Tag Archives: abandonment

Psalm 60 A Plea for God’s Return to the People

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The Ruins of Holyrood Chapel by Louis Daguerre (1824)

Psalm 60

<To the leader: according to the Lily of the Covenant. A Miktam of David; for instruction; when he struggled with Aram-naharaim and with Aram-zobah, and when Joab on his return killed twelve thousand Edomites in the Valley of Salt.>
1 O God, you have rejected us, broken our defenses; you have been angry; now restore us!
2 You have caused the land to quake; you have torn it open; repair the cracks in it, for it is tottering.
3 You have made your people suffer hard things; you have given us wine to drink that made us reel.
4 You have set up a banner for those who fear you, to rally to it out of bowshot. Selah
5 Give victory with your right hand, and answer us, so that those whom you love may be rescued.
6 God has promised[1] in his sanctuary: “With exultation I will divide up Shechem, and portion out the Vale of Succoth.
7 Gilead is mine, and Manasseh is mine; Ephraim is my helmet; Judah is my scepter.
8 Moab is my washbasin; on Edom I hurl my shoe; over Philistia I shout in triumph.”
9 Who will bring me to the fortified city? Who will lead me to Edom?
10 Have you not rejected us, O God? You do not go out, O God, with our armies.
11 O grant us help against the foe, for human help is worthless.
12 With God we shall do valiantly; it is he who will tread down our foes.

While writing to his friend Eberhard Bethge from Tegel military prison in 1944, Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote, “The same God who is with us is the God who forsakes us (Mark 15:34!)” (DBWE 8: 479) Though Bonhoeffer was discussing how he, and other faithful Christians, were to live before God in a world that seems to manage without God, his phrasing could also apply to this psalm where the critical issue is the perceived abandonment of the covenant people at a critical moment by their God. The psalms are theological enough to rest on the conviction of God’s active presence and participation, but they are poetic enough to speak eloquently about the experience of God’s absence, abandonment, and rejection.

The superscription of this psalm seems to be disconnected from the content of the psalm itself. The superscription refers to a string of events in 2 Samuel 8 (and 1 Chronicles 18) when David and his armies are experiencing a time of the LORD’s favor and, “the LORD gave victory to David wherever he went.” (2 Samuel 8:14) Yet the psalm is clearly about a time where the people are not experiencing the LORD’s favor and are speaking in the aftermath of defeat searching for answers. This communal prayer contrasts the experience of God’s previous provision with the brokenness of their current plight.

In the theological world of the Bible the existence of the covenant people is contingent upon the continued provision and care of the God of Israel. They may have suffered a defeat from one or multiple of the surrounding kingdoms of Moab, Edom, or Philistia, but the theological claim that the psalmist makes is that this defeat is symptomatic of their rejection by their God. It is not better military technology or strategy that will change the plight of the defeated covenant people. Their need as expressed in this prayer is that God to return to their side and protect them. There are numerous incidents in the story of Israel where the scriptures narrate a military defeat theologically as a judgment by God or a time where God’s presence has not gone with the people.[2] The bible consistently provides a theological interpretation of history, judging kings and times for their faithfulness to the covenant instead of their wealth, power, or military prowess. In this psalm, it is God who has rejected the people, breached their defenses and broken the land itself. Although the people may have external opponents it is God who has caused them to suffer and given them the ‘wine of reeling.’[3]

There is an abrupt transition in verse four where God’s role changes to being once again the one who provides a safe place for the people to rally under. Perhaps this is the psalmist speaking in hope or perhaps it is a desperate plea, but it remains consistent with the psalmist’s worldview that the problem is God’s rejection which can only be resolved by God’s initiative. In Hebrew verse five ends with the imperative “answer” setting up what “God has spoken.” God’s answer reinforces the psalmist’s worldview that God is not merely the God of Israel, but the God of all the nations. Not only are the places of Israel (verses 6-7) but also Israel’s opponents (verse 8) under God’s authority. The language about Moab, Edom, and Philistia may be intended as an insult of these nations or they may simply be extending the image of God’s possession and claiming of each of these nations that surround Israel as well.

