.
-- C. W.
