Author: Daniel Westfall

Ep.171. Psalms. Half-time Break.

Hello. I’m Daniel Westfall on the channel “Pray with Me”. 

The recent episode on Psalm 75 marks the halfway point in our journey through the psalms. Today, we take a half-time break to reflect on what we’ve encountered.

One thing I notice is that these ancient psalms are as current as the Globe and Mail. Three thousand years ago, psalmists were already covering today’s news: chaos, violence, and disasters;  corrupt politicians, war, and pandemics. The genius of the psalms is translating human experience into poetry rather than focusing on specific events. The Globe and Mail supplies the details of today’s disasters, but the psalms describe the experiences and emotions shared by humans in all periods of history. Names and faces change, but the news stays the same.

Another striking feature of the first 75 psalms is the backdrop of darkness and evil. I expected more praise, more optimism. But so far, the psalms have given greater expression to darkness than light, to difficulty than ease, to complaint rather than praise. In most of the psalms, however, the poet pushes through the darkness to light and hope. Perhaps then, as now, joy and hope are hard-won attitudes, rewards for struggling against doubt and despair. 

Over the last three years I have read The Harper-Collins Book of Prayers (compiled by Robert Van de Weyer. Castle Books: Edison, New Jersey, 1997), 400 pages of prayers featuring 200 authors, spanning 3000 years of history, 

In this wide field of prayers, one section stood out to me like a mountain resign above a plain. It was a small selection of prayers from the Psalms, including Psalm 22, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” I was taken aback by the rawness, the power, the eloquence of that psalm, compared with hundreds of lesser prayers in the book. I thought, “That’s why the psalms are in the Bible. They speak simply and powerfully, as few humans have ever been able to do.” 

Another way the psalms have impacted me is by putting me in touch with my emotions. I tend to live life stoically, soldiering on through thick and thin, consulting my will, not my emotions. When I am tense and annoyed and out of sorts, my family knows it long before I do. The psalms teach me that emotion is an important part of my relationship with God and others, that love is not just a discipline or a behavior, but an emotion that wishes people well, that wants to be in relationship, that desires the best for others. 

But the scary part of emotions is that I can’t choose what ones I want to feel. If I lift the trap door and peer into the depths where I store my feelings–my love and anger and gladness and sadness–the whole crowd of them come jostling toward the light and threaten to overwhelm me. The psalms encourage me to feel each emotion and express it to God. Perhaps when the psalms have done their best with me, I will no longer be a soldier trudging along in endless twilight. Perhaps I’ll be a dancer and singer greeting the mountains and the dawn with joy, singing dirges in the valleys at night, awake to the full range of human emotion. 

Let’s pray. 

Our father, in all our need, in our pain and joy, you have been there for us in the psalms. You have been our guide, leading us to green pastures and walking with us through the valley of shadows. You have been our king, bringing justice and righteousness. You have been our mother, sheltering us under your wings. 

Thank you for the psalms, for the words they teach us to pray, for the images that furnish our imagination. Thank you for the journey they take us on, moving from fear into courage, from isolation into community, from darkness into the light of your presence. 

Amen.

I’m Daniel on the channel “Pray with Me”.

Ep.170: Equal Pay for Unequal Work.

Ep.170: Luke 18: Equal Pay for Unequal Labor

Hello, I’m Daniel Westfall on the channel “Pray With Me”.

In Matthew 20, Jesus tells the story of a farmer who hired day laborers to work in his vineyard. The first laborers started at sunrise; then the farmer hired additional workers 9:00 a.m., noon, 3:00 and 5:00 p.m. 

At quitting time which was 6:00 p.m., the foreman paid the laborers, starting with the five o’clockers, who had only worked one hour. They received one denarius, the standard rate for a full day’s work. Those who started in the morning thought, “This is good. Generous owner. If these guys got full pay for one hour, we should get lots for working all day.” But when their turn came, they got the same as the late-afternoon workers–just one measly denarius. 

