Psalm 13: 1-6

Martin Marty is the dean of American church historians, a longtime professor at the University of Chicago. A group from our church went to hear him speak at Drake together with Bill Moyers – this was 22 years ago, in the aftermath of 9/11. He was already long retired even then, and today he is 95. Years ago, after the death of his wife, he wrote a moving book reflecting on the Psalms. He said that there is a summery kind of spirituality, a spirituality of joy and praise and thanksgiving. But Marty wrote about those times when God seems silent. Roughly half of the Psalms reflect a wintry sort of spirituality. The title of that book is A Cry of Absence. Marty wrote, Winterless climates there may be, but winterless souls are hard to picture. A person can count on winter in January in intemperate northern climates, or in July in their southern counterparts. Near the equator, winter is unfelt. As for the heart, however, where can one escape the chill? When death comes, when absence creates pain – then anyone can anticipate the season of cold. Winter can also blow into surprising regions of the heart when it is least expected. Such frigid assaults can overtake the spirit with the persistence of an ice age, the chronic cutting of an Arctic wind...

One Sunday in the 1940’s, a young woman invited her boyfriend to go to church with her. Both of them were African American, but the church they attended that day was all white and right in the heart of segregated America. The young man waited in the pews while the congregation went forward to receive communion. He was anxious because everyone was drinking from the same chalice. He had never seen black people and white people drink from the same water fountain, much less the same cup. He kept watching his girlfriend. She received the bread and waited for the cup. Finally, the priest lowered it to her lips and said, what he had said to the others, “The blood of Christ, shed for you.” The man decided that any church where black and white people drank from the same cup had discovered something powerful, something he wanted to be a part of. That boyfriend and girlfriend stayed together and got married. In time, they had a son they named Michael. We know him as the Rev. Michael Curry, He is the presiding bishop of the Episcopal church in the USA...

Oswaldo Guayasamin was born in Quito, Ecuador, in 1919. His work titled "The Cry" seems to better capture the emotion of Psalm 13. This is not a calm, still, muted emotion. This is a cry that involves mouth and face and eyes and hands and head. How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever? We can almost imagine the triptych as three stills from a movie clip following the facial expressions of the one crying out...

Martin Marty is a longtime church historian, maybe the leading authority on American religion and culture, now retired from the University of Chicago. Years ago, after the death of his wife, he wrote a moving book reflecting on the Psalms titled A Cry of Absence. There is a kind of summery spirituality, a spirituality of joy and praise and thanksgiving. But Marty wrote about those more difficult times, the winter times of the soul. Roughly half of the Psalms fit a wintry sort of spirituality. Marty wrote, Winterless climates there may be, but winterless souls are hard to picture. A person can count on winter in January in intemperate northern climates, or in July in their southern counterparts. Near the equator, winter is unfelt. As for the heart, however, where can one escape the chill?...

And now we come to the Lord's Supper. The poet, who is one whose life HAS tumbled in, and wonders whether or not it is safe to give voice to the pain here, asks: Is there no place at the table for damaged hearts and scarred souls? Do you not invite everyone who believes? I believe. Oh God, I believe.(5) The poet happens to be Ann Weems, a Presbyterian, the wife of a Presbyterian minister even. Her son Todd had been brutally murdered just after his 21st birthday. How does a mother deal with such a devastating blow? Friends tried to help and offer consolation. One was a seminary professor who called to her attention all the biblical material - the laments - that seemed to be saying so much of exactly what she was feeling. Noting her prodigious talent, he encouraged her to put her feelings to paper. The result is a remarkable compilation that not only helped her healing process, it has helped thousands of others as well. The book is called simply Psalms of Lament. My copy says, "To David, Through Tears - With Hope. Ann Weems." Her poetic preface, composed after her work was done, describes "life between verses 4 and 5": In the godforsaken, obscene quicksand of life, there is a deafening alleluia rising from the souls of those who weep, and of those who weep with those who weep. If you watch, you will see the hand of God putting the stars back in their skies one by one...