The Rhythm of Forgiveness

[00:00:01] Speaker A: Let us pray. Dear Heavenly Father, we join with the psalmist who seems to be in the depths of despair as he calls out to you, O Lord, be with us as we call from the bottomless pit of our world that is so far from you these days. Lord, be with us as we reach for your light, as we try to follow your will. And we hear the words that you speak to us today from your word. In Jesus name we pray. Amen from Psalm 130. We've heard a bit about it already today. Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord. Lord, hear my voice. Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications. If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities, Lord, who could stand? But. But there is forgiveness with you so that you may be revered. I wait for the Lord, my soul waits. And in his Word I hope my soul waits for the Lord. More than those who watch for the morning. More than those who watch for the morning. O Israel, hope in the Lord, for with the Lord there is steadfast love, and with him is great power to redeem. It is he who will redeem Israel from all of its iniquities. And hundreds of years later, Paul wrote to John in the first verse of John 1 in the first chapter, this is the message we've heard from him and proclaim to you that God is light, and in him there is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with him while we are walking in darkness, and we lie and do not do what is true. But if we walk in the light, as he himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son, cleanses us from all sins. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he who is faithful and just will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. This is the word of the Lord. [00:02:25] Speaker B: This fall, we have been looking at the book of Psalms. And while the Psalms may lack musical notation, melodies and notes, I wish it had that notation. It doesn't. But still we have the lyrics to 150 Psalms in our scriptures, and it's often been called the songbook or hymn book of Scripture. In addition to being the prayer book of scripture, back in 1539, when John Calvin wanted the Protestant churches in Geneva, Switzerland to have a songbook that they could use to sing in church, a full 18 of the 21 songs that he put in the Geneva Psalter were simply a straight text of psalms put to music. For he figured many in the Reformed church in Geneva at that time figured what better songs could there be be to sing than the song straight from Scripture, the Book of Psalms. And it's interesting today too, how many contemporary bands or artists or composers are still setting words of Psalms like 130 to music. If you check out Spotify or Apple Music or whatever program you use to get music, put in Psalm 130, and you'll see a ton of different musical renderings of these words, some that have come out just this last year, an author by worship bands like Shane and Shane, or folk artists or rock artists. These words still grab us. They have grabbed God's people since more than 2400 years ago when they were put down, and they still grab us today. [00:04:09] Speaker A: Why? [00:04:10] Speaker B: What is it about the Psalms that continues to invite God's people to use them again and again, to sing them, to pray them, to use them in worship? Well, one reason the psalms, I think have particular appeal is that they not only give us words to sing, they teach us how to sing, how to pray. In singing or praying the psalms, you don't shape them. You don't push them to your form. Instead, you let them shape you, them form you. They invite you into a kind of rhythm or dance or journey they have. And it's not one you or I impose on them. You say, instead, let me listen to your rhythm and flow, dance to that beat, to the steps you provide. And in so doing, we're taught by the psalms how to sing to God, how to pray, how to relate to God, how to move through the world in faith. Well, this last weekend I wasn't here with you a week ago. I was off in New Jersey and I had two separate experiences of being invited into a rhythm and dance I didn't control. I wasn't leading. These dances were prepared and led by others, but I could join in if I wished. And there was a delight in doing that. Jill and I traveled to New Jersey for parents weekend festivities at our daughter's college and sat night included a dinner at her eating club. I should say we didn't plan it this way, but it was great to leave the scorching hot weather. It was beautiful in New Jersey. Not to make you feel bad, but the weather was idyllic. So Saturday night included a dinner at her eating club and a great chance to connect with some of her friends and their parents. And following the dinner, there was a dance that took place out on the patio. Under the Stars. And they had the audacity for this dance not to check with me about the song list. They didn't ask me. I would have had some opinions to share as to what I thought the proper playlist should be, but neither the band nor the planners of this event bothered to check with me instead. If I went out there, the songs were going to be like Bryan Adams, Summer of 69, Billie Eilish, Bad Guy. Whatever songs they chose, that was what was being played. And I had the option to either dance to that music or not. Well, of course I went out to dance and got to join a great community of students and parents under the stars and move together. I was also invited to a different kind of dance. The following Sunday morning, Lucy and her boyfriend invited us to attend their Episcopal church. And it has been some time since I attended a worship service. I was not leading. Some of you out. There are pastors and you've served churches for years, and you know how odd it can be. Wait, wait. I'm here at church and I'm not running something. I'm not giving a prayer. I'm just, like, following along, participating. It can be jarring at first, and then it can be kind of wonderful. In this particular service, there were things I just noted that were different from the way we did worship at Knox and the way I've typically done worship in Presbyterian context. The prayer of confession, which we did early in the service, was done after the sermon, after the message. And