Glory in the cave

I've been thinking about Psalm 57 today. It's one of those psalms where David tells God just what he's feeling. I don't know whether I'd have put verse 3 like that, but the great thing he keeps affirming is that "the God of all the earth will do right", as Abraham put it. God's character is both just and loving. As St John said of Jesus, "full of grace and truth". No one else combines both of those to perfection. When we hear of awful human atrocities, or even experience minor injustices ourselves, our reaction is naturally one of anger, which may well be appropriate, but maintaining love is beyond us.

I preached last Sunday about the Spirit in Prayer (Sermons at St John's/28th July), and quoted Maureen Greaves' testimony. The widow of the organist murdered going to Midnight Mass in Sheffield, at his funeral, said she had decided to forgive the two young men as it was what her husband would have wanted: “It has to be a daily act of saying ‘I place them in your hands, God’, so that I don’t have to worry about them, I don’t have to hate them. After the massive shock and heartbreak, this was probably the most difficult thing I have ever had to do, to go down the path of forgiving them.
“It has been a wonderful release that I have not had the burden of hatred towards them. I have to do it every day so I don’t lapse. It is not an easy journey to look two men in the face who have killed the person you love most in the world and hang onto that.
“When you are sitting there in court and you see them and you are heartbroken at what they have done to you, they have taken from you the person who is still your soulmate, it is very difficult to sit there and continue to forgive them and want to forgive them.
“One thing I have comforted myself with is that the God I believe in had a son who was beaten as Alan was beaten. The God I believe in had a son who was resurrected as I believe Alan will be resurrected to be with God.”

Only God's Holy Spirit can enable us to prayer from our hearts: "Your will (not mine) be done.... Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who have sinned against us." Only the Holy Spirit can give us the attitude of gratitude which David maintains, even in the blackness of his cave. Come, Holy Spirit.

Let Your Glory Be over All the Earth

To the choirmaster: according to Do Not Destroy. A Miktam of David, when he fled from Saul, in the cave.

57 Be merciful to me, O God, be merciful to me,
    for in you my soul takes refuge;
in the shadow of your wings I will take refuge,
    till the storms of destruction pass by.
² I cry out to God Most High,
    to God who fulfils his purpose for me.
³ He will send from heaven and save me;
    he will put to shame him who tramples on me. Selah
God will send out his steadfast love and his faithfulness!
⁴ My soul is in the midst of lions;
    I lie down amid fiery beasts—
the children of man, whose teeth are spears and arrows,
    whose tongues are sharp swords.
⁵ Be exalted, O God, above the heavens!
    Let your glory be over all the earth!
⁶ They set a net for my steps;
    my soul was bowed down.
They dug a pit in my way,
    but they have fallen into it themselves. Selah
⁷ My heart is steadfast, O God,
    my heart is steadfast!
I will sing and make melody!
⁸     Awake, my glory!
Awake, O harp and lyre!
    I will awake the dawn!
⁹ I will give thanks to you, O Lord, among the peoples;
    I will sing praises to you among the nations.
¹⁰ For your steadfast love is great to the heavens,
    your faithfulness to the clouds.
¹¹ Be exalted, O God, above the heavens!
    Let your glory be over all the earth!  (English Standard Version)

The present moment

I've recently finished reading Stephen Cottrell's book Christ in the Wilderness which I've mentioned before. He used this quote from Jean-Pierre de Caussade's book The Sacrament of the Present Moment: "The present moment holds infinite riches beyond your wildest dreams, but you will only enjoy them to the extent of your faith and love. The more a soul loves, the more it longs, the more it hopes, the more it finds. The will of God is manifest in each moment, an immense ocean which only the heart fathoms insofar as it overflows with faith, trust and love." I very much like, by the way, the cover picture of Christ longing to gather his children as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings. It shows that look of attentive care which is the essence of love.

A dear friend of mine recently put this picture of Thérèse of Lisieux on her Facebook status. It's not great art; but she's got the point about love being expressed in the small details of life rather than the grand gestures exactly right.

Sunday is Advent Sunday when we look forward with binocular vision - to the first coming of Jesus which we celebrate in four weeks' time and to His return of which no one knows the day or time. It's a season to ensure that we are ready to meet Him whenever that might be.

Our version of one of my favourite Advent hymns is an adaptation by Charles Wesley and others of the original written in 1850 by Reading-born John Cennick. I rather like his last verse, with its reminder that what we're looking for is the destruction of evil and establishment of universal justice and love:
View him smiling, now determin’d,
Ev’ry Evil to destroy!
All the nations now shall sing him,
Songs of everlasting Joy!
O come quickly! Allelujah! 
Come Lord, come!

I'm intending to take Advent and Christmas off from blogging, as it has distracted me from my main business of book-writing. I wish you a joyful December. À bientôt.

The Sparrow's Prayer

I was talking to Tom after church last Sunday. Well, to be accurate 

he was trying to make sense of my marblefull voice and I was hearing him fine. It's always difficult with all the background buzz of conversation and children's voices in a reverberant hall. Anyway, somehow we still managed to communicate. He told me about the book he'd been reading, Christ in the Wilderness by Bishop Stephen Cottrell. During the week a parcel came through our letter box containing the very book. It's about a series of paintings by Stanley Spencer of Jesus' encounter with the world he'd made before he began his public ministry. Tucked into the book was this poem by the late Lord Hailsham, longest serving Lord Chancellor, and committed Christian. I'd not come across it before.
 
Father, before this sparrow's earthly flight
Ends in the darkness of a winter's night
Father, without whose word no sparrow falls,
Hear this, Thy weary sparrow when he calls.
Mercy, not justice, is his contrite prayer.
Cancel his guilt and drive away despair;
Speak but the word, and make his spirit whole,
Cleanse the dark places of his heart and soul,
Speak but the word, and set his spirit free;
Mercy, not justice, still his constant plea.
So shall Thy sparrow, crumpled wings restored.
Soar like a lark, and glorify his Lord.


Clearly Lord Hailsham's thinking of Portia's "The quality of mercy is not strain'd" speech:
"It is an attribute to God himself;
And earthly power doth then show likest God's
When mercy seasons justice....
Though justice be thy plea, consider this,
That, in the course of justice, none of us
Should see salvation; we do pray for mercy...." It's remarkable, or perhaps not, that one of our most senior lawyers should have had such a humble perspective, and have clung so fervently to mercy.

Tomorrow I am celebrating communion for the second time in three years. It is the sacrament of mercy. We come with nothing except crumpled wings, broken lives, and at his table God gives us his own broken body and shed blood, and says, "I love you this much." And we can rise with hope restored. We are not lost causes after all. I find it intensely moving and an amazing privilege to be allowed to share God's love in such a way. I hope I don't cry too much.

PS Sunday afternoon - In the event I didn't weep, though my voice had a wobbly moment! People were very kind with their comments after. Paul, the curate, had been preaching about humility - and I must say that the way my less than fluent delivery seemed to help people connect with God was very humbling.