Breaking our Hearts with Psalm 3

How do we see God in our enemies? How do we move toward peace with someone who has done something atrocious? Join me for a little reflection on breaking our hearts for peace in today's episode. 

For more information about me and my work, please visit www.BrianneTurczynski.com or www.LovingTheImperfect.com

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For more information about me and my work, please visit www.brianneturczynski.com or www.lovingtheimperfect.com

Transcript

0:05

Welcome to Loving the Imperfect Podcast, a show for seekers of deeper contemplation. I'm Breanne Terzinski. Join me as we imperfectly and clumsily make our way through each day, mustering up compassion for the hours ahead. Hello and welcome to Loving the Imperfect podcast. Today I'm going to skip over to Psalm 3. Because there are 150 Psalms, not including the 22 Psalms sections of Psalm 119. So I don't think I want to read them all. I don't want to trap us in this little box of psalms when there's so much work out there to be looked at and discovered. And so anyways, we're skipping to psalm three. No biggie. This is a psalm of David. All right, here we go. Lord, how many are my foes? How many rise up against me? Many are saying to me, God will deliver him. But you, Lord, are a shield around me. My glory, the one who lifts my head high. I call out to the Lord, and he answers me from his holy mountain. I lie down and sleep. I wake again because the Lord sustains me. I will not fear, though tens of thousands assail me on every side. Arise, Lord. Deliver me, my God. Strike all my enemies on the jaw. Break the teeth of the wicked. From the Lord comes deliverance. May your blessing be on your people. Sometimes we do, we do get angry and we want to seek justice. I mean, but we can't wish for ill will on people. Psalms like this, they're very human, very human. And so I appreciate them because sometimes it's how we feel, We wish these people would get their just desserts for hurting us or our family members. Especially if you're a mother or a father. You have children and somebody hurt your child, you know. So. It's comforting to know that the people thousands of years ago, felt like that sometimes, but they were still trying to be the best version of themselves. So, I would suggest if you're going to read the Bible, all the way through, to get yourself a good study Bible. The study Bible is akin to the plaques next to artwork in an art museum. It gives you information about the author and the time it was written, for whom it was written, and some commentary on the many verses. And the commentary can serve as a great guide. I still come across verses I don't understand. Because a lot of the understanding will only come with a greater knowledge of what life was like back then. Understanding when we read things like the first Psalm, the wicked will be like chaff that the wind blows away. So, the study Bible, reminds us that the chaff on a kernel of wheat is discarded. It's like discarded skin. And it's the center that provides the nutrition. So then we are to gather that it's the inside that counts, right? And even with Psalm 3, we're trying to be the best version of ourselves, though we're looking at our enemies, what's really going on inside those people? When we die, God cares nothing for our outer shells. And the sins that we've committed, et cetera. God cares nothing about that. When we die, and now hear some skeptics listening, we'll think I'm absolutely nuts. And maybe I am. And again, my dog is snoring and breathing very loudly in the background, so forgive him. All right. When we die, God reaches in, not literally, but God reaches in, I guess, figuratively, and sort of uncovers our soul, as if taking a plot of dirt, lifting it away to uncover hidden gold. And that is God's concern. So that piece is God. That God's uncovering when we die. That part of our, that is our soul. Our soul is God. So, no matter your sin, that part cannot be penetrated, you and I are God you and I were given a piece of God to carry through our lives. This is the generosity of God. It is the same as the generosity of nature. But we must nurture nature to get the fruit. And it is the same with our souls. It stays pure, the soul does, throughout your life. No matter where you've taken it, no matter what you've done, your soul will always remain pure. So, this teaching in the church about us being sinners. We might miss the mark, yeah, and people, there are some people that have done some really terrible, terrible things, but I have to believe that the soul stays pure because this is what I've been taught through. Teaching, and through prayer, and through just other experiences I've had. God loves the absolute worst person that you can think of, and God loves you in the same way. So, that's very hard for us to understand. Because we've been raised surrounded by dualistic language. The, you know, language of black and white, right and wrong. We are surrounded by that. So, we need to train ourselves out of it It's both and as Richard Rohr teaches And this is hard because how do you see the God in someone who has done something atrocious? It takes practice to love your enemy. And to see God in your enemy, to see creation in your enemy, to see love in your enemy, that is a hard thing to do. And it takes penetrating through that person, through the surface that we see with our physical eyes into the very center of their being. That seed that God planted in that person. That creation, that seed of creation. That takes a lot of practice to do that. And it's not to say that you're a bad person if you, if you can't get there. It just. It would make you feel more at peace if you could. In this life, you can either live in heaven or in hell. If you have peace, Then you have heaven. Everyone has inner pureness. It's the child innocence in us. That pureness of a child, that delight and that joy that children have is in us, even if you didn't have it as a child, it's in you somewhere. So I'd like to think that we can live more at peace when we can make this inner pureness, live at the surface of our being. To live more at peace is to nurture the God in us. And so this is why, Buddhism teaches us to be mindful, practice mindfulness, um, take some moments out of your day to just be present and breathe. And sometimes that's all we can do is just breathe. And be mindful of our breath. So taking walks out in nature has been helpful for me. Gardening has been helpful for me, and taking time to cook food from other countries has also helped me to stay connected to my greater community, which is the human race. So if, if this makes little to no sense, I'll direct you to a quote from my favorite movie, Moonstruck. When Ronnie and Loretta are standing out in the street on a freezing cold night. They had just went on a date to the opera, and Loretta wants to go home because she just saw that her father is having an affair, and she's pretty upset, and Ronnie looks at her, And says, Loretta, I love you. Not like they told you love is. And I didn't know this either. But love don't make things nice. It ruins everything. It breaks your heart. It makes things a mess. We aren't here to make things perfect. The snowflakes are perfect. The stars are perfect. Not us. Not us. We are here to ruin ourselves and to break our hearts and love the wrong people and die. The storybooks are bullshit, he says. And so I'll leave you with that. Great film. Wonderful film. Ronnie is played by Nicolas Cage and Loretta is played by Cher. So good. So that is your morning psalm. Thank you for tuning in and loving the imperfect with me. So have a good day. Bye bye. Thank you for joining me today on Loving the Imperfect for more information about me and my work, please visit www. briantrzinski. com. Thanks for tuning in. See you next time.