Be pleased, O God, to deliver me; O lord, make haste to help me … come to me speedily, O God … O Lord, do not tarry … Psalm 70
Jean-Pierre Chaussade, SJ writes in The Sacrament of the Present Moment, “When God requires action, sanctity is to be found in activity.”
I have always tried to live my life dancing between faith and action. I’ve never subscribed to the idea that we are saved by faith alone, nor to the concept that we are saved by our works. I prefer to tango down the middle of the road with James, who says that “faith without works is dead.” Of course, someone also once said that those who spend time in the middle of the road are bound to get run over.
In the psalm at the head of this column, we find the psalmist begging God to come to their aid. “I need help, and I need it now,” he pleads.
As I read this psalm, I don’t find myself standing in the sandals of an ancient Jew, but in the ordinary sneakers of a Ukrainian man, woman, or child. I find myself moldering in the body bag of the grandfather who was blindfolded and executed by Russian soldiers for no reason other than being alive and in easy reach of his executioners.
We have the luxury of living in a land far away from the tanks, jets, and missiles visiting death and destruction on the citizens of a foreign land, speaking with a foreign tongue – enduring the devastation of homes and lives there, while we bemoan the rise in price of a loaf of bread, gallon of gasoline, or meal out under the golden arches. Ours are Tesla problems when compared to those living in a travois world.
It is a simple thing to sit in our easy chairs, recliners, or love seats while bemoaning world affairs, inflation, or the slap heard ‘round the world.
“Be patient” we tell them; our leaders snap their fingers ordering more engines of destruction to be sent out to “help” those in distress. Foreigners. Not neighbors. Far away. Not near.
How do “we citizens of heaven” help, though? Isn’t their pain our pain, too?
“Take it to the Lord in prayer,” we suggest to those whose religion may be, technically, the same as ours, but sure looks and feels different, so maybe this is God’s way of telling them to change, and they should listen, and we shouldn’t interfere with the divine “plan” to fix them.
Isn’t it an arrogant assumption on our part to assume the one in pain hasn’t thought to “take it to the Lord in prayer.” Maybe they have; maybe their pain is there to force open our eyes and hearts – to recognize our common humanity in the face of those atrocities.
“Who, me?” we ask, like Moses (the Murderer), or Rahab (the Harlot of Jericho), or Jeremiah (the Prophet), or Esther (the Queen), or John Wesley (the Minister), or Harriet Tubman (the Runaway Slave).
“Yes, you,” says God.
Saint Augustine reminds us, “Without God, we cannot; without us, God will not.” We cannot, in good conscience, look to God without realizing, simultaneously, that God is also looking at us, fully intending to involve us in answering prayer. If we want God to hurry up, we need to suit up, mount up, scramble into the presence of God and declare without grumbling or hesitation, “Present! What are your orders?”
As you read this, we are in the midst of Holy Week. This is the final week of Jesus’ human ministry. He declared to the masses, “My House is a House of Prayer, but you’ve turned it into a buzzing hive of thieves and cut-throats.” Jesus didn’t ask God to fix things. He rolled up his sleeves, tossed ne'er-do-wells out on their ears. He continued to teach. He fed the masses, helped the hopeless, healed the oppressed and, on Good Friday, gave his back to the smiters and, on the cross, gave his “last full measure of devotion.”
The question we are left with is simply this: Will we, too, consecrate ourselves to the great tasks that lie before us? Will we resolve ourselves to live as he lived and, if necessary, die as he died? When God requires action, will sanctity be found in our actions?
I pray it will, God helping, here in this, our valley.
Keith Axberg writes on matters concerning life and faith. Author of: Who the Blazes is Jesus? Good News for a Vulgar World (available through Amazon in Print and e-book)
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