Lent Day Eleven
“Psalm 65:1-5”
Psalm 65:1-5 The Passion Translation
1-2 O God in Zion, to you even silence is praise!
You are the God who answers prayer;
all of humanity comes before you with their requests.
3 Though we are overcome by our many sins,
your sacrifice covers over them all.
4 And your priestly lovers, those you’ve chosen,
will be greatly favored to be brought close to you.
What inexpressible joys are theirs!
What feasts of mercy fill them in your
heavenly sanctuary!
How satisfied we will be just to be near you!
5 You answer our prayers with amazing wonders
and with awe-inspiring displays of power.
You are the righteous God who helps us like a Father.
Everyone everywhere looks to you,
for you are the Confidence of all the earth,
even to the farthest islands of the sea. .
As I write this, it is anything but silent. Another of the seemingly endless winter storms is battering the world outside, and I can hear the wind howling through nearby trees and the rain lashing down and bouncing off the glass of the windows.
Sometimes we are not comfortable with silence. It can be unfamiliar: in cities there is the constant background hum of traffic, and wherever we live even our shopping is beset with supermarket jingles. At times we long to find moments where, if only for a moment, sound ceases and our scattered thoughts can fall into place.
So I was intrigued by the first sentence of Psalm 65: ‘to you even silence is praise.’ I thought about the silences I have experienced: when my words, whether of joy or sorrow, run out, when an extraordinary mix of colours is painted across a sunset sky, when exuberant praise ends and an entire congregation sense that there is a holy moment where silent awe is the only possible response.
As I reflected, I was led back to some words of Jesus. They were spoken on the occasion we call Palm Sunday. Jesus was riding into Jerusalem on a donkey, in stark contrast to Pilate the Roman governor who always entered the city on a warhorse. The crowd and Jesus’ disciples are in party mood, calling out praise, and the religious leaders ask Jesus to order them to stop. Jesus replies simply “Listen to me. If my followers were silenced, the very stones would break forth with praises!” That is quite a thought, isn’t it? God’s world is full of praise even if we, for whatever reason, are silent. Five days later, of course, everything fell silent again, and dark. As our Psalm for today expresses it, ‘though we are overcome by our many sins, your sacrifice covers over them all.’
So on this Lenten day, let’s take a moment to be silent. You might want to find a stone to have with you, to let it sit in your hand as you remember those words of Jesus. Perhaps we might even choose to find a few minutes of silence every day during this period of Lent to join in praise with the rest of creation?
A prayer: Jesus, thank you for all you have done for me. Help me to walk closely with you, and to praise you in both my words and my silence. Amen.
Jeannie Kendall
Jeannie Kendall grew up in Cornwall giving her an abiding love of nature. She worked as a teacher in 2 inner London secondary schools before working in 2 churches in various roles including running a counselling service and latterly as a Baptist minister. She is married with 2 adult children and 2 grandchildren. She currently is freelance, giving time to writing.