The nation still finds themselves in conflict and unable to oppose their foes. They are not going to enjoy success against the defenses of their opponents until God’s rejection ends and God once again goes out with the armies of the covenant people. It would be easy to dismiss this prayer as an appeal to divine authorization of the wars of the people, and in a conflicted history of Israel there are times where it would be appealing to combine military might and strategy with a divine mandate. Yet, Israel has never been a superpower and they were to rely upon God for their survival in the ancient world. As J. Clinton McCann Jr. can articulate.

Their prayer is not that of the powerful, who seek to claim God’s sanction of the status quo. Rather, their prayer is the desperate prayer of those who turn to God as the only possible hope in an apparently hopeless situation (v. 11) (NIB IV:918)

In a violent world the covenant people were to learn to rely upon their God’s continual strength, protection, and provision. In this moment of crisis, in the psalmist’s view, God has not upheld God’s responsibility to the covenant and no justification for this absence is given. This psalm boldly calls upon God to act on behalf of the covenant people and to restore them once again and grant them victory over the foes that oppose them.

[1] The NRSV takes a less literal approach here in its rendition of these words as God has promised from his sanctuary. There is the possibility of understanding this as a ‘brief sermon’, but the more literal reading of the Hebrew rendered by the NIV as “God has spoken from the sanctuary” places this as a plea for an answer responded to by God’s voice from the sanctuary. (NIB IV:916)

[2] Examples of this include Numbers 14:41-45, and Judges 2: 11-15. This theological interpretation of history permeates the narration of Israel’s story throughout historical books (Joshua-Esther) and also often appears in the prophets.

[3] This theme of the wine of reeling or cup of judgment also appears in Isaiah 51:22 (where this wine is to be passed now to the enemies of the people) and Jeremiah 25:15-17(although the language in Jeremiah is slightly different the image is employed in the same manner).

The Lament of the Forgotten Son

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Margaret Adams Parker, Reconciliation: Sculpture of the Parable of the Prodigal Son for Duke Divinity School (2005) View 1

Margaret Adams Parker, Reconciliation: Sculpture of the Parable of the Prodigal Son for Duke Divinity School (2005) View 2

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You stand out on the crossroads looking for the prodigal
Waiting for the return of the one who cashed in his heritage
Who took what we worked so long to build and walked away
He wished for your death and plundered your house
And yet day after day you wait for his return, this lost son
Like some wandering sheep you set out in search of him
Like some lost coin you search every corner to find again
And so, you stand out at the crossroads today and every day
While I rise up in your stead, tending the flock, sowing the seed
Working to ensure that for all of us there will be a harvest
You pine for your lost son, I grieve for my lost father

This son of yours, this spoiled younger brother of mine
Unwilling to dirty his hands among the fields or to care for the home
Who shirked the yoke that I bore for you countless seasons
There were always excuses that were made on his behalf
I thought that his last request might finally cross a line
That this final insult, this slap in the face might raise your ire
Is there nothing he could do, no request he might make
That might cause you to put your foot down and say, ‘no more’
How could you let him take away the work of our hands
Going off to a distant land with the wealth of generations
This son of yours, this spoiled younger brother of mine

The days you spent on the crossroads looking for the prodigal
Are the days you never once looked at me managing the house
Sweating with the servants in the field to sow and reap a harvest for you
Holding everything together while you stayed lost in your grief
Did your eyes never fall upon me as I shepherded your flock?
Was a word of praise ever uttered from your lips for my longstanding obedience?
Did your desire to see what was lost blind you to what remains?
The absent son who erased the son with calloused hands and burnt skin
Who stayed and never strayed from the homestead
And who is still waiting here for you to join him as he works in the vineyard

Then, one day, as I exit the fields at the end of a weary day
I hear merriment as the town eats our food and drinks our wine
The fatted calf has been slaughtered for the prodigals return
And while the entire town was invited to the celebration
You never considered coming to the fields to retrieve me?
It is only from a slave that I learn that my brother has returned
And my father as well, back from the crossroads and the ends of the earth
You rejoice with the town while my soul bleeds outside the home I sustained
What must I do to be seen, heard, loved and welcomed?
Must I also become the prodigal for you to celebrate me?
Must I deny you so that you might accept me?

