Kindred Companions

Psalm 133
Series: Dwelling in the Psalms
November 1, 2026
William G. Carter

How good it is. “How very good and pleasant it is when kindred live together in unity!” Once in a while, it is comforting to have a Bible passage that you immediately understand. There aren’t a lot of difficult words to look up in the dictionary. No mind-numbing theological concepts to pin down. This psalm simply proclaims it is a beautiful thing when people get along. What a great text for All Saints Day!

That’s the theme of this song. Two ancient illustrations are given to tickle the senses. When people live in peace, what is it like? It is like the oil of an abundant blessing, spilling all over your cheeks and dribbling into your beard. Now ladies, most of you might not think that it is an apt analogy, but there it is.

So, what is it like? How shall we describe it when everybody gets along? It is like the morning dew falling on the mountains, watering the thirsty soil, and dribbling down to fill the stream. You did not ask for the dew; it fell from heaven like a gift – just like the oil of that blessing. And that’s how it feels to find that there are people in your life who have been given to you as a gift.

That is the heart of what the Psalmist sings. It doesn’t matter if you translate the first verse literally; in Hebrew, it reads, “How pleasing is the dwelling of brothers together.” Or you can generalize and expand it; as Stephen Mitchell translates the thought: “How wonderful it is to live in harmony with all people.”^[1] Either way the meaning is clear: it is a holy gift to have companions. It is a blessing from God to have people who share your life. It is good and pleasant to have sisters, brothers, friends, living together in peace. How good it is.

So, for the next few minutes of this sermon, I want you to think of a face. Who is the first person that comes to mind when you think of good and pleasant company? 

In one of his books, writer Frederick Buechner describes his first real friend:

Like me, he was kind of oddball – plump and not very tall then with braces on his teeth and glasses that kept slipping down the short bridge of his nose and a rather sarcastic, sophisticated way of speaking that tended to put people off – and for that reason, as well as for the reason that he was a good deal brighter than most of us, including me, boys tended to make his life miserable. But it was Jimmy who became my first great friend, and it was through coming to know him that I discovered that perhaps I was not, as I had always suspected, alone in the universe and the only one of my kind. He was another who saw the world enough as I saw it to make me believe that maybe it was the way the world actually was . . .^[2]

How good it is, to have a friend like that – somebody who sees the same world you see. Can you see a face? Can you see the face of some kindred soul?

Sometimes we discover them out of shared interests or experiences. We did not choose these people, but suddenly we discovered they were there. C.S. Lewis says friendship happens when two or more people discover they have something in common. Up until that point, each of them believes she or he is alone, bearing some unique treasure or burden. Then comes the discovery, says Lewis, and friendship begins when one of them says, “What? You too? I thought I was the only one.”^[3]

How good it is to discover you are not alone! That you are never alone. Even if you talk to yourself and live by yourself, you are always part of a larger company. Surely that’s what the Psalmist is singing about. This is the next to last Song of Ascents. The pilgrim has been moving gradually toward Jerusalem for worship. Now she pauses to celebrate that there are others on the same journey.

You know how it is: say you are on an airplane, or riding a bus, or driving down a crowded highway. It is possible to be surrounded by other travelers and still think you are the only one taking the trip! We isolate ourselves and don’t even realize we’re doing it. Maybe we are focused on the destination and stop paying attention to those on parallel journeys. Or we put in the iPod earbuds and insulate ourselves from conversation with anybody else. And suddenly, this wide-awake traveler wakes up to realize, “I don’t have to be alone. In fact, I am never alone. God has enlarged my little world and put others in it, and that is a great blessing.”

About two hundred years before the New Testament was written, there was another Jewish teacher named Jesus – his name was Jesus Ben Sirach. He had lived long enough to go around the block a few times, was a careful observer of daily life, and compiled many wise sayings which were later published in a book. It’s a good book, even if it is not included in most of our Bibles. Three of his sayings are descriptions of faithful friends:

●      Faithful friends are a sturdy shelter: whoever finds one has found a treasure.

●      Faithful friends are beyond price; no amount can balance their worth.

●      Faithful friends are life-saving medicine; and those who fear the Lord will find them.^[4]

That’s the promise the Psalmist is making. If we love God, if we honor God, if we move as lifelong pilgrims toward God, we can look around and see people that God has appointed to join us on the journey. They will enrich our spirits and enlarge our world, and they are a blessing that may surprise you. Can you see a face? Can you think of a name? 

I can think of a few. There’s Jim over there, sitting by the window. Some of you know we have known one another for a while. Forty-six years, by my reckoning. All I know is when we met, my hair had not yet turned blond - and his haircuts took longer than they do now. Jim voted on my candidacy as a ministerial student. Four years later, he voted to approve of me for ordination - you can blame him! In between, I saw him on the campus of our seminary, recruiting future ministers for the little churches in the western Catskills. We kept bumping into one another. 

