Great Faithfulness to Those Who Suffer

Remember the agreement you made with us,
because violence fills every dark corner of this land.
Do not let your suffering people be disgraced.
Let the poor and helpless praise you.
- Psalm 74:20-21, New Century Version

One cannot escape the recurring theme in the scripture of justice for the poor.

We are admonished to be fair and compassionate in our attitudes and actions toward the downtrodden and marginalized.

This is the work of God and God works through us. At the same time, there is a theme of acknowledgement that we are all, somehow, in some way, poor ourselves. So, what we wish for them, we wish for ourselves.

The prayer in Psalm 74, possibly from the days of exile, intermingles praise and lament in a cry of hope for the oppressed.

Tables turn, sometimes for the worse, sometimes for the better. It is crucial that we invest our confidence in what is worthy of our confidence.

Real estate, once thought to only increase in value, can become a bottomless pit of devaluation. Stock markets fluctuate and individual stocks in companies with great assets and greater possibilities, can plummet to near zero. People may fail us; they may move away; they may die. Careers may crumble. Our carefully honed skills may become obsolete. Guarantees made my insolvent guarantors gravitate downward to an abyss of worthless promises.

But there is a covenant that is sustaining and sustainable. There is a guarantor that will never lose power, authority, and ability to remember that covenant of love. There is One who is faithful and whose providence emerges amidst a backdrop of hopelessness to lighten our loads and lift our broken souls. The poor and helpless join the chorus of praise because they are not disgraced.

Violence fills the dark corners of our planet and seeps into hamlets of perceived safety and isolation. There is no isolation from the decadence of our day, only insulation. Our bodies may be bruised; our purses may be emptied; our homes may crumble with our false securities, but the covenant of hope and grace continues because the One who made it is strong and faithful.

Great is God's faithfulness. This season of days growing longer lengthens our perception of the degree to which our God will go to reach us, teach us, and redeem us from destruction.

God descends into the darkness and illuminates our spaces and places with abundant graces. Like the psalmist, we are invited to cry our in utter honesty, but also to affirm faith - audacious and irrational - the kind that activates our side of the covenant, reis thy faithfulness which is to receive with gratitude, the gift. of hope.

Great is God's faithfulness.

Great is Thy faithfulness, O God my Father.
There is no shadow of turning with Thee.
Thou changest not, Thy compassions, they fail not.
As Thou hast been, Thou forever will be.

 

Great is Thy faithfulness.
Great is Thy faithfulness.
Morning by morning new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided.
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me.

 

Summer and winter and springtime and harvest.
Sun, moon and stars in their courses above
Join with all nature in manifold witness
To Thy great faithfulness, mercy and love.

 

Great is Thy faithfulness.
Great is Thy faithfulness.
Morning by morning new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided.
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me.

 

Pardon for sin and a peace that endureth.
Thine own dear presence to cheer and to guide.
Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow.
Blessings all mine with ten thousand beside.

 

Great is Thy faithfulness.
Great is Thy faithfulness.
Morning by morning new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided.

Great is Thy faithfulness.
Lord, unto me.

 

- Thomas O. Chisholm