A Shield Around Us

 


I love the visual image that comes to my mind as I read this morning's texts:


Many are saying to me, “There is no help for you in God.” But you, O Lord, are a shield around me, my glory, and the one who lifts up my head. Psalm 3:2–3


A leper came to Jesus begging him, and kneeling he said to him, “If you choose, you can make me clean.” Moved with pity, Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him, and said to him, “I do choose. Be made clean!” Mark 1:40–41


The image that comes is of a person kneeling. They are kneeling because they are in pain and in need of help. Their head is bowed under the weight of worry, illness, financial stress...


How often have you felt like that? Bowed down under the weight of something beyond your control? Maybe you feel it today. Maybe someone close to you is feeling it.


Read the Mark passage above again.
Hear the promise.
Jesus is moved.
He does choose to help...every time.
He stretches out his hand.
He touches the untouchable.
He knows the pain we hide from others.


Now read the Psalm again.
The image I have in my mind shifts...
as Jesus lifts up the person's head...
as he becomes a shield around them...


I love that. A shield around them.
A shield around us.


May that image follow us today; as we face both problems we have helped create, and things beyond our control...


May we see the shield around us...
May we hear the promise that Jesus reaches out to us...
May we feel our heads being raised...
May we know the weight is lifted...


Healer, faithful Friend, have mercy upon us! You see us in all of our frailty; you know all of the ways that we are “unclean.” We acknowledge you as the Great Physician of our bodies and our souls. Hear our humble petition: Stretch out your hand and touch us! Amen.*


*Prayer taken from the Moravian Daily Texts