The Human Condition

 Psalm 25, like many other psalms, contains a plaintive cry:  My eyes are always on the Lord, who rescues my feet from the snare.  Turn to me and have mercy on me, for I am alone and poor.  Relieve the anguish of my heart, and set me free from my distress.  See my lowliness and suffering, and take away all my sins.

God told Moses: I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt.  I have heard them crying out because of their slave drivers, and I am concerned about their suffering.  So I have come down to rescue them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land into a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey (Exodus 3).

If we look at the ministry of Jesus in light of Psalm 25, we can see in living color, so to speak, God's concern for those who are "alone and poor," those who have anguish of heart and distress.  He is the new and final Moses, sent by God to bring us out of slavery and into a good and spacious land.  His ministry of deliverance continues even today through the church, as any reader of the Acts of the Apostles can see.  Today, there is a magazine, whose name escapes me, devoted to stories of God's deliverance of those who have -- like all of us -- experienced times of distress, of being "alone and poor."

Thomas Merton says, "Christianity is a religion for men who are aware that there is a deep wound, a fissure of sin that strikes down to the very heart of man's being.  They have tasted the sickness that is present in the inmost heart of man estranged from God by guilt, suspicion, and covert hatred.

Merton maintains that it is dread alone that delivers us from easy answers about prayer and Christianity.  It is only when we face being alone and poor that we truly turn to God and open ourselves to His deliverance.  Most of us, I think, prefer to manage life on our own until it becomes beyond our capability -- and then we cry out to God for help!  

C.S. Lewis describes the beginning of his conversion as a kind of cracking and crumbling of the exoskeleton that surrounded him and protected his individuality.  He speaks of being a reluctant convert, as I think most of us might be.  But dread, in the words of Thomas Merton, is the human condition that finally breaks out outer shell and often leads us to cry out to God.  

And God's answer is always, "I have seen the misery of my people in Egypt and have seen their suffering!"  He has sent Moses; He has sent Jesus Christ.  He has sent the Holy Spirit.  

Those who have experienced God's help in distress are those who cry out with the psalmist:  God is our refuge and our strength, an ever-present help in distress! (Ps. 46).