Finding Your True People with Psalm 45

Thank you for joining me today. Please consider sharing or subscribing! In this episode I talk about leaving the crowd, our comfort zones, to seek what the Spirit is calling you to do. It also includes a brief teaching on the art of detachment. I mention several examples from scripture that speak to this. This episode also includes a reading from Psalm 45 which inspired the subject for this episode, Finding Your True People. 

Books mentioned in this episode:

Living Buddha, Living Christ by Thich Nhat Hanh 

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

Transcript

 Hello and welcome to Loving the Imperfect Podcast. I'm your host, Brianne Turczynski. Thank you for joining me again today. Today we're going to be reading Psalm 45. It's a psalm from the sons of Korah. And you can sort of hear the rhythm and rhyme when I read this.

Okay. Psalm 45:
 “My heart is stirred by a noble theme as I recite my verses for the king. My tongue is the pen of a skillful writer. You, who are most excellent of men, and your lips have been anointed with grace, since God has blessed you forever. Gird your sword on your side, ye mighty one, clothe yourself with splendor and majesty, in your majesty ride forth victoriously in the cause for truth, humility, and justice. 

Let your right hand achieve awesome deeds. Let your sharp arrows pierce the hearts of the king's enemies. Let the nations fall beneath your feet. Your throne, O God, will last forever and ever. A scepter of justice will be the scepter of your kingdom. You love righteousness and hate wickedness. 

Therefore, God, your God, has set you above your companions. Amen. Amen. By anointing you with the oil of joy. All your robes are fragrant with myrrh and aloes and cassia from palaces adorned with ivory. The music of the strings makes you glad. Daughters of Kings are among your honored women. 

At your right hand is the royal bride in gold Ophir. Listen, daughter, and pay careful attention. Forget your people and your father's house. Let the king be enthralled by your beauty. Honor him, for he is your lord. The city of Tyre will come with a gift.

People of wealth will seek your favor. All glorious is the princess within her chamber. Her gown is interwoven with gold. embroidered garments, she is led to the king. Her virgin companions follow her, those brought to be with her, led in with joy and gladness. They enter the palace of the king. 

Your sons will take the place of your fathers. You will make them princes throughout the land. I will perpetuate your memory through all generations. Therefore, the nations will praise you forever and ever.”

Okay, so this psalm, you can tell right away, is a little bit different from the psalms of David. 

David seems to have a very direct way of speaking, he seems to have some sort of goal in mind, is a prayer to God when he writes, and so you sort of can hear that in his tone. With the sons of Korah, however, the tone changes a bit. In this psalm in particular, it says in the study Bible, because I always try to read the notes, it says this was a poem to the king, possibly Solomon, on the occasion of his wedding. it was written for a historic occasion; it is also seen as a prophecy about Christ and his bride. The church who will praise him throughout all generations. And so when I was reading this and I looked at the notes and it said, that this is about the bride of Christ, I just wondered where that came from. Throughout all of scripture, I have heard this over and over and, and those of you who have studied the Bible or, you know, go to church often, whatever, we always hear that the church is Jesus's bride. It's a metaphor. So I was wondering, how did we come up with this idea these comparisons of Christ and the bride in any scripture, we're going to always say it means the church and leave it at that. And so I did some research and found that, they pointed me to this letter that Paul wrote to the Ephesians. the verse that they pointed me to  involves a very hard teaching from Paul.

And I wanted to address that not in this episode, but I want to create a bonus episode that will point to this hard teaching and explain it a little bit, because I think it deserves to be talked about. If you look it up, you will know what I mean. It's Ephesians chapter 5, verse 22 to 24. We need to talk about that a little bit further, and I won't do it in this episode because we could go down many rabbit holes, but I'm trying to keep these episodes under 30 minutes. 

Whenever I read about these comparisons of Christ and the church, or , the bride and the groom in any scripture, I always think that it's about the individual  and  Christ  or that spirit that guides us and calls us into a deeper spirituality,  a deeper and meaningful spirituality.

I just wanted to point that out quick.

 So I want to talk about verse 10 specifically, and this idea of leaving the crowd, having the courage to, leave that which is familiar for new horizons that will help you grow and be the best version of yourself. And so, in verse 10, it says, listen, daughter, and pay careful attention.  Forget your people and your father's house. So, this reminds me of the verse from Genesis, chapter 12, verse 1. Which says, the Lord said to Abram, which he is Abraham, he gets his name changed, God changes his name, anyways, the Lord said to Abram, go from your country, your people and your father's household, to the land I will show you. 

And later, Jesus says, multiple times, to leave your family and follow him. But what do these hard teachings mean when Jesus says to leave your family? He says in Luke 14,  if anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, even their own life,  Such a person cannot be my disciple, and whoever does not carry their cross and follow me  cannot be my disciple.

 I really think that that word hate is mistranslated. People need to be more careful when they're translating scripture. Because there are certain people that take this stuff literally.

And so they need to know that when they're translating the Bible. There are multiple words that we could use for one word, and so they could have chosen that differently. Jesus did not mean to hate your family, in the way that we mean the word hate. 

