April 14: Let God Deliver Him
♫ Music:
Day 44 - Thursday, April 14
MAUNDY THURSDAY
Title: LET GOD DELIVER HIM
Scripture: Psalm 22:7-15
But I am a worm, and no man;
A reproach of men, and despised by the people.
All those who see Me ridicule Me;
They shoot out the lip, they shake the head, saying,
“He trusted in the Lord, let Him rescue Him;
Let Him deliver Him, since He delights in Him!”
But You are He who took Me out of the womb;
You made Me trust while on My mother’s breasts.
I was cast upon You from birth.
From My mother’s womb
You have been My God.
Be not far from Me,
For trouble is near;
For there is none to help.
Many bulls have surrounded Me;
Strong bulls of Bashan have encircled Me.
They gape at Me with their mouths,
Like a raging and roaring lion.
I am poured out like water,
And all My bones are out of joint;
My heart is like wax;
It has melted within Me.
My strength is dried up like a potsherd,
And My tongue clings to My jaws;
You have brought Me to the dust of death.
Poetry:
We Wear the Mask
by Paul Laurence Dunbar
We wear the mask that grins and lies,
It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes,—
This debt we pay to human guile;
With torn and bleeding hearts we smile,
And mouth with myriad subtleties.
Why should the world be over-wise,
In counting all our tears and sighs?
Nay, let them only see us, while
We wear the mask.
We smile, but, O great Christ, our cries
To thee from tortured souls arise.
We sing, but oh the clay is vile
Beneath our feet, and long the mile;
But let the world dream otherwise,
We wear the mask!
MAUNDY THURSDAY
The evening of the Last Supper is a study in stark contrasts. From the many juxtapositions contained in the text, we see Jesus’ humility, sacrificial love, and trust highlighted against a backdrop of human selfishness, duplicity, and weakness.
Perhaps the most obvious contrast is Jesus’ teaching on servanthood and the disciples’ response. Jesus takes on the lowliest of jobs––washing filthy feet that have been coated in the dust, refuse, and animal dung that covered the pathways of the day. Then, after Jesus explains the need for his followers to embrace being servants, we find the disciples arguing among themselves over which among them was the greatest (see John 13:1-17; Luke 22:24-30).
Another contrast in the story has to do with rescue and betrayal. The Passover celebrates God’s faithfulness to rescue the children of Israel from slavery in Egypt. It also foreshadows the even greater rescue accomplished for us on the cross. And yet, on this particular evening, as God is at the threshold of his great act of redemption, the most striking acts of his followers are Judas’ betrayal of Christ and Peter’s denial of ever knowing him.
There is a contrast as well between the authenticity of Jesus and the duplicity of Judas. During the last supper, we get a raw, genuine picture of Jesus. He is honest with his love for the disciples and his emotion at his forthcoming betrayal. In contrast, Judas has so successfully hidden his evil intent that no one suspects anything, even as he leaves the dinner early. As Paul Laurence Dunbar so eloquently writes, we all wear a mask, but Judas seems to be an expert at duplicity.
In today’s passage from Psalm 22, we find yet another contrast. David writes of the Messiah suffering extraordinary pain––physical, mental, and emotional. He is mocked, rejected, and in physical agony. In the midst of this severe pain, though, the Suffering One still maintains a deep trust in God.
Here, the juxtaposition comes in our response to suffering. How easy it is for us to trust God when things are going well! But let misfortune or even simple inconvenience come our way, and our trust in God can quickly evaporate in grumbling or even blaming Him. This frail response stands in sharp contrast to Psalm 22, where the sufferer chooses to trust God fully even in terrible circumstances.
As we stand at the beginning of the Paschal Triduum, we would do well to contemplate how the sufferings of Christ are a proclamation of the goodness of God and how trials in life do not obviate God’s trustworthiness. In the painting by Peter Howson, the Christ figure has chosen to be present among people whose own suffering lends a grotesqueness to their faces. In the same way, Christ is present with us, not, perhaps, to alleviate our suffering, but instead to fellowship with us and sustain us through it.
