Falling into grace

Psalm 51:1-12

Have mercy on me, O God,
  according to your steadfast love;
according to your abundant mercy
   blot out my transgressions.
Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity,
   and cleanse me from my sin.
For I know my transgressions,
   and my sin is ever before me.
Against you, you alone, have I sinned,
   and done what is evil in your sight,
so that you are justified in your sentence
   and blameless when you pass judgment.
Indeed, I was born guilty,
   a sinner when my mother conceived me.
You desire truth in the inward being;
   therefore teach me wisdom in my secret heart.
Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;
   wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
Let me hear joy and gladness;
   let the bones that you have crushed rejoice.
Hide your face from my sins,
   and blot out all my iniquities.
Create in me a clean heart, O God,
   and put a new and right spirit within me.
Do not cast me away from your presence,
   and do not take your holy spirit from me.
Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
   and sustain in me a willing spirit.

    At the beginning of this year I came to Jason and I asked for the opportunity to offer the sermon on the third Sunday of every other month in 2018, along with any Sunday that Jason might have to miss. This had been something Jason and I discussed in the fall, and, as the year changed over I knew it was something I needed to do to help me grow in my calling to ministry. After Jason enthusiastically accepted my request to preach, I began searching the lectionary for the the scripture text that was presented for those certain Sundays.
    March 18. Psalm 51, verses 1-12. I read the prayer of the psalmist and I thought “Yes..God has granted me with an easy lectionary reading. Preaching a sermon on praying for forgiveness will be a piece of cake!” By the end of January I had an outline. I knew how I was going to broadcast our collective lostness and the ease of going to God and asking for forgiveness through prayer. After weeks of Divinity School classes in February and a wonderful series of Sunday nights with the youth group, where we dove into the struggle of life in our world today and the vastness of God’s mercy, I found myself constructing an all new outline for today’s sermon. This second sermon would be a love letter to those struggling with pain and guilt, an acknowledgment of God’s never ending grace and mercy. I decided the second outline sounded the best and would produce the best, most powerful sermon.
    Still, I knew I needed a little bit of guidance, or possibly affirmation that I was doing a great job preparing for this sermon. So I set up a meeting with Jason to go over my outline and my plan for how I was going to present the sermon. We sat down for our meeting and we dug deep into the words of the prayer in Psalm 51, we sifted through the commentary put together on all the different aspects of the text. We talked about what the writer may be feeling and the heart of the emotion within the words of this prayer. I began feeling overwhelmed by the weight of the prayer offered by the psalmist in psalm 51 but I still felt confident in my ability to preach the sermon.

    As I sat down, however, to put all of my thoughts, the scripture, and the commentary together into the form of a sermon, I found myself paralyzed. I felt as I often due when I have to do something big; write a term paper, take a major test, in making life decisions like moving or accepting a job. I always feel immense pressure throughout my entire being, each letter typed feels like I am lifting a 500 pound weight and each step feels like I am fighting against an supernatural magnetic force. This pressure, this weight, grew and grew as the past week progressed. As Jason led our Wednesday night study on welcoming prayer, allowing us a time to center ourselves, to pray in a way that we acknowledge the location in our bodies where we feel pressure, pain, or anxiety, all I wanted to do was to tell him there was no way I could preach this Sunday. The pressure was too great, I could not carry the weight any farther, I could not take one more minute of this torture.

    I did not go to Jason on Wednesday night and asked to be relieved of the seemingly burdensome weight of this sermon. No, I went home and took a night to only read the prayer of psalm 51 again and again. Then after a night of sleep that I felt had been escaping me all week, I woke up and read Psalm 51 again..

  Have mercy on me, O God,
  according to your steadfast love;
according to your abundant mercy
   blot out my transgressions.
Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity,
   and cleanse me from my sin.
For I know my transgressions,
   and my sin is ever before me.
Against you, you alone, have I sinned,
   and done what is evil in your sight,
so that you are justified in your sentence
   and blameless when you pass judgment.
Indeed, I was born guilty,
   a sinner when my mother conceived me.
You desire truth in the inward being;
   therefore teach me wisdom in my secret heart.
Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;
   wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
Let me hear joy and gladness;
   let the bones that you have crushed rejoice.
Hide your face from my sins,
   and blot out all my iniquities.
Create in me a clean heart, O God,
   and put a new and right spirit within me.
Do not cast me away from your presence,
   and do not take your holy spirit from me.
Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
   and sustain in me a willing spirit.