What he meant was he was talking about detachment, and this is a practice that Buddhists teach us and Christian mystics teach us and Sufi mystics it's basically, you’re just detached. You're still affected by the loss, but you're not taken off balance by it. 

It doesn't take you off balance. It doesn't take you off your path. It doesn't make you fall apart. But you're still affected by it. You're still sad if you lose somebody. Or lose your job, or lose your position, or your reputation. We're still sad about these things, but if we're truly detached, it won't destroy us and take us down. You still love people, but you understand, you have this understanding that those people are not yours to keep. We only have people for a small amount of time and they’re ours to care for and ours to love, but they're not ours to keep.

And they're not ours to possess. So even your children, and that's very hard for some people to understand, that our children aren't ours to keep. They're their own individual people.

And I really think that that's what Jesus meant, this sort of notion of detachment so that at any point when you're called to do something big, you won't have anything holding you back from your main purpose in life when you're called.

And so that's what Jesus means. He means to detach yourself not detaching yourself from the love of them, but detaching yourself from possession. 

And this goes for all possession, possession of your shoes, your house, your clothes, your jewelry, your car. We need to detach ourselves from all of these possessions. Not hold onto them because if anything happened to those things, would you fall apart? Would you be destroyed?

Would you not be able to build yourself back up? And so detachment is to protect you from gluttony that comes with wanting to possess things. It also helps you with control issues If you're too possessive of your children or your spouse, that's a control thing. 

Maybe you're cooking a dinner, and you want it to go just right. Be detached from even your expectations. That's letting go of your control. It's very healing when you do this.

It can be scary at first, but it's very healing when you can just let it go. Let go and detach yourself, sever those ties from those things that are holding you back from your growth. From being  more open and I'm still working on this stuff myself. I put on dinner for my family.

I want everything to go well. I have certain ways that I want to cook. I have certain ways I want the house to look. So, you then, you get mad at somebody because they didn’t, dust the floor just the way that you would have done it. And this is all just silly. It's all silly. So that detachment will help you draw back from your anger and control and pride and all of that stuff. 

 That's why practicing detachment can be good if you want a good book that will help you, 

 Living Buddha, Living Christ by Thich Nhat Hanh is good. Living Buddha, Living Christ is a good way to step into Christianity from a Buddhist perspective. And he does touch on detachment a little bit in that book. He says to be a good Christian is to be a good Buddhist. That's an interesting concept if you aren't familiar with Buddhism. 
 
 

So, Jesus isn't saying hate your mothers and your fathers. I think that was a misinterpretation. What Jesus really meant is to be detached.  When Jesus called his disciples James and John. Jesus called them and immediately, immediately they left the boat and, and their father also, and followed Jesus. 

So, that's an example of that detachment. Those people, James, and John were detached from their current position, their job, and their father, to be able to just drop everything and go with Jesus. In scripture, that is an example You are able, you have that ability to just leave and go toward your cause.

Move toward your vocation, what you're being called to do. And that's an extreme example, but it proves my point that he was talking about detachment. And then again, we have another example of Jesus, calling another, disciple, and the disciple says, “Lord, first let me go and bury my father. But Jesus told him, follow me, and let the dead bury their dead.” So that's another example of Jesus asking you to be kind. detached and let the dead bury their dead. 

These are just examples. These are supposed to be symbols and metaphors and allegories of what it is that Jesus is calling us to do. So, when you are called to a vocation, say you want to work with hospice care, follow me and let the dead bury their dead means don't procrastinate.

That's what that story is trying to tell you is don't hesitate and don't procrastinate. Go with the spirit now. Matthew, chapter 12, Jesus was talking to a crowd. And his mother and his brothers showed up and I imagine somebody must have interrupted what he was speaking about to tell him that his mother and brothers were here, thinking that, Oh, if your mothers and brothers are here, that takes precedence over what you're doing right now.

And Jesus said, who is my mother and who are my brothers? And he pointed to his disciples and he said, here are my mother and my brothers for whoever does the will of my father in heaven is my brother and my sister and my mother. And so, he's basically asking us to be present in the moment. 

Nothing takes precedence over the moment, what is happening right now, and who he was with in that moment was important. And he was basically proving that point that just because he was related by blood to those people waiting to speak with him does not mean they take precedence over his community, the people that he was with at that moment, the people that he was present with in that moment. That's another, that's another example of detachment. Be detached from your blood ties. There are people out there that don’t really love anyone or have any empathy to anyone except for the people that are in their clan it’s very hard for outsiders to infiltrate their community because they're all about the clan. I always wondered how someone like Hitler could love his mother the way he did. For example, and I believe that Hitler had this mentality of Klan love. I don't know what the proper psychological term of this would be. I don't have that education, but. to me, that's what I've called it, is just this clan love that, people are very attached to their clan, the people that are like minded, and,  they don't have any love or empathy for anyone outside of that. 

And that's why, Ku Klux Klan members can love their families, and that's why people that you know. out there that are narcissists or, bullies can love their families because it is all about the clan for them. That's it. And it, it's, it's very narcissistic love.

