Lent

April 8, 2020

Scripture Reading: Psalm 114
When Israel went out from Egypt,
   the house of Jacob from a people of strange language,
Judah became God’s sanctuary,
   Israel his dominion.

The sea looked and fled;
   Jordan turned back.
The mountains skipped like rams,
   the hills like lambs.

Why is it, O sea, that you flee?
   O Jordan, that you turn back?
O mountains, that you skip like rams?
   O hills, like lambs?

Tremble, O earth, at the presence of the Lord,
   at the presence of the God of Jacob,
who turns the rock into a pool of water,
   the flint into a spring of water.

God’s in His Heaven, All’s Right With the World*. It does not feel right; does it? As we shelter at home, we feel impotent to address a virus that does not discriminate as we mourn the loss of so many people and the pain and suffering of many more. We are thankful for living in a country that has some resources. We are also grateful for all those who are risking their own lives to save others. We pray for those in other lands with limited medical care and for all who do not have homes in which to shelter. We thank God for God’s servants who are already among those in such stark need as we do whatever we can from afar to support them.

Our scripture today is a poem describing the experience of the Israelites as they fled Egypt. Going from known oppression to an unknown future is itself daunting. We no more like to live in an out of our control unknown existence than these ancestors in faith. We do serve the same God who loved them and tabernacled with them throughout the 40 years of wandering in the wilderness. They, too, had to be reminded regularly that God’s in His Heaven, All’s Right With the World. We need to say and hear and understand that over and over too.

Prayer: Lord of Life, help us use this experience to grow in spirit and truth as we strive to serve you more nearly. Amen.

*The last line from the poem Pippa’s Song by Robert Browning

All scriptures are quoted from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicized Edition, copyright 1989, 1995, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights are reserved.