As we sat and visited I thought about all the years of like conversations and memories surrounding my life with Mom. Though now suffering from age related dementia, she is amazingly quite sharp regarding the past, so that memory sharing with her can be fun. As we visited I found her recounting the last 45 to 50 years with incredible accuracy. We laughed and spoke quietly, in the contented back and forth way family members sometimes do, and she reminisced about Dad, now gone for 30 years, and how she loved him.
Before I was to leave, I asked Mom if she would like me to read from her Bible. I hold fond memories of her doing this for me and my sisters when we were young. She said, "I'd like that," so I chose David's Psalm 139.
O Lord, you have searched me and known me!
2 You know when I sit down and when I rise up;
you discern my thoughts from afar.
3 You search out my path and my lying down
and are acquainted with all my ways.
4 Even before a word is on my tongue,
behold, O Lord, you know it altogether.
5 You hem me in, behind and before,
and lay your hand upon me.
6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me;
it is high; I cannot attain it.
'What do you think of that, Mom?'
"It's pretty. Very comforting."
'Yes it is.' (pause) 'Mom?"
"Yes"
'What did you think when I was born?' 'What were you thinking?' 'Do you remember?'
"Well, I was only 19. But I thought you were the prettiest thing I'd ever seen." "And I loved you." "I love you now."
'And I love you, Mom. But think of this, God loves us both.' And every day of our lives, every thought that we have had - he knows it, and... still He loves us, even more than you and I love each other.'
What do you think of that?'
Well, that's pretty neat."
'Yes, Mom, it certainly is.'
Where shall I go from your Spirit?
Or where shall I flee from your presence?
8 If I ascend to heaven, you are there!
If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there!
9 If I take the wings of the morning
and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,
10 even there your hand shall lead me,
and your right hand shall hold me.
11 If I say, “Surely the darkness shall cover me,
and the light about me be night,”
12 even the darkness is not dark to you;
the night is bright as the day,
for darkness is as light with you.
13 For you formed my inward parts;
you knitted me together in my mother's womb.
14 I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.[a]
Wonderful are your works;
my soul knows it very well.
15 My frame was not hidden from you,
when I was being made in secret,
intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
16 Your eyes saw my unformed substance;
in your book were written, every one of them,
the days that were formed for me,
when as yet there was none of them.
There are things we cannot know in this world. How long we might live or how those days will look for us are two of those things. The folks in El Paso and Dayton Ohio suffering horrible tragedy and loss yesterday are testimony to this. But one thing we can know - God knows us, loves us and He has known us even before we were yet formed. According to David, who knew what it was like to suffer and to celebrate, then taught us through his very human life what worship of God was to be; according to David, God's thoughts of us are far reaching, even to the 'uttermost parts of the sea' - which was simply a ancient metaphor for the most feared and least understood places humans might experience. In other words, even through the depths of a crazed hate-filled gunman, a terrorist attack, or the singular, un-romantic but common pain of old age, He has known us and will continue to know us, the pinnacle of his creation, forever!
Lofty terms? Perhaps in this world they do seem so. For our world often screams it is under no control - no sense of God's knowledge or care. But, as Mom closed her eyes and I passed from her room into the hall, I knew otherwise. These words from the heart of David were truth. Truth for the 19 year old who first held me as a babe in a town called Mexia 69 years ago, and for the 88 year old laying in bed with the same boy, now grayed and changed himself, looking on.
17 How precious to me are your thoughts, O God!
How vast is the sum of them!
18 If I would count them, they are more than the sand.
Search me, O God, and know my heart!
Try me and know my thoughts!
24 And see if there be any grievous way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting!
Good night, Mom!
Pastor Sam
