As I read Psalm 27 again, after apparently creating a completely different version for it in Lent last year, I noticed that that familiar metaphor for light wasn’t really captivating me. It want God to be more than a beam, an array of particles bouncing into the abyss to create radiance. After all that has happened in Minnesota and Venezuela, and maybe also in Greenland, I need a more solid metaphor.

I’ve noticed that we talk about the militarization of the police as only a bad thing. We don’t explain that word. We let it only be a bad thing which in recent news it surely is. When soldiers are only described as those that “kill people and break things for a living” who are not “politically correct and don’t necessarily belong always in polite society,” we have missed out in the power of a good metaphor. Metaphors invite our imagination, stirring us beyond our assumptions to find something deeper. As a military spouse, I have struggled hard with the militarization of my faith. I have bristled at more than one chaplain’s prayers and I don’t want my faith to ever be used as brutal force. Violence is not the center of this image. Nor is it the center of my faith so I wanted to understand more of what this stronghold might be. Here is how that prayer found words.

O God, I am so scared.
I crave the shelter of your walls,
so strong and safe. 
Be my salvation.

I do not live in a time when 
allusions to the military garner
such security or hope. 
There is too much to fear. 

We might hope for 
the brilliance of light shining
in the deepest darkness
but the one thing we really ask for
is that place where there will be no trouble.
That place where we can 
see your face clearly, 
assuring us that 
there is nothing to fear. 
You are our stronghold.

We lift our voices, together,
not just to despair but to praise. 
To see your face nodding,
revealing that perfect love,
whispering to us, ever so gently, 
"I know. I know."

Praise in the doubt.
Praise through the worry.
Praise in the midst of all that is uncertain.
Praise for what we will never understand
but we so want to believe.
Praise of the faith you find in us
and that love that might 
just cast our fears.

When so much is uncertain 
and fear overwhelms, we will praise
that you are not the root of our fears.
You are the courage in our hearts.
You are the goodness that
shines from within us.
You are the love
with which fear 
cannot abide.

Let this song of praise
echo through all the chambers 
of our hearts. Let us 
sing of your salvation
together. 

I wrote this for the Living Psalms Project of the United Church of Christ. It can also be found on their website when it posts. You can find the version of this same psalm that I wrote for Lent here. I hope one or both can open up new metaphors for you of what it is that God might be doing in the world right now.