Asaph's Psalm 77: Power, Mystery

Even if verses 11 through 15 talk about might and wonder and holiness, something feels personal. This is a God who is known, who has made himself known, and not just in a general way but to his people (v 14).  He has not only intervened but intervened on their behalf (v 15). And perhaps we could say that this is exactly where Asaph's frustration lies; it's this personal God who seems absent at the moment.

And so with another pause and a deep breath, he switches gears yet again. And all of a sudden this is a big and powerful God, mysterious and transcendent, a God to be revered.

When the waters saw you, O God,
    when the waters saw you, they were afraid;
    indeed, the deep trembled.
The clouds poured out water;
    the skies gave forth thunder;
    your arrows flashed on every side.
The crash of your thunder was in the whirlwind;
    your lightnings lighted up the world;
    the earth trembled and shook.

It's not something I think about often, but one of my biggest fears is being stranded in the middle of an ocean. You know those crazy terrible movies where people are treading water holding on to the last floating plank after the ship sank, or stuck huddled in a flimsy raft after the plane went down? To be small and alone in the incomprehensible vastness of an ocean, and to be a poor swimmer on top of it, that's a nightmare.

Or think of how helpless we are in the wake of recent tornadoes or hurricanes or earthquakes. We humans manage ourselves pretty well in the day to day, but when it comes to the force of a lot of water or a lot of wind or the solid ground beneath us -- the surest thing we know -- all of a sudden starting to shake, we are utterly defenseless.

I guess I'm not so crazy for fearing the ocean. It is right to fear the power of nature. And it's in these terms that Asaph describes this God. The force of nature, the most uncontrollably powerful thing we know on this earth, is afraid of this God, trembling before him.

Asaph is reminding himself just who exactly he's dealing with. If this is the powerful, mysterious, awe-inspiring God we're complaining to, surely there are a few details that surpass us, a few things we aren't understanding.

This is God asking Job, "Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth?"

Another note for lament: Remember who you are and who you're dealing with. That shouldn't keep you from lamenting, but instead will keep you running to God and not away from him, trusting him rather than yourself.

Asaph's Psalm 77: The Right Way to Lament

And so Asaph remembers. Despite the trouble, the restlessness, the weariness, the depression, the torture, something in him drives him to remember, to retell, to recount.

I will remember the deeds of the Lord;
    yes, I will remember your wonders of old.
I will ponder all your work,
    and meditate on your mighty deeds.
Your way, O God, is holy.
    What god is great like our God?
You are the God who works wonders;
    you have made known your might among the peoples.
You with your arm redeemed your people,
    the children of Jacob and Joseph.
  
And here we pause again, do a double-take, scratch our heads and ask, Is this the same person? Is this the same psalm? Did the editor get a hold of this? Surely this is a misquote.

But don't get me wrong, we're relieved. Here's where we prooftext, where we read selectively. Here's where we conveniently pull a few verses from the Psalms for our Call to Worship, forgetting the context, forgetting the setting. Because yes, this is still Asaph, and yes, this is still the same Psalm, this is still a lament.

Remember, this is Asaph reflecting on what God used to do. This is Asaph wondering if God will keep working in the same manner, and if he will, just how long it will take. Yet he's seeking God, and in so doing is essentially saying, "Maybe God has changed, but God still exists, and he is still God." This is Asaph collecting clues, gathering evidence, rehearsing what he's sure of. And it's all he's got.

But what a wonderful way to lament! This is not a human way of complaining. These verses show us the disposition of the psalmist's heart, revealing that the questions and accusations in the first 10 verses are not a human heart waging war against God as is often the case, but seeking him in all desperation. A depressed human heart does not naturally affirm God's wonder, might, and holiness. That is often the last thing we'd dream of doing as we shake our fists at God. This is, then, Spirit-filled and Spirit-led lament.

Neither the tough, honest questions of doubt nor the blunt expressions of anger and depression are to be feared. The thing to fear is the disposition of the heart from which these overflow.