The summer after he moved from Unadilla to West Pittston, I filled in at the pulpit he left. Later that fall, we got re-acquainted at the Pennsylvania State Pastors Conference. When I moved down here, the connections grew tighter. He has been a model for me of what pastors ought to do and be, modeling a life of prayer and scholarship, compassion and creativity. We have been roommates at conferences in far-flung locations like Bradenton Beach and Yale Divinity School. At the beach, when he got up early to walk and pick up seashells, I made the coffee and made sure I got into the bathroom first.

Over the years, when some of you drove me crazy, he heard about it. After he retired, started worshiping here, and met some of you, he discovered the situations were two-sided. There are very few essential things in our lives that we haven’t shared - or will continue to share. 

And the circles grew and extended. We shared a devotion for our dear friend Virginia, who now lives with Christ in heaven. And I introduced him to the four jokers that I just spent a week with in North Carolina. They call themselves, “the Pilgrims of Lughnadsah.” Lughnadsah is a Celtic harvest festival. At the beginning of the pandemic, we got a grant from the Lilly Endowment to form a support group to explore how to end our ministries with energy, intelligence, imagination, and love - in other words, how to end strong.

The point is that we need these people in our lives. Victoria Atkinson White calls them “holy friendships.” They help us carry heavy things. They tell us the truth that we have tried to avoid. They share laughter in times of celebration and sit with you when the surgeons are checking you out. They help us become better humans. And there may be fringe benefits, too. If your friend Jim has a wood-splitter, he can help you create firewood out of the maple tree that got cut down last week in your backyard.

“How very good and pleasant it is when kindred live together in unity!”

We know what the Psalmist is sing about, don’t we? Can you see a face? Can you survey your life, and name those people who were given to you as a sheer gift? Maybe you are related to them. Maybe you are not. But God puts these people in our lives for a while, and their presence has been a deep blessing. They enrich us. They call our attention to matters otherwise neglected. They raise our sights toward visions too great for our imagination. They walk with us, always side by side.

In the opening pages of John Irving’s wonderful novel, A Prayer for Owen Meany, the narrator says, 

I am doomed to remember a boy with a wrecked voice – not because of his voice, or because he was the smallest person I ever knew . . . but because he is the reason I believe in God; I am a Christian because of Owen Meany… I skip a Sunday service now and then; I make no claims to be especially pious; I have a church rummage faith – the kind that needs patching up every weekend. What faith I have I owe to Owen Meany, a boy I grew up with. It is Owen who made me a believer.^[5]

How good it is to have a kindred companion like that! Can you think of a face? Can you write down a name? Find the margin of your worship bulletin and write down that name. Hang on to that name. No matter what happens, hold on to that name. And sometime this week, why don’t you send them a note that begins, “I thank my God whenever I think of you. . .”

(c) William G. Carter. All rights reserved.

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^[1] Stephen Mitchell, A Book of Psalms: Selected and Adapted from the Hebrew (New York: HarperCollins, Publishers, 1993) 73.

^[2] Frederick Buechner, The Sacred Journey (New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 1982) 70.

^[3] C. S. Lewis, The Four Loves (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc., 1960) 96.

^[4] Sirach 20:14-16

^[5] John Irving, A Prayer for Owen Meany (New York: Ballantine Books, 1990) 3.

All the Time We Need

Psalm 90
Series: Dwelling in the Psalms
October 25, 2026
William G. Carter

Psalm 90 is our reminder that, in the light of God’s eternity, human life is pretty short. How’s that working out for you. 

I sat down recently to watch a favorite movie. It’s an honest film called About Schmidt. Jack Nicholson plays Warren Schmidt, a man whose dreams for retirement are interrupted. Right after his retirement dinner, his wife Helen dies unexpectedly. She leaves him with a Winnebago that he thinks is too big, and there’s nobody to cook or clean for him. His daughter Jeannie is marrying an idiotic waterbed salesman with a bad mullet. Schmidt expected his autumn years would continue without any interruptions, but he has now awakened to a new reality.

And Warren Schmidt, of all people, knows that life is short. As he explains,

I was an actuary at Woodmen of the World Insurance Company. If I’m given a man’s age, race, profession, place of residence, marital status, and medical history, I can calculate with great probability how long that man will live. In my own case, now that my wife has died there is a 73% chance I will die within nine years, provided that I do not remarry. All I know is I’ve got to make the best of whatever time I have left. Life is short, and I can’t afford to waste another minute.

In the very next scene, he is taking a nap in his Lazy Boy recliner.

Sometimes the Bible is too honest for us to handle. Psalm 90 is one of those honest passages. It begins with a polite statement of God’s eternal presence. “Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations. Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever you had formed the earth and the world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God."

But pretty soon, the Psalmist admits that while God is eternal, we are not. “You turn us back to dust. You sweep us away. We are like a dream that fades by morning. We are a field of grass that withers by sunset.”

