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Keep Me Faithful

One of the reasons I use and like the daily lectionary (reading) is the fact that it gives me the benefit of regularity.  And in a sense, regularity is the key to any discipline---spiritual disciplines, too.  Spiritual disciplines are much like physical exercise.  If I did it only when I felt like it or want to do it, I might slack off.  I would get out of shape---physically and spiritually.  So I decide I want to be in shape physically and spiritually and, therefore, make the commitment to be disciplined about it.  That is the role of the lectionary.           

Since I use the lectionary more in the mornings than the rest of the day, I often look at the readings for Morning Prayer.  I also like the fact that Benedictine monks around the world are doing the same readings as I am doing.  That connects me to a community that I value.          

One of the readings for this morning came from Psalm 86.  That is not one of the familiar ones to me, so it is always a bit of a surprise when I come to one of these Psalms.  The opening words of the Psalm come as a plea to God.  The Psalmist writes, “Incline your ear, O Lord, and answer me, for I am poor and needy.” (86:1)  Another translation asks the Lord to “turn your ear to me.”             

I had to laugh a little.  I can just see God turning the divine face and putting that divine ear near to my mouth.  Of course, I cannot take this literally.  I don’t actually imagine God as a real person.  But I am quite fine using personal, metaphorical language to describe God.  In some way I do think God puts the divine listening ear in my direction and hears me.  But why would God bother to do this?           

God would bother to do it because I am me!  And that is why God would do it for you, too---just because you are you.  It is not because you or I are more special than other folks.  The joke on all of us is the fact that God considers all of us special.  Of course, that must be rather difficult to consider some of the monsters of our world to be special.  But my theology says that is exactly what God does.  It does not mean that God does not hold these special monsters accountable for their “monster-ness!”           

We ask God to bend the divine ear in our direction because we are poor and needy.  That sums up very well my sense of being some of the time.  Some days I am on top of the world.  Those days are the easiest to forget to turn to God for nurture and sustenance.  Other days are just the pits, as the saying goes.  These are the days I feel poor and needy---poor and destitute as the other translation goes.  When I am feeling destitute and desperate, I need the God who considers me special.           

The next line of Psalm 86 is also very significant.  “Preserve my life, for I am devoted to you; save your servant who trusts in you.” (86:2)  Preserve me.  I relate to that request.  Especially in times of depression or danger, we plea to be preserved.  Another translation I like says, “keep my life safe.”  I like the Psalmists’ basis for this request to be preserved or saved, namely, because the Psalmist is devoted to God.  The other translation asks to be preserved, “for I am faithful.”          

At that moment I realized this whole request to God is based on one condition, namely, that I be trustworthy or faithful.  I don’t have to be perfect or a saint.  I don’t have to grit my teeth and use herculean effort to be God’s child.  I do have to trust God.  I do have to be faithful.  I need to reflect a minute on what this means.           

I find it to be reasonable that God would expect us to be faithful, if we are asking to be answered, preserved and saved.  Faithfulness is nothing more than trust.  God is saying, “if you can trust me, then all things are possible.”  Trust and faith are crucial to any relationship.  And that is exactly what we have with God: a relationship.  It can be a good relationship, a stormy relationship or a lousy relationship.  I contend that it cannot possibly be a good relationship unless there is faith and trust.           

Trust is both a verb and a noun.  As a verb, trust is a process.  I trust you this minute and this day.  But when tomorrow comes, I must trust again and again.  As a verb, trust never finishes.  So it is with God.  Today I might trust God (sadly, the English word, faith, cannot be used as a verb, although we want to say that we “faith” God).  This is what God is asking us to do: each day to trust or to “faith” God.  It is fairly simple, but we have to do it.  It is an action verb.           

Trust and faith as nouns suggest the state of trusting daily.  If I trust God today and tomorrow and the next day and so on, then I can say that I am faithful.  I am faithful---full of faith.  Being faithful is how we sustain a relationship.  God wants us to be faithful so that we are not deciding minute by minute whether to trust.  Being faithful is like the discipline we talked about in the beginning.           

If I want God to lend an ear to me, in order that I be answered, preserved and saved, then God counts on our relationship with the Divinity to be a faithful relationship.  We cannot come and go relationally---blowing hot and cold.  We cannot go chasing other gods of our own making.  We need to be faithful and ask to be kept faithful.  It’s that simple.
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