Prayer
Dear Lord, thank you for the example you have given us of complete trust in the midst of suffering. Please grant us the grace to find you in the midst of our suffering and be able to draw strength from you as we walk through it. Let us also, as we meditate on your Passion, grow more deeply in love with you.
Amen.
Kevin Greiner, M.Div.
Development Director
Development Associates International (DAI)
Colorado Springs, Colorado
For more information about the artwork, music, and poetry selected for this day, we have provided resources under the “About” tab located next to the “Devotional” tab.
About the Artwork:
Outcast
Peter Howson
2011
Oil on canvas
122 x 92 cm
Directly addressing the struggles of the human condition, renowned figurative painter and printmaker Peter Howson creates powerful, unflinching works inspired by the streets of his native Glasgow, Scotland. Drawing on his own traumatic experiences, Howson’s pieces contain the threat of violence and are populated with broad-shouldered, masculine, and predominantly working-class figures. In other works the figures depicted appear grotesquely caricatured, though retaining some spark of innate human dignity and perhaps the potential for salvation. This work by Howson entitled Outcast doesn't hold back as it depicts Christ’s encounter with his brutal tormentors, who mock his claims of authority and kingship. Here a gaunt Jesus, his robe wrapped tightly around his torso like a straitjacket, stands awkwardly amid the claustrophobic space and the mocking crowd as their hands push and pull and point at him. Christ’s eyes, highlighted by a strong accent of blue, stare resolutely beyond his tormentors toward a fixed point outside the frame. One individual boldly sticks his tongue out in contempt of Christ while others join in the mocking. Crowned by a bright “halo” about his head, Christ illuminates the surrounding grotesque figures with his holiness. The lighting, shading, and depiction of Jesus all evoke strong emotions that draw the viewer in and allow them to connect with Jesus and his suffering, reminding us to question who the true outcast is in this encounter.
https://imagejournal.org/article/peter-howson-harrowing-hell/
About the Artist:
Peter Howson, OBE (b. 1958), is a Scottish painter. His work has encompassed a number of themes during his lifetime. His early works are typified by very masculine working class men. Later, in 1993, he was commissioned by the Imperial War Museum of London to be the official war artist for the Bosnian War, during which he produced some of his most shocking and controversial work, detailing the atrocities taking place at the time. He was also the official war painter of the Kosovo War for the London Times. In more recent years his work has exhibited strong religious themes which some say is linked to the treatment of his alcoholism and drug addiction at the Castle Craig Hospital in Peebles in 2000, after which he converted to Christianity. His work has appeared in other media, with his widest exposure arguably occuring in 1999, when he did the illustration for a British postage stamp that celebrated engineering achievements for the millennium. His work has been shown in major collections including Ben Uri Gallery and Museum, Edinburgh City Art Centre, Glasgow Museums Resource Centre, Guildhall Art Gallery, Harris Museum and Art Gallery, Herbert Art Gallery and Museum, High Life Highland Exhibitions Unit, Huntarian Art Gallery, Jerwood Collection, Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art, National Galleries of Scotland, Nottingham City Museums and Galleries, Rozelle House Galleries, Fitzwilliam Museum, Ingram Collection of Modern British Art, and The Wilson. In November 2010, BBC Scotland aired a documentary entitled The Madness of Peter Howson, which followed the final stages of the completion of a grand commission for the renovated St. Andrew's Cathedral and also dealt with Howson's struggle with mental illness and Asperger's syndrome.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Howson
https://peterhowson.co.uk/
About the Music:
“Psalm 22” from the album Let Beauty Be Our Memorial
Lyrics (KJV Translation):
My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
Why art thou so far from helping me,
and from the words of my roaring?
O my God, I cry in the daytime,
but thou hearest not;
and in the night season, and am not silent.