Is he shaking his fist at God? I don’t think so. He is simply admitting the way it is. Like it or not, admit it or not, all of us are running out of time. All of us know this, even if most of would rather avoid this. We would like to keep up the illusion that we will always be youthful and spry, that we will never wear out or break down, that the warranty on our parts will never be challenged.

But then, we have a truthful moment that brings us up short. We remember what we would rather forget.

In many homes, a silence settles in when the parents say, “You know, we need to put together a will.” It is quiet for the rest of the day. We don’t like to think about running out of time. We don’t want the dream to fade.

And then, for instance, a seventeen-year-old smashes up her parents’ car on a winter night. Nobody knows what to do. Nobody knows what to say. Everybody is in shock. They don’t want to hear it was a miscalculation in physics: that if you drive that fast on bad tires on an icy road and slam on your brakes to avoid that oak tree, you’re not going to be able to stop in time. They don’t want to hear that. All they know is that this isn’t right. She’s a teenager. She is supposed to live forever. She’s not supposed to run out of time. But she does.

Contrast that with a fourth-century saint of the church. He found a human skeleton and put it beside him on his bed. (He was a really strange saint!) But this was his constant reminder that death was his constant companion and could visit him at any time.

We don’t want to hear this kind of thing. That’s why the Psalmist gives us nine verses of warning, right in the middle of Psalm 90. In fact, when this psalm appears in the worship books of the church, usually these middle verses are left out.

For all our days pass away under your wrath; our years come to an end like a sigh. The days of our life are seventy years, or perhaps eighty if we are strong; even then their span is only toil and trouble; they are soon gone, and we fly away. 

With a message like that from Psalm 90, some request cheerful hymns to sing. This old text does not hand out any pink lollipops. “O Lord,” says the psalmist, “Your wrath is as great as the fear that you deserve.” 

The Bible scholars say this passage reminds us God is God. God is not mean, but God is not arbitrary. God does not dish out meaninglessness. But neither will anybody ever step on God’s holy feet. There are limits on what we can and cannot accomplish in this life. There is only so much that we can get done in one day. Even if the scriptures declare that God loves us, “Death is the final and ultimate ‘no’ that cancels any pretension to autonomy from the human side.”[1]

Now, I’m not bringing this up because my bones are creaking a little bit more than they did last year. But a text like Psalm 90 forces us to take stock of our lives: who we are, and what we’ve done, and what we haven’t done, and what we may not get to do.

Years ago, when one of my friends turned fifty, he found a website that he should have ignored. I wouldn’t recommend it. The address is www.deathclock.com. It’s billed as “the “Internet’s friendly reminder that life is slipping away,” and it is a strange site. You can type in your birth date, gender, health data, and it will predict the probable date of your death.

I wasn’t going to try it, but curiosity got the better of me. Depending on whether I can lower my body mass index or improve my mood, I’m going to last until somewhere between 2033 and 2052. It is rather ominous to see it in print; so much so, I’ve actually thought about taking up exercise and watching what I eat. When you know that time is short, you do what you can to make the most of what you have.

We cannot finish our own lives – much less finish all the projects around the house. That’s what the psalmist says in five or six different ways. He doesn’t intend this to be good news; it’s simply the news of how things are. There are limits to our ability. No matter how capable we are, we cannot do it all. No matter how good we try to be, there are limits which are established beyond our control.

We know this because we live in northeastern Pennsylvania and it is nearly time to put on snow tires. The best laid plans can be cancelled by an unexpected snow day.

We cannot do it all; knowing this is a gift of wisdom. And so, Walter Brueggemann notes in his commentary on the psalms, "A wise heart does not refer to knowledge, skill, technique, or the capacity to control. Instead, it seems to mean the capacity to submit, relinquish, and acknowledge the decisive impingement of Yahweh on one's life."[2]

One way to gain this wise heart is to lean back into God’s everlasting arms and try to get the biggest picture possible - - to see as God sees, over vast spans of time. To be patient, as God is eternally patient. To affirm that life happens to us, through us, and in spite of us. To say once again, there is nothing that can ever really separate us from the love of God. To hold fast to such truths is to prepare for a wise heart.

It is of great comfort to remember that God does not wear a wristwatch. God is eternal, standing outside of human time, while mysteriously entering it with the grace of Jesus Christ. From moment to moment, we catch glimpses of how God is inclined to help us when we can’t help ourselves, and that’s how God is our savior. We are always up against the wall, and our own failings are obvious. But God has the ability to finish what we cannot. God is eternal.

I like how theologian Reinhold Niebuhr once put it:

§  Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore we are saved by hope.

§  Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history; therefore we must be saved by faith.

§  Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; therefore we are saved by love.

§  No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as it is from our standpoint. Therefore we must be saved by the final form of love which is forgiveness.”[3]

Our time is short. But God’s time is eternal. And the best interpretation of Psalm 90 may come from the hymn we’re singing today:

                    Our God, our help in ages past, our hope for years to come.

