Psalm 128

A Song of Ascents.

1 Happy is everyone who fears the Lord, who walks in his ways.
2 You shall eat the fruit of the labour of your hands;
    you shall be happy, and it shall go well with you.

3 Your wife will be like a fruitful vine within your house;
your children will be like olive shoots around your table.
4 Thus shall the one be blessed who fears the Lord.

5 The Lord bless you from Zion.
    May you see the prosperity of Jerusalem all the days of your life.
6 May you see your children’s children.

The issues raised by vs. 3 were addressed in part in Wednesday’s conversation, so we will move directly to the repeated phrase: “who fears the Lord” (vs. 1,4).

Fearing the Lord – fearing God – feels odd, even wrong, in our ears. For God is a God of love who forgives – that image of God has been drilled into our heads from our earliest moments. Just think of the song – “Jesus loves me, this I know.”

In no way is this psalm saying that God is not a God of love, what the psalm is suggesting is that the kind of love and care in action that we see in God in creation and in making human beings. The kind of love and care in action we see in Jesus Christ in his life, death and resurrection is a sign of God’s love. We see the same in the work of the Holy Spirit. God – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – is a God of love. That love, that grace, as the song “Amazing grace” says, “Taught my heart to fear”. The fear of awe and wonder, the fear of being in the presence of something more amazing, more wonderful than anything we could think or imagine.

To fear the Lord is to live in the knowledge that one who is greater than we are, who is beyond us, who has no need for us – has shown us grace and mercy. A grace and mercy greater than anything we have ever experienced or known. In the presence of such majesty and mercy fear, holy awe, is the appropriate response.

In the presence of such majesty and mercy the cry is “Bless us, Lord, bless us”, trusting the God of love to do exactly that.

PRAYER:

O Lord, in wonder, awe and fear we bow before you, crying out “Bless us, Lord, bless us.” In Jesus’ name. Amen.   

A Prayer on the 80th Anniversary of D-Day

O Lord, on this 80th Anniversary of D-Day (June 6, 1944), we acknowledge those who landed on the beaches of Normandy, seeking to bring an end to the Nazi occupation to Europe.

We thank you for their courage, for their willingness to serve, for their willingness to lay down their lives for a greater cause. O Lord, we are humbled by their example.

We mourn the lives lost both among the Allies who landed and those who would follow them over the following days and among the Germans who also fought and the civilians who were killed. O Lord, our hearts are broken over the loss of life.

As we stand at another moment when war is again being fought in Europe, a war which threatens to spread beyond Ukraine and Russia, we again mourn the loss of life and we pray for the threats and violence to be turned to peace and empathy for the other. O Lord, send peace.

May we live towards that peace with courage and hope, led by Jesus Christ, who is the Prince of Peace. Amen.