Does our lament drive us away from God, putting up barriers, seeking independence, fleeing, rebelling, resisting, hiding? 
Or does our lament drive us toward Him, persisting, wrestling, fighting, chasing, waiting, hoping?

In personal suffering, it's an empty-handed Job asking question after question of his Creator.
In national suffering, it's Habakkuk boldly complaining to God, then camping out until he gets an answer.
In doubts and second-guesses, it's John the Baptist asking, "Are you the One?" or Thomas asking, "Can I see your hands?" and believing after receiving the answer they needed.
In the daily grind, it's a simple man pleading, "I believe! Help me with my unbelief!"

Sometimes I wonder if we Christians have bipolar disorder, a bunch of manic-depressives, happy or sad, hot or cold, one or the other. And once again I'm wondering if the Christian experience isn't meant to, a bit like Asaph's Psalm 77, always embody both at the same time. Lament doesn't mean an absence of hope, and hope doesn't mean an avoidance of lament. We're to be sorrowful yet always rejoicing.

Asaph's Psalm 77: The Only Thing Left to Do

Verse 10 is the hinge of the Psalm, the opening to a new stanza and thus a turning point. But those still waiting for a quick answer to the hanging questions shouldn't feel too relieved right away, because this verse itself might not be the real hopeful shift we were hoping it was.

The ESV puts it this way: "Then I said, 'I will appeal to this, to the years of the right hand of the Most High.'"

But if you take the time to read the fine print, you'll find a footnote containing a very different version: "This is my grief: that the right hand of the Most High has changed."  

Now I'm no Hebrew scholar, and I haven't found any Hebrew scholars in my brief attempt of research that want to explain the controversy to me. (If you are a Hebrew scholar, speak up!) It appears as though the Hebrew isn't real clear, and from looking at the many different resulting translations, the jury is split. 

For example: 
The New King James, like the ESV: “This is my anguish; But I will remember the years of the right hand of the Most High.”
The New American Standard, like the footnote: "It is my grief that the right hand of the Most High has changed."

Both siding with the second option, one French version says, "What causes my suffering is that the Most High doesn't act like he used to," and another says, "The right hand of the Most High is no longer the same."

It seems to me that choosing one translation over the other really shifts the tone of the psalm. I don't know which is right and true, but it seems to me we're generally more at ease with the first. We're more comfortable with a Psalmist who slams on the brakes with a BUT and goes on to think happy thoughts. We're much less comfortable with a Psalmist who accuses God of changing. 

A psalmist who accuses God of changing! These are indeed strong words! Are we allowed to even express such a thing? Are we allowed to be this gut-honest? Are we permitted to be so blunt, epecially in the middle of a worship song? Can such a thing even be a part of worship? 

I'll let you wrestle with those questions yourself. My hypothesis, though, is that your answers probably determine how you would translate verse 10.

So which translation is best? I personally can't say. But regardless, it's clear the psalmist is introducing a passage where he recounts how God has worked in the past. And so whether he is saying, "I will remember how God has acted in the past" or he's saying, "God isn't acting like he used to," he is still essentially saying the same thing: 

The only thing left to do is remember. 

In the present, God's not doing what he used to, in fact, God doesn't seem to be doing much at all. So if I can't rejoice about what he's doing right now, the only thing left to do is remember what he used to do. 

Because what he used to do was wonderful (v11) and mighty (v12) and holy and great (v13) and marvelous and powerful (v14) and redemptive (v15). 

Asaph can't say all those things for Today, and who knows about Tomorrow, but he can at least remember Yesterday. It's worth remembering. And so, for now, that's the only thing left to do.

Asaph's Psalm 77: Hanging Questions

There are plenty of questions we shy away from in church circles. Questions that are off limits, or at least questions that must be asked quietly, or at least questions that must be answered quickly.

In giving a title to Psalm 77, the ESV takes a quote from verse 2 and suggests "In the Day of Trouble I Seek the Lord." The French Semeur version chooses a more unsettling title: "Might God have Changed?" I think the average Christian these days prefers periods over question marks.

