by Marcia Mount Shoop
Psalm 111:1-10
“The psalmists wrote songs in exile, in
Betrayal, in pain. Psalmists sang when
All was lost, when everything was
Going down the drain–everything was
Changing. No one knows who to trust.
The things we thought we could count on
Are gone. They are not coming back.
Are we are wandering in a wilderness
With no direction to follow
No horizon, no landmarks, no pathways.
Our ancestors fed on their sorrow in those
Days of utter devastation. They got an
Education in disorientation, separation,
Isolation, in the loss of civilization.
They were schooled in exploitation,
humiliation, domination,
desecration, desolation.
The psalmists sang in those graveyards,
Those waste lands, those washed out roads.
God’s people were taught to sing from
Their prisons, their solitary confinement.
They were taught to hold on to their dignity,
Their God-given right to create, to believe,
To be a part of a liberated world, freed to be…
Free to just be.”
Watch the full GCPC service on 1/28/24 here
(Scripture and sermon begin at 46:25)