“Bring, all ye
dear-bought nations, bring, alleluia
Your richest
praise to your King, alleluia”
“Our richest praise”. I wonder what that really looks
like. “Our richest anything” given to God – I wonder, too, what that looks
like.
We make a big deal of the big celebrations of Easter and
Christmas. We pull out all the strings. And yes, so we should. Those are the
days that people who are strangers to churches and to worship make an
appearance.
It is in the day to day ordinariness of life that we make
our biggest impact. Our richest praise is not pulled out of the drawer and
brushed off on special days – but every single day. The middle of the week
Wednesdays as well and the end of the week Saturdays should see us
demonstrating richest praise.
I felt very keenly some of the words from Malachi 1:-
“It is you priests
who show contempt for my name. But you ask, ‘How have we shown contempt for
your name?’ By offering defiled food on my altar. But you ask, ‘How have we
defiled you?’….
When you offer
blind animals for sacrifice, is that not wrong? When you sacrifice lame or
diseased animals, is that not wrong? Try offering them to your governor! Would
he be pleased with you? Would he accept you?” says the Lord Almighty. “Now
plead with God to be gracious to us. With such offerings from your hands, will
he accept you?”—says the Lord Almighty. “Oh, that one of you would shut the
temple doors, so that you would not light useless fires on my altar! I am not
pleased with you,” says the Lord Almighty, “and I will accept no offering from
your hands.”
I get the impression that if Jesus had his own way as he
watched the widow carefully put her two copper coins into the offering at the
temple that day, he might have pulled out the heavy bags the rich had so
carelessly tossed in and handed them back. He might have said to them, “I am not pleased with you and I will
accept no offering from your hands.”
Sometimes I find it easier to give what’s not always the
richest. Sometimes I convince myself that I can’t afford to give what is the
richest, as if I will end up with too little myself. Like some of the rich
people giving their offerings, I toss in something that I can afford to let go
of. I don’t always count out what is precious and surrender it to God’s hand cheerfully.
I know people that do and the joy that fills their faces is all too evident.
Over the weekend I have had my fill of the nod to Easter
in TV programmes. I began watching a three part drama on the life of Jesus. I
barely made it to the end of the first episode. The absence of God in the narrative
annoyed me. There was no dream to tell Joseph to take Mary and Jesus to safety
but just a feeling something was wrong. There was no dove fluttering down, no
voice of God claiming His Son at the baptism of Jesus – just John and Jesus
alone in a river. There were no spoken words rebuking a demon or a command
given, just a hug and a holding close and a quiet recovery from something not clearly
identified as demon possession.
God has been erased from the story and Jesus, in the
first episode, was not dynamic or charismatic, God-soaked or vibrant.
“What’s so different about your life?” said God, “Do the
words dynamic or charismatic, God-soaked or vibrant apply to you?”
Ouch! I have my
moments. Too few of them.
The programme might have been striving not to offend, not
to come too clearly down on the God side of the fence. Jesus never lived His
without causing offence and sometimes deliberately so. His words take a
sleeping man by the shoulders and give him a good shake to remind him that he
is only sleeping and not dead, and he needs to wake up. Offence wakes us up.
In George Hebert’s poem “Easter”, which I also read this
morning, his chosen method of praise is the lute. His heart, the strings and
the Spirit combine to bring about his richest praise. My chosen method is
poetry – my heart, the words and the Spirit combine as I weave a poem.
My richest praise. My richest everything given to God.
Today.
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