Let my prayer be counted as incense before you. — Psalm 141.2

How much we need our words to be incense today. After a night of watching maps and months of debate—after our national rhetoric was dragged so low—how much we need the fragrance of our prayers to rise before God.

Set a guard, O Lord, over my mouth; keep watch over the door of my lips! — Psalm 141.3

In our silence, may the voice of thunder be heard. For even when we believe ourselves to be right, the good, holy, and perfect truth is beyond us. Dietrich Bonhoeffer writes:

No good at all can come from acting before the world and one’s self as though we knew the truth, when in reality we do not. This truth is too important for that, and it would be a betrayal of this truth if the church were to hide itself behind resolutions and pious so-called Christian principles, when it is called to look the truth in the face and once and for all confess its guilt and ignorance.

Indeed, such resolutions can have nothing complete, nothing clear about them unless the whole Christian truth, as the church knows it or confesses that it does not know it, stands behind them. Qualified silence might perhaps be more appropriate for the church today than talk which is very unqualified.

For though our battle is not against flesh and blood, it must be met here and now—as we partake in the flesh and blood of Christ. May every prayer, every word, and every action stream from the heart God is sanctifying within us.

Do not let my heart incline to any evil. — Psalm 141.4

Our best-laid principles betray us. “Tolerance becomes a demand for acceptance, humility is supplanted by moral certainty, and patience loses to outrage,” John Inazu laments. The law professor shares his vision for “modest unity,” even in the face of what seems like unyielding opposition:

I am hopeful. And one reason is that the American experiment in pluralism, for all of its failures and shortcomings, has actually worked well for much of our nation’s history. This is not the first time we’ve confronted deep racial tensions, divergent views of morality, religious difference, or course rhetoric. In many ways the success of the American political experiment has always required finding and maintaining a modest unity against great odds.

Come, Lord Jesus.

Today’s Reading
Joel 1 (Listen – 2:59)
Psalms 140-141 (Listen – 2:44)