psalm 42

In June, 1974, I skipped lunch and found my way to the garden next to the seminary chapel. While our class on death and dying had listened the the powerful music of Leonard Bernstein's "Kaddish" (in memory of John F. Kennedy), I found myself sinking into a spiritual abyss ... with an awful sense of being alone, abandoned and submerged into darkness.  In the garden, I read Psalm 42: As a deer longs for flowing streams, so my soul longs for you O God ... The prayer poem expressed the deepest yearnings of my life. Then I began reading Mark's account of Jesus' crucifixion. Gently, quietly a sense of awareness and assurance emerged that what happened on the cross was intimately connected to my life and that Jesus Christ is risen!

I wish I could say that sense of assurance completely quenched the thirsting of my soul. It has taken over 30 years to realize that the promise of streams of living water are not symbolic promises but rather the clearest truth of Creation. Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city. ... And he said to me, "These words are trustworthy and true ..." Rev. 22: 1, 6