Yet I have to agree with the audacity of the French title: questioning God's changelessness seems to summarize well the psalm, and I'm struck by Asaph's bold, hanging questions.

Asaph starts by describing his condition. Restless weary nights, so much trouble he's speechless, no matter what he tries he cannot find comfort. It's not for lack of trying: he cries out to God, he seeks God, he stretches his hands out to God, he remembers God, he meditates, and even still, nothing. The thought of God makes him groan and instead of being calmed or rejuvenated in meditation, he faints. It sounds like what we might call a "tortured soul" or someone being "haunted" by the past.

Too often we don't accept that these things are compatible with the Christian experience. Too often we insist the problem is a spiritual one: we've lost focus and fellowship with God. But try telling that to Asaph.

And so, from this state, he asks questions, questions that typically must be asked quietly and answered quickly. Read them slowly. Let them sink in. Hear them.

"Will the Lord spurn forever,
    and never again be favorable?
Has his steadfast love forever ceased?
    Are his promises at an end for all time? 
Has God forgotten to be gracious?
    Has he in anger shut up his compassion?"

In other words, Is God who he says he is? Is God who we think he is? Might God have changed?

And instead of a quick answer, Asaph plans a pause in his song. A long, uncomfortable, silent pause.

These are not questions to be taken lightly. A quick and confident answer might not necessarily mean you are in fact taking them lightly, but it sure can seem that way to the person who's asking. If you refuse to observe that pause, you are refusing to identify with the person who is not only asking the questions but living them. And so, let's allow the space to let these questions hang, at least for a moment, to truly ask them, to take them seriously, to acknowledge the dark corners of the human experience that are not incompatible but rather a real and necessary part of the Christian experience.

Like Job's friends who sat with him a full week without saying a thing, for our brothers and sisters who are weary and troubled and tortured and haunted, let's sit with these questions.

Selah.

Bilangue

It's fascinating when a two year old automatically knows to say "ByeBye" to anglophones and "Au Revoir" to francophones.

But it's heart-melting when he decides to randomly switch it up and say, still respectively, "See yaaa" and "Ciaooo."

You know what's not heart-melting? When your little punk 5-year-old proudly announces that he now knows more French than you do.

half life

The joke is often that we were engaged in kindergarden, or something along those lines. It was never that serious, but in celebrating our anniversary this year I realized that we've now been together for half of my lifetime.

There are not many others our age who could say that (although we did think of at least 4 other couple-friends that could...) and it's a sort of mind-blowing thought for which I am thankful beyond what words can express. Because despite all the other craziness that life has thrown our way, this is good, this is amazing.

Beauty

And of course beauty: the beauty that was for him the link between the ships and the woods and the poems. He remembered as though it were but a few days ago that winter night, himself too young even to know the meaning of beauty, when he had looked up at a delicate tracery of bare black branches against the icy glittering stars: suddenly something that was, all at once, pain and longing and adoring had welled up in him, almost choking him. He had wanted to tell someone, but he had no words, inarticulate in the pain and glory. That nameless something that had stopped his heart was Beauty. Even now, for him, 'bare branches against the stars' was a synonym for beauty.
-Vanauken, A Severe Mercy

-"Mlle A", Miroir, Fabienne Rivory

First sign a girl is joining the family:

The lint in the dryer's lint filter is bright pink. Strange.

Pentecost 5: Hangin On

E heard an unusual amount of bells ringing at the church this morning. I wondered if it was their way of marking life in the Spirit after Pentecost Sunday and Monday.

It's not always as victorious as those bells make it sound. Sometimes it resembles the title the liturgical year gives it: "ordinary time."

Because sometimes the Holy Spirit gives that extraordinary courage, audacity, assurance, confidence, boldness to achieve wonderful things. Other times he's the one thing that just keeps us hanging on. Looks and feels ordinary I guess, but somewhere in there I wonder if it isn't just as extraordinary, just as worthy of ringing the bells.

Another strange dream...

The other strange dream I didn't know I have involving Icelandic musicians coming true...Sigur Ros on the Simpsons...?!?