Meditating on Proper 7: Make us have perpetual love!

 

Proper 7    

The Sunday closest to June 22

O Lord, make us have perpetual love and reverence for your holy Name, for you never fail to help and govern those whom you have set upon the sure foundation of your loving-kindness; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Preface of the Lord's Day

Matthew 10:24ff

Have you ever seen one of those “perpetual motion” machines? You know what I mean. Like the rack of steel balls that constantly clack back and forth, demonstrating Newtonian physics. Or the revolving pendulum on an anniversary clock that runs one direction for a bit, then back the other way.

There is no such thing as a perpetual motion machine, of course. The clacking steel balls come to a standstill eventually as the energy dissipates little by little. Anniversary clocks and pendulum clocks keep moving as long as the battery or spring mechanism has energy to keep them going. The idea of anything being “perpetual” is attractive, but is it realistic?

“Make us” have perpetual love, we pray. Perpetual love? What’s that? How does that work? What do we mean? Is this a sort of Ronco Set-it-and-forget-it kind of love? And what do we mean by “make us”? That sounds like compulsion. Compulsion isn’t loving, is it?

Our prayer reminds us that we humans have a tendency to let things go. Deferred maintenance creeps up on us. We’re supposed to change the batteries in our smoke detectors every six months – and no longer than a year. Yet how many people die because their batteries died first? 

I had a fellow come in for an oil change (back when gas stations actually serviced cars). I opened the oil pan and what came out wasn’t oil, but more tar-like sludge. He hadn’t changed oil since the age of the dinosaurs! Deferred maintenance to a whole new level.

We ask God to “make us” because it is so easy to let things slide. We’re not evil. We’re not even lazy. We’re simply so involved with life and living we lean on our habits. We take care of what’s in front of us – and that’s a good thing! 

So we need reminders about other important stuff, too. Love is a moving target. We don’t chase after it to catch it like a cat after a mouse or dog after a car. Love is a relationship that is ever-evolving, and what we’re doing is asking God to help us keep after it. We need help keeping it fresh, keeping it alive – help “keeping on keeping on” as we used to say back in those good ol’ hippy days of yore.

So what does that perpetual love and reverence for God look like? Well, it doesn’t take too much most of the time. Just as the clacky balls need a fresh push every now and then, and alarms need fresh batteries to sniff the air and keep us safe, so we need to learn to “hear what the Spirit is saying to God’s people.” 

We keep our relationships with God and neighbor fresh by spending time with them. Daily prayer. Yes, I can whip off the Lord’s Prayer lickety split, but I think what I’m asking God to help me do is slow down, taking as much time to listen to God’s Spirit as I do giving God a divine honey-do list that sloppy prayer often sounds, looks, and feels like. So God, help me slow down and just enjoy some time with You, for when I do that, many of my anxieties fade away.

Reading scripture daily is also helpful. Not as one of those anxiety-building exercises for which we feel guilty if we don’t get so much read daily or let slide because we’ve got meals to make or things to do. Oh my, the dishes need washing! No, don’t worry about quantity. Forget about trying to read the Bible in a year or a Gospel in a month (unless you find those exercises helpful or useful). No, just find a system that works for you. Find a passage and ask, “Where is God in this story? Where am I in this story? What would I be doing? How would I be reacting? What would happen if the characters did something different? Where would the story go if someone had a different choice or made a different decision, or chose a different path? What should I believe or do differently if I took this tale to heart? 

Attend church. It ain’t magic, but the fact is we live in a world that is so fractured and lonely, we need to come together to remember that we are not alone. We may feel like Don Quixote off on some crazy quest, but Quixote had his Sancho, and the fact is, sometimes I’m the knight, sometimes I’m the Sancho, but always I’m in need of a foil against which to exercise my faith and judgment, and to challenge the practicalities and ideals I am sometimes prone to overlook. 

In sum, “making us” isn’t compulsion, as such. Another way we use the word “make” has to do with production and manufacturing, like making breakfast or dinner, or making one’s bed, or even making up one’s mind. We are asking God to make of us a meal that’s nourishing and palatable for the world – to help the world see the love God is pouring out upon the people of the world – including those who don’t look, feel, act, or believe like us.

Perhaps if we focus on letting God change us, the world may eventually come around faster than if we try to change the world, for God has set us upon the sure foundation of (God’s) loving-kindness. 

God, please do this for us, we pray. Amen