But thou art holy,
O thou that inhabitest the praises of Israel.
Our fathers trusted in thee:
they trusted, and thou didst deliver them.
They cried unto thee, and were delivered:
they trusted in thee, and were not confounded.
But I am a worm, and no man;
a reproach of men, and despised of the people.
All they that see me laugh me to scorn:
they shoot out the lip, they shake the head, saying,
He trusted on the LORD that he would deliver him:
let him deliver him, seeing he delighted in him.
But thou art he that took me out of the womb:
thou didst make me hope when
I was upon my mother's breasts.
I was cast upon thee from the womb:
thou art my God from my mother's belly.
Be not far from me; for trouble is near;
for there is none to help.
Many bulls have compassed me:
strong bulls of Bashan have beset me round.
They gaped upon me with their mouths,
as a ravening and a roaring lion.
I am poured out like water,
and all my bones are out of joint:
my heart is like wax;
it is melted in the midst of my bowels.
My strength is dried up like a potsherd;
and my tongue cleaveth to my jaws;
and thou hast brought me into the dust of death.
For dogs have compassed me:
the assembly of the wicked have inclosed me:
they pierced my hands and my feet.
I may tell all my bones:
they look and stare upon me.
They part my garments among them,
and cast lots upon my vesture.
But be not thou far from me, O LORD:
O my strength, haste thee to help me.
Deliver my soul from the sword;
my darling from the power of the dog.
Save me from the lion's mouth:
for thou hast heard me from the horns of the unicorns.
I will declare thy name unto my brethren:
in the midst of the congregation will I praise thee.
Ye that fear the LORD, praise him;
all ye the seed of Jacob, glorify him;
and fear him, all ye the seed of Israel.
For he hath not despised nor abhorred
the affliction of the afflicted;
neither hath he hid his face from him;
but when he cried unto him, he heard.
My praise shall be of thee in the great congregation:
I will pay my vows before them that fear him.
The meek shall eat and be satisfied:
they shall praise the LORD that seek him:
your heart shall live forever.
All the ends of the world shall remember
and turn unto the LORD:
and all the kindreds of the nations shall worship before thee.
For the kingdom is the LORD's:
and he is the governor among the nations.
All they that be fat upon earth shall eat and worship:
all they that go down to the dust shall bow before him:
and none can keep alive his own soul.
A seed shall serve him;
it shall be accounted to the Lord for a generation.
They shall come, and shall declare his righteousness
unto a people that shall be born, that he hath done this.
Amen
About the Performers:
St. Silas Singers with Ben Parry, conductor
Ben Parry (b. 1965) studied Music and History of Art at Cambridge University, and was a member of King’s College Choir. In the mid-1980s he joined The Swingle Singers as a singer, arranger, and music director, and toured globally and performed with some of the world’s greatest musicians including Stephane Grappelli, Pierre Boulez and Dizzy Gillespie. Moving to Edinburgh in 1995, he co-founded the Dunedin Consort, which has gone on to establish itself as Scotland’s premiere Baroque ensemble. He also took up posts as Director of the Scottish Chamber Orchestra Chorus; Director of Choral Music at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama; and conductor of Haddo House Opera. He moved back to England in 2003, becoming Director of Music at St. Paul’s School, London, then of Junior Academy at the Royal Academy of Music, and subsequently his current position as Artistic Director of the National Youth Choirs of Great Britain. As Director of London Voices he has performed in major concert houses around the world as well as conducting many major film soundtracks including Harry Potter, The Hobbit and Avengers. Parry is Assistant Director of Music at King’s College, Cambridge, where he is responsible for the mixed voice choir, King’s Voices. As an orchestral conductor he has worked with the Academy of Ancient Music, Britten Sinfonia, London Mozart Players, Seville Royal Symphony Orchestra, London Symphony, London Philharmonic and BBC Concert Orchestras. His own compositions and arrangements include the popular Faber Carol Book and a burgeoning catalogue of choral music for Peters Edition and OUP. He has enjoyed commissions from, among others, the St John’s College, Cambridge, BBC Singers, Chelmsford, Ely, Norwich and Worcester cathedrals, and his music has been heard at the BBC Proms and on the TV and radio. Parry features on the credits of well over one hundred recordings, appearing variously as singer, conductor, co-director, director, producer, chorus master and composer.
