Living Psalm 121 – Lent 2A

Living Psalms Book

Psalms in the form of words and art, reborn in the specific contexts of our world, privileging the voices of historically marginalized communities and those acting in solidarity with them.

We lift up our eyes to hospitals
for the help that is … wisdom,
diagnosis, skill, compassionate care,
and under these gifts of earth
and the tenderness of hands and hearts
is the help that is God.

God holds you in the inmost parts,
in the heart and tumor,
the replacement of a kidney or knee,
the care of a fragile pregnancy,
or sudden catastrophe
of accident, fire, or gunshot wound,
under scalpel, in infusion,
with the suture of the Spirit.

God does not slumber.
God wakes when you wake to worry,
and God wakes, watching,
when in weariness and medication
you submerge.

In a net of prayers, you are kept
in the light of healing
from the sun’s rising on a tray
brought in with smile and laughter
to a nurse who strokes tears
in the moonlight’s shining.

And unceasing prayers also keep
the precious ones of your life,
as they come in to visit
and go out to learn and plan and breathe,
in these so fragile days,

and all the holy time surrounding
your now and your always.

Living-Psalm-121-for-those-in-the-hospital Download

Living Psalm for Lent 2A – Psalm 121 was written by Maren Tirabassi.

Living Psalms Book is created by UCC Witness & Worship Artists’ Group, a Network of UCC connected artists, activists and ministers bridging the worship and liturgy of the local church with witness and action in the community. Maren Tirabassi, editor

Logo is detail from Living Psalm 80 by Sophia Beardemphl, Redwoods, CA. Recovering from significant bullying, Sophia, age nine, read Psalm 80 and thought of brokenness that needs mending. She drew this broken and mended bowl.