Diary of a Theologian

    R.    And sustain us with thy Holy Spirit.

    The concluding suffrage draws from Psalm 51, the famous psalm understood to be David’s response after the prophet Nathan confronted him with his sin of adultery with Bathsheba and his subsequent arrangement of the death of Bathsheba’s husband, so that he could marry her. That psalm is known by its first word in Latin, “Miserere,” meaning, “Have mercy.” It is appropriately recited on Ash Wednesday and other penitential situations, when we look into our hearts and lay before God the whole mess of sin within us, while at the same time trusting in God to save us and restore us.

    Verses 10 and 11 of Psalm 51, in the antique translation, read as follows. “Make me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from thy presence, and take not thy holy Spirit from me.” The final suffrage takes the first and last phrases of these verses, and puts them together as a concise, fitting conclusion to all our suffrages—all our beseechings of God. Although our prayers turn back to ourselves, in the context of sinful unworthiness evoked by David in his remorse, yet we do so with trust in God—and in God alone—that he can fix our hearts and “create” them again, make them clean, and do so by the work of his Holy Spirit.

    In the 1979 Prayer Book translation, this suffrage draws a slightly broader stretch of Psalm 51, namely verses 11 through 13. (The verse numbers differ in the psalms, since they are laid out for reading.) These three verses are as follows: “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from your presence, and take not your holy Spirit from me. Give me the joy of your saving help again and sustain me with your bountiful Spirit.” As you see above, the contemporary suffrage opens with the word “create” (a more powerful synonym of “make”) and draws from the end of verse 13 (with “sustain”) while keeping “holy” from verse 12. All three verses together make the point that we seek restoration with God, a newly created clean heart, to dwell in God’s presence, to be “sustained” by his holy Spirit which, thank God, he is not taking away from us!

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    Over several of these posts this year, I have written about the seven suffrages which are in Morning and Evening Prayer, prayers that are waiting to be said as much as twice daily by any of us. They begin with acknowledged dependence upon God: “O Lord, show thy mercy upon us; And grant us thy salvation.” And so they end with begging God to “create” anew in us “clean hearts” as he sustains us every day of our life with his Holy Spirit. In the context of this, we pray for everything else: the church, the world, our nation, the advancement of God’s “way” through the earth, and the needs of all people. We do not deserve any of this; we do not deserve that he listen to us; we are bold enough to pray because, first and last, we beseech his mercy. 

    It is the best news in the world that he will stick with, and not take his holy Spirit away from, those who turn to him.

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    Out & About: On Sunday, October 19, I am to preach at St. Matthew’s Cathedral in Dallas, at 9 and 11:15 a.m., and at 10:20 or so, I will speak about Books I & II of Augustine’s Confessions (see below).

    At 5 p.m. (also on Oct. 19) the Good Books & Good Talk seminar meets to discuss Anthony Trollope’s Dr. Wortle’s School. This is a late treasure from 1891, a short book with a secret (revealed very early in the book) about possible bigamy, the cruelty of society, and the importance of matrimony. It also has many small delights of wit and ironic observation. One thinks that Trollope is the sort of author that only a culture thick with the Prayer Book could produce. Give yourself the pleasure of relishing Trollope.

    The Confessions of Saint Augustine. I keep hearing from people who recently read this book and are grateful for it, sometimes wondering why they took so long! As is commonly said, after the Bible the Confessions is likely the most-read book in the Christian West in the past sixteen centuries. I am teaching a series of classes on it, and you are welcome to come whether or not you have read it. The first session will be at St. Matthew’s Cathedral, Sun., Oct. 19, at 10:20 (on Books I & II). If you can, drop in and get a taste of real theology (not mine, Augustine’s).