The cry of the poor

 

"I sought the Lord and He answered me and delivered me from all my fears." (Psalm 34: 5)

When I retired a couple of years ago, I began a journey to deepen my interior life, to come closer to the Lord.  To deepen my relationship with Him.  My journey has been one of increased prayers and reflections that I look forward to sharing each day on my blog.  This journey has become one of coming to know the Lord and His love, but also of knowing myself.  And letting the Lord know me.  Not the varnished version I often might present, even to God.  But of the real me He created and knows.  I’ve come to know, or I’ve been shown, my poverty, my need.  

Psalm 34 reminds us that “The Lord hears the cry of the poor” (v 7).  My reaction over the years when I heard the verse about the Lord hearing and answering the cry of “poor” among us was to immediately think of the poor in Africa, Calcutta or even the chronically poor here in the USA. 

I may have always thought of myself as a “good” Catholic, but on my current journey, even at 67 years old, I’ve been led to know myself in a deeper and truer way, seeing my poverty, my need for healing, my need for a Savior.  It’s not the physical poverty I had always thought of when I heard the refrain from the Psalm, but I truly have come to see myself as one of the Lord’s poor.  I believe it’s from that humble place, that we’re better able to be open to live the Lord’s truth and come into the light that we hear about in John’s Gospel, allowing The Lord to heal our poverty and draw us into new life with Him.  

Do we ever think of ourselves as poor?  As being in need?  Or are we ok, just need a little help now and then?  We’ll ask for it if we need it.  A temporary lifeline.  Do we ever consider our own poverty?  Our need for a Savior?  God has seen mankind’s need throughout history, and in John’s Gospel we’re shown His response:  Out of His love, He sent His only Son that we might be saved, that we might have life, eternal life (John 3:16-21).