Friday May 29th, 2015 Psalm 29
The voice of the LORD is over the waters; the God of glory thunders, the LORD, over mighty waters. (verse 3)
I once heard an Old Testament scholar speak about how our western experience of God is very different from that of the Hebrew people. For us, our lives, concerns, dreams and worries fill the sky, so to speak, around us. We are big and God can feel far away. But for the Hebrew people, God was big and they were small. Not small in an unimportant way, but in a relational way. The world belonged to God, God was present in everything, God filled the sky in a real way.
For us, the space for God in our world and in our lives doesn’t exist until we face the storms. Often it takes illness, suffering, loss or death for all our concerns, dreams and worries to give way and make space for God.
When we are big and God is far away, it can be hard to know where God fits in our lives. And while being small may be hard, a big God is also a nearby and present God. Maybe letting ourselves be small is just what we need.
Mighty, thundering God, make us small so that we can see how you fill our world. Amen. — EP
Contributed by God in the Storms
I once heard an Old Testament scholar speak about how our western experience of God is very different from that of the Hebrew people. For us, our lives, concerns, dreams and worries fill the sky, so to speak, around us. We are big and God can feel far away. But for the Hebrew people, God was big and they were small. Not small in an unimportant way, but in a relational way. The world belonged to God, God was present in everything, God filled the sky in a real way.
For us, the space for God in our world and in our lives doesn't exist until we face the storms. Often it takes illness, suffering, loss or death for all our concerns, dreams and worries to give way and make space for God.
When we are big and God is far away, it can be hard to know where God fits in our lives. And while being small may be hard, a big God is also a nearby and present God. Maybe letting ourselves be small is just what we need.
