I shared this last night at our monthly Church Council meeting and thought it would be a nice blog entry. The other entry I was working on isn’t ready and I have a bit more thought and planning needed so, maybe next week!
The other day one of the scripture verses sent to my email box was Psalm 121: 1-2, “I lift up my eyes to the hills – from where will my help come? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth.”
This bit of scripture took my brain back. Way back. Back to senior year in high school. When I had somehow been selected to be part of a state women’s choral group that I didn’t remember applying to sing with. I think someone I know had a hand in that.
So, when I was looking for scripture inspiration for today’s devotional, I came back to Psalm 121. Specifically, trying to find a song that I knew I had sung in the women’s choral group while a senior in high school. My brain knew the tune a bit. But you can’t quite Google a tune. I had a very, very vague recollection of the words. But, do you know how many songs there are out there based on Psalm 121?
This hunt led me down quite the rabbit hole of music searching and videos Tuesday late afternoon. And more memories of another song I sang with the same group, like “Father William” which was a setting by Irving Fine based on Lewis Carroll’s poem, “You Are Old, Father William.” I also discovered a song that I can’t remember where I sang it, but it came from Mendelssohn’s Elijah, “He watching over Israel.” And this morning…yes literally this morning at 10:20am I found from the same piece, “Lift thine eyes,” women’s arrangement of the song I had been hunting for.
Now I bet you are wondering what the rabbit hole down my crazy musical past has to do with Church or Church Council.
It gave me the opportunity to reflect on Psalm 121, more than just the two verses I read the other day in my email as almost just a regular task that I do because it is in my email. It really got me to pause, even amid the crazy rabbit hole, on what Psalm 121 was saying.
“I lift up my eyes to the hills—from where will my help come? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth. He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber. He who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord is your keeper; the Lord is your shade at your right hand. The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life. The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in from this time on and forevermore.” I know I have read this Psalm several times, and I know in January I read it through at least twice. But how awesome are those words?
But isn’t that sometimes like our meetings? Or even doing something at church? We may be busy with preparing for a service or a meal or an event or a study, sharing a report, or preparing to lead a meeting. And someone says something after contemplating scripture. Or someone reads a particular scripture, one we never paid much attention to or one we have heard a thousand times before. Or we hear a hymn or song that brings up a memory. And it immediately makes us stop and want to spend some time on that.
Sometimes we need to stop and take that time to contemplate what God is putting before us. I haven’t thought about those songs I mentioned nor that singing event in at least 20 years. Now I’ve got songs stuck in my head. But I also have a different perspective on Psalm 121. My hope is that there are things God has for each of you to spend time with, to not only help each of us grow, but to also help us as we do the work God has for us not just within the church itself but the communities we are a part of as well.
 |
| Tulips 4/29/22 |
No comments:
Post a Comment