Find Psalm 98 here
It’s not often that we read from and talk specifically about a psalm. There are 150 psalms in the Bible and are ancient prayers and hymns so old that the original melodies have been lost to history.
The Psalms can be divided into different categories: There are psalms of sorrow or lament, psalms of praise, royal psalms, and thanksgiving psalms to name a few. Psalm 98 is in a category of both praise and enthronement.
There is a lot of interesting technical Biblical stuff regarding form and structure in this short psalm of 9 verses, but most importantly, is the question of what does it all mean? That is to say, what does it mean for us to offer praise?
Psalm 98 calls all creation to join in praising God, for all nations to join in a new song, recognizing that God alone is God, the creator of the universe whose power and majesty call for our response of praise . . . So why don't we feel like praising? Maybe because it's nothing new. In a wonderful little book, Praying the Psalms, Thomas Merton, a Trappist monk and Christian mystic who lived in the 20th century before the days of the Internet and personal computers, and cell phones had this to say:
Praise is cheap, today. Everything is praised. Soap, beer, toothpaste, clothing, mouthwash, movie stars, all the latest gadgets which are supposed to make life more comfortable -- everything is constantly being "praised". Praise is now so overdone that everybody is sick of it, and since everything is "praised" . . . nothing is praised. Praise has become empty . . . Are there any superlatives left for God? They have all been wasted on foods and quack medicines. (Praying the Psalms, 1956)
Lent is not a time in which we are to suppose to make ourselves miserable. to the contrary, Lent is really a time where we are invited to turn our focus to God- to change what we do in heart body and mind that our joy might be found in a place outside ourselves.
Our world doesn’t leave much room for praising. It is filled with despair, loneliness, division, war, famine, and disease. At the Girl Scout World Thinking day on Sunday, where different troops explored and shared their knowledge of different countries in the world, attendees were also reminded, even in developed countries, of the need for clean drinking water.
The world in which we live is not a world that praises God with every fiber of its being. There are gods of a different sort that compete for our allegiance” control, power, authority, wealth, technology, these can become the idols to which we offer shallow praise.
How can this psalm, addressed to a world filled with too many gods speak to us in a world that seems to make God irrelevant?
There are some that have difficulty with the language of the psalm and its exclusive description of the one and only one God and that all of creation, sings praises to this singular entity. Putting this psalm in its proper context and in an ancient time among the faithful this would make sense. But we do not live in an ancient time. We live in a post-modern, pluralistic world.
The problem is NOT the kind of pluralism that rightly recognizes that people are different, that they have differing religious beliefs, and that they should be allowed to live their life of faith and worship as they please. This is a good thing and only adds to the genius of God’s creation.
I mean the kind of pluralism that moves beyond tolerance and begins to believe that reality, itself is pluralistic (that is, it's all reality is only a matter of perspective); that truth, itself is relative; that God is irrelevant or at the very least an accessory like a piece of jewelry nice to have, shiny and draws attention, but has little substantive influence and affect on our lives. The danger here is that in a modern society, there is little use for the role that faith and spirituality play in developing and perpetuating good leaders.
In the end, the cynic in me says that truth is relative and so, it doesn't matter what we believe- as long as we're sincere. But domestic violence is a sin, genocide is another incarnation of evil, racism and bigtory are intolerable- these are truths for which, though seemingly justifiable by those in positions of power are universally accepted as wrong and contrary to basic human rights. What is also true is that the world we have is a precious gift, the talents we have are the extensions of our soul, the birth of a child is a miracle in life, and there are many, many more.
Psalm 98 is utterly opposed to the idea of a fragmented world in which God is irrelevant and has no bearing on our lives. This psalm declares that God is creator of heaven and earth and thus God is the God of all life and all people, whether they acknowledge it or not, whether they are religiously inclined or not, whether they worship other gods or not. This claims the eternal truth that there is a god to whom belongs all worship and praise: the same God who created us out of the dust of the earth, who breathed life into us in the Garden of Creation.
We are called, therefore with every fiber of our being to offer to God, the praise and the joy that lies in our hearts. We need to discover and enrich those part of our being that, by God’s grace, animate us and fill our lives with meaning and joy. Maybe that is found while surfing, biking, swimming, hiking, painting or pottery, perhaps it is found in music, in instruments or in song.
In all that we do, whatever we do, may it be the song that God longs to hear. May the name of God be blessed.
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