My Psalm

Father, Your name is burned on the chambers of heaven and in your peoples’ heart.

I’m hungry for your plans and desires to be actuality on earth, in our homes and churches and lives.

Lord, I ask for nourishment for the masses of hungry that will die of starvation today; Many of the hungry call on your name for help, but your body is slow to respond. Forgive me for being slow and blind and deaf to the cries of your people.

Lord you’re rich in grace and generously lavish freedom on all whom desire your love and forgiveness. You have wiped out my great debt that was a noose and guillotine hungry for my neck and head. Help me to echo your grace to those whom have seemingly violated our laws and charged against our earthly facade of wealth.

Lord what do we do concerning the illegal alien? What are these peoples’ names? Are they not your children? Are they not parents and sons and daughters of distraught dependents fighting off death and grabbing after their fleeting self-preservation? What would I do in the sojourner’s situation? Would an ethical and godly virtue send me beyond starving and desperate homelands to a near or distant land of potential relief? How far does an animal dying of thirst venture for one drop of water?

Forgive your people for caring more about man’s laws than your laws. Forgive your people and reprove a nation’s people that strangle the innocent and shun the desperate marginalized poor to preserve their own comfort.

And lead us not into temptation.

My eyes distract me. We want what we see. We are easy pickings for the evil one. Not one of us exists without sinful inclinations. Our hearts stray from your will and justice. We squabble in our families and your family. We trust in our thoughts and interpretations more than we humble ourselves before your great open throne of grace. We are tempted in self-reliance, self-ruling, self-serving and selfishness in all areas of life. We perversely think that guarding our wealth against outsiders preserves our survival. We have instituted greed as the fabric of our society.

Rejection and grief haunt me.

Let not despair bury me. Let not trials crush me, however, if I am crushed let it be into your image. And when I die and in dying form me into your selfless image.

Do bury my selfish greed. Do crush my life for your sake and the sake of the least of these. I know not where to begin, tenderly lead and give me Gethsemane like courage.

In your name Jesus I cry out. In your name will I finally sleep and awake. Your name is what I cling to and the true only surety in life.

What criticism is there toward those who cling to your name? What rights and wisdom of others do I have to criticize?

If I am critical let it be for those without voice or defense. May we be found on your side of grace and love when all the superficiality of this age is finally uncloaked and openly manifested.