Of course, the all-day workers grumbled. They had done the bulk of the work. They labored through the heat of the day. Hadn’t they earned more than the five o’clock slackers? What’s with this–equal pay for unequal labor? 

The farmer said , “It’s my money and I want to be generous. I don’t care when people punch in and punch out. I’m not a fan of pay equity and merit-based compensation. Go work for someone else if you want to count pennies. In my vineyard, the first are last and the last are first.” 

Let’s pray. 

Jesus, are you saying that the thief on the cross who sneaked into your kingdom in questionable circumstances on his last day, will get the same reward as I, who have worked honestly and honorably all my life? Will the slackers who spent their money on motorhomes and vacation clubs, and skipped weeks of church every winter get the same reward as we who have scrimped and tithed and served the church faithfully and vacationed cheaply if at all? 

The Pharisees promoted themselves to first place in your kingdom, abstaining from evil, studying your word, keeping your laws, tithing scrupulously. But you said, “The first will be last, and the last first.” Did the Pharisees earn last place in your kingdom? I have worked hard like they did. What have I earned? 

O Jesus, here is my response to your story. I set aside all the time cards I have punched for you. All the work I have done for you. I confess I have been self-serving and arrogant, believing that my faithfulness and sacrifice deserve a generous reward. I confess to an edge of bitterness, wanting to come out ahead of the five o’clock slackers. I release my desire for recognition that I have spent years in your service, not just hours or days. 

O Jesus, I give up every claim to equal pay and generous reward. It is a privilege to be in your employ. It is an honor to work with you through the heat of the day. It is a gift to invest my life in your kingdom.

O Jesus, if the post-pandemic reckoning taxes away my savings, if inflation eats away at my comforts, if life is a struggle and its outcome uncertain; still I will praise you and work in your vineyard. It is enough to hear you call my name. It is enough to be a serf in the fields outside your castle. It is enough to spend and be spent in your service. 

Amen. 

I’m Daniel on the channel “Pray with Me”. 

Ep.169: Psalm 75: God Crushes It!

Ep169_Psalm075. Power Images of God.

Hello. I’m Daniel Westfall on the channel “Pray with Me”. 

Psalm 75 uses three power images for God: God steadies the pillars of the earth (v. 3); God prepares a potion in his cup of wrath for his enemies (v. 8); and God cuts off the horns of the wicked (vv. 4-5, 10). Let’s look at these three images.

First, God says,
  I will choose the appointed time;
      I will  judge with equity.
    When the earth and all its people quake,
      I will hold its pillars firm (vv. 2-3).

This is God asserting that he will judge fairly. When the earth and its people quake, when world leaders further personal agendas, appointing only judges who agree with them, when nations build bigger bombs and missiles, when people revolt against their leaders; in all these shakings and quakings, it is God who holds the pillars of the earth firm. People may rage and collect guns and propagate fake news, but underneath are the everlasting arms. 

Second, God presents another power image when he says,
  To the arrogant I say, “Boast no more,”
      and to the wicked, “Do not lift up your horns.
    Do not lift your horns against heaven;
        do not speak defiantly” (vv. 4-5).
    “I will cut off the horns of the wicked,
        but the horns of the righteous will be lifted up” (v. 10). 

A word about horns. Ranchers remove horns and testicles from cattle to make them less dangerous and aggressive, safer to handle. Hunters hang racks of antlers on their walls. That says it all. You know you’re a real hunter when your wall hangings show the beasts you have conquered. God is the great hunter in this psalm, dehorning proud warrior nations, domesticating them to serve his purposes. 

The poet presents a third power image for God:
  In the hand of the Lord is a cup
        full of foaming wine mixed with spices;
    he pours it out, and all the wicked of the earth
        drink it down to its very dregs (v. 8).

God’s wine is a picture of his anger. In his wrath, he makes the wicked drink wine until they are insensibly drunk, unable to strut about and make war and speak defiantly against God. 