                    Be Thou our guide while life shall last, and our eternal home.[4]

Regarding short time, the best lesson may come from Morrie Schwartz. Do you know that great little book, Tuesdays With Morrie? A sportswriter named Mitch Albom reports on some lessons he learned from his college English professor, Morrie Schwartz. Morrie has a terminal disease, and it has focused his perspective on his remaining days: 

     “Let’s begin with this idea,” Morrie said. “Everyone knows they’re going to die, but nobody believes it. If we did, we would do things differently.”

     So we kid ourselves about death, I said.

     “Yes. But there’s a better approach. To know you’re going to die, and to be prepared for it at any time. That’s better. That way you can actually be more involved in your life while you’re living…”

     How can you ever be prepared to die?

     “Every day, have a little bird on your shoulder that asks, ‘Is today the day? Am I ready? Am I doing all I need to do? Am I being the person I want to be?”

    Morrie continued, “Most of us all walk around as if we’re sleepwalking. We really don’t experience the world fully, because we’re half-asleep, doing things we automatically think we have to do.”

    And facing death changes all that?

    “Oh, yes. You strip away all that stuff and you focus on the essentials. When you realize you are going to die, you see everything much differently.”

     He sighed. “Learn how to die, and you learn how to live.”[5]

I hate to bring this up, but time is short. The Psalmist says, “Lord, teach us to number our days, that we may be full of wisdom.” The best way to number our days is to make them count. To do something important with whatever time we have left.

And so, I charge you to hug a child. Plant a tree. Enjoy a purple sunset. Write the next great American novel. Forgive the lingering grudge. Make a fabulous meal. Take a stand against wastefulness. Plan a legacy gift for your church. Tell a stranger that he or she is worthy of your respect. Above all, tell your loved ones that you love them.

The time is short. That’s OK, for God’s steadfast love endures forever.

(c) William G. Carter. All rights reserved.

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[1] James L. Mays, Psalms, Interpretation (Louisville: John Knox, 1004) 292.

[2] Walter Brueggemann, The Message of the Psalms (Minneapolis: Augsburg) 111.

[3] Reinhold Niebuhr, The Irony of American History (New York: Charles Scribner’s sons, 1952) 63.

[4] Isaac Watts, The Presbyterian Hymnal, 210.

[5] Mitch Albom, Tuesdays with Morrie (New York: Doubleday, 1999) 80-83

The Things You Never Remember

Psalm 106 (106:1-6, 19-23)
Series: Dwelling in the Psalms
October 11, 2026
William G, Carter

That’s one way to end up with a short sermon: pick a long Bible passage! There are longer psalms to choose from. But there are few quite as exhausting. Psalm 106 is a history psalm. A long history psalm. A psalm recounting a long history. If it were left up to the Lectionary Keepers, whoever they are, we would hear six verses in the beginning and five verses in the middle. That’s all that was suggested for today. 

When a text gets trimmed, I’m always curious what gets left out.

The beginning is pleasant enough. The psalm starts by singing a hymn: Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good. His steadfast love endures forever! That is a familiar verse. It comes up regularly. It is followed by a declaration of right living, and that is always a good idea. Then comes a one-word prayer, “Remember!” Remember us, O Lord. We call on God to look back in the divine memory and recognize us.

Yet from that point on, it is the psalm that does all the remembering. What it remembers is a significant number of times we have goofed up. We have sinned. We have twisted ourselves out of shape (That’s the root meaning of “iniquity.” It signifies a twisting beyond original recognition.) And we have done evil.

Here’s my question for today. What kind of people remember all the ways that they have messed up? God isn’t calling them to account. They are calling themselves to account. What kind of people do that?

History, they say, is decided by the winners. We rarely listen for the losers. Can you imagine the history of North America told by the people who lived here first? And if it were spun in a positive direction? Let me imagine one of those scenarios.

We had resigned ourselves to living in North Dakota. The land was barren. The winters were cold. So, when the pale-skinned strangers from Scandinavia arrived, we were happy to hand over the land to them. Not much here for us anyway. So glad they came and planted their flags. We snickered the whole way to Nebraska.

Is that the way the story went? It depends on who tells the story. It’s not revisionist history, just the rest of the story, a more complete version.

Tomorrow is designated Columbus Day, a national holiday. It’s named for an Italian adventurer was financed by Spain to cross the sea, where he discovered Bermuda. Well, he didn’t discover it – other people were already living there. To the empire he represented, they did not count. Thinking he had found a new way to India, he planted a new flag, looked for hidden riches, and took what he could find. In subsequent returns, he and his crew brought smallpox and slavery to the islands. Thousands of natives died from the diseases brought by Europe.[1]

Isn’t that the way we were taught the story in school? No, not really. Back in second grade, the teacher passed out crayons for us to color the Nina, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria. It was all about the European conquest of a New World. We were taught it was a story only about courage and adventure. Don’t get me wrong; I like it here. Yet there’s a whole lot more that has been cut off of the story. Just like the suggested verses of Psalm 106.

