"Beheld... Still with You."

"I ask for the grace to pray and meditate faithfully.  I ask for patience, tolerance, empathy, compassion and gentleness.  I ask to abstain from anger, anxiety, arrogance, compulsive behaviour, cynicism, discouragement, and self-importance.  I ask to know and follow Jesus more closely, seeking justice, loving kindness, and walking humbly."


Psalm 139:16-18
¹⁶ Your eyes beheld my unformed substance.
In your book were written
   all the days that were formed for me,
   when none of them as yet existed.
¹⁷ How weighty to me are your thoughts, O God!
   How vast is the sum of them!
¹⁸ I try to count them—they are more than the sand;
   I come to the end^*—I am still with you.


1) "...beheld my unformed substance;" "...vast;" "...I am still with you;" "...weighty;" "...your eyes;" "...your eyes beheld;" "...more than the sand;" "...still with you."


2) "Vast."  I've been thinking on that word much the last week.  God is vast.  If God is, God is vast.  If God is, God is more vast than we can imagine.  God's thoughts would not only be more than the sand on this beach, but more than the sand on every beach, every desert, every ocean floor, on every planet, in every star system, in every galaxy, in every cluster of galaxies.  God is vast.  And yet, here we are in intimate relationship, eyes beholding one another, in the sand, in the sea, in the stars, in the eyes of others.  How can we even call God's thoughts "thoughts" when the only thoughts I have are my own, which, are relatively small in relation to creation that includes supper clusters of galaxies.  It is a weak metaphor comparing human thoughts to God's.  God is vast.  God beholds our unformed substance, a reminder that we are made in the image and likeness of God.  Something of that vastness is captured in this small creature.  I myself am a supper cluster of particles, forces, and super strings.  From yesterday, "I am fearfully wonderfully made."  I am being fearfully, wonderfully made.


3) What is the invitation in all this?  To live up to that image.  To be worthy.  And never mind about trying to be vast myself, but to focus on being present and graceful here and now: being present to someone here, today; an intentional act of kindness, maybe even forgiveness.


"Holy One, behold our unformed substance, we are still in the making.  Make of us something worthy to weigh and count your thoughts.  Be with us."


Breathprayer: "Beheld... still with you."