Psalm 42: Deep Calls to Deep

My soul thirsts for God, the living God... Why do you despair, my soul?... Deep calls to deep / In the roar of your waters.
In biblical cosmology, the land is a crust floating on the waters of earth and the sky is a membrane holding back the waters of heaven. During lectio on psalm 42, I heard "the deeps of earth call to the deeps of heaven." Or the core substance and being of earth resonates in oneness with the core substance and being of heaven. A call and response chant plays continually between the divine embodied in earthy existence and the divine beyond earthly existence.

At a time when the grind of life-in-body smudges my windows and I can't sense the presence of God all around and within me, I am given to despair... Until I stop rushing about and breathe the breath/spirit/wind, the "ruah." Flowing Presence enlivened the stuff of earth "In the beginning." That same Presence enlivens still every bit and being of material existence, flowing in and out and around every seemingly separate, earthly body. Ruah is my core and the larger substance through which I move. Stop. Breathe, smell, taste and see God in each and every tiny being: despair can't hold in the face of such powerful reality.

This lectio was the basis for the original psalm 4: Remember God, posted October 30.copyright R. Elena Tabachnick, November 2006