    As I got into my car on the bitterly cold Thursday morning to drive to Wake Forest, I began to question the true force behind the weight that had tortured me for so long. What if the weight wasn't the the words of the text or deciding how to preach the sermon? Might the weight truly be the pain I feel from a childhood of parent teacher conferences where the teacher gushes over how smart I am but my head is stuck in the clouds and if I tried harder I would be a top student. A pain that would turn into a self-image stained with guilt and failure as my inability to focus seemingly derailed the possibility of me being a good student.
    Maybe the weight is the hot July night at summer camp my sophomore year in High School when I felt the deeply compelling call to a life of ministry and I stood on the beach arms open wide proclaiming to God “..here I am, use me”. A night where after I closed our group devotion with a prayer of thankfulness and awe at the transformation God was crafting in my life and the lives of others in the youth group, an older youth asked me why I prayed such a long, weird prayer, and the other youth laughed as he proclaimed that I took Jesus a little too seriously. The first of a long list of times where I have been questioned about how I followed God’s calling on my life. Each leaving me feeling more and more inadequate to do ministry.
    The weight could be attributed to the mistakes I have made in relationships and friendships. Times where I have lied, where I have been mean and spiteful, and hurt individuals I professed to care for. Or the times I have given my heart and soul for the ones that I loved only to be ripped open by words of hate and disgust that stay with me like knives piercing my skin. My weight may take the form of my desire to be perfect and the times I have stooped down into self hate when I was almost always anything but perfect.
    The weight may be the growth of the guilt and expectation of failure from my childhood into my years as an undergraduate college student. Having lived into this mold created for me of an underachieving, unfocused, and subpar academic performer I found myself on the brink of destruction with only those who I had let down numerous times to help me to a place of success. Success that led me to honors that I still feel are undeserved. And the weight could be from the time I have spent as a student at divinity school where I have had to opportunity to learn from voices like that of Sobunfu Some, who writes that failure is only that of falling out of grace. Failure is not only an individual act but a communal act. When we fall out of grace it is a breakdown of multiple operations. And even yet knowing that my moments of falling out of grace of hurting others, hurting myself are not mine alone to hold I still feel the weight that is created by those moments.

    As I sat there having laid out all of the pain and the heartache in my life that have become weights that I continue to lug around, I felt a new connection to the writer of Psalm 51. Whether it is David looking at the mistakes he has made, the pain he has caused, and laying himself bare before God or just an unnamed poet who is struggling, as I have struggled, with the weight of guilt and shame pleading for God’s love. As I sat broken and exhausted, I felt the warmth of God’s presence and the urge to read Psalm 51 again, but this time the words were different.
​
Have mercy on me, O God,
  according to your steadfast love;
according to your abundant mercy
   blot out my transgressions.
In moments where I have created pain and heartache
   for myself and those around me,
create an environment of peace and tranquility.
   For I have recognized my failures
I have carried them with me daily.
   I have believed myself to be worthless and inadequate,
Unworthy of pursuing your loving presence.
   I have believed my failure to be a part of my inner being.
I know that you are righteous,
   you hold the knowledge of all reason and justice.
You are a God of love and peace and mercy.
   Help me to see the places where I have made mistakes.
But also, grant me grace and joy
   knowing that no matter my downfalls,
   you will always love me.
May your presence always guide me and
   hold onto me in times when I will stray.
Do not cast me away from your presence,
   and do not take your holy spirit from me.
Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
   and sustain in me a willing spirit.

    I immediately felt a rush of relief and peace overcome my body. As I finally faced so much of what I have been carrying, that which has been weighing me down, I looked to God and said “take it..” You see, that is what God so desperately wants from us. The almighty, all loving creator of the universe wants to be present in each and every one of our lives. Our God looks at all of the ways we torture ourselves and carry weight that keeps us from being the beautiful, vibrant, loving creatures we were created to be and our loving creator pleads “...give it to me...let me take it from you...let me help you heal..”

    God was present with Noah and his family! Saying “Here, I will place my rainbow so you know that no matter the storms that will come in life, no matter the mistakes you make, I will love you..”
    God was present in the desert! Calling for the construction of the serpent statue so that, even as they blamed God for their pain and suffering, the Israelites would be saved.
As we read the prayer of psalm 51, God is there, arms open wide to embrace the one who has laid their burden down.

    Just as with all of the stories in all the books of the Bible, God is present in our lives today. God is present in Every. Single. Moment. of our lives. When we deem ourselves to be unlovable, God is there whispering “...I love you.” When we look ourselves and wonder if we are any good, God is there acknowledging everything that makes each of us beautiful. When we fall out of grace, and wonder if we can ever escape our guilt, God calls out “..fall into my grace! I will always be here.”

     A month ago, after watching a video that taught of God's forgiveness and grace, one of the youth raised their hand. “So you are telling us that no matter what we do, God will give us grace?” I could only muster a one word answer...yes.

    Yes. God is with us...here...now. Yes, whatever weights we carry with us through life, God wants to take them away. Yes, God wants to replace our pain with love that never ends. Yes, God sees the ways that we fail, the ways that we fall out of grace and contribute to the pain of those around use. And Yes, No matter how hard we fall we will always only fall in to God's grace.

     Dropping our weights are never easy, facing our pain always hurts, but, we will never be too far that we can't fall into God's grace.

Amen.