What would we have lost if we had trimmed out verses seven through eighteen and twenty-four through forty-eight? Rebellion against God, superficial faith, wanton craving, and wickedness. That’s just in verse seven through eighteen. In the latter half of the tale, there was dissatisfaction, grumbling, scattering, to say nothing of sacrificing their own children to the violence of their own making.

If that wasn’t enough, they said, “God is too quiet and too invisible for us. Let’s make a few smaller gods for us to worship. We will light up a bonfire and crank up a pep rally.” They wanted fire, excitement, exuberance, so God nodded and gave them over to the vain desires of their ravenous souls. And it did not go well. The shorthand account is in the psalm that we read together.

Once again, I ask: what kind of people tell the crystal-clear truth about themselves? They must not be running for office in Pennsylvania. They might not even be Presbyterians.

Do you remember that classic scene with Colonel Nathan Jessup, in the film A Few Good Men? In a critical moment, he bellows out, “You want the truth? You can’t handle the truth.” And a few moments later we discover in the darkness of the theater, he can’t handle the truth either. He has acted despicably and done what he could to cover up what he has done.

And Israel goes into the Temple, opens the prayerbook to Psalm 106, and begins to tell the truth. God already knows what they’ve done – and what they have left undone. God is not surprised by anything we do or say. The surprise comes when we have the courage to say out loud when and where we have been wrong.

Years ago, I had a friend who wrote a lot of songs. Dave has been gone for many years, but I had the privilege of his company on many occasions. One day, Dave Brubeck gave me the handwritten manuscript for a fresh new song he had written. There were words attached. The first verse went like this:

            The things you never remember / are the things I’ll never forget.

            The vows we made to each other / the thrill we felt when we met.

            The life we started together / so full of promise and yet

            The dream was so quickly shattered / our hearts so full of regret.[2]

I said, “Dave, are you in trouble with your wife?” He laughed and said, “She wrote the words.” Then he quickly added, “It’s about a dear friend who went through a traumatic breakup.” And I thought, “It could have been anybody.”

Reflect on your own experience. We try to push painful memories out of our heads. We jump out of one broken relationship to create another broken relationship. Our friends, the therapists, tell us if we bury the pain or pretend “we don’t remember,” the pain is still there. Grief always waits for us to catch up. If you kick it down the road, it’s waiting for you. Unresolved pain waits to be named – and only then can it begin to be healed.

And Israel goes into the Temple, opens the prayerbook, and recites Psalm 106. “Lord, here is when we wandered off your path. When we broke your commandments. When we went our own way rather than your way. We are certain that we made you angry – yet you have never let us go. You are a god – The God – of steadfast love and mercy.”  

Suddenly, my friend’s song modulates to a new key. The things we never remember are the things God never forgets. Let’s hear it that way. Mercy comes only through honesty. We cannot be free from the mistakes we’ve never confessed. We cannot fully experience the power of forgiveness if we have never owned our own broken lives.

And here we are, in the Temple, in God’s local Presbyterian Temple. This is safe space for truth-telling. And it’s an old, old building – a hundred fourteen years old. I suspect it’s heard it all and seen it all. It’s OK if you drop your burden here. God can carry it.

At the same time, let’s remember there is more at stake than our personal issues. Our psalm is a national psalm. It is a national confession. And there is so much pain in our own nation that is shoved aside, denied, and dismissed. Every single day we see real truth covered by lies, smoothed over by selfishness, and postponed in the hope that our grandchildren might tackle the problems someday.

Now, we can’t fix all the messes we’ve made. Nor can we mend all the brokenness we have inherited. The psalmist knew that. But here is what we can do as the people of God: we can tell the truth, the whole truth, and our differing points of view of the one truth. We can look into our own past to admit, “Yes, that was us.” There’s no shame in confessing our shame. We can keep talking with one another and resist the tendency to shout past one another. And we can look to the Holy God who has not given up on us, who waits for us to get it right.

This is what true community looks like. It is faith embodied by honesty. It’s a community led by Jesus to remind us of what we don’t want to remember. It’s a community that invites those who have been silenced to speak up. It’s a community that stands up for others when those who are far too comfortable beg us to sit down. It is a community in Christ that serves a broken world with crucified hands, a truthful tongue, and an open heart.

Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, from everlasting to everlasting. Let all the people say, “Amen.” Praise the Lord.

(c) William G. Carter. All rights reserved.

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[1] See, for instance, https://www.history.com/articles/columbus-day.

[2] “The Things You Never Remember,” words by Iola Brubeck, music by Dave Brubeck. © Derry Music.