for the prayer of confession, we knelt little prayer benches or little cushions that you could pull out and kneel on, which was kind of neat. We've sometimes done that Knox context. There were also times where you'd cross yourself. There was a lot of movement for this. And I have to confess, sometimes I got the steps a little wrong. There was one time where we went forward to communion later in the service, and I was the first in our particular row to follow. I was following behind a young, young woman in front of me. We went to a middle area, this is right up in the chancel area, where everyone was invited to form a circle around about four people, the priests and others helping them serve the elements, the bread and the cup. Well, I followed this other young woman over to the side where there was a prayer bench, and I figured, oh, this is where you go to receive the elements. No, that was where you went to pray. So I'm sitting down with this young woman, and both of us are in this same situation. People are being served standing in this circle. Then they go back to their seats. Others are served and they go back to their seats. We're still sitting there. We figure that the priests at the time thought, man, they must need special prayer. You know, they're in a bit of trouble over there in that pew row. Eventually we both lifted up our hands and it's like they oh, okay. And they went over and served us too. But I was like, all right, you learn a new dance, you might miss a step or two. But what a delight it was to join my daughter and her boyfriend for worship. You know, it's a great privilege to get to do that and to not have to, in that case, impose the form myself or even be in charge of setting the form, but just receive a form that was set for me, like going to dinner and the table and food was all set and I could just participate. When you join a new dance, there are steps to learn, and sometimes you get a few wrong. But what a joy to join in the dance. And the Psalms, it seems to me, do this kind of work on us, for us. They give us a form, a shape, a dance, particular moves to make, and then invite us into making those moves, even showing us what the dance of life with God looks like. Life and relationship with God, with our neighbors, and with the goodness of creation. One of the forms and rhythms we see in the Psalms, I looked with you at two weeks ago. We looked at that classic two beat form that is cry and answer, call and response. A kind of a 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2 beat that we see in many of the psalms. Cry and answer. The psalmist cries out to God. The psalmist senses God's answer to their need and presence in the midst of whatever challenge they face. Well, many scholars break down Today's Psalm, Psalm 130, into a kind of four step or four beat rhythm. Instead of 1, 2, 1, 2, it's a kind of 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2, 3, 4 step, 1, cry. Out of the depths, I cry to you, O Lord. Lord, hear my voice. Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my supplication. De profundus is the way this psalm is often titled. And it's given that because of the first two words, out of the depths in Latin, de profundis, I cry to you, O Lord, crying out to God from a place of deep human need, from a sense we've come to the end of our own resources and need, a power beyond ourselves to help us, to save us, to reach out and accompany us. That's how the prayer so often begins. It begins with that cry. Then step two in Psalm 130, if you, O Lord, should mark iniquities, who could stand? But there's forgiveness with you, Lord, so that you may be revered. Beat 2 is acknowledgement of sin. And the sin that's confessed is not just the individual psalmist's own sin, but it's also the sins of the world. We hear this stated, if God were to mark sin and strike down those who were guilty of it, nobody would stand. It's like that statement we find in the words of the prophet Isaiah. All of us, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us turning to their own way, or the words we hear in the book of Romans, all have sinned and fall short of God's glory. There's this recognition in step two that we have a kind of woundedness, a brokenness. Not that there is no good whatsoever in us. There is wonder and beauty in human beings and in creation. But there's a recognition here that there is a need, a sin, a ways each one of us, and we together have fallen short, have gone astray, need a power beyond ourselves to not only save us, but turn us back to the right road, the right paths, the paths that lead to life. And acknowledging sin, like a person in recovery admitting they have a problem, is this crucial step in that journey. Step one, cry out to God. Step two, acknowledge sin and that God is a forgiving God. Step three, Wait. Wait. We read in the third section of today's psalm. And this waiting on the Lord, and there's this repetition. My soul waits on the Lord said three times, and then more than those who watch for the morning said twice, as if we're almost stepping out of our time. And if we have to pray this again and again and again, we will, because we're waiting for God to act. We're looking to God for intervention to God's timing and not our own. Step three is that waiting. Wait for the Lord, and we show up open to what God might do. Step one, cry out in need. Step two, acknowledge sin and God's forgiveness. Step three, wait for the Lord. Then step four. O Israel, hope in the Lord. For with the Lord there is steadfast love, and with him is great power to redeem. It is he who will redeem Israel who will redeem Israel from all its iniquities. Step four, receive and savor the promises of God. Celebrate the promise of God's steadfast love, God's forgiveness, God's power to redeem and remember God's promised future, that through whatever darkness, whatever challenges we face right now, remember God has great things in store. Not only the redemption of our souls, of all creation that is coming, the renewal of all things. That's the promise we cling to. And we have a foretaste here and now with the presence of the God we know in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. But there's also that promise for a