Lent Lectio: Psalm 31:9-16
April 22, 2011
Have mercy on me, Lord, for I am in distress.
Tears blur my eyes.
My body and soul are withering away.
I am dying from grief;
my years are shortened by sadness.
Sin has drained my strength;
I am wasting away from within.
I am scorned by all my enemies
and despised by my neighbors—
even my friends are afraid to come near me.
When they see me on the street,
they run the other way.
I am ignored as if I were dead,
as if I were a broken pot.
I have heard the many rumors about me,
and I am surrounded by terror.
My enemies conspire against me,
plotting to take my life.
But I am trusting you, O Lord,
saying, “You are my God!”
My future is in your hands.
Rescue me from those who hunt me down relentlessly.
Let your favor shine on your servant.
In your unfailing love, rescue me.
________
This week. This very week.
I look out the window and see a neighbor’s house surrounded by three police officers. Their guns are drawn and they’re motionless. It’s hard to believe I’m seeing what I’m seeing, and I’m as frozen in place as the officers. Eventually our neighbor comes out looking like a ghost of herself. She’s pacing on the front porch, smoking and occasionally wrapping both arms around herself as though looking for comfort. The next day I discover that the grown son of our neighbors (allegedly) committed a crime that same day and that there was a felony warrant on him. He allegedly fled the scene with a gun in hand and was threatening suicide. Police had reason to suspect he was at his parents’. If the allegation against him is true it’s the kind of crime that often carries a lifelong stigma with it. The kind that parents would never forget. The kind that would keep parents up in the night and make them wonder, “Where did we go wrong?”
“Piece of shit who needs to be tortured slowly to death.”
“Hang him.”
“I thought this dirtbag was going to do us all a favor and kill himself.”
These comments, among many others, were posted in our local newspaper beneath the article reporting on the alleged crime after the suspect turned himself in. I am praying that the parents don’t ever read them.
The following day I’m in my yard when I hear screams from another neighbor’s house: “Get off me! Get off me! Get off me! David! Jody! Help! Please!” I yell to Jody to call 911, to report screams and cries for help coming from the house in question. I then run to the front door and start banging on it as loudly as possible, shouting my neighbor’s name. She comes to the door with blood on her arms and shirt. Moments later a man comes to the door with blood pouring down his face. She gives her version; he gives his. Police arrive and the man is taken away, later to be charged with assault. Our neighbor is a gentle (and probably naive) woman, trying to make a living and raising two kids alone. She already had a restraining order against the man.
This morning I tell Jody, “I don’t want to believe this, but think this is just the tip of the iceberg. I think there’s more pain within 100 yards of us that I care to know about.”
But these two houses are much, much closer than 100 yards, and we know the names of those who inhabit them. They are neighbors in distress, whose eyes are blurred with tears, whose bodies and souls are withering away, whose years are shortened by sadness. They live at this moment in the lament of the psalmist.
Will I scorn? Will I despise? Will I be afraid to come near? Will I ignore? Will I regard them as broken pots — useless? Will I spread rumors? Or will I draw near and reflect the unfailing love of God? We are praying for resurrection and asking again what it means to be sent like Jesus, what it means to pitch our tent with others in this neighborhood.
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