Psalm 140

Psalm 140

Reflections
Whose jobs are they coming for anyway?    I was under the impression that jobs (good and bad) came from the Provider.    You think they're the pestilential ones? What if "the wicked" were closer to home?    What if you found them on your speed-dial, on your Sunday School roster or voting    record? Or what if you were wicked, unwittingly but complicit still in    God's least favorite injustices - the dreadful things that rile his soul with rage    and send his feet to the tribunal? The only rescue is the Righteous One    who is enthroned to out-grace us all. Though He is also enthroned for justice,    which overturns, providing glory. Psalm 140
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Psalm 139

Psalm 139

Reflections
It can be terrifying, when someone knows what you're thinking. A judging look casts shadows on your conscientious, sunbathed emotions: unspoken, sheer in the unwanted backlighting. But there is a grace that fills when it finds character bankrupt. Psalm 139
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Psalm 138

Psalm 138

Reflections
I am not lowly    when I leverage privilege to shout or whine at the tax     rate on my shiny, selfish things. I am not lowly      when I bemoan loss of newness or bristle at friends       when they succeed where I have failed. God still sees me, but graciously invites me down. Psalm 138
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Psalm 137

Psalm 137

Reflections
The guilty party goes unpunished,     and it feels like justice is an arcade token, limited     by trade and arrangement: "Win or lose, but don't expect power."     But maybe Power waits for the fruit of repentance to grow     in powerfully cold hearts. Psalm 137
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Psalm 136

Psalm 136

Reflections
As I take delight in history     I'm so often the ignorant page - marked by happenings but never moved.     What if I should be upturned instead of delivered? What if I should be     torn down to be built into a mold that resembles nothing of my plans,     nothing of my dreams of victory, nothing but a beaten Nazarene. Psalm 136
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Psalm 135

Psalm 135

illustrations, Reflections
If God delights in me,     even a little, why shouldn't I delight     in grace more than in self-congratulation?     What if God's little delight is infinite?     Shouldn't grace best me? ... But I wander to the     snow fields of self-care and wallow in the cold     ice-blanket alone. I will delight in me.     I will satisfy grief and the longing for     oneness and justice. But grace stands above me,     a distant, present mass of glorious flame     that warms regardless of my bitter self-love.     The gravity draws like a salt cure and leads     me to the threshold. I hear singing... Psalm 135
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Psalm 134

Psalm 134

Reflections
Toiling in the mundane seems     far from blessedness, but keeping your post, or not     leaving it to chance, persists an incarnation     of God's hope on site. Psalm 134
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Psalm 133

Psalm 133

Reflections
If unity means that we think     the same thing, then unity is a lost coin     in the leaves. But if it means that we share the     selfsame heart, then unity is the clean air     after rain. Psalm 133
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