future we anticipate and for which we wait. Step four is that sense of receiving the promises God, that four step dance, cry out in need, acknowledge sin, wait for the Lord, celebrate and savor God's redemption. We see that in the New Testament as well as if it's echoing Psalm 130. Now, in the light of Jesus Christ in First John, this dance is described as walking in the light. And in the short letter of First John we see this again, professing need, confessing sin, waiting, waiting for God, and then hearing the promise, God will forgive us and cleanse us of all unrighteousness in Christ. You hear echoes of Psalm 130's rhythm, that four beat dance, and it's called walking in the light. Well, some of you may come from Methodist Church backgrounds or been exposed to Methodism. And you know that Psalm 130 has a very special place place in the Methodist Church tradition because it was Psalm 130 that John Wesley heard song on the very afternoon, May 24, 1738, that he would have a famous experience that evening. Here's what Wesley, the founder of Methodism, wrote of what happened later that day after he heard Psalm 130 sung in the evening. I went very unwillingly to a society in Aldersgate street where one was reading Luther's preface to the Epistle to the Romans. About a quarter before nine, while Luther was describing the change which God works in the heart through faith in Christ, I felt my heart strangely warmed. That phrase has been celebrated. I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone for salvation. And an assurance was given me that Christ had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death. Well, immediately following that experience, Wesley shared his newfound faith with the group. And later that evening he visited his brother Charles and triumphantly exclaimed, I believe for Christians the very gospel has been heard often in history in this song and dance of Psalm 130. We're in need. We confess before forgiving God. We wait on God and we are met anew with God's promises and God's loving presence. You might Call it the very dance of life with Christ by faith. Well, praise God that you all showed up for the dance today, that you show up again and again for it's so easy to forget one or more of the steps, to lose the rhythm and miss the chance to participate in such a glorious dance with those here and around the world who come together to share life in Christ, to sing and dance together. Maybe not underneath the stars, though in some contexts it's absolutely under the stars. But for us today, under this roof, we try to follow ancient forms in our worship given to us by the Psalms. And we didn't set that form. We didn't say it has to include confession or it has to include this cry of need. But we find in our life together the Psalms have something to teach us. Both of those are crucial. Waiting for the Lord is crucial. Remembering and savoring together the promises of God, those are crucial. You leave a step out and you're out of step with the dance. You miss all that the dance has to provide. Knox's fiction reading group just finished a novel called Martyr. And much of that novel reflects on a family's loss following the tragedy of July 3, 1988, when Iran fell. Air Flight 655, a civilian aircraft, was misidentified as a military threat, and a US Navy warship over the Strait of Hormuz shot it down, killing 290 people, women, men and children. And reading this book and reflecting on that event, I thought I'd go back. That seems like the perfect kind of event where we'd hear words of apology or humility, or inviting a kind of forgiveness that might lead to greater mutual understanding between nations, or at least set the stage for nations to recover from such a horrific tragedy neither nation would have ever wanted to happen. And while there was regret expressed by then President Reagan, I happened to see this quote that then became legendary from then Vice President George H.W. bush while he was campaigning for president, made roughly a month after that tragedy. And it struck me as a dance step missing. He said, I will never apologize for the United States. I don't care what the facts are. I'm not an apologize for America kind of guy. Whatever political party we're a part of, whatever denomination, Presbyterian, Methodist, whatever faith we're a part of, isn't expressing regret for wrongdoing, acknowledging in humility our need individually, collectively, nationally, four times of forgiveness where we can say I'm sorry? Isn't that crucial to the dance of life together? Isn't it crucial in our most intimate relationships? Of marriage, where both parties have to learn somehow, some way to say, I'm sorry, and then to receive forgiveness. And so in churches and so in communities and so in nations and the world. That's how the dance of relationship works, isn't it? I pray that we as people, as congregations, as broader entities, can get this dance step and recognize it for what it is, a wonderful opportunity and invitation to truly be vulnerable with one another and build relationships together. As Christians, this is how we believe we come to God, the God who reached out to us in Christ. We acknowledge our need and our sin, and we wait and we receive forgiveness. And with that, we're then taught how we can relate to the world. Not that we push aside wrongdoing, not that we don't engage in the work of justice and repair and reconciliation, but that we include in that mix the humble willingness to say, I was wrong. I did something I regret. Will you forgive us? Will you forgive me? And then receiving that, we enter this dance called human flourishing. Friends, it's a blessing and honor to be a part of that journey with you. And thank you for the ways you teach me this dance. And may we continue to enjoy that life of dance together, even if we get steps wrong, as we will, even if we forget steps now and then, let's remind each other what that dance looked like and how glorious it is to get out on that patio. And whether it's under the stars or under this roof with family and friends and people we've just met to celebrate that dance God has given us, especially that dance we have in Christ. In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, amen.