Psalm 145:8-9, 14-21
You open wide your hand
145:8 The LORD is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.
145:9 The LORD is good to all, and his compassion is over all that he has made.
145:14 The LORD upholds all who are falling, and raises up all who are bowed down.
145:15 The eyes of all look to you, and you give them their food in due season.
145:16 You open your hand, satisfying the desire of every living thing.
145:17 The LORD is just in all God’s ways, and kind in all God’s doings.
145:18 The LORD is near to all who call on God, to all who call on God in truth.
145:19 The LORD fulfills the desire of all who fear the divine; God also hears their cry, and saves them.
145:20 The LORD watches over all who love God, but all the wicked God will destroy.
145:21 My mouth will speak the praise of the LORD, and all flesh will bless God’s holy name forever and ever.
There are things that just come with getting old, I guess. Nighttime trips to the bathroom (usually more than one), waking really EARLY, even before the chickens (if I had chickens), and having a shorter fuse—at least internally—than I ever did. I can’t say that I’ve ever been a hothead; many friends would say I was more patient and tolerant than most. I have a “justice hair-trigger” when I see things that just aren’t right, though, and possibly this has been sensitized even more by my advancing years, but I do find myself getting upset at more other stuff that has less to do with justice and more to do with just-me.
I get more quickly ticked at people standing in the middle of the supermarket aisle with their carts, shelf-shopping (more like gazing aimlessly?), and blocking the entire aisle for others’ safe passage. I find myself going off easily over the “idiot” drivers who believe their motorist’s rights trump all others’, especially when their indignation is manifest in aggressive, unsafe practices behind the wheel. I’m not as tolerant of screaming or shrieking children as I once was. As a pastor, because I was always thrilled to have young families in my congregations, I could preach, pray, or even lead moments of meditative “silence” in worship over even the loudest crying child, with absolutely no malice. People used to comment about this “virtue” of mine, and I used to tell them that in the Bible, the cry of a child was either a sign of great need, or a portent of unwavering hope for the future. The voice of a child in the church, whether talking loudly, shrieking, or even just asking really tough questions that sound more like riddles than inquiry, should be reasons for rejoicing in every congregation, for in so many, there are no such voices present.
Back to my anger…I’m not as patient with people who don’t seem to know when to put a period at the end of a very long sentence, while telling their story. As one who likes to edit, I have this secret desire to cut, paste, and delete while listening to someone tell a needlessly long story, and I’m talking about one being told verbally. My wife tells me I have begun to develop the nasty habit of showing my frustration in these settings by just suddenly jumping into the narrative in an effort to “edit” it. I think she’s right, and I’m working on that. It is most helpful that we have moved into a retirement community where all the stories are “new” to me, and I yearn to hear each of my new friends’ sharing about their life and personal history. Confession: hearing someone’s story first has made it easier to be patient with and more tolerant of them when it later emerges that their politics or theology is rather perpendicular to my own. Personal histories explain a lot of what we carry around in these regards.
There is good news here, though. I am much more patient with slow-moving old people, now that I must admit I am one—not slow moving yet, but yes, OLD, at least by biblical standards. We are told our days shall be “three score and ten,” meaning I am both into the overtime period, AND starting to expect my “senior discounts,” however they may manifest themselves. Interestingly, I try so hard to not “act old,” while my lovely wife is quite content to just accept her age, and in doing so, she is probably one of the “youngest” persons I know. When you are in your 70s and yet don’t “feel” old, it is so easy to become a “poser.” It’s nice to live with someone who has no need to be one. I’m learning…
I could go on with the list of things that raise my ire, but the purpose of this message is to elucidate a bit on the character of the Almighty, at least according to the first verse of this weekend’s lection reading from Psalm 145: The LORD is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.
