Daily Lesson for March 24, 2015

Today's daily lesson is Psalm 124:

124 If it had not been the Lord who was on our side—
let Israel now say—
2 if it had not been the Lord who was on our side
when people rose up against us,
3 then they would have swallowed us up alive,
when their anger was kindled against us;
4 then the flood would have swept us away,
the torrent would have gone cover us;
5 then over us would have gone
the raging waters.
6 Blessed be the Lord,
who has not given us
as prey to their teeth!
7 We have escaped like a bird
from the snare of the fowlers;
the snare is broken,
and we have escaped!
8 Our help is in the name of the Lord,
who made heaven and earth.

Go to any black church on Sunday morning and you're bound to hear it. If not in the sermon than in the testimony, and if not in the testimony than in the prayer, and if not in the prayer than in the rhythms of the call and response -- somewhere you're going to hear it:

"If it had not been the LORD who was on our side . . ."

It's the glad shout of the survivors, a word of witness from those who, against all the odds, are still alive. In it you hear the still-living voices of the generations: 350 years of North American slavery, 70 years of Babylonian captivity, and 300 years of labor under Pharaoh:

"If it had not been the LORD who was on our side . . ."

Yesterday I read a wonderful reflection by Ann Lamott, where she talked about what it's like to be a child growing up in a household with alcoholics and substance abusers:

"You grew up with a clenched fist in your stomach, agreeing not to see what's going on; tip-toe-ing around, not trusting yourself as a reliable narrator, trying to rescue people who were 30 years older and hundred pounds bigger. Scared, alone, small. 

"You grow up waiting for the other shoe to drop."

Her words were a reminder to me of just how many of us are survivors.  We have survived alcohol and substance abuse and all kinds of other craziness. We've survived physical, sexual, and emotional abuse. We've survived the abuse we inflicted upon ourselves in our own sin and shame that followed. Like the psalmist, we recount all that we've been through -- the torrents and floods which should have drowned us -- and still, somehow we made it; we're alive. Not only did we survive, but we are survivors.

So the words of psalmist, and the Israelites, and the black church are our words too.  They're every human being's words and witness, thanksgiving and praise, call and response:

"If it had not been for the LORD who was on our side . . ."

Let the church and everybody else say, "Amen."