If You Know What's Good for You

Psalm 19 (click here to read)
Series: Dwelling the Psalms
October 4, 2026
William G. Carter

 

Whether people go to church regularly or not, most of us perk up at a psalm that begins, "The heavens are telling the glory of God." What a beautiful thing to say! Had any experiences of the sky lately?

Two weeks ago, I watched the sun sneak over the horizon on a farmer’s field. The grass sparkled with the dew. The cobwebs twinkled with drops of diamonds. The sky went from black to blue, to purple, to brilliant orange, to flaming red. I tried to capture the scene with the camera on my phone. Alas, the light kept changing, the technicolor brilliance was too bright for my gadget. Had to stand there, slack-jawed, and take it in.

The heavens are telling. No wonder C.S. Lewis said, "I take this to be the greatest poem in the Psalter and one of the greatest lyrics in the world."[1] For the poet points to say, "There really is a God out there." Anybody who looks around the natural order comes to that conclusion. As John Calvin put it, "There is nothing so obscure or contemptible, even in the smallest corners of the earth, in which some marks of the power and wisdom of God may not be seen."[2]

That's where Psalm 19 begins. The opening words celebrate a world that bears God's fingerprints. And before we jump down the throats of people who skip church to enjoy bicycle paths and putting greens, we remember an institutional church cannot contain the glory of God. "The heavens are telling the glory of God."

A lot of people will tell you that they have had religious experiences outside of church walls. Like the woman who confessed, "I often feel closer to God on the tennis court, or on the golf course, or taking a stroll in the park." We know what she's talking about. Ask someone, "When have you felt God was present?" A few might mention a sermon, a hymn, or a prayer, but others will say, "When my daughter was born." Or watching the sunset descend into the Gulf of Mexico. Or finding yourself at night in a dark sky ignited by stars. I understand what the woman said: God can be experienced out there.

It's striking that Psalm 19 begins out the heavens. Whoever wrote these words didn't compose them in a pulpit gown, but in a sweatshirt and jogging shorts. As the sun floated from one side of the dome of sky to the other, the poet’s heart swelled with wonder. His head swirled with mystery. Just like the sun-worshipers of every time and place, he threw back his head and broke out in song. "The heavens are telling the glory of God . . ."

But then, the scene changes. There is wonder and mystery, to be sure, but ambiguity and loneliness too. Did you hear that? Listen to the psalm: "Day to day pours forth speech" (That's a good thing!) "and night to night declares knowledge (also good); “but there is no speech. There are no words. We can't hear the voice." The Psalmist hears the melody reverberating through the skies, but he can't make out the lyrics. He knows God is out there, but he doesn't know what kind of God it is. In fact, the word he uses for God is Elohim. That's the Hebrew name for the God who is out there somewhere, the Great Spirit. 

But the heavens can't tell us what kind of God it is. They do not have the words.

This is true, isn't it? Nature can be so beautiful and so impersonal. Creation is both captivating and cruel. Out there you can taste maple syrup and step in poison ivy. You can enjoy purple mountains and be crushed in an avalanche. You can find a good housecat or be eaten by a wild beast. For all of the beauty of this world, there is danger and irrational violence. Catch the wrong germ, and the infection could do you in. Shoot the rapids in a canoe and you could be smashed on the rocks. One little bitty hurricane can cause immeasurable suffering.

Belden Lane, backpacker and theologian, tells of hiking a red rock canyon in northern New Mexico. A sudden storm became a flash flood, and Belden kept scrambling up the box canyon wall as the water kept climbing beneath him. He paused long enough to say it out loud: “I could die out here and this beautiful landscape would not care.”

So, the psalmist confesses, "The heavens are telling the glory of God, but I cannot make out the words." It’s natural to wonder, "What kind of God made all of this, anyway?"

That's why the psalmist comes in out of the cold. The rhythm of the psalm changes. The words take on the insistent beat of a drum: "The law of the Lord is perfect. The decrees of the Lord are sure. The precepts of the Lord are right. The commandment of the Lord is clear." The pulse changes.

And the word for God changes. As the psalm begins, God’s name is "Elohim." That’s the God-who-is-out-there-somewhere-if-only-we had a clue. Then the name changes to Yahweh. That’s the Lord of the covenant, the Lord who brought us out of slavery, the Good Shepherd who pursues us even when all seems lost. This is temple-talk. It's church talk. Out there, the heavens are infused with the glory of God - but in here, we tell the story of what this formidable God has done among us and for us.

Out there, we fear God's power whenever creation shakes its fist in all of its fury. But in here, we tell the story of how the Lord’s power has saved us through humility, mercy, and self-sacrifice.

Out there, we know the rage of a hurricane and the roughness of disease. But in here, we are instructed that "nothing shall separate us from the love of God."

