Psalm 119:97-104

Proper 24 (29) - Year C


Misreading alert—a first glance at the pericope found this, “Oh, how I love your law! It is my medication all day long.”

Two reading leap to mind. One is a curative one. Struggling with the meaning of commands with some presumption of importance can lead one out of a morass of confusion. A path can be discerned. A second one is a masking one. To too quickly toss chemicals into a living system can make it dependent (like land on fertilizer) and cover the underlying cause of dis-ease. A status quo won’t be questioned.

If some newfangled medication automatically displaces a tried and true folk remedy, there do need to be some questions asked about unintended consequences (that long list of dire results listed at the end of a sunny commercial). It is also important to not simply lose the folk remedy for when the new goes bust or further study of it might bring forth something even better.

Medicated thinking can lead one to greater clarity of boundaries and it can erase them all so only I have a true understanding and anything you have to offer is false in every way.

Blessings on your use of a community heritage such as the bible, quran, vedas, etc. as helpful meditation medicine that moves you and all along a clearer path to common goods.

- - - - - - -

Here's a resource from John Wesley and his concern with physical health as well as spiritual health: Primitive Physick.

http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2013/10/pentecost-22-year-c-psalm-11997-104.html

 


 

Psalm 119:97-104 or Psalm 121

The law as a meditation vehicle is important. Too often the law is an enforcement issue. Meditation here may be a mild word for wrestling. Wisdom comes in the midst of the wrestling, not the passivity that sometimes comes to mind with meditation. Just sitting and waiting for revelation is not what this is about. As a result of active interaction with the law it becomes a guide for our living. This is different than setting the law up as an article of obeisance.

Likewise is the need for active participation in the discernment process. Simply lifting one's eyes and seeing everything being taken care of works against the early understanding of finding conversation in the cool of the evening that would shape our next day. And there was evening talk and morning work, each and every day, and it is good. Upon the mountains or under the trees, where do you sense the healing touch arising? Is it from far away or here in our midst?

http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2004/october2004.html

 


 

Psalm119:97-104 or Psalm 121

Law comes from roots that have to do with what has been laid down - from set in place to lying in wait for birth to laying out a dragnet to catch. The biggest thing to be laid down (set in place) is creation. Here then is a jump from law to creation.

"Oh, how I love your 'creation'! It is my meditation all day long." (Ps 119:97)

This makes much more sense in terms of what is available to us all day long and what can capture our imagination that will lead us more quickly to wisdom. In some sense "law" can lead to knowledge, but it is "creation" that leads to understanding.

This sort of play can be fruitfully done in other references. Try it for yourself in your favorite passages about "law" (presuming you have favorite law passages).

- - -

that pesky old problem
of help arising
remains with us
it is the cry of earth
as it is being toasted
of Iraqis now toast
cut off from their hills
of poor children
so concerned about
and even more ignored

we are again
at a point of helplessness
where god is again
effectively absent
as we lift our eyes
to ozone holes
heritages demolished
communal care abandoned
leading to another choice
acquiescence or revolution

http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2007_10_01_archive.html

 


 

We sharpen our wits against that which isn't very witty. A justice-seeking widow against a judge out for their own. The next generation against the present one. Wisdom against the law.

In this case the law is sweet for what it reveals, my understanding has value beyond allegiance to accumulated knowing. It is not that the law is sweet in itself for law is always too little, too late, reactive or preemptively restrictive, constraining a better tomorrow from influencing today.

We practice having eyes that will see beyond the approved limits of the day - to receive revelation beyond what has been revealed. Keep your eye ready, a subtle opening to better living doesn't last long (but, fortunately, it keeps coming around). It is important to be ready to walk through legal walls by using a mantra - no, not "Open sesame", but "I am who I am and will be who I will be no matter that I have been who I have been". A bit on the longish order, but what could be left out?

http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2010/10/psalm-11997-104.html