How long before you realize that there is a son missing from your feast?
Before you make the journey into the fields you abandoned for the crossroads?
Until you see the son who didn’t squander your wealth with prostitutes
He feasted away your fortune and you throw him a feast of rich foods
I worked your fields, maintained your table, fed your flocks
Yet, not even a goat was to be spared for me and my friends
Welcome home father, I hope you appreciate the pantry I stocked
Welcome home brother, I hope you enjoyed the calf I raised
Hear this lament of the forgotten son who awaited your return
To the family you both turned your backs upon

Psalm 22-A Desperate Cry to God

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Marc Chagall, Solitude (1933)

Marc Chagall, Solitude (1933)

Psalm 22

<To the leader: according to The Deer of the Dawn. A Psalm of David.>
1 My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from helping me, from the words of my groaning?
 2 O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer; and by night, but find no rest.
 3 Yet you are holy, enthroned on the praises of Israel.
 4 In you our ancestors trusted; they trusted, and you delivered them.
 5 To you they cried, and were saved; in you they trusted, and were not put to shame.
 6 But I am a worm, and not human; scorned by others, and despised by the people.
 7 All who see me mock at me; they make mouths at me, they shake their heads;
 8 “Commit your cause to the LORD; let him deliver– let him rescue the one in whom he delights!”
 9 Yet it was you who took me from the womb; you kept me safe on my mother’s breast.
 10 On you I was cast from my birth, and since my mother bore me you have been my God.
 11 Do not be far from me, for trouble is near and there is no one to help.
 12 Many bulls encircle me, strong bulls of Bashan surround me;
 13 they open wide their mouths at me, like a ravening and roaring lion.
 14 I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint; my heart is like wax; it is melted within my breast;
 15 my mouth is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue sticks to my jaws; you lay me in the dust of death.
 16 For dogs are all around me; a company of evildoers encircles me. My hands and feet have shriveled;
 17 I can count all my bones. They stare and gloat over me;
 18 they divide my clothes among themselves, and for my clothing they cast lots.
 19 But you, O LORD, do not be far away! O my help, come quickly to my aid!
 20 Deliver my soul from the sword, my life from the power of the dog!
 21 Save me from the mouth of the lion! From the horns of the wild oxen you have rescued me.
 22 I will tell of your name to my brothers and sisters; in the midst of the congregation I will praise you:
 23 You who fear the LORD, praise him! All you offspring of Jacob, glorify him; stand in awe of him, all you offspring of Israel!
 24 For he did not despise or abhor the affliction of the afflicted; he did not hide his face from me, but heard when I cried to him.
 25 From you comes my praise in the great congregation; my vows I will pay before those who fear him.
 26 The poor shall eat and be satisfied; those who seek him shall praise the LORD. May your hearts live forever!
 27 All the ends of the earth shall remember and turn to the LORD; and all the families of the nations shall worship before him.
 28 For dominion belongs to the LORD, and he rules over the nations.
 29 To him, indeed, shall all who sleep in the earth bow down; before him shall bow all who go down to the dust, and I shall live for him.
 30 Posterity will serve him; future generations will be told about the Lord,
 31 and proclaim his deliverance to a people yet unborn, saying that he has done it.