Out there, the only law is the law of the jungle, namely, "the survival of the fittest." But in here, we discover the only way to life is through the laws of mercy, justice, and sacrificial love. We tell the story of the Lord God who freed us from the domination of slavery and taught us another way to live. We tell of a Savior who forgives destructive behavior – then calls us to make things right, to walk humbly, to love kindness, to tell the truth.

We remember what the world out there can't tell us - - that the God of wind and wave is the Lord who loves us. This is the God who wants what is best for us, who desires that we flourish, the God who wants each one of us to know that we count and we are called to make a positive difference. The words of God break through creation’s silence and teach us that every last one of us is worthy of honesty and love.

A good friend told me about a professor that he had in graduate school. The teacher was a very imposing man. He was not a tall man physically, but his mind and his piety were powerful. You can even sense something of what he was like when you hear his name: Dr. James McDowell Richards. Well, the students adored Dr. Richards. They revered him and held him in great esteem. But they were scared of him too. He was not a very approachable man.

That was Bob’s read of his former professor. After school, he took a series of jobs. Then he landed as an administrator in a Presbyterian nursing home. Imagine his surprise when discovered the newest resident was Dr. James McDowell Richards, now retired and feeble. He felt more than surprise; Bob was intimidated by Dr. Richards in school and dreaded he would be seeing him regularly in the hallways. But he did the best that he could. He gathered up his courage and knocked on the old man’s door. He re-introduced himself as a former student, which prompted a single nod of the head. He sat with him at chapel services, greeted him regularly, tried to strike up conversation. He did the best he could.

One evening, Bob went into the dining room of the facility. There was Dr. Richards in his wheelchair, having his dinner. Bob pulled up a chair and struck up an informal conversation. Then suddenly, and he does not know to this day why he asked him this, Bob said, "Dr. Richards, I've always wanted to ask you something."  "Yes?" 

"You and your wife had sons."  "Yes."  "Did you ever tell your sons that you loved them?"  "No. I'm an old-fashioned father. I didn't need to tell them. They knew.”

The old man paused for a moment, then added, “Well, one time, I told one of them. I was in the hospital. I thought I was going to die, and one of my boys came to visit me. I told him I loved him. But it wasn't a regular thing." 

Bob said, "You know, Dr. Richards, my father never told me that, either. And you were like a father to us in school, and I just wondered if fathers ever did that sort of thing." Dr. Richards looked at him, silent, then pushed around some food on his plate.

The meal was now over, and an attendant began to wheel Dr. Richards toward the exit. Bob watched him go, then saw him signal to the attendant and say something to her. She turned the wheelchair around and brought him back. Dr. Richards reached up and touched his cheek and said, "Bob, I love you."

"I knew that all along," said Bob, "but to hear him say it sealed it in my soul."

If you go outside and look at the heavens, you get the clear impression there is a powerful and awesome God out there. But when we come in here, into the sanctuary, we hear the story of the Lord who loves us so much that he gave his own Son to the world. And when the world tried to get rid of the Son, God sent him back. And we come in here to meet him once more, as he keeps teaching, correcting, forgiving, and risking more love on the likes of us. That’s the good news. 

And it’s good for us to keep hearing it spoken in sacraments and words.

(c) William G. Carter. All rights reserved.

Thanks to Dr. Tom Long, who told a version of the concluding story in a sermon on this text. 

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[1] C. S. Lewis, Reflections on the Psalms (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1958) 63.

[2] John Calvin, Commentary on the Psalms, 308.

Short and Sweet

Psalm 117
Series: Dwelling the Psalms
September 27, 2026
William G, Carter

Today is Worship Through Service day, a day when the congregation takes on tasks to improve the lives of those around us.

Praise the Lord, all you nations! Extol him, all you peoples!
For great is his steadfast love toward us, and the faithfulness of the Lord endures forever.
Praise the Lord!

That went by pretty quickly. Let me read it again:

Praise the Lord, all you nations! Extol him, all you peoples!
For great is his steadfast love toward us, and the faithfulness of the Lord endures forever.
Praise the Lord!

The psalm for today is short. It’s sweet. Not a lot of words to look up; maybe a couple. We don’t use the verb “extol” very much. One scholar translates the verb, “applaud,” as in “clap for God!” And the phrase “steadfast love” is a single Hebrew word, “hesed.” Someone told me that is the Jewish word for “grace.” As in, “great is God’s grace.”

If you like brief Bible passages, this one’s for you. It reminds me of the conversation from some time back. A group of teenagers are discussing their favorite Bible passages. One of them said, “John 3:16,” and then quoted it. Another said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, the first beatitude.” One more replied, “Psalm 23, the Lord is my shepherd.” Then they came to the minister’s son and asked, “Tommy, what’s your favorite Bible verse?” He said, “John, chapter eleven, verse thirty-five.” Everybody looked at him, curious. John 11:35 – what’s that?

Tommy said, “Should I recite it for you?” Yes, please. So, he cleared his throat and said, “John 11, verse thirty-five: ‘Jesus wept.’” Everybody laughed, and Tommy said, “It’s easy to remember.” Short and sweet.

