(no subject)
To the choirmaster. Of the Sons of Korah. According to Alamoth. A Song.
God is our refuge and strength,
a very present help in trouble.
Therefore we will not fear though the earth gives way,
though the mountains be moved into the heart of the sea,
Though its waters roar and foam,
though the mountains tremble at its swelling.
Selah
There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
the holy habitation of the Most High.
God is in the midst of her; she shall not be moved;
God will help her when morning dawns.
The nations rage, the kingdoms totter;
he utters his voice, the earth melts.
The LORD of hosts is with us;
the God of Jacob is our fortress.
Selah
Come, behold the works of the LORD,
how he has brought desolations on the earth.
He makes wars cease to the end of the earth;
he breaks the bow and shatters the spear;
he burns the chariots with fire.
"Be still, and know that I am God.
I will be exalted among the nations,
I will be exalted in the earth!"
The LORD of hosts is with us;
the God of Jacob is our fortress.
--Psalm 46 (ESV)
On a college campus, in a chapel packed with frightened and bewildered students ten years ago today, this is what the Vice President of Student Services read. It seems that my soul is more resonant now, and thus the words -- true then as ever -- ring deeper in me.
Here we stand, after ten years: a decade which has brought its own share of deaths and tragedies and bombings and wars. Surely we must know better by now than to trust in the things we build and the foundations we lay, or in the natural world, which turns on us with such deadly caprice. If they are all we have, then fear is natural.
But there is a foundation not dependent on the laws of physics or of society. Comfort and security in this world is a gift, one we shouldn't dismiss lightly, nor withhold without good reason. But it doesn't last. We can know that if that comfort and security vanishes, we've still got a refuge in the rock.