http://www.benparry.net
Let Beauty Be Our Memorial is a composer-driven recording for which conductor Ben Parry gathered some of London’s finest singers. The music was recorded at St. Silas Church, known in part for its beautiful reverberant ambience. It is also known for its association with writers Charles Williams and T. S. Eliot. JAC Redford and Ben Parry chose the name St. Silas Singers as an apt way to honor the space, the writers, and the musicians.
About the Composer:
J.A.C. Redford is a composer, arranger, orchestrator, and conductor of concert, chamber and choral music, film, television and theater scores, and music for recordings. His work has been performed by: Academy of St. Martin in the Fields, Joshua Bell, Chicago Symphony, Israel Philharmonic, Kansas City Chorale, Los Angeles Chamber Singers, Los Angeles Master Chorale, London Symphony Orchestra, Anne Akiko Meyers, New York Philharmonic, Phoenix Chorale, St. Martin’s Chamber Choir, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, Utah Chamber Artists, and Utah Symphony. The Alphabet of Revelation, Confessiones, Eternity Shut in a Span, Evening Wind, The Growing Season, Inside Passage, Let Beauty Be Our Memorial and Waltzing with Shadows are recordings devoted to his art music. He composed the Raymond W. Brock Memorial Commission for the American Choral Directors Association 2017 National Conference in Minneapolis, Minnesota. JAC’s five hundred episodes of television include multiple seasons of Coach and St. Elsewhere, for which he was twice nominated for Emmy Awards. He composed the scores for The Trip to Bountiful, Newsies and The Mighty Ducks II and III, conducted The Little Mermaid, and orchestrated the scores for Avatar, WALL-E, 1917, Finding Dory and Skyfall, for which he also arranged and conducted Adele’s Oscar-winning title song.
One can hear more of his music at his YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHs5LLxK9Fm-IMzLXgk9WYQ
or on his website:
https://www.jacredford.com.
About the Poet:
Paul Laurence Dunbar (1872–1906) was an American poet, novelist, and short story writer of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Dunbar became one of the first African American writers to establish an international reputation for his work. In addition to his poems, short stories, and novels, he also wrote the lyrics for the musical comedy In Dahomey (1903), the first all-African-American musical produced on Broadway in New York. The New York Times called him "a true singer of the people – white or black." Frederick Douglass once referred to Dunbar as "one of the sweetest songsters his race has produced and a man of whom [he hoped] great things.” Dunbar has continued to influence other writers, lyricists, and composers to this day. Writer Maya Angelou titled her autobiography I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969) using a line in Dunbar's poem "Sympathy," at the suggestion of jazz musician and activist Abbey Lincoln. Angelou said that Dunbar's works had inspired her "writing ambition."
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/paul-laurence-dunbar
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Laurence_Dunbar
About the Devotion Author:
Kevin Greiner, M.Div.
Development Director
Development Associates International (DAI)
Colorado Springs, Colorado
Kevin Greiner joined Development Associates International (DAI) in 2019 after a career that has included work in the nonprofit world, small business, pastoral ministry, and the military chaplaincy. Kevin is a graduate of the United States Air Force Academy (B.S. in history and international affairs) and Denver Seminary (M.Div. in pastoral counseling). He served as an associate faculty member at Colorado Christian University and Denver Seminary, where he taught Greek, homiletics, and crisis counseling classes. Kevin’s main ministry focus has been in urban Denver working with the poor, most recently with the Providence Network. He was ordained at Open Door Fellowship in Denver, Colorado.