Northern Plains Anglican

Last night I prayed Psalm 106, which included

Remember me, O LORD, according to the favor that you show to your people; O visit me with your salvation, That I may see the felicity of your chosen, and rejoice in the gladness of your people, and give thanks with your inheritance.(verses 4-5)

After almost four years in which the combination of Covid craziness and a Sunday job kept me out of church services, being at worship in person is like drinking water after escaping a desert.

Last Sunday was a particular blessing as I worshipped side by side with a brother in Christ who was instrumental in helping me find new work that freed my Sundays.

God’s people, God’s chosen, God’s people, God’s inheritance. So sang and prayed the people of Israel; so sings and prays the Church of Jesus Christ.

The favor, the felicity, the gladness and thankfulness in which God’s people dwell is in God’s salvation, pictured in Hebrew at the top of this piece: bî-šū-‘ā-ṯe-ḵā. “In your (God’s) Yeshua.” In God’s Jesus.

It is ironic that I won’t get to an Ash Wednesday service with God’s people today – not because of sloth or other obligations but because we are under a blizzard here and even in-town travel is out of the question.

Yet I rejoice this Ash Wednesday (if that’s permitted on a penitential day) because, blizzard aside, Jesus Christ is my salvation. Jesus Christ is God’s undeserved favor that brings me into the communion of saints. As those not hindered by blizzards or whatever will hear in churches today,

For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. (2 Corinthians 5:21)