Lent, Week Five

During this season of Lent, I'm writing reflections based on the psalm assigned for each Sunday by the Revised  Common Lectionary (look it up, if you want), and sharing those with the congregation I serve when we gather for Evening Prayer on Wednesday evenings. This reflection is from April 9, week five, and is based on Psalm 130

You ever sing the blues?

      ever play the blues?

Once I found myself on stage

            playing the blues

      12 bars later, I was lost

            transported beyond myself by

                  musical catharsis

***

the blues

            down in the dumps

            feeling low down

            depression

the blues

      a state or spell of low spirits

      down-hearted-ness

***

out of the depths

      I cry to you, O Lord

down in the dumps, I cry

      feeling low down, I cry

      singing the blues, I cry to you, O Lord

out of my depths I cry

      and in my depths, I know you hear

***

speaking, or singing, my blues

            giving voice to my cries

      allows space for my own identity

            to be transported beyond the blues

      allows space within my self

            within my very self

for my self to recognize that God is present

      for me to enter into divine embrace

***

though speaking, sharing, singing

            does not magically, or immediately

                  or necessarily

      automatically change my reality

            still I cry out

                  trusting that God,

                        who has passed through through the gates of Hell

                              about as low down as you can get

                  trusting that God, in our crying out

                        in our blues lamentation

            trusting that in our crying out to our God

                  we are ourselves invited into

                        the presence of the divine

and we allow ourselves

            to expect to be

      transported beyond the blues, beyond

            our lamentation, beyond

            our selves

and into the promise of

      the presence of

            divine redemption