Sweet...

 

Sweet…

Psalm 19
19:1 The heavens are telling the glory of God; and the firmament proclaims his handiwork.

19:2 Day to day pours forth speech, and night to night declares knowledge.

19:3 There is no speech, nor are there words; their voice is not heard;

19:4 yet their voice goes out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world. In the heavens he has set a tent for the sun,

19:5 which comes out like a bridegroom from his wedding canopy, and like a strong man runs its course with joy.

19:6 Its rising is from the end of the heavens, and its circuit to the end of them; and nothing is hid from its heat.

19:7 The law of the LORD is perfect, reviving the soul; the decrees of the LORD are sure, making wise the simple;

19:8 the precepts of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the LORD is clear, enlightening the eyes;

19:9 the fear of the LORD is pure, enduring forever; the ordinances of the LORD are true and righteous altogether.

19:10 More to be desired are they than gold, even much fine gold; sweeter also than honey, and drippings of the honeycomb.

19:11 Moreover by them is your servant warned; in keeping them there is great reward.

19:12 But who can detect their errors? Clear me from hidden faults.

19:13 Keep back your servant also from the insolent; do not let them have dominion over me. Then I shall be blameless, and innocent of great transgression.

19:14 Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer.

 

We all marveled at the images sent back to earth by the Hubble Space Telescope went into service over thirty years ago. This device, orbiting the planet at about 326 miles up, gave us glimpses of the majesty and vastness of God’s creation never before seen by earth-borne telescopes. One image that graced many a magazine cover, and later was splashed all over the Internet, was one of what looked like “fingers” reaching into the cosmos. We were told that these “pillars of star creation” were doing just that—congealing into new stars. Thanks to the orbiter of the space shuttle system, astronauts were able to work some wonder on that magnificent instrument. You might remember that, when they first turned the beast ON, it had a bad case of astigmatism, thanks to some engineer’s error guiding the giant mirror’s grinding. Talk about a costly mistake! The orbiter was able to reach the Hubble, and anchor it into its massive payload section (which is how the Hubble was originally delivered to orbit in the first place). There, astronaut/”house call” repairmen first gave Hubble a set of eyeglasses, giving us our first “clear” images. Then, over subsequent repair and refurbishing missions, the Hubble was kept functioning, and even had its grand-piano-sized equipment modules replaced with more advanced technology. Late in the shuttle program, one final “house call” was made, and the Hubble was set adrift in good working order, only now without its repair crews, due to the retiring of the space shuttle program. Our current means of getting into low earth orbit—SpaceX’s “Dragon”—is not capable of reaching the height of Hubble’s orbit, nor would it be suited to maneuvering its impressive bulk, even if it could (several “Dragons” could be placed in the former orbiter’s cargo bay). Hubble kept cranking out the images to astound us, and remind people of faith that the creation really IS “telling the glory of God.” At one point, the Hubble’s “deep field” instrument was aimed at a tiny, tiny section of the heavens—less than a degree’s worth—as I recall. What observers “assumed” were stars in the first iteration of the transmitted image turned out to be WHOLE GALAXIES, too numerous to count. Think of that—The vastness of space, as we usually see it, is mostly contained in our OWN galaxy, the Milky Way. Now, here were thousands of them, many even larger than our own “home” galaxy, and it only a SINGLE DEGREE of the stellar sky! Just how majestic IS God’s universe? And have we been conceiving of a divine creator FAR too small, given this reality? Hubble may be soon ending its run, but as those ad guys say on TV, “No, there’s MORE!”

 

A larger, more impressive instrument called the James Web Space Telescope (JWST) began returning its pictures a little over two years ago. Its light-gathering ability and technology makes the Hubble look like a Ford Model T, and it’s parked WAY away from the distractions of earth orbit at a much more stable “platform” known as a LaGrange Point. Early on, the JWST scientists pointed it at some of Hubble’s old haunts, just to compare images, and OH boy, did she show her stuff! I expect God will again take center stage as this telescope sends its images back to us over the next decade, or so. The Psalmist, who had only her or his un-amplified eyes with which to gaze at the heavens, far understated just how MUCH the “heavens declare the “handiwork” of God! 

 

This picturesque and inspiring psalm has massaged the souls of God’s people down through the ages. I’m pulling out just a few of the “pregnant” phrases used by the writer for us to look at this week. Here’s one most of us who grew up in the church culture probably learned, early on, if not as Sunday School pupils, in worship liturgy we recited from the Psalter:

 

“The Law of the Lord is perfect…”

 

Much is meant by the “law of the Lord.” We need to go WAY beyond the “law” as codified in Jewish history. I believe this phrase captures the totality of God’s revelation to humanity, a revelation designed to not only restore us to right relationship with God, but also to instruct us how to live in harmony with each other and the rest of the created order. The “perfection” of God’s law will not stop short of a full restoration of the earthly creation, including shalomamong all of God’s people, of every faith, race, nationality, and ableness. That’s what makes it PERFECT, and why the psalmist tells us it “revives the soul.” How cool is that? 

