Sporting – Psalm 104

A text – Psalm 104:24-34

²⁴ O Lord, how manifold are your works!  In wisdom you have made them all; the earth is full of your creatures.
²⁵ There is the sea, great and wide; creeping things innumerable are there, living things both small and great.
²⁶ There go the ships and Leviathan that you formed to sport in it.

²⁷ These all look to you to give them their food in due season;
²⁸ when you give to them, they gather it up; when you open your hand, they are filled with good things.
²⁹ When you hide your face, they are dismayed; when you take away their breath, they die and return to their dust.
³⁰ When you send forth your spirit, they are created, and you renew the face of the ground.

³¹ May the glory of the Lord endure forever; may the Lord rejoice in his works—
³² who looks on the earth and it trembles, who touches the mountains and they smoke.
³³ I will sing to the Lord as long as I live; I will sing praise to my God while I have being.
³⁴ May my meditation be pleasing to him, for I rejoice in the Lord.

A reflection:

I love thinking about God, Creator, Son, and Spirit, creating the world and its creatures to play in it and live out the joy of the Lord who created them. Can’t you see the leviathan sporting? Read the psalm from verse 1 and you’ll find more joy. If the creatures live to the fullest and they love to sport, I’m pretty sure humans were meant to do the same.

When did you last sport? Dance for joy? Laugh until the tears came? Rejoice and, as far as you could without breaking something, jump for joy? When I sport, I’m pretty subdued. You know. Avoiding breakage. I’ll be 75 in two months. But really, some jumping for joy would be good, I think. And in these fraught news cycle days, if we believe in a loving Creator and an ever-alive Redeemer who broke death and a Holy Spirit who animates every part of creation with breath and life, shouldn’t we be signs that there is something better to pay attention to than madmen and war?

This weekend I will get to spend a little time with a seven-year old. I think we will go to the zoo and talk with all the creatures there. We may laugh until we cry. And I promise I will do a little jumping. I will be singing to the Lord, while I have being, my friends. Peace (and joy) to your house.

A prayer:

Lord God, Thank you for loving us. Thank you for making us and making sure we could play. Help us to remember to sport whenever we can, jumping for joy in the great would your have made, redeemed, and allowed to know you. Amen.