Hear My Cry - Psalm 40: 1-11

Some of my favorite pieces of scripture are found within the Psalms, where a clear view of humanity and the complexity of God meet. We’ve made God into who we want God to be, but the Psalmist, they write down who God is to them in the moment, which may not be what they want. But I would venture to guess that the Psalmist words are closer to our experience then we want to admit sometimes.

Unyielding I have call to you, and now at last you have stooped to me and answered my cry for help. Has there ever been a time in your life when you think that God isn’t hearing your prayers. A time of immense pain or suffering or fear where it just seems as if God is deaf and mute? I have to think that is how David felt. Now at last, God has answered his cry for help. How long had he been outstretched before God that he felt the need to say finally, now at last? David was persistent before God, even when persistence seemed futile.

You have pulled me out of the Pit of Destruction… you set my feet on a rock and made my steps firm. I think when we are in those hard places in our lives, crying for help, we are happy to get even a little break. Notice that David does not say that God solved all of his problems, like a wishing well or genie. God, set his feet on a rock.

Let’s be honest for a moment. My center of balance is flawed, to be kind. Therefore, put my feet on rocks and I will teeter, totter, and fall. This is why I dread one of my kids favorite activities at camp – creek stomping. Combine not being able to see where my feet are going, even if I know it’s going to be rock to rock, with water and a poor sense of balance. Well it’s not pretty. But what a metaphor for life. Our help from God, is often not pretty, or complete, or what we wish for. And maybe that’s why we miss it so many times. We are looking for something that is done for us completely, instead of a light to show us that first tentative step.

But without taking that first step, or being so caught up in our expectations that we miss the signs of God’s grace, how can we ever sing a song of praise to God? This new song that will make others look on in wonder and come to God? Our lives are the only testimony people cannot only see, but hear. So what are people seeing and hearing from you? A song of complaint? A dirge? Or a song of praise to God? And is that song accurate? Because God does not need us to be PR agents for the Divine. Did God show you the first step that brought you to this place, then say that. Because when we aren’t truthful about who God is in our lives and what God has done, we are not nurturing the faith of others, we are just setting them up with a false image of God, an idol to worship when things are bad.

But when we see that God has made the first move, however small, in response to our cry, then and only then, will we be able to look back and see all of the ways that God has been moving in our lives. Like an intricate tapestry, things that didn’t make sense previously will become enlightened. The ways that God has worked for us, which we can clearly see as the haze of life has been removed, are numberless.

The psalm goes on to take about how to show our appreciation for what God has done, but I want to stop and dwell in these few verse today in response to the week we’ve witnessed. First, the tragic shooting in Arizonian over politics, which left among its wreckage of the injured and dead a nine-year-old girl. We’ve seen a nation respond appropriately, and inappropriately, to the pain experienced that day. But one of the images that touched me the most, but was publicized the least, were the cries of the God fearing folk. One of my fellow seminary classmates serves in a church in the area of the shooting, that opened its doors to just cry to God over something so tragic and senseless. We can debate over gun control and political mudslinging all we want, but if we don’t take time to cry to God, how can we be surprised if God doesn’t hear?

This week also marked the one-year anniversary of the Haiti earthquake. We’ve patted ourselves on the back after seeing the amount of money donated to the country, but we seem to have forgotten to cry to God after the first few months. So are we shocked that cholera is spreading and that Haiti is now one of the top countries for rape after the disaster? How can God respond if we don’t cry?

Brothers and sisters of Albright-Bethune, the world around us is not going to cry out to God. They may blame God and blame each other, but we don’t live in a world that shed tears to the Divine. That is the role of the church. And there is possibly no better time to remember that then today, as we celebrate Martin Luther King’s birthday. We remember one man who had a God-sized vision of the beloved community, that called for the shedding of a whole lot of tears. Mothers cried for their children sent to jail. People cried over the injustices being committed against their brothers and sisters.

People cried and acted for justice for a long time, because injustice isn’t cleaned up over night. But if MLK didn’t have that God sized dream that was worth living, working, crying, and dying for, where would we be today?

So my question to you, brothers and sisters, is are we crying out to God today for the things that break the heart of God? Can we look with Divine eyes on what is going around us, and weep until God pays attention. And do we have wisdom to discern and respond to the small steps God gives us towards justice, or are we only looking for everything to be taken care of immediately. Because if we do not cry and respond to God, how will we ever have a song to sing?