 

I wouldn’t be a good Wesleyan if I didn’t point out that Mr. Wesley picked up on this concept when he spoke of his followers “going on to perfection.” As is the case with the breadth and depth of the psalmist’s words, John Wesley’s view of perfection had little to do with what we think of when WE use this word. Don’t we tend to think of something without ANY flaw? Or imagine perfection almost like Plato did when he posited that the divine had a perfect idea of everything in heaven—the “ideas”—and yet all we could muster on earth were the “things,” or less than perfect representations of the celestial “idea.” Almost any time we pronounce something as “perfect,” we are using the term as hyperbole. However, when we think of the “perfection” of God’s law, whether in the mind of the writer of Psalm 19 or someone like Mr. Wesley, we must realize that GOD views “perfection” very differently. For God, “perfection” means that the creation is fully reconciled and is living in peace and harmony, with the fullness of God’s justice having been restored and practiced. For Wesley, our personal “going on to perfection” means we are participating in this redemption, one that benefits not just OUR status before God, but everyone else’s, as well. Were either perfection to be reached, humanity, the created order, and the divine will all be “on the same page,” as they say. 

 

Now let’s talk about sweetness (and I’m not talking about the late, great running back Walter Payton, for you NFL fans out there, although he WAS pretty sweet!). It’s almost hard to imagine anything “sweeter than honey.” While I know honey has been hawked as some kind of miracle elixir that tends to a multitude of ills, it actually IS something pretty amazing! Whipped up by our bee siblings, it basically lasts forever, with samples found in ancient tombs of Egypt still quite edible. Even if it crystalizes, a little bath in some hot water restores it to its original goodness. And it IS very sweet. Prior to modern chemistry, I’m guessing people like this author could not fathom anything sweeter than honey. However, in our day, we have stuff like Sorbitol, Aspartame, and Saccharine that are actually sickeningly sweet, needing a very small quantity to “sweeten” foods or beverages. There’s something called Thaumatin, also known as Talin, made from some kind of seed arils grown in Africa that is the sweetest thing known on earth, 1600 times sweeter than cane sugar. Most of these manufactured or concentrated sweets leave a bad aftertaste, while honey does not. Doesn’t matter, though. God’s law, God’s plan of reconciling the creation, and God’s love of God’s people makes all of these pale in their “sweetness,” by comparison. Using a “catch all” term for this, God’s GRACE is “sweeter than honey, and the honeycomb”…even sweeter than Thaumatin! And no aftertaste, other than the promise of living happy ever after!

 

Of course, no responsible “preacher,” whether a pastor or a biblical author, would be doing their job if they didn’t take at least one parting shot at us cleaning up our act, even in a poetic, inspirational psalm like this one. “Clear us from hidden faults” makes its appearance. Any good campaign is best served by fixing known faults, right at the beginning, and “hidden” faults may need a little sleuthing to flag before tackling them. Besides, only we can attack our own faults. I’m intentionally avoiding the word “sin” here, as this translation doesn’t use it, and sins are technically infractions, not shortcomings or faults. Our faults need to be fixed for us to fully participate in God’s redemptive action, because they will most definitely get in the way. Again, the Good News is that God will guide us to surface them, empower us to “git ‘er done,” and not judge us for having them in the first place. O that we human beings could view our faults in this way! When we judge ourselves harshly over our faults, we may wind up wallowing in self-condemnation and suffering from an overly negative view of self. When we judge others for THEIR faults, we can pretty much know that anger and resentment will follow, doing more damage to the relationships God’s “perfect law” wants to restore. 

 

And one last phrase that caught this preacher’s attention: God as “our rock and redeemer,” which we may think of as our foundation and our imparted freedom.

 

God as our rock and redeemer (foundation and freedom) sure sends me to Jesus Christ, even though Jesus would not have been in the mind of the original author. Jesus gave us the parable of “building on the solid rock” AND told the disciples that “on this rock I will build my church.” (This latter phrase has been much debated, with some thinking Jesus is talking ABOUT Peter as the “rock” upon which the church will be built, while others of us believe he was careful to differentiate that he meant the church would be built on HIMSELF as the rock. This could have been easy for his audience to confuse, as Peter’s name can mean “rock.”) Regardless of how you parse it, rock makes a generally good foundation! And who but Jesus can the modern Christian label “our redeemer”? As a teenage Christian, I used to listen to one of the early religious rockers, Larry Norman, sing: “Jesus is the Rock and he Rolled my blues away.” Yep. And he just keeps rollin’ along!

 

This sermon is more a collection of thoughts and maybe a few small “teachings.” (This style of preaching, incidentally, would not have been unusual for me during the 36 Lenten seasons in my ministry.) The point is that God is out to save the world, redeem and restore all of our relationships, and reunite us to the wider creation, that will, for all time, “tell the glory of God.” Amen, Beloved!