Let’s pray. 

Our father, we prefer to think of you as a loving God, a safe God, but with the poet in Psalm 75, we reflect on your power and anger. We thank you that you are interested enough in human society to throw down the powerful nations and to implement justice. 

As our earth quakes and shakes with climate change, political divisiveness, fake news, drug abuse, and violence, we thank you that you judge with equity and hold firm the pillars of the earth. 

As authoritarian leaders exalt themselves, proudly displaying their horns of power–nuclear arsenals, warships, and armies–thank you, God, that you are the horn-cutter. Stop the arrogance of the wicked, crush their plans, bring the violent to a violent end. Bring wisdom and good governance on earth. 

As we see the greed and immorality of leaders, as they practice favoritism and nepotism and self-aggrandizement, we wait for you, God, to make them drink the wine of your wrath. They are drunk with self-importance, Lord. Pour out on them the wine of your anger that crushes them into submission, the wine of your wisdom that exposes their  foolishness and weakness, the wine of your justice that will put an end to their evil deeds.

O Lord, hold firm the pillars of the earth. Carry us in your everlasting arms.      

Amen.

I’m Daniel on the channel “Pray with Me”.

Ep.168: Book Review. Boase: The Prayer of Faith.

Hello, I’m Daniel Westfall on the channel “Pray With Me”.

Today, let’s look at the book The Prayer of Faith  by Leonard Boase (London: Darton, Longman & Todd, 1976). First published in 1950, the author rewrote, rearranged, and republished in 1976. He comments on his revision: “The more things change, the more they stay the same. The car has been re-upholstered but the engine’s the same.” (p. 9) 

Boase describes prayer as a rope. The purpose of the rope is to pull. It is the pull that matters, not the rope’s color or age or hairiness or smell. In prayer, love is the pull, the most important part. We exert the pull by loving God, as we do thoroughly and with due attention whatever we happen to be occupied with–work, play, suffering, or having a time of formal prayer where we pay attention to God’s presence. 

Boase says that the first stage of prayer is usually “mental prayer”–that is, thinking about God or meditating on scripture to experience his presence. Mental prayer may succeed for a time, maybe even a long time. But then comes the darkness. (p. 23) 

He describes the darkness in a chapter titled “Frustration”, which begins: “There is a crisis in the life of prayer which, for many, spells disaster. There is a desert on this Golden Journey, where nearly everyone wanders lost and parched, and some die of thirst.” (p. 20). 

He continues, “We find ourselves lost, irretrievably lost, in the desert. No efforts, however frantic, seem to be of any avail. Not only do we feel no taste for prayer, but even if, spurred by an uneasy conscience, we override the distaste, we seem to have lost the knack.” (p. 24)  Boase  says about this darkness, “. . .we find that when we try to love God by thinking about him, our thoughts are cloudy and confused, and we cannot focus them on him or anything relating to him. This frustration. . . causes distaste and aversion to prayer.” 

I remember an early experience with this darkness. I decided to pray the Lord’s Prayer for a whole semester. But three quarters of the way through that semester, I was still unable to get past the first phrase, “Hallowed be your name”. I tried to pray almost every day, but my prayer was distracted, inattentive, unfocussed. With anger and frustration and disappointment in myself, I said to God, “I guess I’m just not able to pray. It doesn’t work for me.” 

I felt God reply “I have enjoyed your prayer this semester. It’s been good to hear you pray, ‘Hallowed be your name.’” 

Father Thomas Green makes a similar point. Suppose you plan to spend your birthday with God, he writes. You set aside the day for him and read scripture and pray and try to be present to God. But the whole day is dry and barren. You show up, but God doesn’t, and it feels like a wasted day. Then, Green says, three days later when you’re sitting on the toilet, you unexpectedly sense God’s presence and he fills you with peace and joy and the water of life.