Psalm 22 echoes heavily in the gospel writer’s telling of the crucifixion of Jesus and it forms a central part of the liturgy of holy week (closing the Maundy Thursday service and serving as the pivot into Good Friday). For both Jewish and Christian readers this Psalm of suffering and lament has been a place that can reflect the reality of the faithful life when God seems absent and God’s promises not to forsake seem far away. Many people are troubled when they read the language of the Psalms of Lament, particularly the vivid language of Psalm 22 because it seems unlike the language of faith. Yet, here in the place of suffering where the faithful one calls out to God and questions God’s seeming lack of intervention is a faithful (even if difficult) place. As Beth Tanner can state, “Crying out in pain and expressing trust are not incompatible.” (Nancy deClaisse-Walford, 2014, p. 233) There will always be those, like Job’s friends in the book of Job, who want to equate suffering as proof of the suffering one’s unfaithfulness and demand a rigidly ordered world where the righteous prosper and the unrighteous are punished but the real world is seldom that tidy. My experience as well as my reading of the story of many of the saints of the church and the patriarchs and matriarchs of the Jewish story reveal a very different dynamic: frequently those saints and ancestors in the faith do suffer, and often in ways that seem unreasonable, yet they can hold their suffering within the framework of a world where God still remains sovereign even if the world is often incomprehensible.

The Psalm begins with a cry to a known God, the one the sufferer calls out to is their God who they have known in the past, who has been present and active throughout their lives and who now seems absent. It is this absence of God’s presence that makes a space for the crisis of the sufferer and allows their oppressors to have their way. For the petitioner who cries out to God they trust that God is a God who hears, much as in the Exodus when God heard the cries of the Israelites, and the Psalmist calls upon this history of God’s action in the past on their behalf and on behalf of the people. The Psalmist contrasts the position of their ancestors ‘who trusted in you and were not put to shame’ and their own experience of being despised and scorned. The Psalmist oscillates between the ways in which God has acted in the past and their own experience of abandonment, terror and shame. The poetic language of this Psalm is particularly rich in representing their opponents as wild bulls, ravening lions, a pack of vicious dogs and their experience takes a toll on their own body in vivid ways: mouth dried up like a potsherd, being poured out like water and bones being out of joint with a heart that has melted like wax, and they are dying of hunger to the point where their bones stand out against their skin. The person places their petition to God in the direst terms possible, their petition is a matter of life and death and their only hope is for God to hear and act like God has heard and acted in the past and to honor God’s promise not to forsake.

As with most of the Psalms of Lament, Psalm 22 allows us to see the reversal of the petitioner’s condition. In the middle of verse 21 the situation changes and the tone changes. The verse begins ‘save me from the mouth of the lions’ but then abruptly switches ‘from the horns of wild oxen you have rescued me’. We don’t know the time that elapses in this transition but the deliverance occurs and the prayer switches to one of praise. Since God has not despised or disdained, there is a hope for tomorrow. Those who sought the LORD now become those who praise, the poor whose bones could be counted can finally eat and be satisfied and the God who seemed to forsake has become the LORD who reigns over the nations. God’s action in the speaker’s generation ensures that another generation will be told about the God who watches over God’s faithful people and hears their complaints and prayers.

For the first tellers of the story of Jesus the resonant images of Psalm 22 probably helped to make sense of their experience of the crucifixion. For both Matthew and Mark the words Jesus speaks from the cross, “Eloi, Eloi lema sebachthani, my God, my God why have you forsaken me” would resonate with the beginning of this Psalm and the question of the righteous suffer. Even within the experience of that day where the soldiers cast lots for the garments of Jesus, the Psalm provides an easy connection for followers trying to make sense of the senseless suffering. The Psalms provided a language for their experience and words for their pain.

As important as Psalm 22 is for Christians in telling the story of the crucifixion both in scriptures and in the liturgy of Holy Week we cannot leave it only there. Psalm 22, and the psalms of lament more generally, are rich and powerful words that for generations of Jewish and Christians followers of God have given voice to a cry for deliverance. Whether it was the Jewish people in exile in Babylon, slaves crying out in suffering, or the person dealing with a devastating injury or illness that has robbed them of their sense of belonging we need to hear again that the God who we perceive has forsaken us can indeed hear our cry. We need to be able to claim that the experience of suffering and isolation need not be read as an implication of our own unfaithfulness or unrighteousness, but that indeed crying out to God in that time of suffering and isolation is itself a mighty cry of faith. Groaning words can indeed be powerful words when they reach the ears of the LORD who rules over the nations.