Change of Perspective
For your steadfast love is great to the heavens, your faithfulness to the clouds. Psalm 57:10 ESV
Heavens/ Clouds – shamayim and shehaqim describe David’s new perspective. But considering the circumstances, this is quite a shock. David is sitting in a cave! Is he viewing the clouds, enjoying the sun, gazing at the heavens? No. He is in the dark. In the dark he declares that God’s hesed is the most important truth in the cosmos. Without it, life is a cave, a dark hole in the ground filled with fear and incomprehension. Hesed, not love, makes the world go around. Hesed is the foundation of the universe (‘emet).
Consider the implications of David’s declaration. Hesed is not grace. It is not God’s freely bestowed favor on all mankind. It does not come down with the rain on the just and the unjust. Hesed presupposes a covenant relationship between the parties. Hesed does not apply between strangers. If you don’t know God, you don’t know hesed (and, tragically, God doesn’t know you either). That means that most of the world’s population sits in the dark. Most of the people in the world do not experience the mutual obligation and transitive transformation of hesed. Most people are residents of the cave. They have never experienced the exuberance of Son light, nor the joyous mystery of floating on air. They don’t know what it means to dance along the light of day or soar into the Milky Way. They are creatures of the dark, and preferring the dark, they reject the light of hesed because they want neither obligation nor community. In the dark, I console myself alone.
“It is not good for Man to be alone,” says the Genesis account. But the overwhelming truth of this world is that we are alone and in the dark. That’s why the universal language after Babel is pain. How glorious is David’s declaration. God gives light. His truth may blind me at the beginning, but as I adjust to hesed and ‘emet, I discover, as the man on the road discovered, that I can finally see.
Perhaps the good news is not that we will go to heaven or that the guilt we have carried can be lifted. Perhaps the good news is that the light has come and the darkness cannot vanquish it. Perhaps the really good news is that we can soar to the heavens and walk among the clouds on the firm foundation of God’s covenant relationship.
There’s not much more to say, is there?
Topical Index: heaven, shamayim, clouds, shehaqim, light, good news, Psalm 57:10
A beautiful finish to a beautiful song! Thank you, Skip, for these wonderful insights.
“If you don’t know God, you don’t know hesed (and, tragically, God doesn’t know you either).”
True! Folks take chesed for granted, presuming they deserve the blessings and they have happiness, but true joy and the truth of their lifestyle and habits evade them.
They are truly in dark caves.
And they miss out on community lifestyle, miss out living in joyful covenant relationship with YHWH.
BUT, darkness can never vanquish light! Amein!
Nothing more than that His chesed extends to the heavens!!!! Hallelu YAH!
“There’s not much more to say, is there?”
Nope. Not really. That really is a good summation of things as they are.
Light. His light.
’emet hesed
Of course, after the brief silence of deep contemplation, I’m sure we’ll all have to add something. Sometime. 🙂 Light is just that way. It radiates outward and onward always. Ever contributing to
the revelation of the truth of all things.
It’s certainly worth talking about.
Thanks, Skip. A great adventure path for the day.
Hi Skip…in your final paragraph you state, “Perhaps the good news is not that we will go to heaven or that the guilt we have carried can be lifted…”
You have often suggested this, although I struggle to understand why the above statement is NOT good news. It sounds wonderful to me.
And, yes, “the light has come and the darkness cannot vanquish it,” sounds equally as good.
As does the awareness that we can “soar to the heavens and walk among the clouds on the firm foundation of God’s covenant relationship.”
They all sound like unbelievably amazing gifts from God and I’m curious why you often encourage us to view them as separate and unequal.
I understand that being forgiven or being in heaven with God for all eternity shouldn’t be the sole/selfish focus of our lives, but should we feel ashamed for wanting to be there someday?
A good point, Judi. You’re right. It is ALL GOOD NEWS. My concern is that we tend to focus our attention on the good news after death, due to Luther and Augustine importing the Greek Platonic dualism. I want to point to the good news now while we are living, and to help us focus on redeeming God’s world. But you are absolutely right. With both in mind, it is ALL better.
Thanks Skip. That really helps clear things up in my head.