What is it with this darkness and dryness in prayer? Boase says it’s God working in us to build faith, a faith that helps us be present with God in our spirit, rather than our mind or emotions. God wants us to worship in spirit and truth, so he helps us by letting our mind and emotions go dark, and teaches us a new way of experiencing his presence.

The way through the darkness is to keep on praying, to keep listening in silence for God, to reach out to him with our heart, even when our mind is distracted and our feelings are not engaged. 

Leonard Boase calls this the prayer of faith, because it is God’s gift, drawing us into communion with him by a hidden way. Teresa of Avila calls this the dry well. St. John of the Cross calls it the dark night of the soul. If your prayer has begun to be dry or dark, you might find this book helpful. 

It’s The Prayer of Faith, by Leonard Boase. 

Let’s pray. 

Our father, wherever we are on the journey of prayer, we ask you to be our companion and guide. Save us from self-deception, from an unhealthy desire for mystical experiences, from imagining we have found the best way to pray. Above all, whether we pray in light or in darkness, lead us deeper into the prayer of faith. 

Amen. 

I’m Daniel on the channel “Pray with Me”. 

Ep.167: Psalm 74: Crisis of Faith.

Hello. I’m Daniel Westfall on the channel “Pray with Me”. 

Psalm 73 described the author’s personal crisis of faith. He felt God was giving the wicked great success, and making his own life miserable. Today’s psalm, 74, describes a community crisis of faith, as Israel remembers how the Babylonians conquered Jerusalem and destroyed God’s temple. It looked like God rejected his people and his temple, and gave their violent enemy complete success.

Feel the pathos as Israel complains to God about the situation:
    Why have you rejected us forever?
        Why does your anger smoulder against the sheep of your pasture? (v. 1).
    Turn you steps towards these everlasting ruins,
        All this destruction the enemy has brought on the sanctuary (v. 3).

It is a long, long road from the comfort of Psalm 23, “The Lord is my shepherd, he leads me beside quiet waters” to this psalm which asks, “Why does your anger smoulder against your sheep?” 

Feel the hopelessness in Israel’s memory:
    Your foes roared in the temple where you met with us (v. 4a).
    They smashed the carved panelling
          with their axes and hatchets (v. 6). 
     They burned your sanctuary to the ground;
          they defiled the dwelling-place of your name (v. 7).

And feel their despair when God doesn’t seem to notice or care:
    We are given no signs from God;
        no prophets are left,
        and none of us know how long this will be.
    How long will the enemy mock you, God?
        Will the foe revile your name forever?  (vv. 9-10).

But the poet does not stop his journey at the station of despair. The chaos in the temple, the chaos in Jerusalem, and the chaos in his life of faith remind him of creation, when God overcame the forces of chaos to create an orderly and beautiful world. 

Let’s pray. 

Our father, 

As the poet shifts his focus from the destruction of the temple to your power and your kingship, we say with him: 
    God, you  are our King from long ago,
          you bring salvation to the earth (v. 12).
  It was you who split open the sea by your power. . .
  It was you who crushed the sea monster
      and gave it as food to the creatures of the desert (vv. 13-14). 

You were not weak at creation, God. You wrestled with the waters of chaos, you wrestled with the sea monster, you overcame the beast and cast it into the desert.

You replaced the primordial darkness with order and beauty and light:
    Yours is the day, and yours the night;
          you established the sun and moon.
      You set the boundaries of the earth,
          you made both summer and winter.
You are not a God who leaves things in chaos. You are the author of life, you shine light into the darkness, you create a world with dependable boundaries for the seas and dependable seasons for the climate.

We pray then for our lives, our churches, our society, which are overrun with chaos. Make us a new creation, God. Overcome the darkness, wrestle our monsters to the ground, send us summer and winter, light and darkness according to your design, bring your people out of despair into jubilant hope.

We are the sheep of your pasture, Lord. Lead us from pain and doubt and chaos back to the still waters and green pastures of Psalm 23. 

Amen.

I’m Daniel on the channel “Pray with Me”.