It's not true because it only involves certain people. It's not inclusive. So that's, you know, something that Jesus is trying to tell us. 

He included everyone in who he chose to love and be with. It's a good lesson. What he means by all of this leaving our families, leaving the crowd, leaving your clan, scripture is telling us, dare to leave the comfort of the crowd.

Perhaps you are fitting in quite nicely to your spot. Jesus is trying to tell us. To step to the edge of that comfort. Step to the edge and get to know the people who are on the fringes of society. Dare to be the black sheep of your family or of your friend group.

Even doing this, this podcast here, much of my family and even some of my friends had no idea that for the past 10 years or so, I have been intensely studying scripture and that my focus has been a way to incorporate all religions into my life. to realize the one true meaning and purpose of our lives here on earth and how to incorporate all those religions and how to break down the barriers and the boundaries that people have built up because of some of the church's teachings 

The separation of religions that we have going on in the world right now, instead of beautifying diversity, which is what its purpose is. Just like different cultures, different looks, different skin colors, different sexual orientations, even. This is supposed to be the beautifying diversity of the world, just like nature and the trees and the flowers and the animals and the sea creatures and the landforms.

This separation of religions, it has separated us and made us cling ever so much more to the familiar. And we have become afraid of other religions, mostly because for centuries, the church told us to be. In Christianity, we have that other hard teaching of the gospel, the words of Jesus, which say, I am the way and the truth and the life.

No one comes to the father except through me. What he means is when he says, no one comes to the father except through me. That means through love. That means through inclusivity. That means through compassion. 

So Psalm 45 it is the same as Jesus telling us to leave communities that no longer suit or encourage our growing spirits, and to go out and seek a community of people, or elders, your teachers in this field who will encourage, inspire, and affirm your deeds. If you are living, for example, with a family who likes sports, okay, and they talk only about sports, but your spirit is seeking a community or even maybe just one friend. who likes, let's say, music. 

You must seek out someone like-minded who can help you grow in the world of music and lead you to the pathways that were never possible with your former people. We see this in business too, to thrive, a company must find its target market, its community. with which it can multiply and sell its goods and thus sustain the people who are working for the company.

If you are on this path, a spiritual path, a musical path, whatever path you're on, and you're finding yourself at a loss, something is lacking. And you feel lonely, this is a sign that the spirit is telling you to seek community. Those of you on this path know exactly what I'm saying because you've already felt this in your spirit. There's already something that's sort of tapping you on the shoulder that's saying you need a friend. You need communities, some people to talk to about this thing that you're really into.

You need a way to share this with other people so that you can grow. That's one of the reasons I'm doing this podcast. It just got to a point where I had so much inside of me that I had I've been studying all these years and I had notebook upon notebook of all this stuff, all these teachings, and I wanted to share it so badly, but in the writing community, I've submitted my work, I've gotten published here and there. 

But to submit spiritual work is hard to get that published and it's hard to find an outlet for it. And it's hard to find literary agents and literary magazines that will take spiritual work and spiritual writing. And so, one day I just heard this voice that said, it's time for you to do this.

And this is the outlet that. Came to mind was just to start a podcast and put stuff out there.

Because unfortunately, even if I wrote everything in my blog, because I have a website, if you're ever curious, it's just my name www.BrianneTurczynski.com, or you can go to www.lovingtheimperfect.com. Even if I wrote all of that in blog posts, all this stuff, you've already published it. It's already been published.

So, you can't submit it to literary magazines. So at least this way, I’m just saying it and it's a lot different than my writing. It’s a whole new learning curve for me. to have to edit my speaking voice. But it's good to learn. It keeps my brain going, and I'm happy to do it. If you feel lonely it would be good for you to find someone to speak to. And if it is a spiritual path that you're seeking, or maybe you're already on it, but you need more direction, then maybe talking to a priest or a rabbi or even a spiritual director could help you. 

And for those of you who don't know what a spiritual director is, a spiritual director is basically a professionally trained person to journey with you through your spiritual transformation and beyond. So, they are there to affirm your path and encourage and sometimes discourage some decisions that they might deem unwise or hasty. They are not counselors, they are purely there to act as an elder guide, a guru, they can help you find a trustworthy community.

Sometimes your diocese will have a list of spiritual directors that they can recommend to you, or your priest can point you in the right direction. If you feel you're on a mystical path, finding a spiritual director who will speak to that can be difficult. In this case, you can ask potential spiritual directors questions like, who is your favorite spiritual author? Or you could ask them, who is your favorite saint and why? Or who inspires you? These questions will tell you what they like. Some people like social justice and they read a lot of social justice stuff. Some people like church history and they're very traditional and some people like mysticism and they read all of the mystics, and they will lead you on that path too. So, find your community. Find your people who will encourage you to be the best version of yourself. 

It takes courage, but if you can find the right people to journey with you and be in community with you and talk to you then it will make that job of leaving the crowd physically or mentally that much easier. 

Thank you for joining me today on Loving the Imperfect. 

Next week's psalm is 52. It's another psalm of David, but it's not very long. I hope you have a good rest of your week. Have a good day. Bye bye.