And, you’re absolutely right…we need to get busy LIVING (God’s way) while we are still here on earth. There’s SO much to do.
THE HOPE of the Follower of THE LORD is the resurrection from the dead .
Those who have been raised up NOW by HIS power to live for HIM NOW will one day die and sleep.
They will be raised up at HIS COMING as far as I can understand from the Prophets of old and from the Apostles in the New.
DEATH is NOT our conversation but LIFE and LIFE by way of THE RESURRECTION concerning life from the dead spiritually and yes , bodily if the LORD tarries and we die.
““It is not good for Man to be alone,” says the Genesis account.”
Hmmm
Last night I watched “Life of Pi” with my daughter; it is a movie about a boy in a boat with a tiger
According to the author of the book, Yann Martel, the plot can be summarized in three statements
– Life is a story
– You can choose your story
– A story with God is the better story
I don’t want to set expectations too high, but I think it was the best movie
That I’ve ever seen
Michael,
What a coincidence. Our Netflix movie this time was “Life of Pi.” I had already watched it when it came out in the theater, but we got it again, and I watched it a second time with my wife.
It was very interesting. Besides the beautiful cinematography created for this movie, the story line left much to discuss and ponder.
While it’s difficult for me to say any single movie is the ‘best movie’ I did highly enjoy watching it again.
The protagonist of this movie asks a character in the movie, “Which story did you like better?” or something very close to that.
Our Father tells us a story beginning in Genesis. A story about Him and us. You can choose to see it as He tells it or how you want to believe it.
Unfortunately, we willing remain so far removed from the true telling of this story that we have simply replaced His story with our infinitely finite version. Our small box has become our entire defunct and slanted universe. It’s all we know and all we want to know.
Like in the story, “Life if Pi,” we don’t want to break out of our little self made limiting boxes of comfort to discover all that is true and real. It’s only when we are taken to our extreme limits that we come to realize all there is out there, outside our box.
Before a tree can sprout, grow and become that which it is, a tree, a tiny seed must be buried, covered with dirt and die. Only then can it become what was designed in to it, a replica of the information contained within it, a tree.
The Scriptures, in Hebrew, contain a story with such depth and breadth that reveals everything our Father wants us to know about Him and about us. It’s done with concrete images that everyone of us can relate to, things of the earth and things of biology and things about our body. It’s related to us in things that we can see, touch, taste, smell and hear, things that we all have an understanding of and can relate to.
The first book of Torah starts with the Hebrew letter Bet, which pictorially represents a house, a safe dwelling place. How appropriate that His story to us begins with a house, a place of safety, shelter and protection-a home.
Anyway, thanks for the thoughts Michael. You got me thinking of the implications of that movie again.
“Anyway, thanks for the thoughts Michael. You got me thinking of the implications of that movie again.”
Hi Michael,
My pleasure, I watched the movie with my daughter and my yellow lab Max
And it had a very powerful emotional impact on me, sort of like Bambi when I was a little boy
I always loved being out on the ocean in a boat and used to love to fish when I was young
Although I didn’t really go to high school much, I did come across Max Mueller in my senior year
And I couldn’t imagine how anyone could learn Hindu in the first place and the religions
Seemed so much more complicated and mysterious than my elementary intro to Catholicism
But I could relate to Gandhi and he gave me a greater appreciation of Jesus
After high school it took me a few years to get back to college where I encountered
Camus and Sartre and Dostoevsky like the boy in the movie
In the movie I think God is using the lion to form the character of the boy
And when the lion leaves the boy it is very sad, especially when the lion doesn’t look back
To say farewell
But I think that’s because the lion’s job is done and the boy is now a man
Makes me think of one of my favorite poems
THE TYGER (from Songs Of Experience)
By William Blake
Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?
In what distant deeps or skies
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand dare sieze the fire?
And what shoulder, & what art.
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread hand? & what dread feet?
What the hammer? what the chain?
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? what dread grasp
Dare its deadly terrors clasp?
When the stars threw down their spears,
And watered heaven with their tears,
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the Lamb make thee?
Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?
1794
hesed—-love for no reason—given by our Father God Second time today this has been brought to my attention. Thank you