Given that some of the Psalms go on for a while – just two Psalms later, Psalm 119 has one-hundred-seventy-six verses – it’s curious that this one is included. Why do you suppose it’s here?

Could it be that it’s part of a larger section of Psalms? And in fact, it is. Psalms 113 through 118 belong together. They are called the “Egyptian Hallel” psalms. “Egyptian” because they recall the exodus from Egypt when God brought the people of Israel out of slavery. They are called “hallel,” which is short for “hallelujah!” That’s what Israel shouted after the people escaped from Pharoah.

To this day, if we eat a Passover meal with our Jewish neighbors, they will recite all seven of these psalms during the meal. In one of the Last Supper stories, we read that Jesus lifted the cup of wine and said to his friends, “Drink the blood of the covenant, shed for the forgiveness of many.” Then it says, “They sang the hymn” before going to the Garden of Gethsemane. Psalm 117 is part of that hymn.

By now, you are starting to realize that a short Bible text does not guarantee a short sermon. Do you know why that is? It’s because of a scientific law called Kinetic Molecular Theory. This is a rule of physics that affects even sermons. Kinetic Molecular Theory states that every gas will expand to fill the available space. The hotter the gas, the more it expands. That’s the best definition of long sermons that I know: a lot of hot air, it fills the room.

But what can be said about this Psalm, Psalm 117? We have just two verses, hardly worth the effort - - until we read it, until we say the words. “Praise the Lord, all you nations! Applaud him, all you peoples!” Could it be there is something here for all nations, all people? Not just the Jews who wrote the text. Not restricted to the Christians who have adopted the text. The psalm is calling upon all the outsiders, too. The goyim – that’s Jewish word for “everybody else.”

What we have today is a universal invitation. It’s a call offered to everybody, without restrictions. It’s an invitation that pushes beyond the walls and steps over the boundaries. There is something about the love of God, something about the steadfast love of God, which reaches out to every single person. This short little psalm opens us up to see an expansive world. God created us all. God has grace for us all.

It happens locally. The other night, one of our church friends was talking about a person in this neighborhood. He is often here before the rest of us on Sunday mornings. He described her and I knew exactly who he was talking about. It’s a young lady. She has a beautiful dog. She walks up and down the sidewalk with her dog. That’s all I know about her. I don’t know her name. I’m not sure where she lives. I’ve waved to her a few times. She nods and keeps walking.

One day, Jim was here early. He saw her and said, “What a beautiful dog!” She paused long enough to say, “thank you” and “hello.” They chatted for a minute. Then she asked, “Do you think the priest at this church would ever bless my dog?”

Well, is she here today? I don’t see her, but if you should spot her, please tell her, “Yes, of course! Today he’s hard to pick out. He’s wearing a yellow T-shirt, but he would be happy to bless your dog. Or anybody else’s dog.” All our companions in life are worthy of - and welcome to - the blessing of their Creator. Great is God’s steadfast love for all of us. Dogs included. Maybe even the cats. Maybe even the people who belong to their animals. God’s blessing is for all God’s creatures. Our little bitty psalm opens up that far.

And it opens up a good bit further, too. Have you heard of a guy named Ron Garan? He’s an astronaut and he spent 178 days aboard the International Space Station. When he landed back on earth, he brought back something far heavier than space equipment or mission date. He returned with a transformed understanding of the blessing of God.

As he described it, “From orbit, Earth doesn’t look like a collection of countries, borders, or competing interests. It is a single, radiant blue sphere suspended in darkness.” Lines do not divide the continents. No flags mark territory. From 250 miles above the surface, every human conflict suddenly looks small – and every human connection is unavoidable.

Garan watched lightning storms crackle across entire continents, auroras rippled like rainbow curtains, and city lights glow slowly against the planet’s night side. “What struck me most,” he said, “was not earth’s power – but its fragility.” A paper-thin blue halo is the atmosphere. Barely visible, that thin halo is responsible for everything that breathes, grows, and survives. There is no backup, no second home, no escape.

Up in orbit, he says, pollution has no nationality. Climate systems ignore borders. Environmental damage in one region ripples across the entire globe. All those divisions we defend so fiercely on the ground simply don’t exist from above. The notion that life is “us versus them” disappears, replaced by a single, unavoidable truth: there is only us.[1]

All of us. All of us subject to the steadfast love of the God who makes us all. All of us, called by God to show that steadfast love to all the nations. All of us, with no “them.” Just us, God’s children. Praise the Lord!

Well, that’s all I have for you today. I apologize that the sermon is so brief, but the scripture text was short and sweet. Not only that, but we also have work to do. So, let’s get on with it.

(c) William G. Carter. All rights reserved.

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[1] Quoted on Facebook, 26 September 2026: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1673600016825249/posts/2240600823458496/