The previous day’s air, cooled and dried by a front, convinces me to wear a suit I normally neglect during summer. I recognize my mistake as soon as I step outside. Before I reach the garage, sweat has softened my collar. It’s not all that hot—probably high 80s. But the humidity is heavy, palpable. Almost July, fully Texas, the air’s weight is not surprising; the tiny, isolated shower spotting my windshield on the way to church is.
David envelopes the 12th psalm with declarations of what envelopes the world: “…the godly one is gone; for the faithful have vanished from among the children of man. Everyone utters lies to his neighbor; with flattering lips and a double heart they speak…. On every side the wicked prowl, as vileness is exalted among the children of man.”
We think of evil as isolated showers: a disappointment or disease here, a vice or brutality there; the once-in-a-while spotting of the world’s otherwise sunshine-clean windshield. But in scripture, it is the air’s humidity: sometimes emerging as light sprinkles or a damp collar; others as a deadly deluge or devastated dream; always there, though mostly transparent to our attention.
David neither simply laments the world’s condition nor invites despair. Rather, first he asserts the compassion and certitude of God’s promise: “’I will now arise,’ says the LORD; ‘I will place him in the safety for which he longs.’ The words of the LORD are pure words, like silver refined in a furnace on the ground, purified seven times.” Then he models our response: “You, O LORD, will keep them; you will guard us from this generation forever.”
This week, may we attend the world’s deluge of lapses by depending on our caring God to keep his promise.