Believe me, for my comfort level, God may be too “slow to anger” when it comes to the rampant and seemingly multiplying injustices unfolding around us. “If I were God,” as they say, I’d be doing a bit more smiting and going a bit easier on the mercy. I confess that upon reading of yet another new injustice—such as deporting helpless children BORN here under the 14th Amendment or torpedoing the rights of persons of color—I wonder where God is? Does the fact that God is “slow to anger” an indication that in God’s “time,” righting such wrongs may be more than a generational thing? That in God’s restorative justice, humans must be both allowed to commit such horrible acts in order to learn—possibly over several generations—the consequences of their actions, in order to finally come to the their collective senses and RIGHT the wrongs? Do statements such as “God’s ways are not our ways” or “to God a day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years, a day” cover this? What is God waiting for? Doesn’t a “loving” God realize that people are being trampled here? GOD’S people? In the Old Testament, it seemed that when God’s people Israel misbehaved, the retribution was swift. What about Israel now, as they murder women and children in Gaza and seemingly seek to obliterate all “enemies”? Oh, here’s another characteristic of we “elderly”: we are p-r-e-t-t-y impatient!
I have come to accept that God’s being “slow to anger” is not a sign that God doesn’t care, or is siding with the oppressor. However, God DOES expect human beings to actually mature and learn as a people to fix many of their own problems, especially the ones THEY cause directly, such as injustice. As a teen, my parents rarely intervened when they saw me “cruisin’ for a bruisin’, as they say. It was never a sign that they didn’t care, but rather one that they were willing to forego their parental comfort in order that I may learn a “hard” lesson that had a better chance of “sticking.” When a particular lesson ended, I never, ever wondered, “Where were my parents? Don’t they CARE about me?” I understood their methodology, and as a parent myself, I also empathize with the pain they must have felt when standing back while I made bad, or at least questionable, choices. Why, then, do I have a hard time understanding God’s “slow anger”? Is this not the same thing, here?
That “If I were God” thing is a real problem for us. As Feuerbach once said, most of us write ourselves on the sky and call it “God.” But Yahweh is a different breed of cat. “Abounding in steadfast love” begins to give us a clue as to the nature of the God of the Bible. This is a God who cares so deeply—like a truly loving parent—that God must “step back” to allow the human race to learn, experience, and grow, even when it comes with very hard lessons. As I’ve said in many past messages, God is NOT the “genie in the lamp” who gives us what we want at our beck and call. This may be the God we WANT, but it is not who God is. God’s slowness to anger has kept humanity in the game. Remember that time when God told Moses on the mountain that God was so upset with humans that God might just wipe us out and start over with Moses and a remnant? Moses “argued” with God over this, pleading for a bit of that grace and mercy on behalf of God’s erring people, and “won” the argument…or did he? Did God set this up so that Moses might develop a loving advocacy for God’s people whom he was leading, despite their shortcomings? Maybe.
There is no doubt that this lectionary passage from Psalm 145 is “making nice” with God, and our understanding of God’s love, mercy, and grace. The psalmist must have been having a good day. I get tripped up on the last verse of the passage, though. What does it mean to “bless God’s holy name forever and ever”? Praise is a thing that has never been easy for me to wrap my brain around. My view of the nature of God is such that I don’t believe God “demands” or even “needs” praise, so why is it such a thing, especially in the Psalms? A good counselor will point out that “praising” another is a way of moderating ones OWN ego and affirming the positive actions or attitudes of the other, so why wouldn’t we want to praise God, accordingly. In this case (with apologies to Rick Warren), it IS about us. A good parent will tell you that they wanted most that their children would grow into a healthy, productive, and happy life, not that they would receive “praise” for their good parenting. However, I can say it was always really nice when our children DID show their appreciation for something we did for them, and our children were gracious to do so regularly, so on that level, I get it. Still, as a parent, I felt more “rewarded” for my efforts when my kids just “did well” and lived out most of our family values. In my view of the nature of God, this is the way God is, too.
Perhaps the psalmist is just giving voice to the myriad reasons humans have to be grateful to the Deity? How ever one chooses to “praise” God, this author says there are ample reasons to do so. I, for one, will be working on my “fast to anger” problem, as if the Psalm 145 author is correct, it is directly opposed to the way God is. If I am to be more “Christ-like,” then slow anger, abiding patience, and merciful, “abounding” love are on the agenda. I have a whole new “congregation” and “laboratory” (the Wesbury Retirement Community) in which to explore these character goals, which is a good thing. You don’t want to mess with old people. Amen?
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